Fluctuat nec Mergitur

Chapter 4

​​​​"Max!"

"What?" I said, or at least tried to, sitting in the basement over a fifth grade math book. That's about the level I'm at.

Dani soon appeared after the voice, running down the stairs, asking something loudly that I didn't understand and grabbing my arm. I dropped the black ink pen on the floor by accident and tried to push Dani off, which didn't work because she's bigger than I am. "No!"

She said something else, pulling me up the stairs.

*Christina's POV*

Dani reappeared with Max in tow, who seemed confused and distressed, trying to pull her hand free. She started yanking on her arm harder, but Dani wasn't paying attention to that and continued pulling her towards the kitchen.

"Dani-" I tried to tell her to let go. Max isn't going to run away, I don't think.

Max had given up on trying to pull herself free and kicked Dani in the shin. Dani immediately let go and put a hand to her shin while Max backed up, almost tripping on the sofa, looking at her wrist.

"That hurt." Dani whimpered, examining her leg.

"Well..." I raised my eyebrows. "I'm not sure what to say."

​​​​Max was looking around anxiously, like something bad was going to happen, especially something coming from Dani. She finally settled on staring at me, her dark eyes nearly emotionless. Just tired, and just wanted to go back and work on whatever she'd been doing before. She doesn't even know it's her birthday.

"Both of you can go over there." I pointed to the kitchen, trying to enunciate my words. Dani took off, but not until a few seconds passed did I realized that Max wouldn't respond to and couldn't understand anything but her name.

She tugged at the small gold chain around her neck, pendant hidden under what I recognized as my shirt. It didn't fit her right, but we'd still been too busy to get her some of her own stuff. She's smaller than all of us, and too large for any of Amy's clothes.

"Max, you too." I pointed again. She nodded briefly and followed Dani. I turned to go upstairs, intending to help Amy and Dad do something with what we got Max.

I climbed up the stairs and headed into my parents' room, where Amy and Dad sat laughing on the bed, the guitar in Amy's lap.

"Guys, come on." I clapped my hands together, although I couldn't help but smile too. "If we don't do this now, it will never get done."

"You know what, Stina? We think Max is too tired to deal with much of this at all, so we figure we'd just leave this in the basement and not do anything stressful today, like just go out and do something nice." Dad said, his face turning serious.

"That's a good idea." I nodded. "She just needs a break from whatever she does down in the basement all day, is all."

"And all night." Amy added. "It's math and English. I've seen her stuff laying out."

"Why does she do that?" Dad asked, rubbing the headstock of the guitar with his pointer finger.

"Well, you could imagine that she feels pressure to do it." Amy shrugged. "You know, Dad, not speaking English makes almost everything a lot harder. You're really limited when it comes down to it. She can't even speak to us, and we're the only people she knows here. She just feels like she's got to do something about it, I guess. I'm not her."

"How do you know that?" I asked, curious.

"Some of it Lauren told me." Amy shrugged. "The other parts aren't that hard to figure out."