Penny For Your Thoughts? [unedited]

c h a p t e r • t w e n t y e i g h t

••••••••••••••chapter  twenty eight••••••••••••

We sat quietly around my dorm living room; none of us knew exactly what to say. I sat on the couch between Tommy and Benny, my knees pulled up to my chest. Winn and Adam shared the other couch while Chris stood so Jas could take the rocking chair.
The air was tense and anger floated around us like lightning bugs on a warm summer night. I'd never thought this day would come. I thought I'd die with the secret that my father is an abusive sick bastard, but yet, here we are.

"Penny, you could've told us." Winn murmured from across the room. I looked up at him.
I felt like I was hurting them by letting them see me like this: broken.

"No, I couldn't." I replied. "He'd hurt you. All of you."

"We can handle him," Tommy sighed from beside me.

"And what about Evie? She has to live in the same house as that piece of shit. She's in more danger than any of us."
I snapped back. Just thinking about even remotely letting my little sister be anywhere near him pissed me off.

"So what do we do?" Jas asked.

The seven us looked between each other. We were family, we knew what we had to do.

"We'll stick together," Tommy announced. "We're going to stick together and protect each other because that's what family does. It's what brothers and sisters do. And Tobias Weaver can give us all he's got, but if we go down, he's going down with us."

***
It was weird being back in classes the next morning as if nothing happened. It felt like the weekend was going to last forever.
I trudged to the Great Hall, continuously tugging at the hem of my skirt as it decided to keep rising up my ass. Once at the Great Hall, I huffed into a seat next to Tommy as our family huddled in our usual spot. It was only Tommy, Benny, Chris and I at the moment and boy were we not in the mood. Benny's head was down, Chris leaned exhaustedly in his chair and the only thing holding up Tommy's head was his propped up arm. We'd stayed up late last night talking about...everything...and it was finally taking it's toll.

"This is harder than I thought." I chuckled, causing the three of them to look at me.
"Having to walk around like everything is okay...it's weird."

"Tell me about it." Tommy scoffed as he hands fell to the table. I caught a quick glance at his knuckles and my heart sank.

"Tommy, what the hell happened to your knuckles?" I asked as I grabbed his hand in mine to take a closer inspection.

He shrugged.
"I went to the gym after...you know... and I guess I hit harder than I thought."

"You hit the punching bag hard enough to the point where your fists started bleeding?" I furrowed my brow.
He snatched his hand away and sunk back in the seat.