The Washington's

Chapter Four

Alex awoke the next morning and stretched in his new bed. He could get used to this. Before he could even get out of bed his door was thrown open. John charged into the room and jumped on Alex's bed.
"Mornin' Lexi!" He shouts hugging Alex. Alex blushes at his new nickname, but smiles at the small boy hugging him.
"Good morning John." He says. John climbs off of Alex and offers him a small hand.
"Momma is making breakfast, it's bacon day!" He says with a excited smile. (Sorry to those of you who might not eat meat)
John pulled Alex out of bed and lead him downstairs to a table where everyone else already was. George sat at the head of the table reading the newspaper, Hercules and Lafayette sat on his right, and three empty seat remained to his left and the the end of the table.
Martha stood at the stove frying something in a pan. The smell was amazing! John lead Alex to one of the empty seats and sat down next to him.
"How'd you sleep Alex?" Martha asks her back facing him.
"Better than I have in a long time." He says smiling.
"So Alex, we were hoping to get you into school soon, are you ok with that?" George asked tilting his newspaper downwards.
"Sure, I love school!" Alex replied enthusiastically. Hercules and Lafayette let out gasps.
"Really? You love school?" Hercules asked with astonishment.
"Well yeah, the schools in the Caribbean were either really small, or not very good. So I had to learn myself." He says looking down. John takes his hand from under the table and holds it. Alex looks at John, who is staring forward like nothing was going on. Martha comes around at this moment and fills everyone's plate.
"Oh" Lafayette said quietly.
"Just another reason to enroll you as soon as possible." Martha says patting Alex on the back softly. She sits down and everyone begins to eat, John lets go of Alex's hand at this point.
Half way through the meal Alex notices the death glare between Hercules and John. He stops eating to observe. Hercules shifts his hand closer to John's plate and John kicks Hercules under that table. Hercules seems to swallow the 'ouch' that would have caused. Hercules shifts his hand again, this time John smacks his hand with his fork. Hercules quickly retracts his hand and rubs it.
It was about at that second George decided he was annoyed. Of course he had seen the whole thing, he just chose to ignore it.
"Hercules, John enough." He says in a stern voice.
"Yes dad." They say at the same time.
A plan must have formulated in Hercules's head, because he soon leaned over to Lafayette and whispered something in his ear. Lafayette nods and looks back at his plate.
A few minutes later Lafayette kicks John from under the table. The split second it took John to look from his plate to Lafayette was all it took for Hercules to swipe a piece of bacon of John's plate. When John realizes this he stands from his seat.
"Quit taking my bacon you stealer!" He says face getting red. Hercules looks at him straight faced.
"I. Have. No. Idea. What. You. Are. Talking. About." He emphasized every word with a pause. At that John let out a war cry and threw himself at Hercules, tackling him off the chair.
Martha and George looked up simultaneously, and both stood up. And pulled the two apart.
     "Grounded. Two weeks. Both of you."George said. At first it looked like they were going to protest but George gave them a look at said 'don't even try' and the nod their heads.
     After the rest of breakfast Alex headed upstairs to get ready for the day. He put on a pair of khaki shorts and a red t-shirt. He sat  down on the floor to tie his shoes.
     When he came back downstairs everyone was waiting in the family room. Once they see Alex Martha began to speak.
     "Ok now that everyone is here, this is how we're gonna spilt up today. Lafayette, John you have doctors appointments today, your coming with me. Alex, Hercules, you guys have to go to school, your going with your dad. Ok?" She asked looking around for any signs of confusion. Everyone seems to understand so she smiles. "Let's go." (Dun dun dun Alexander, Just kidding)