6 Brothers and Me

Chapter 4

The night flew past like a whirlwind:the risotto, that I made, was delicious; mum was home for an hour before I had gone to bed; my brothers were noisy, as usual; my mind was restless and full to the brim with stories and scenario of love, death and anger and my dreams were a calm sea of old memories.
"Ivy." Marty tapped at my shoulder whispering, "Wake up."
"Marty, what's the time?" I say sitting up rubbing her eyes.
"You have half an hour." Marty turns on the light and smiles already in his uniform.
"Where's mum?" I ask slowly climbing out of bed, eyes squinted.
"She just left." Marty says, pushing his long dark hair back, before leaving.
What, was I late? Would I be stuck alone on the walk to school? No, calm down, it'll be fine, just get out of bed and get ready- which is what I did.
I rushed down stairs and pulled a wide-tooth comb through my bedraggled hair and twisted it back so it was half up half down. I walked into the kitchen and grabbed a banana.
"She's alive." Louis jokes coming up behind me and placing his head on my shoulder.
"Mum tried to wake you, sleeping beauty." Alex says spinning around me eating his toast and brushing back his blondish hair.
"I was dreaming." I say jokingly.
"Well get a move on." Chandler says spelling his egg before he ate it with some toast.
"Oh, can you take me to ballet tonight, they moved the place?" I ask Chandler knowing he was taking Louis and Jacob boxing and that was near the hall.
"I'm not a taxi driver, and I won't be doing this again." He looks over to me with those warm but icy blue eyes.
"I know, it's just this week." I pull down a straggling, coiled strand of hair.
"Ok." he agrees and I go up to brush my teef and retrieve my bag from beside my bed.
"Jacob, hurry up, we're leaving soon." Marty calls up the stairs as I slip on my worn shoes.
"Im coming, give me a second." Jacob calls down slowly coming down the stairs.
"Let's go." Louis says sticking his head in the door with a wonderful smile on his face.
I'm waiting outside with Louis, who is texting his best friend Ed (Edward), whose house he was going round tonight, to discuss what they were doing. I think they were going to do a new lego set he had got for his birthday together while watching a film.
We began walking, I was with Marty , which was nice, as we talked about school and game night on Friday.
"So, it's Alex's turn this week to do ten questions." I say to Marty as we turn up the smallish hill.
"Yeah I think, when your all out, I'm having a friend round- his name is Sam." Marty says slightly awkwardly.
"Ok, that sounds great." I smile and reach for my phone feeling a buzz.
We arrived at school around half an hour later and I went up to my friends leaving Marty to go over to his group.
"Hello, Ivy." Gracie says pulling her fine, blonde hair back into a low ponytail.
"Hello Gracie." I say my voice slightly cartoonish.
"So Gracie you were going to show us Fred and George." Millie says talking about her new cats.
"Oh, yes, they were so cute and ginger so the name was obvious." She digs her phone out of her bag checking for teachers around before showing us. It was a video of the two ginger cats running up her sofa the sound of ripping claws cutely and the other cat forward rolls coming out of a cardboard box.
"They are so cute." Rosie exclaims, adjusting her glasses as she replays it.
"Perfect names." Charlotte giggles.
"Definitely." I smile looking at the cute kittens.
"How do your parents allow so many pets?" Lilian laughs.
"Yeah, we've never had a pet." I say laughing.
"You have six brothers that's enough." Charlotte says laughing.
"We need to get to class." Lila says looking at her watch as she comes over.
*
School flies past with nothing happening out of the ordinary. After, we make our way home and I begin to get ready for ballet. My leotard was black with crossed straps giving it some daughter of style, I pulled it over the convertible tights then sorted out the straps using my phone as mirror. A pair of ripped boyfriend jeans from the bottom draw of my wardrobe go over my tights for when I go to class and I pull the chest piece up, grabbing my small bag.
The stairs are warm and carpeted as I run down to look at a mirror to place my hair into a bun. It takes around a minute for me to pull my straggling hair into a tight ponytail and then wrap round into a flat, well flat as possible, bun using the pins.
"Let's go." Jacob says with his boxing bag over his shoulder, followed by Louis.
"Hurry up Ivy." Chandler says as I pull on my school shoes and grab my bag.
"I'm coming." I run out the door closing it behind my.
"Hang on could you get my phone, I left it on the shelf in my room." Jacob says as I open the door.
"Seriously, you know, fine." I close the door and run in knowing only Marty and his friend would be home as everyone else is out. I drop my bag and quietly run up the stairs pushing the door of Jacob and Marty's room open.
"Ivy!" Marty says sitting up from kissing Sam.
"Umm..." I grab Jacobs phone from the side.
"Ivy." He looks up to me worried but then an idea comes to him, "Curiosity won't kill the cat."
No, no, no this is not happening, "Marty." I say referring to the fact that he just asked me to keep his secret.
When we were younger my father (Ant Stark), used to say that all the time so once he died me and Marty decided that if either of us said that it meant that we would ever say about it to anyone.
"Ivy please." He looks so strangely serious as the other blonde boy stands up awkwardly in the corner.
"Ok." I say walking out of the room and down to ballet.
                                                                                                            *
Two hours later after a great ballet class with a mildly painful pointe class, Chandler picks me up and takes me home again. Mum had just got home from work and we are about to have dinner, when we walked through the door.
"Ivy." My mum comes and hugs my, "How was ballet?"
"Great mum." I say and slip of my shoes.
My mum is smaller than me, around 5'5 and a half, and has been for about a year. She has curly light brown hair, blue tiered blue eyes but still as beautiful as ever. I go up stairs and slip out of my ballet stuff not being able to take my mind of the secret I was now trusted with keeping, Sam had gone home and Marty must have been downstairs with everyone. I completely supported him no matter what but I also think that everyone else would, well, possibly except Chandler with his very conservative closed mind set, but who cares about him.
Changed into a big, white oversized t-shirt with a chuncky belt wrapped tightly around my center, I made my way down stairs -where everyone was just sitting down for dinner. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see Marty looking at me nervously just in case I had told someone, which I hadn't. I might not think it is the best idea to stay in the closet but I wouldn't out him if he didn't want to. I look over at him and smile trying to tell him I didn't tell anyone and he looks relieved and smile back.
"I don't know what is going with you two and your weird eyes." Alex says switching his blue eyes between me and Marty, "But, I would like to say I have finished my ten questions for Friday's quiz."
"Well done." Jacob says mockingly implying that he forgot last time.
"Boys, well on Friday their will be a guest and his son's." she says smiling and eating her pasta.
The whole room falls silent to this, a guest and 'his' son's, does that mean boyfriend or just a friend, I don't know but the silence was very weird.
"That...sounds, great." Marty says breaking the weird silence with an even weirder comment.
"Yeah." Louis says supportively.
"Uh-huh." I try and say more but I'm to shocked.
The rest of the dinner is strange to say the least but I keep myself occupied being last to finish.