Pentacle

Sharp Jabs and Sharper Tongues

Jace groaned, retrieving a small, rusted pocketknife from his back pocket—a relic he'd found in one of the house's many vacant rooms. He stretched his hand across the marble countertop of the kitchen island, starting to stab the knife down between his splayed fingers. He jabbed the knife as a distraction from the three bothersome girls he was stuck with.

Ever since Aggie banished them to the kitchen, Acacia spent the time whining on her phone to her boyfriend while Harper entertained the tiny, fluttery brat with a 'dolly tea party.' Jace felt winded just from listening to the child's relentless, energetic chatter. It was all he could do to not to barf from all the girliness infecting his brain. At least once the Zinnia left, Harper moved on to cleaning... again. The girl had a serious issue with neatness.

A smirk tugged at Jace's lips as he watched Harper flinch with every thud of the knife against the granite countertop.

From the table, Acacia groaned into her phone, "This place sucks." She glanced at Jace, still stabbing the knife between his fingers, then at Harper, busy sorting the spice cabinet, and sighed. "The other kids here are total wack jobs... I miss you more."

"Wait, so you mean you miss your boo-boo bear?" Jace taunted, satisfaction bubbling up as a scowl darkened Acacia's face and she flipped him off. If he had to listen to her whine about missing her boyfriend one more time, he'd gladly jam the switchblade into his own eardrums for relief.

"Can you please stop that?" Harper asked, her voice strained.

"What?" Jace asked, quickening the pace of the knife's jabs between his fingers once noting Harper's twitching eye and fixed gaze on the blade.

"You could hurt yourself," Harper said, trying to focus on alphabetizing the herbs, though her shoulders tensed with every slam of the knife on the counter.

"Didn't know you cared so much, Little Red," Jace replied, sarcasm soaking his words.

"I don't, but you could cut yourself, and blood is messy," Harper replied, restraining herself from digging her nails into her palms as the stabbing persisted. ""We'd need to use bleach to clean it properly, and even then, bleach is only 99 percent effective at disinfecting, but I guess we could—"

"Shut up!" Jace yelled, lifting his hands in surrender after he slid the knife back into his pocket. He smacked the countertop with his hands as he stood to pull a bottle of orange juice from the fridge. "And here I thought the baby had already left the room."

Jace flicked the cap across the island, deliberately placing it within Harper's line of sight. He strolled over to the table and plopped down beside Acacia, snickering as Harper scurried to retrieve the cap. He then turned his attention to Acacia, who promptly pivoted her body away from him.

"Oh, Edward, I simply can't bear spending another moment apart from your eternal presence," Jace whined, mimicking a high-pitched girl's voice. "Everything means nothing without you."

"Hey, Pigpen, I get you're new to having..." Acacia scanned him from head to toe. "Anything. But those of us from actual homes understand this concept called personal space. Might wanna give it a try."

Jace scratched his head, took a long swig of orange juice, then leaned in closer to Acacia and let out a loud belch. "Personal space? What bees that, Ms. Cacia?"

"Mickey, I'll call you back," Acacia gagged, shoving Jace so hard he nearly fell to the floor. "Are you completely deranged or just mentally damaged or something?"

"He's insufferable!" Harper exclaimed, quickly covering her mouth and tracing a cross over herself.

"Church mouse's right, but I'd raise her a fucking psychotic," Acacia hissed while Jace cackled in amusement.