Inferno

~6~ The Run

Taylor's POV

As I watch my family leave, I feel like a failure. How could I have gotten us to this place? With Liam, it was easy. Yeah, he would mess up, but then we would punish him and it would be over. There was never this resentment. This anger.

Luke and I have a horrible relationship. It's not at all what I had envisioned when we found out that one of the twins was a boy. I thought he would be my buddy, the way Liam was from the beginning. He just isn't. Ever since he was a little thing, he's been a challenge.

I remember once when he was probably 7, Greene and I took the boys to a Monster Truck Rally. I was so excited the night before, I hardly slept. We get there, and everything was going great. Then all of a sudden, I turn to say something to him, and he wasn't in his seat anymore. He had snuck down into the arena, and was sitting in the dirt, watching it from there.

"Lucas Reed, what do you think you are doing?" I ask, grabbing him by the shoulders and glaring at him.

"The seats you got were horrible, I couldn't see nothin' he says, sticking his lip out to pout.

"Well, your seat is going to feel horrible in a minute, young man." I say as I grab him by the hand and walk him off the arena. I pass Greene on the way, and tell him that we will be back.

I take him into the bathroom, and wear his backside out. By the time we get back to our seat, it's almost completely over.

That was just one instance. Nothing I do is ever good enough for this kid. I don't know why I can't do right by him. If I can't figure it out now, I'm afraid he won't let me be apart of his life when he gets older.

Sasha is sneaky, as was shown last night. I love that girl with everything that I have, but more times than not, I know she's lying to us.

Then there's Emma. I don't know what to do. Ellie was in tears last night when she was telling me about their talk yesterday. I don't know how much to say to Emma. I need to have a talk with her, and see if I can get through, but I don't want to make it worse. This is totally uncharted territory for me.

I nap for several hours, and then I pick up the house. It's already almost clean, but I know it wasn't to Ellie's standards. Then I do some laundry until they get home.

Ellie comes in, looking frazzled.

"What's wrong, Ellie Jane?" I ask, kissing her perfect cheek softly.

She throws her purse on the counter roughly.

"This was your punishment. Frankly, I thought it was a little harsh, but I would never say that in front of her. If I have to hear one more time that I'm ruining her life, I'm going to get snappy." She says, suddenly turning her anger on me.

I have to hide my smirk. I think she's already gotten snappy.

"She been bugging you all day?" I ask, frustrated.

"All. Freakin. Day. And all night last night. Oh, but I'm sure she won't say a damn thing in front of you. Nope, she saves it for when it's just me. The punching bag" she says, opening the fridge to get a soda. She still drinks Pepsi when she's stressed.

"Oh, and apparently this is my fault, because if you would give me money once in a while, she wouldn't have to always bug you" she snaps. She is furious.

"If I gave you money?" I ask, letting a chuckle slip out.

"Oh yeah. Like I need a freakin allowance or something."

Truth of the matter is that I used to always make sure Ellie had enough money on her, so if an emergency arose, she would be fine. However, Ellie loses things all of the time. After the sixth purse she lost, resulting in hundreds of dollars being lost, we decided to just open up a separate checking account for emergencies. We've still had to replace several debit cards, but at least we haven't lost any more money. Except for replacing the purses.