Chapter 2

Later in the evening that day, when the sun had long since submerged behind the horizon, Finian pranced the front porch, rolling the coin between his fingers.

He had discarded his heavy outfit and was in a simple sleeveless jersey and the chinos pants. Even the heavy shoes had been swapped for house flip-flops.

The front door opened and Pippa stepped out, closely followed by Odessa, who smirked on seeing him. Pippa's attention was entirely on the small phone in her clutches, pressing at the backlit buttons rapidly like a typist.

Finish smirked back at his elder sister and rolled his eyes at the younger. He wondered what was with her and the phone anyway. Mother had had to threaten to take it away forever before she stopped going at it at the dining table.

For real and for true, he should have gotten the phone instead of Pippa. All his friends in school used the latest phones. But Finian hadn't wanted a hand-me-down from his parents. Especially since he knew he'd be getting his very own new touchscreen one in secondary school. His parents had made it a sort of tradition to not get their children gadgets till secondary school.

Iden and Odessa had both gotten theirs on entering secondary school. So, the phone had been given to Pippa (the lucky brat) and he was stuck with his old laptop. And even that had been given to him by Iden when he was going to university and had bought a new, better one.

'Get inside, doofus.' Odessa rolled her clear blue eyes at him, crossing her arms.

Finish ignored his sister and continued to prance. He hadn't been doing anything at all, really. Just prancing and getting the feel of his new possession in his hands. But now, he wished there was something to do to escape Odessa. To escape his sisters.

'Mom is calling you,' Pippa chipped in, still concentrated on her button phone. Her long, blonde locks fell in front of her face, hiding it. But Finian knew she was on her phone, anyway.

'Why so?' he wanted to know, pausing from his pacing. He glanced at Odessa for a reply.

Odessa rolled her eyes at him again and went to sink in the old suede sofa by the door, tieing her brown hair out of her face. Ever since the afternoon incidence, she had had on this smug, superior look. And, of course, her menstrual pain had disappeared the minute he had arrived from Big Mac's with the shopping for lunch.

Finian, for the nth time, found himself wishing he weren't stuck with her for a sister. Why did she have to be always so mean to him? And what was wrong with his parents and other siblings for not seeing what she was doing to him? The poor boy had his mind made up his family was a big conspiracy against him.

'I dunno,' Pippa said, going to sit on the arm of Odessa's chair. She finally slipped the phone out of her face to stare at her elder sister. 'Dessa, are you still going to braid my hair? You promised.'

Finian sighed in contempt, pocketed his coin and stomped down the porch steps unto the walk path. He had long realised he was on his own. Ever since his elder brother Iden had left for Oxford University. He sighed once again, in defeat. Those two had been thick as thieves. It had always been them against the girls.

'Finian,' he heard Odessa shout after him. He ignored her and veered off the path to the old triple set swing to the right. At one point in the past few months, one of the swings had broken from rust and it lay in jagged and scattered metal rods on the floor. A side of the poles holding the set together was also tearing off, metal sticking out at dangerous angles.

Their father had ordered them to stay away from the swing till he had time to fix it or get it fixed. But he knew for a fact that stubborn Pippa still sneaked onto it once in a while.

She would have gotten away with it lightly, have she been caught, anyway. That spoilt seven year old brat could easily get away with murder with their parents. So could Odessa, if she played the right calculated cards.

'Finian!' Odessa's annoying high-pitched voice rent the air again. "Mom is gonna kill you."

Finian rolled his eyes and fisted his hands in anger. The boy wished he was an only child. Or that he had been in a family of boys where everyone was as thick as thieves.

He turned away from the broken down swing set and stomped into the house.

At night, when he was tucked in bed and had long forgotten about his afternoon vendetta, he still held the coin in his hands, examining it under the dim lava bed lamps.

He wondered what the coin was made with and if it was possible it was some valuable, lost from a museum. But then he reasoned that it was pretty new.

He turned the coin to the back and frowned when he thought the cursive writing on the back looked different. He didn't know what the writing was, to start with, but he could have sworn it looked shorter than what he remembered seeing earlier.

He reached for the lamp to draw it closer and the coin slipped out of his hand to the floor. The boy sighed and turned the lamp towards the ground. Just as a strong breeze took hold of the set of curtains near his bedside table and lifted them up.

A chill swept in through the open windows, causing him to shiver involuntarily. He almost screamed out when he thought he saw a very dark figure behind the open windows. But he looked again and saw nothing.

He convinced himself it had been a trick of light, but his heart had still yet to stop beating so fast from the surprise. Still a bit spooked, he was quick to retrieve the coin, put it on the table and turn off the lights.