A D Tier's Breaking Point

Chapter 17

Soon enough everyone was sitting at the large kitchen table, with Alex opening a bottle of wine and Morgan refilling everyone's lemonade. Katie was rather bemused by the scene, which only turned into a full laugh when Alex tried to get the first serving of casserole only to be rapped on the knuckles by Bernard with the serving spoon ('Guests first Alex!'). When she tried the first bite however, she suddenly understood Alex's impatience.

'This is delicious!' she exclaimed, eyes wide at Bernard.

'Thank you dear,' he smiled. 'It's my own recipe. The secret is...'

'Hey no fair!' Morgan said, 'You don't give me your recipes!'

Katie tried hard not to spit out a mouthful of food with laughter, which she only just managed as Janice said, 'Ah, they're right Bernard. Fair's fair and all that.'

Bernard raised an eyebrow at Janice, before spotting a recognisable villainous sparkle in her eye that left him rolling his eyes fondly, 'Of course dear.'

She smiled, before turning back to Katie, 'Now trading for the recipes on the other hand, is absolutely allowed.'

Morgan spluttered in horror as Katie turned between the two, before growing a devilish grin of her own, 'Of course. What would you like to trade?'

Alex's hand on Morgan's arm was the only thing stopping them from plugging Katie's mouth up with the bread rolls on the table, leaving them helpless as Katie happily agreed to regale the table with various stories of her and Morgan's childhood.

'Traitor,' they whispered at Alex.

Alex simply smirked, 'Hey, Dad told you about Gibbles. How else will I get embarrassing stories about baby Morgan?'

Morgan could only cringe at that, silently begging that Katie would be merciful with the stories she chose. 'Well, there was this one dance recital-'

Katie was not going to be merciful.

'Dance recital?' Janice asked, face lit up in excitement.

Katie nodded with a grin, 'Yep. Morgan and I both did dance classes. Ballet, tap, ballroom, the usual suspects.'

Janice's eyes were saucers as she looked between the two siblings, 'Wait wait, I need to know. For the ballet, what was Morgan's costume?'

Morgan groaned, which only spurned Katie on, 'Well, the dance teacher wanted Morgan to default to the boys uniform, but they insisted on wearing a tutu.'

'I was four!'

'And you wanted to be, and I quote, "the prettiest ballerina on the stage".' Katie said with a smug smile, and Morgan refused to meet Janice in the eyes. They did not need to see the heart eyes Janice was bound to be projecting at them. 'But this recital was for a tap show.'

'Hey that wasn't my fault,' Morgan looked up, pointing at Katie with their fork. 'I know what you're going to say, but I didn't slip. Abigail pushed me.'

Janice gasped in shock, but Katie only snorted, 'Oh I am aware. That was why you ripped her shirt sleeve off after you went down and your foot went, toe cap first, into Jason's delicates, right?' Morgan's defiance quickly turned into mortification, much to Katie's amusement.

'Who's Jason?' Alex asked.

'Morgan's first crush.'

That answer finally earned a bread roll being thrown at Katie's head, sending her cackling as Bernard yelled about no food being thrown at the table. When Morgan tried to argue, Bernard threatened the "no dessert" card, and Morgan snapped their mouth shut and resigned themselves to stuffing their mouth with casserole as Katie continued.

'Jason was thankfully okay. He had to go to hospital during the recital. Abigail's mum tried to get our mum to pay for the damaged costume, which mum refused to do. Turned into quite a fun fight to watch actually. Then Abigail and her mum tried to get Morgan kicked out of the class, and the teacher literally laughed in their faces.'

'Really?' Janice looked at Morgan with nothing but excitement at the story, 'Why?'

'Well Abigail was angry that Jason wanted to practice more with Morgan than her,' Katie said with a knowing smirk. 'So she tried to bully Morgan out of class.'

'Good luck with that,' Bernard chuckled. 'But why did the mum join in on that?'

'Morgan was the teacher's pet.'

'No I wasn't! I was just really good at it!' Morgan said, before freezing in horror as they realised what they just said.

Alex leaned forward, curious, 'How good?'

'Top of the class,' Katie said with a smile. 'They actually got moved up the next age bracket and hit the top of that class too.' Morgan refused to look at the ridiculous amount of adoration from Janice, or the amusement from Alex. They glanced up at Bernard, begging for an ally against Katie, but found a soft look of pride in fatherly eyes. Traitor .

'Was it just tap that Morgan was good at or...' Janice asked.

Katie shook her head, 'Pretty much anything with choreography and a rhythm.'

Alex blinked, a lightbulb going off in his head, 'Is this why you have heist soundtracks?'

'Alex!' Morgan cried out, but the damage was done.

Katie gasped, eyes shining with the potential of further sibling teasing, 'Heist soundtracks? You...oh Morgan! What songs, what songs?'

'I will never tell,' they said.

Katie pouted and turned to Alex, but he shook his head and shrugged, 'Sorry. They would always wear headphones and I wasn't allowed onto their Topsify account.'

'Boring,' Katie said. 'I guess I'll have to try and find pictures of the page boy outfit from Uncle Steve's wedding to show everyone.'

'Don't you dare,' Morgan glared.

Bernard finally piped in, 'We have a rule about phones at the dinner table.'

Morgan sighed in relief, and Janice glared at Bernard, 'Why would you betray me like this?'

'If you break the rule then we'll never get Alex off Twitter.'

Katie smiled, 'I can always show you later. Unless Morgan changes their mind?'

Morgan looked between Katie and Janice, before turning back to their dinner, 'You'll never get to my Topsify account.'

'Well in that case,' Janice leaned forward, hungry for more adorable Morgan anecdotes, 'When you say page boy, how old are we talking?'

'Six I think,' Katie said. 'They wanted to be a flower girl because the girls got flower wands,' Morgan interrupted only to groan, 'but Aunt Evelyn insisted on an even number of page boys and flower girls.'

Janice looked shocked, 'Morgan wasn't allowed to be a flower girl? That's ridiculous, how rude!'

'You're just saying that because you want to see small Morgan in one of those poofy dresses,' Alex grinned.

Janice hushed him, but Katie smiled, 'They would have been cute, but I think they were absolutely adorable in their little waistcoat and bowtie.'

'Bowtie?'