My Salvation- raia

C5- A Whole Lot Harder

~Kat~
"You are so dead." I whisper harshly at my twin brother as he walks through the front door.
"Did you cover for me?" Ross asks, kicking off his shoes and giving me a stern look.
"Yes, I stuck to our story! You owe me big time." Snapping at him whilst I fold my arms, he puts his hands up on defence.
"Jeez, lil sis..." He mutters to himself, looking over to the kitchen door as he hears Harvey and our father behind it.
"Where were you?"
"That wasn't apart of the deal." Raising his eyebrows, he looks down at me whilst rolling his eyes. Even though he was my twin, he's still taller than me. Making his teasing even worse.
"Fine." I sigh and open my mouth to yell for Dad but he is quick to put a hand over my mouth.
"I went to a cafe out of town that's all. Did you know Maia already has a job?" Raising my eyebrows at him, I look down at his hand which he removes so I can speak.
"Yeah, she told me that's why she left so early." Shrugging my shoulders, I give him a questioning look.
"How come she has a job already?" Punching his arm, I tell him it's none of his business. "That didn't hurt." Smirking at me, I punch him again.
"Have fun with Harvey." Pushing him towards the kitchen, he huffs and opens the door.
"WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN?!?!" Dad bellows the minute the door is opened.
"Just doing homework, isn't that what you wanted me to do?" Ross replies. How come he was the one who gets to chill out?!?! I'm the stressy one.
"What's happening?" Lucas asks, as he walks down the stairs.
"You've seriously gotten him into shit." Folding my arms, I glare at him as he walks closer to me.
"I know, I'm sorry." He scratches the back of his blonde mop.
"Don't tell me... Why did you rat him out?" Hitting his arm slightly. Even though we fight a lot, me and my siblings (except Harvey) did our best to keep the others out of trouble: especially Ross. He was always on the edge of being sent to Military School, because he just has to get himself in trouble. His life motto was 'if I don't get caught, I might as well do it.'
"You can't say that your not worried about him too..." Folding his arms, Lucas' eyes widen.
"Of course I am, but this won't help. I get why you did it, okay? But Ross is too far into this to give it up. We can't blame him, it's only partially his fault."
"I know... We can't just watch him like this." Sighing slightly, I can't say that I don't agree with him. Everything is really going downhill for Ross. The drinking, tattoos, smoking and being the towns 'bad boy' wasn't what he used to be like. Once upon a time, he had straight A's, played the piano non stop: now he's lucky to get a C, gave up everything he loved. If people would just listen to him or pay attention... Maybe he wouldn't be like this.
"I'm not like you! Don't you get that not everybody wants to be a lawyer! And why do you only bug me about it!" We hear Ross agitated voice.
"Should we go in?" Lucas whispers to me, as we both look at each other when our Dad yells something back. Creeping to the open kitchen door, our two little sisters, Ivory and Jade run up to us. They were only five and I'm guessing the shouting is scaring them. Ivory jumps up to me and I pick her up, assuring her everything was okay. Ross was facing us whilst Harvey and Dad had their backs to us whilst they yelled at my brother. His face falls when he sees us all there and the frightened expressions on the twins faces. In times like this, our sister, Olivia, would usually be the one to stop everything but she's on a business trip in New York. Our Dad's hand raises to hit Ross, making us all gasp.
"Dad! No!" I yell, putting Ivory down as Lucas runs forward and grabs his hand. Ross' face doesn't even flicker as glares at our father, his eyes burning right through him.
"Rossy?" Jade asks quietly. Her small voice makes Dad and Harvey turn around.
"Everybody go to bed." Dad snaps, failing to contain his anger. Kneeling down as she runs towards him, Ross picks up Jade and walks around him, avoiding all of our stares.
"Son..." Our father starts, but Ross turns around quickly and cuts him off.
"Don't talk to me and don't touch any of us." Ross warns walking out the room with us all following. Dad reaches out to touch Ivory, but she flinches away, moving towards me as I place a hand on her back.
"Don't touch any of them." Growling this time, Ross leads us all away from him and up the stairs. We all enter his bedroom and he sits down on the bed, Jade in his lap. We all end up lying in various positions on his bed, silence taking over us all. Soon the sounds of Jade's whimpers fill the room. Sighing, Ross wraps his arms around her and brings her to his chest.
"It's okay, nothing happened." He mumbles to her, but his gaze doesn't move from the white ceiling above us all.
"Was he going to hurt you?" She sniffles, wiping her nose with her sleeve.
"I don't know." He replies honestly, shaking his head. "Just stay away from him until I figure this out, okay?"
"There's nothing to figure out, Ross." I tell him, sitting up. The look he gives me shows that he's just as sure as I am. We couldn't tell anybody about this. We'll all be split up and we can't let that happen. Who knows where we might all end up?
"None of you can say anything about this to anybody." He states sternly, still looking at me as I nod slightly.
"What? Ross, he-" Luke starts.
"It doesn't matter, you cannot tell anybody. We need to stick together and your all going to have to trust me on this." Ross cuts in quickly, his gaze falling on each and every one of us. My little brother looks desperately at me for help.
"He's right. As far as anybody knows this never happened." Adding on to what Ross is saying, they all mutter in agreement. "Bed time, it's 1 am and we have school tomorrow." Soon enough every body was is bed. Me and Ross still needed to talk though.
When I walk into his room, he was leaning against the headboard, expressionless.
"You alright?" Sitting on the foot of his bed cross legged so I was facing him.
"Don't worry about me, I'll be fine. But if that had been Lucas or Ivory..." He shakes his head, sighing loudly. "If somebody finds out about this, you knew we won't all end up together."
"I know and I don't think Foster Care is the best thing for them after Mom." We never talked about her after she died. The way it happened made it all the worse and Ross completely ignored the topic of her. It was always obvious her and Ross were the closet out of all of us. Obviously he didn't take to losing her very well.
"I hate life." He grumbles, hitting his head back against the wall. "How are we supposed to let him near them?"
"We don't, just do whatever we can to keep them out of his way." Pulling my hair out of its high pony tail, I tell him.
"How-" The clicking of the door opening makes both of our heads shoot to the side.
"Leave." Immediately, Ross is on his feet and closing to door in our brothers face. Harvey puts his foot in the way of the door. "What do you want from me?"
"You can't stop Dad from seeing them." He snaps at Ross as I walk next to him.
"I have every reason to. Funny you didn't try to stop him..." If looks could kill, Harvey would be on the floor right now. Jesus Christ, Ross had a good death stare.
"You deserved it, you can't keep him from seeing his children." This time I cut in, my anger taking over me.
"What happened to protecting the innocent and all that shit?!?! How on earth did you graduate Harvard when you won't even see how wrong this is!" Ross mumbles my name under his breath after my loud outburst. Fuck, I hope I didn't wake up everyone.
"If it's so wrong, tell the police." The smirk on his face is pure evil. Both of us tense up at his words, making victory flash in Harvey's eyes. "Ah, but how soft you are becoming, Ross? You just want to keep everything happy, don't you?"
"We're not happy. None of us are right now." Ross growls, clenching his fists until his knuckles turn white.
"So you won't mind if I pay a visit to our little sisters? I'm sure their missing me?" His words make Ross move forward but I put a hand on his shoulder and pull him forcefully back.
"Not worth it." I mutter to him since he was in enough trouble already.
"If you go near any of us, you won't see the light of day again." Hisses escape Ross' lips as he speaks sincerely, even scaring me slightly.
"Your not that tough." Harvey says uneasily, as a expression of fear flickers on his confident expression.
"Try me." Our brothers jaw clenches before he storms away, slamming the door of the guest bedroom.
"You better go to sleep too..." Ross mumbles. I walk out of his room and he shuts the door lightly. Sighing I make my way to my own room, raking a hand through my hair. Things just got a whole lot harder.