Twice The Love, Twice The Hate. I Just Had To Fall For Twins.

Twice The Love, Twice The Hate. I Just Had To Fall For Twins. {17}

                We went back into the room and I handed Julia her juice. She thanked me and drank it happily. We sat down and entertained the kids in the playroom for a while.

                “Can I do your hair?” Julia asked Luna curiously. Luna smiled at her and nodded. Shane and I watched as Julia played with Luna’s hair, trying to get it in a ponytail. She made it look like complete shit, but Luna was good natured about it and smiled when Julia told her she was done.

                “Aw! It looks so pretty!” Luna lied with a huge smile. Julia giggled. “And this is why I cut my hair  over the summer,” I grumbled, remembering the times Julia asked to do mine or Shane’s hair.

                “I can’t imagine either of you with long hair,” Luna said, glancing at us. “Well, longer than it already is, I mean.” We both shrugged at the same time. “It used to come down to our shoulders, but straightening it was a pain in the ass, so we both cut it,” I said.

                “Do you guys always get the same haircut?” Luna asked curiously and I nodded. “Yea. Our parents have trouble telling us apart sometimes.” “Dad always just thinks he’s talking to you,” Shane said quietly.

                I felt a flash of guilt. Shit. Dad did always think he was talking to me. “Yea. But mom confuses us a lot too,” I said, trying to get away from the subject of dad. It wasn’t his fault he struggled with addictions. His mom had been terrible to him and his step-

                I cut my thoughts off and moved towards Luna, fixing her hair with my hands. She smiled gratefully at me and I leaned down and kissed her gently before smiling.

                I was a good actor. Good enough for this, at least. I could get Shane and Luna to believe I was in love with her, I knew I could. And Type could help me if I needed him to. He knew I was just trying to protect Shane. He knew what happened to Shane.

                I felt someone tugging on my pant leg and looked down at Jeremy. “Yea, Jer?” I asked curiously, leaning down and picking him up. “I wanna go to sleep,” he whimpered and rubbed his eyes before resting his head on my shoulder.

                I kissed his forehead and nodded. “Okay buddy,” I said and carried him upstairs. I put Jeremy to bed before heading back downstairs. We played with the other two kids before putting them to bed.

                “I’ll be right back,” I said and went outside. Shane followed me and we leaned against the side of the house together. I handed him a cigarette and let him borrow my lighter.

                “I can’t believe dad doesn’t notice when you take his cigarettes,” Shane said and blew out a cloud of smoke. I shrugged and took a long drag. “He probably thinks he smoked them all. He doesn’t keep very good track of his cigarettes.”

                “You guys are gross.”

                Luna was glaring at us. We glanced at her and Shane got a guilty look. But I just raised my eyebrow at her. “How are we gross?” I asked calmly, blowing out another cloud of smoke towards her as she shook her head at us.

                “You’re 16 years old and smoking. You’re going to get lung cancer.” I shrugged. “We’ve been smoking since we were 13. It’s called an addiction. It’s not like we can just go up to our parents and be like ‘Oh hey we stole some cigarettes off dad when we were 13, got addicted, and have kept stealing them ever since. Help us?’ Our mom would kill us.” Shane nodded in agreement. “Our dad would ki…Be mad too,” he said quietly.

                He sighed and took another drag before throwing the cigarette on the ground and squishing it with his shoe. He kicked it into the bushes. “There,” he said, barely audible. “All gone.”

                Luna shot me a look. “These things are expensive,” I said with a shrug and took another drag of it. “I’m not kissing an ashtray, Shawn,” she said stubbornly. “Good thing I’m a person, not an ashtray,” I said, placing the cigarette back in my mouth.

                “They’ll smell it on you. Your parents,” she pointed out. “Our dad smokes so much; the house always smells like it. And if she really questions us, we can just tell our mom Chris was smoking. He smokes too,” I said, smirking a little. “We never get caught.”

                “You will when you get lung cancer,” she pointed out. Smart ass, huh? “Second hand smoke is easy to blame. We’re around our dad when he smokes, and second hand smoke is worse than first hand. Duh,” I said with a shrug.

                She was giving me a dirty look and I felt anger rising in me. Jesus fucking Christ; who cares if my brother and I smoke?

                “Your dad shouldn’t smoke around you. That’s just wrong. That’s not a good thing for a father to do,” she hissed. “Shut the fuck up. Our dad’s great to us. How many dads get their kids’ names tattooed on their wrists? Most dads nowadays are dead beats. Our dad loves us. He takes care of us. He does it out of habit, not because he’s trying to hurt our lungs,” I snarled viciously.

                Luna raised an eyebrow at me. “I said it wasn’t a good thing for a father to do. I never said your dad wasn’t a good one. Don’t get so defensive, Shawn. I don’t know your dad, and I don’t know what kind of dad he is.”

                “A damn good dad, that’s what he is,” I growled in annoyance. “God dammit! Sh-Sh-Shut up about dad!” Shane said in a pained voice before hurrying into the house, leaving me and Luna to stare after him in shock.