GOLDEN ROSE • THE UMBRELLA ACADEMY

CHAPTER TWO

Well, so much for staying away.

Pogo sent a car for me. Father died.

I remembered seeing in literature and movies how people cry when they loose someone. Rose cried in Titanic. Romeo cried in Romeo and Juliet. John cried in Marley and Me.

I didn't cry. Not for my dad. And I didn't feel bad.

I figured that he wouldn't cry for me, and he didn't cry for Ben. So why should I cry for that hollow shell of a man.

The house looked different, yet the mood never changed. It still held that sorrowful mist in the air that was once covered by the laughter of eight kids. It was stronger now, the sorrow.

But for some reason we weren't sad that he was gone, at least most of us weren't, but we were just sad. Like a bunch of emotionally stunted adults that never learned to cope with life.

And boy was life hard to cope with.

Mom sat by the fireplace, under the painting of Number Five. She wouldn't say anything, just kept embroidering some worthless rag that would probably end up in a drawer with the others.

Pogo didn't say anything either, just looked at me with mournful eyes and retreated behind the secret door in the living room.

Why won't anyone say something?

Sure, maybe I wasn't a sobbing mess over the loss of my father, maybe I wasn't even missing him at all, but after all he is the only father I ever knew and I deserve more than this painful silence.

And silence was no more when Luther entered through the foyer. He didn't even need to say anything to make a whole lotta noise, with the wood creaking under his monster size feet.

"Hey Rose," he bellowed at me, looking down. "You sure... grew up."

I winced; how I wish that were true. Our dear father, Reginald, forgot to mention how shape-shifting would stunt my growth and physical aging. Sure, on the outside I may have looked 20 some odd years old, but that was just another form I took. In reality I was stuck in my 17 year old body.

Staying in a form for long periods of time is strenuous on the body, and eventually (and unwillingly) you will shift back to your normal state. But I figured that I could hold up this facade for at least as long as I was with my family.