Love and dances - Joel Dawson

Commissioned

Dear Joel,

This is Clyde. And me, personally, I think you might be making a huge mistake. But I think I'll let you figure it out on your own.

In the end, they did end up having nuggets for dinner. Since Minnow had convinced Joel to side with her, using her infamous puppy eyes and pouty lips, Joel had decided to ask Maple if they could have chicken nuggets for dinner as well, and, considering she now had her little sister and the boy she had been crushing on for a while now practically begging her for the damn chicken nuggets, it wasn't as if she really had an option now, was it? Even Boy seemed eager to have the nuggets, even if Maple was sure no one would be giving him anything.

So, really, how could she ever tell everyone no?

She couldn't. And, therefore, there they were, the three of them sitting at the kitchen table sharing a meal that consisted basically of rice, chicken nuggets and a salad that Maple made sure Minnow ate even a little of. In the end, Minnow and Joel ended up slipping Boy a few pieces of nuggets and when the dog came over to her side of the table and sat down beside her chair, placing one of little paws over her thigh, Maple found herself caving in.

"You all are gonna be the death of me..." She mumbled, pretending to be annoyed as she pulled out a piece of her chicken nuggets and gave it to Boy.

From his seat across from her, Joel watched the girl with a smile, chuckling at the way Boy waggled his tail as soon as she gave him a little treat and whined when he was done, basically swallowing the piece of food whole. Joel felt his heart skipping a beat for a second when Maple laughed, playfully chastising the dog and saying human food wasn't meant to be eaten by dogs. Boy barked at her, almost as if to protest and Maple rolled her eyes, turning back around in her seat as her eyes fell on Joel next, a glimmer of what Joel could only really describe as happiness in her eyes as she smiled gently at him.

Joel suddenly worried he had made the whole thing awkward when Maple coughed gently and looked down at her plate again and he was desperately trying to come up with something to say to try and avoid ruining that dinner, but, thankfully, before Joel could even start messing things up even more, Minnow started to talk.

"Oh, I forgot to say something!" She said, causing the two older kids to basically let out heavy breaths of relief as they snapped their heads in the little girl's direction.

"Don't talk with your mouth full!" Maple warned, her words stern, but her smile soft as she threw a piece of napkin across the table at her sister.

"Sorry..." Minnow mumbled, swallowing a good piece of chicken before taking a gulp of her orange juice and completely ignoring the napkin that had accidentally ended up stuck in her hair, thanks to Maple. "I have an art assignment for next month. It's supposed to be like a landscape or something... My teacher said it's meant to help us understand shadow and perspective."

"Yeah, landscapes can help a lot with that." Joel nodded, his hand coming up to pull the piece of napkin from Minnow's hair, considering she had been sitting beside him at the table. "Do you have anything in mind?"

"The teacher said we should try drawing whatever we could see from our window, but, from my window all I can see is a wall of bricks." Minnow said, as Maple let out a chuckle.

"Yeah, somehow I don't think that's gonna work too well." She said.

"That's what I said!" Minnow said, throwing her hands up in the air, sounding almost exasperated as Maple rolled her eyes fondly at her sister's dramatics. "She said I should look for something else to draw then, but I don't want to. I don't even want to draw!"

"You don't?" Joel asked, turning to look at Minnow and laughing when she shook her head at him with a pout on her lips. "Why not?"

"I don't like to draw! I can't draw!" She protested. "Nothing I make looks good."