The mafia king and the mafia queen

Brothers by heart (Chapter 15)

John was lost in his thoughts, and looked extremely shocked when I said him that Richard is guilty for not noticing how he was feeling. After sometime he pulled me into a hug, shocking me by the sudden action. But I hugged him back anyways, knowing that he was overwhelmed by so many emotions and thoughts running in his mind, and needed comfort. Once he pulled back, we were surprised to see the tears in his eyes. 

John: I am so sorry, I became so selfish that I didn't even think of how they would feel. 

Arl: You were not being selfish, you were just confused about everything going on. You just need time to work everything out, both of you. And for god's sake don't fight again, it is affecting you both more than you think. You both get sour moods because of it as inside you know that you both need each other, and fighting puts a fear of losing each other in your mind. 

John/Richard: Ok, and thank you so much.  

Arl: Ok now Greg and Alessandro might be coming anytime, let's go down. 

We went down and at the same time Greg and Al came there. 

All: Hey guys.  

Al: Baby, you are joining school tomorrow, and John will be mailing your courses to school since tomorrow you will be going so he won't get time to go and submit it. And John, I wanted to talk to you after dinner, alone. 

John: Ok. 

John looked a bit surprised but immediately covered it. 

Greg: There is a problem. 

Richard: What happened?

Greg: The cook will be absent for a whole week. 

Richard: Shit. Arl, do you know how to cook?

Arl: Ya.

Richard: That's great. You are the only one who can convince Al to not make food. He loves cooking but we all are too young to die from food poisoning. And you know how to cook, so we can get proper food to eat, that's if you want to cook. Today the cook is there.  

Arl: I'll cook. Sandro. 

Al: Yeah.

Arl: Is it fine if I cook the food this week? Richard said you are the one who cooks as others don't know how to and you make good food also, but I want to cook this week.    

Al: Of course you can. 

Richard, John and Greg sighed in relief which luckily Al didn't hear. I glared at them, knowing if he would have heard it, he might have felt bad. They were scared by my glare which they had seen for the first time, more than Anthony and they immediately turned their faces after giving me apologetic smiles. 

End of POV.

John's POV:

After dinner I went to Al's room to find him in the balcony. I went there wondering what obsession does this family have with balconies. He turned around hearing my footsteps and smiled before turning back to the railings. I stood next to him.

Al: John, I know I don't talk to you much, or rather at all, since I am usually spending time with Greg. 

John: Hmm.

Al: But I have noticed you are usually distancing yourself from us, not as much from Richard but yeah. You and Richard refuse to consider each other as your  twin, and I know it's not just a joke, yet you both are so close. And you show that you hate baby, and I know it's not true. Is all this related to us being mafia, which you don't want to be a part of?

John: Why are you asking me this suddenly?

Al: Even I don't know why I didn't ask you all this before. Maybe because I thought that you are taking our father's death hard. But yesterday when we were in mall, Arlin had told us that she finds yours and Richard's behavior weird, and I said that it is due to father's death, but I realized that I never thought about it. After that I saw Richard looked stressed and realized that his reason was the stress he has taking care of us three, which made me somewhere guilty, but when I thought about you I realized I don't even know you properly, especially since the last 4 years. 

He said looking down. From all he said, the only thing I could hear was that Richard was stressed because of us, because of me. The thought of it made me feel guilty. I was not there for him, instead I was the reason for his stress. 

John: Al, it's nothing like you are thinking, yeah we both don't see each other as a twin, but a best friend. And I am not distancing myself, it's just that mostly my attention is to Richard, just like yours is on Greg. And it doesn't affect me that you all are in mafia, I just don't want to be included in it. 

Al: Ok. I just don't want you to feel left out. 

I just smiled at him and went to my room. I felt good listening to Al's words, just like Arlin said we are brothers by heart, just like I felt with Al. 

End of POV.         

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