Off With Their Heads

Chapter 3

Someone was shaking me awake. I groaned and rolled over. They laughed.

"Come on, sleepy head! Time to wake up."

"No." I pulled the covers over my head. I was staying right where I was. Well, I would have if someone hadn't yanked the covers away from me. Unfortunately for them, I came up swinging.

"Son of a -"

"Rane!"

Finally, I opened my eyes to the sight of my brother clutching his bloody lip and Ryn trying to hold back his grin.

Ty was not happy. "What was that for?" he exclaimed.

"For interrupting my beauty sleep," I said, rubbing my eyes and blinking up at them. I squinted at Ryn. Did we...? No, of course not. But I could have sworn I remembered being in his arms.

Ty was glaring at me. "Whatever," he said. "You have to get up, we're having a family lunch and then we have to train."

I groaned and put my head in my hands. I needed some drugs for this headache. Ty and Ryn chuckled. "How's the hangover, sis? You got pretty bad last night."

I groaned again. Looked up. "How bad?" They looked at each other and seemed to have a silent conversation. Ty winced. Sighed.

"Al told me you stripped off your shirt and danced on the bar."

Looking down, I realised I was, in fact, only wearing a bra and cutoff jean shorts. My hand flew to my mouth to smother a gasp. Shit. My eyes flicked up and rested on Ryn before I pulled the covers over my flaming cheeks. Ty laughed again. "Come on sis, it happens to the best of us."

"But not to me!" My head popped back up from under the covers. "I never get like that! I know what it did to mom, seeing her dad like that. I don't want to make her feel like that again." The lids of my eyes flickered shut again.

Ryn finally spoke up. "You're still young, your mother can't expect you not to drink."

I looked up. His eyes were trained on me. I gulped. "I know she expects me to but I don't ever want to do that to her. Watching what drinking did to her dad destroyed her and I've watched it through her and I just - I could never do that to her. I don't want to disappoint her."

Ryn nodded as if this all made sense, even though it barely even made sense to me.

Ty cleared his throat. "Well, this is all well and good, but we really do need to get moving."

"Fine," I grumbled, muttering under my breath as I swung my legs over the edge of the bed and stood. And fell right back down. Ty laughed again.

"Need some help, sis?"

I glared at him and he backed away. He probably didn't want to get punched again. I got up again and managed to stumble my way to the bathroom where I promptly emptied my stomach. The boys heard my retching and I heard their laughter through the walls. After I flushed the toilet, I showered and got ready. I had completely forgotten about the Sunday family lunch. Every Sunday, we had lunch with Ryn's family.

I debated dressing up, but in the end just went with sweatpants and a tank top. The thought of wearing anything tight and constricting, even jeans, made me want to puke again. Pulling my hair up into a messy bun, I left the bathroom to find Ryn on my bed. I paused. He looked up.

"What are you doing here?" I asked, averting my eyes. I still wasn't sure what had happened last night.

Ryn got up and walked up to me. "You were out of control last night," he said and I flinched. "But," he continued. I looked up. "That's not always a bad thing. I think you needed it. Do not feel guilty about letting loose a little. You work harder than any of us and deserve more breaks than you get."

Tears sprang to my eyes and I took a deep breath. "Thank you." He nodded before leaving the room. Slipping into some flip flops, I followed and found my family in the living room and chatting with Ryn's parents. They all looked up as I entered. My mom's face was tight and I looked down, unable to meet her eyes.

Dad stood and clapped his hands together. "Alright, let's get going."

He made his way to the garage and we all piled into the car. I ended up in the back between Ryn and Ty. Emerson, my little brother, was wedged between the Martins in the middle and Dad drove with Mom in the front. The car ride was tense.

When we got to the cafe' it was still tense when everyone sat down and I sighed.

"Alright, out with it," I said. Mom immediately jumped on it.

"You were completely irresponsible last night. We needed you and you were too drunk to fight. What if something had happened? To us, to you?"

My hands curled into fists. "I was irresponsible? Ty does things like that all the time and never gets punished. I decided to have fun for one night because I needed a break. I get perfect grades, I train every day and take shifts almost every night and I never complain about any of it! The least you could do is let me have a little fun every now and then." I sat back, rant over and put my hands over my eyes. I didn't want to look at my mother. I had never spoken to her like that before.

Dad cleared his throat and I flicked my eyes open. Mom looked shocked. "You're right," Dad said. "We put too much pressure on you. You put too much pressure on yourself. I think being able to see into our heads is taking a toll on you. You don't want to disappoint us."

I looked away. He was right. My most powerful gift, being able to see and hear people's thoughts at will, made me never want to disappoint them. Because I knew how they felt and why they did things. I never wanted to make it any harder on them.

Mom grabbed my hand. I focused on her and her watery smile told me all I needed to know. I'd been forgiven.

The rest of lunch passed happily and uneventfully. After our little argument, Dad switched the topic to a much lighter one and we continued on like that on our way to training back at the Ankh Mansion gym.

We all got out of the car and started to make our way to the west wing where the gym was located when Mom held me back.

"Rane -" she started, but I cut her off.

"I know. You don't have to say anything. I know."

And she knew I did. I heard her; she didn't mean to make me think I needed to be perfect all the time. I just didn't want them to stress any more than they already did. I knew she felt guilty about that but she didn't need to. I would always try and do whatever I could to help them out.

Mom smiled and looked up. Suddenly, her smile turned to a look of fear.

I looked up too, but saw nothing but clouds... one of which looked exactly like a rabbit. 

Sorry I haven't posted in a while guys, I've been swamped recently with schoolwork and other crap, so I might have to start posting every 2 weeks. I'll try and make sure I'm consistent with my posting though.

Hope you enjoyed this chapter and if you did, give it a vote and me a follow :)