Abbey Road

Come Together

COME TOGETHER

"Naomi!!" Zachs voice echoes down the upstairs hallway.

"Whaa-aat!" I call back, not taking my eyes off of my book. I am busy reading Zach, leave me alone. I hear his footsteps blundering towards my slightly open door. I scramble to my feet and shut it right as he reaches it.

"Naomi, don't shut the door in my face." he sighs on the other side of my poster-clad door.

"Already did." I say casually, returning to my place.

"I need to talk to you." he sounds exasperated and I don't like to talk to him when he is.

"I need to read." I focus as hard as I can on the words in front of me. Kindness is not an illusion, and violence is not a rule. I'm confused so I move on.

"Naomi this is serious. Mom called a family meeting."

"I am busy reading Zach, leave me alone." I hear him groan and trudge away. I smile to myself, satisfied.

"Yo, Mitch!" Zach is yelling again. Now I have a headache. "Can you get Naomi to come out of her room? She always listens to you." I sigh this time. I don't want to stop reading, go away. Why can't they just listen for once?

"What's the problem now?" I hear Mitchells voice from the other end of the hall.

"Mom wants to talk to Naomi and she won't come out of her room." Mitchells turn to sigh. I hear him walk down the hall, much softer and swifter than Zachs footsteps. He stops in front of my door and knocks softly.

"Naomi?" Mitchell says in his quiet I'm-trying-to-be-nice voice.

"I am READING." I push my nose as close to the book as I can get before the words get blurry and press on.

"Naomi you can read in a few minutes. Can you take a short break to come talk to Mom? I'm sure it's important."

I hate when Mitchell talks like that. He gets this way that makes my heart melt cause he just sounds sad. Mitchell sounds sad a lot lately. It's been driving me nuts. He comes home all tired and then does homework for hours. I heard Zach tell Mom that Mitchell was crying in the shower the other day, which I thought was weird cause one time Dad said that boys don't cry. I thought he meant they don't as in they can't cause they don't have tears but I guess that was wrong. His fault for not clarifying.

I set my book down and stuff the bookmark in my page. I get up with a few pops of my hips from sitting oddly, and walk to my door. I open it to Mitchells tired and empty face. He smiles at me with dead eyes and I want to hug him but it doesn't fit the context of the situation so I don't.

"Thank you." He says and turns away. I walk down the hall to the stairs and shuffle down them. When I reach the kitchen, Mom is waiting for me. I pull myself onto one of the bar stools and grab a pear from the fruit bowl on the counter. Mom smiles at me with her tired worn-out smile. Mitchell smiles like he is required to; Mom smiles out of habit. She must've smiled so much when she was young it got stuck on her face. It's a nice formality but it looses it's specialness cause it's been used so much. I just stare at her over my huge mouthful of fruit.

"Naomi," she starts, in a tone I know means this is gonna be something I might get mad at. Mom doesn't want that, so she's trying to be soft, which isn't helping. "How would you feel about moving schools?" she seems extremely hesitant, but my face instantly lights up. This was not what I was expecting.

"Amazing, that's how I would feel!" I beam, setting my pear down on the counter. "Are you for real?"

"Well, there's a wonderful integrated education program at your brothers' school, and I thought it might be better if you go there, since last year didn't go so well-"