Straighter than Parallel Parking

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PSST: I'VE WRITTEN 12.1K WORDS YESTERDAY FOR THIS STORY. SOMEONE GIVE ME A HELL YEAH!

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{ Chapter Two: They Always Get The Metaphor Wrong }

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IF THERE HAPPENS TO BE ONE THING THAT COMES WITH BEING ADOPTED, it's having a mixed reaction from most of your non-biological family.

Janice hasn't ever had the chance to meet her blood family; she was too young to remember the day she was offered to the orphanage and her adoption had been closed and secure, so even if she ever wanted to reach out (which she denies she ever would) to whomever abandoned her, there just wasn't any possible way.

But that didn't really matter to her, if you ever asked how she felt. She once wrote in her journal back in the third grade when her teacher assigned the class to write about what they think of the concept "family", where she wrote: "The people who make you smile, make you feel loved, make you whole. Everything that the Diablo family is to me, because I am the Diablo family."

Even today, she still stands by what she'd grasped at the tender age of nine, because that's all she's ever known about when it comes to whomever she lives with.

But that didn't stop her from being the black sheep in her little home. Sure, her brothers and her dad loved her unconditionally (at least she thinks so, underneath all that teasing, and prodding and annoying and—), where the feeling was mutual. Unfortunately, her relatives outside from that weren't exactly as keen.

And, unfortunately, that would be an understatement.

"Oh, no," mumbles Janice as she finally catches sight of a group of people clambering out of a familiar van, the frown on her face a sharp contrast from the former bubbly grin. "Them."

"What?" Karlo asks, before following her line of vision and blanching significantly. "Oh, them."

Janice sighs, before picking up her (yes, she was the utilities bearer for everything) leather football in one hand, trying to straighten her clothes to no avail. "Well, might as well get it over with."

The teenage boys has already began dispersing, since the game signified the end of the afternoon and the sky began to break apart in a series of colours.

Even when screaming their farewells and exchanging congratulatory pats on the backs, no one noticed the distraught girl in the middle of the field, making her way to the spawns of satan themselves.

Her brothers had already taken a dash, knowing things were going to get ugly. Wimps.

Approaching them, she decided to take the lesser of evils. The family was a little distracted, parents making sure the ignition was off and that everyone was out of the car, so the children were already scattered.

They weren't that bad, she concludes, for toddlers at least they're not chewing the grass.

Crouching to eye-level with the youngest, she tries to smile through her dirt-caked face. "How are you doing, mi primo?"

All she gets is adorable blubbering, but that doesn't block out the abrasive voice cutting in.

"Janice, honey," says the aging woman to the side, her words anything but sweet. "Aren't you going to welcome your Aunt Maria inside?"

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IT WAS DIFFICULT TRYING TO PREDICT WHEN HER EXTENSIVE FAMILY decides to stop by, especially since most of them hardly stay in contact long enough to mark down a date. It's sporadic, here and there, couple times in a year if Janice is lucky. Unluckily, her luck seems to have run out for the time being.