violet | tbn modern au

02 // Respected And Feared

"I can't help seeing that you are very lonely, and sometimes there is a hungry look in your eyes that goes to my heart."

Book: Little Women, Louisa May.

Jack walked into the kitchen on a Tuesday morning, rubbing the sleep from his eyes, stopping dead in his tracks when he noticed the scene before him.

Elmer was frantically waving a dish towel, Buttons was opening windows, Jojo was screaming, and Race and Romeo...

"You started it!"

"You're the one who looked away from the stove!"

"Oh, I looked away from the stove? May I remind you that you threw a basketball at my head, causing me to look away from the stove?"

Jack dragged a hand down his face. "Why is no one putting out the fire?"

As if on cue, everyone turned to look at the flames that licked up towards the ceiling, slowly but surely getting larger.

"Specs, get me a bucket," Jack ordered. When the boy left to do so, he pointed towards Romeo. "Turn on the tap and start spraying." Specs soon came back with the bucket. While the rest of the boys were focused on this, Jack grabbed the bucket and went to the washroom, filling it to the brim with water. He passed Kloppman on the way out, saying simply: "You might want to avoid the kitchen."

Leaving Kloppman confused in the hall, Jack rushed to get to the fire and hurled the water into the flames. The fire hissed, as though angry at his attempt to cease its destruction, before becoming larger.

Jack scratched his head. "Thought that'd work."

Tommy Boy was now crying in the corner, his phone in his hand, a distressed look on his face. "I can't remember the number for 911!"

Finch whirled towards him. "Did you try looking in the phone book?"

"We have a phone book?"

"You idiots, 911 is 911!" yelled Blink.

However, before 911 could be dialed, a sudden spraying sound caught their attention, and they all turned towards Kloppman as he aimed a fire extinguisher at the flames, stifling them until they died down. After he'd finished, all the boys gazed at the destroyed space in silence.

"Well," said Mush, "that could've gone much worse."

Kloppman cracked a smile. "You boys keep getting ready. I'll focus on fixing... this."

Which would be no minor feat, indeed. The walls and counters were scorched, the floor slippery with water, and Jack didn't even want to begin thinking about what had been lost and what could be salvaged.

"Wasn't my fault," Race commented, lifting his hands in the air.

Romeo fumed. "You looked away from the stove!"

"Well you threw a basketball at my head—"

"Oh yeah? Well you—"

The only sound in Lane's kitchen that morning was the gentle clicks of her spoon against her cereal bowl.

She couldn't pinpoint the reason, but the silence in her house seemed intensified compared to yesterday, or the day before, or the day before...

She sighed, pushing her cereal around. She had been eating the same brand for days. Months, even. It was cheap and affordable, but quite bland. She found her appetite was quelled just by looking at the mush left in her bowl.

Pursing her lips together, she ate, not wanting to waste what she did have. She couldn't afford to waste food, no matter how disappetizing.

She couldn't help but notice that her brothers hadn't bothered to make an appearance that morning. Or the night before... Not that she was complaining. The two boys were always a pain to deal with, and she seriously couldn't be bothered. The last time they'd stopped over, they'd brought friends... friends that assumed Lane was Oscar and Morris' bed partner, and not their sister. You would think that, even so, anyone would be warned to stray away from making crude jokes about someone else's girl, but alas. They'd all been beyond wasted, which she figured didn't help at all with the confusion of thinking she wasn't related to the brothers.