Rose and Her Thornes

Chapter Five

    Daniel Thorne sat on the piano bench, his fingers ghosting over the keys of an old piano. His calloused fingers brushed across the black and white mountains and valleys, but they never pressed down enough to make a sound. He stopped playing the piano six years ago, and although he has made and broken countless promises, he'd go sixty more years fulfilling the promise he made to himself when his father died--protect his mother and siblings and never play the piano again for as long as he lived. 

   "That's a nice tune."

   His mother's soft voice brought him back to his senses before he quickly took his hands away from the piano as if it burned him. Realizing what she had just said, he must have been humming what that Fowler girl was singing that morning. With a small cough, he placed the white sheet over the piano and stood up to face his mother at the door. "I don't know what it is, but I heard it on the way to school. I found it irritating so I guess that's why it's stuck in my head."

Ruth leaned against the door frame with her arms crossed as she glanced between her son and her late husband's old piano. With a small, fond smile she smoothed over Daniel's unkempt hair and nodded in understanding, too tired from work to tease him about his defensive opinion over the simple melody he had hummed. Her hand fell to her side as she said," Dinner is ready. Go set the table while I bring the girls down," and left him alone in the storage room. His mother didn't even give him enough time to protest that he could get the triplets and that she should just sit down at the table. 

Daniel cast one last glance at his dad's baby grand and went to set the table as he was told. The Thorne home was by no means luxurious, but it was warm and full of life. The family of five lived in an average sized 3 bedroom apartment above the cafe his mother worked at near the center of town. As he was setting the table and getting dinner out of the oven, Daniel's eyes swept across his current home and solemnly remembered their old one. Six years ago the six Thornes lived in a beautiful house in the quiet suburbs of the city; the dirty peeling white walls of their apartment used to be the pristine white walls which would always be painted by their housekeeper to keep them bright, their cramped one floor apartment was once a beautiful and spacious  three  story house surrounded by the green that Daniel never tired of running around, the two rooms being inhabited while their mother slept on the couch used to be five bedrooms, more than enough for the large family to be comfortable, and instead of setting the table, Daniel remembered having many house maids who did all the work for them, although his parents would often do it themselves and enjoyed giving their help the time to rest because they were practically family. But that was six years ago, and the Thornes were no longer the same family. 

Eventually, Ruth came to the table with the three girls in tow. Daniel smiled as he saw his sisters joking and bickering, joining in as they sat down and began to eat. He asked them about their day, genuinely interested in how they were doing, and Ruth smiled as she saw her children happy and together despite everything they'd been through. It warmed her heart to see her boy, usually rough around the edges, start to shed off the tough, bad boy image and transform back into the sweet, caring son she raised. 

"I heard there was a fire at the high school! I was so worried about you, Danny!" exclaimed Abby, the oldest of the triplets. Ruth suddenly remembered hearing about the event.

She looked at Daniel with concern and told him,"I can't believe I forgot that I got a call from the school office about that. We were so busy down at the cafe it slipped my mind! Are you okay? Were you where the fire started?"

Daniel quickly hid his smile at the mention of the incident before calming down his family and saying," I'm completely fine, the fire was in one of the freshman labs. No one was hurt." Except Fowler's chances at getting together with Kyle Williams, he thought to himself smugly.