Thirteen Summers

three

J O S I E

"How is that even possible?" I muttered, once the shock had worn off. "Mom never said.."

Caleb scoffed, "Well, your mom never said much about any of us, did she?"

"Caleb!" Madison shouted in a whisper to him.

"That's enough." Cameron's stern voice silenced him.

I bit my lip to keep it from wobbling and looked back down at my plate.

"Sorry..." Caleb apologised quietly, playing with his food.

I shrugged in response, acting like I wasn't affected by it and stuffed more pasta in my month, although the thought of my mom only made it taste like mush.

It was quiet for a few moments before Nicholas broke the silence, "This food is really good."

A few hours later, I was in my room. I tried to occupy myself by reading or watching TV because now I had one. Mom would've never let me have a TV in my room, I was usually restricted to watching something for a few hours every weekend.

Television makes people lazy, do something worthwhile.

Read a book or go on a run, she'd tell me so that was what I'd do but mom wasn't here and I could watch all the TV I'd like, it didn't feel as good as I thought it'd feel though.

Eventually, I drifted off to sleep and that's what I usually spent my days doing. Going down for lunch or dinner, never both and never breakfast and then going back to my bed, before I knew it two weeks had gone by.

No one usually bothered me, half of my siblings were usually at school and the other half were probably at work except Roman, he was always home for some reason, confined in his home office, he'd nod to acknowledge me sometimes if we happened to bump into each other when I was down for lunch during the day and then retreat back to his office.

It didn't bother me that they barely interacted with me because I loved being alone in my room, I loved my bed and I loved being asleep. My dreamworld was my sanctuary, there were no worries there, no pain and I'd do my best to take advantage of that or so I thought.

This was before Cameron had asked to speak to me one night after dinner and he sprung the most random idea on me out of nowhere.

"Summer school?" I mumbled, raising my brows at him. "I don't want to go.."

"I know but you don't have much of a choice, sadly." Cameron spoke, a small frown on his face. "You've missed a lot of school and the semester's nearly over, if you want to go to highschool then this is your only option."

I frowned deeper, realising he was right. School was out of my mind actually, of course I didn't think this freedom would last forever but I hoped it would last a little longer. The more I pondered on it, I mentally cursed myself for slacking off at home. I struggled at school sometimes so I always worked hard at home to bring my grades up except this time, I hadn't even done that.

"Fine, I'll go." I agreed, although I really had no say on the matter at all, Cameron had long decided for me. "Can I go back to my room now?"

He nodded at me and started shuffling some papers on his desk, only speaking once I'd opened the door to leave.

"You know, I planned to get you a private tutor so you'd be able to do the work at home but I think it'd be good for you to get out of the house once in a while. Being cooped up in your room all day, that's not healthy."

My cheeks burned in embarrassment, I didn't think he knew that, he was rarely home. I left the room and closed the door behind, all without looking back at him and sped walked back to my room, I clearly wasn't watching where I was going as I bumped into another body.