Lost

Chapter 13 - Crazed

"I'm hungry!" The little curly-haired girl complained, slouching in her seat and looking expectantly at her big brother.

Ace raised his hands as if to say, not my fault, his eyes directed at his friend who was behind the counter. "I dunno, Joes. You gotta ask Caleb when his famous dinner will be ready.

Jodee took that as a demand from her brother, and turned to the blonde haired boy who was currently slaving away in the kitchen. "Caleb, when's dinner going to be ready?" She asked politely.

"Thanks a fucking lot, A." Caleb whispered harshly to his friend.

"Hey! That's a bad word. You said a bad—" Jodee broke in.

"No I didn't." Cal was quick to cut her off with a little charming smile of his own reaching across the table to ruffle her hair a little bit. "Just a few minutes, babe." He winked.

Ace's upper lip curled at the nickname. Ever since Jodee and Caleb had been getting to know each other a little bit, Caleb has been calling her some cute nicknames as he sees Ace do it and Jodee loves them. Babe has been one of his more recent ones and one of Ace's least favorite ones. Jodee loves it because it sounds like her brother calling her, baby, which is the reason Cal does it. Ace doesn't mind it so much as long as he stays away from his special nicknames for the baby sister.

Cal also came up with a name-oriented nickname of, JD for Jodee. Jodee doesn't like that one so much, but Cal thought he was really smart for coming up with it so he's still using it. But that one is more of a constant, compared to the various pet names he's been trailing out.

"Kay." Jodee responded, curling a curl around her finger.

"Oh no." Ace muttered, gently taking her hand loose from the curls. Whenever she does that it just turns into a knotty mess and he has no interest in detangling that mess. Sometimes she even gets her finger stuck which is also painful for her. He was just done fighting the after at this point and stopped it before it even began.

"Almost done!" Caleb assured, taking the smoking lasagna out of the oven.

Although getting started was the hardest point and lasagna was more of an art than he anticipated — he did think the end result looked pretty darn good! Caleb took out a bunch of cutlery and set the table for the three of them before coming around and joining the Chambers siblings, with a butchered, 'Bon Appétit!'

"Why is it black at the back?" Was the first unfiltered response to come out of Jodee's mouth, pointing with her fork and a scrunched facial expression at the back half of the dish.

Caleb chuckled forcefully, using his hand to put the little girls fork back in her lap and draw the attention away from that part of his dish.

"That was just at the back of the oven. It's the oven, not me." He told her.

"Oh!" Jodee made a big 'O' motion with her mouth, nodding her head as she accepted his answer.

"Sure, Cal." Ace muttered under his breath, every time Ace cooked in the oven there was never that problem. "Here, Jo." He cut her a piece from the front and placed it on her plate.

"Fffanks!" Jodee exclaimed.

Both of the boys then put portions on their plates. When Ace announced they could finally start eating, however, there arose another problem.

"Ace! How many fucking times do I have to tell that fucking dim-witted brain of yours to stop locking the fucking front door! You little bitch." A loud and scary voice interrupted the nice conversation.