The Lovely Life of Launa G. Kohri

Family

A cool breeze blows through my wavy, brown hair and I breathe in a refreshing gulp of salty see air. I watch the waves toss around in the ocean and glance up at the sky. The clouds are dark and grey.

"Annie!" My sister's voice travels through the air and reaches my ears. I glance to my right to see Bell running towards me. Even though it's kind of dark, I can see the tears spilling down her cheeks.

Something is wrong.

I jump off the big rock I'm sitting on and run to meet her.

"M-mom says that- that," she's chocking down her tears. "she says that we h-have to come inside."

I know she's worried about our pet seagulls. I am too.

When I was five years old, my mom and I found a wounded seagull and nursed it back to health. I, being only five, insisted on naming it 'Gullie'. We kept it, and a few months later, Gullie became a mother of six baby seagulls- Whistle, Kyle, Shells, Gullie Jr., Ocean, and Chocolate-Frosted-Donut-With-Pink-Sprinkles. Bell named her when she was really little and she insists on us calling her by her full name. But when Bell's not around, Chocolate-Frosted-Donut-With-Pink-Sprinkles becomes 'Sprinx'.

Anyway, Gullie and the others went on a 'flyaway' as we call them and has not come back yet. I'm worried they got caught up in the storm. I give Bell a hug.

"It's okay, they'll be back soon." I say, trying to believe my own words.

Bell grabs my hand and the two of us begin walking back to the house. As we reach our door, a loud 'squawking' comes from behind us. Seven seagulls are flying across the sky to beat out the clouds. Bell yells: "Chocolate-Frosted-Donut-With-Pink-Sprinkles!" at the same time as I yell: "Gullie!" I finish yelling first. After all 'Chocolate-Frosted-Donut-With-Pink-Sprinkles' is kind of a mouthful. I immediately feel bad for only welcoming Gullie and Sprinx so I add: "Oh look, Kyle, Shells, Whistle, Gullie Jr., and ocean are here too!"

Bell gives me a weird look.

"What?" I say.

We open the door and the seagulls fly in to avoid the raindrops which have just begun to fall. My three year old sister, Avery runs in. "Guh-yie!" she yells, chasing my seagull around the living room. All of a sudden, Miles, my ten year old brother, and Frederick, my other brother who everyone calls Fiz, come flying into the room, running after Whistle who appear toy has Fiz's "Brand-freaking-new-Lego-guy". Then Malia, my twelve year old sister walks in eating a peanut butter and marshmallow fluff sandwich and texting someone. Probably her best friend, Jake.

"Mom says not to say 'freaking'." she yells. Miles stops running long enough to stick his tongue out at her.

It's basically chaos.

So just to get things straight, Avery is three, Fiz is seven, Bell is eight, Miles is ten, Malia's twelve, I'm thirteen, and Blake is sixteen. (He's probably in his room.) We all have blonde hair and blue eyes except for me, who has brown hair, and Malia who has red hair, and Blake, who's hair is currently half blue, against my parents will.

There's a clap of thunder and Avery bursts into tears. I lift her into my arms.

"S'okay Avery, baby. It's just thunder." I say.

Avery sniffles. "Guh-yie! Where Guh-yie?" she mutters.

Gullie is walking towards the basement door; her children following her, except for Whistle who is still being chased by Miles and Fiz. We've decorated the basement to look like a small beach, with sand, plants and even some water. We call it "The Swim Room".

"Gullie's in the Swim Room, Avery, s'okay."

"Oh." Avery kicks until I let her down. Then she chases the seagulls down the stairs.

I can hear the rain beating down on the roof as I head for my bedroom. But I'm only halfway up the stairs when I hear my mom.

"Annie!" she calls, "I want you and Malia to make dinner! You two can make whatever you want, but I'm running to Rach's, so I'll be back late."

Late is right.

Rach has been my mom's best friend since forever. Last time mom went to her house, she came home at three in the morning and Dad went downstairs with the shotgun, because he thought someone was breaking into our house.

It was pretty funny when we found out it was mom and not some burglar tryna steal our money.

But mom not home means party night with dad.

"Okay!" I yell, sounding a little too excited.

I don't think mom notices.

I turn around and go back downstairs to look for my sister. "Hey, Mal!" I yell. She kinda hates it when I call her Mal, but she's got to understand, with an opportunity like this.

"It's Malia." She says, like I was born yesterday. "And yes I want to make chocolate chip pancakes with with syrup glazed sausage and bacon!"

It's our favorite meal.

Malia and I run to the kitchen. I start on the pancakes and Malia starts cooking bacon and sausage. We finish in half an hour. And then another ten minutes to clean up all the flour, sugar, syrup, bacon grease, and smushed chocolate chips.

"Okay Mal!" I say, but I catch myself. "Lia. Malia. I said Malia." She rolls her eyes."

"Can you go round everyone up? I'll get our 'secret touch'." I say.

Malia grins. "Kay."

I pull a bottle of whipped cream out of the fridge, and some mini chocolate chips out of the cabinet. I get them just in time, too, because my siblings are thundering down the stairs louder than a herd of elephants. I smile when I see Blake. He's got Fiz on his back and he's running around the room making car noises. It's nice to know he still cares about us.

"BE QUIET!" I yell over everyone's obnoxious noises.

I'm surprised when it actually works.

"Hey! I want puh-cakes!" Avery brakes the silence. We laugh. I command everyone to get in a line and Malia and I begin serving sausage, bacon, orange juice, and chocolate chip pancakes topped with whipped cream and mini chocolate chips.

Even dad, who's just gotten home from work, enjoys them. During dinner he says: "Malia, Annie. Thank you girls so much for dinner. Mom's at Rach's, so she won't be home for awhile." We all grin, knowingly. "But since it's still raining, we can't do our usual thing, so do you guys want to have a Star Wars marathon?"

That sounds great, since I feel like I've just gained about two hundred pounds and don't know if I can move. Everyone agrees, except Avery who yells: "NO! I go swim!"

Dad scolds her for arguing and being disrespectful. Then the eight of us sit down to watch our movies.

At the end of the first one, I'm practically crying because Qui Gon Jin is dead, even though I've seen the movie about two million times before.

Darn you, Darth Maul.

We finish the third movie, and Bell, Fiz and Avery have long been sleeping.

It's one o'clock, after all. I pull a blanket over my shoulders and fall asleep right there, on our big, comfy couch.