Autumn in Philadelphia Trilogy

The Return: Shots Fired

"It was not intelligent to damage the ego of a young boy. You can, with some impunity, insult an older man who has already been humiliated by life itself and will not take to heart the small slights of another human being. But a young man thinks these offenses mortal." — Mario Puzo

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6:15 AM on Monday morning came about two hours earlier than it should have by Shawn's estimate. Groggily, he rolled over to turn his alarm off forgetting that his phone was his alarm, it was on the desk, and he was on the top bunk. After preventing an unpleasant fall from his bed, Shawn was fully awake.

Grabbing his clothes, he headed down the hall hoping to beat Julia to the kids' bathroom. He just finished getting dressed when he heard an unhappy knocking on the door.

"Grayson? Jamie? Whoever's in there: GET OUT!"

Shawn jerked the door open and gave her a disapproving look. "It's too early to be so loud."

"Shawn? What are you doing in there?" Julia was clearly not expecting him to be the one hogging the bathroom.

"I just got out of the shower what does it look like?" He pointed to his wet hair.

"Well, get out," she huffed, folding her arms over her waist. "I need to get ready for school."

"I'm not done."

"I don't care."

"If I get out now I'll never get back in before it's time to go." He shut the door in her face.

"Hey! Shawn!"

She pounded on the door until he cracked it open again.

"Are you trying to wake the dead?"

"I need in the bathroom!"

"Look, sis, I realize that you've been holding my place as the oldest for fifteen years now and I appreciate it, I really do. But I'm back and since I am, we can all take our rightful places in the sibling hierarchy and thus balance can be restored to the family. Do your part, huh?" He shooed her back so he could shut the door again.

No amount of banging on the door got him to reopen. It only got her reprimanded by her father when he came upstairs to see what all the noise was about. Julia was still glowering when Shawn finally exited the bathroom. He grinned at her grumpy face and the slam the of the door behind her as he headed down to the kitchen.

"Don't drink the coffee!"

Shawn was reaching for a mug from the cabinet when he heard Jon's warning. He turned and gave him a bewildered look. "Why not?"

"There's dirt in it."

"What?"

Jon nodded. "Jamie's been asking me for the last three days how you get coffee from dirt. I guess I should have been paying more attention to why he was asking. Apparently, he thinks coffee grounds are dirt. Since I wasn't giving him a satisfactory answer he tried to test his theory himself."

Shawn made a face. "Did he drink it?"

"Nah," his father took a box of tea out of the cupboard. "Audrey chased him out of the kitchen last night and cleaned up a trail of dirt he left. He must have gotten as far as putting the dirt in the filter before she caught him."

"How'd you'd find out?"

Jon scowled at him.

"Oh. Gross!"

"Yeah, it was. I'm making Audrey tea for today. We'll swing by Topanga's for coffee after we drop Julia off."

"What are you going to do after you drop me off?" Julia walked into the kitchen with wet hair she was trying to towel dry. She was still annoyed with her brother for cutting into her morning prep time.