Not As It Seems - We Bought A Zoo Fanfic

Ch 7

The next weeks went by quickly. The new school we went to was ok. I avoided people and spent most of my time drowning myself in my studies. My grades were staying high for the most part, except for history which I still struggled on but I had been reading up on things more.

My dad still didn't really talk to me much. He and Dylan were always arguing about something and Rosie was Dad's little minion so she didn't pay much attention to me either. Dylan was distancing himself from me so we only really had conversations when he really needed one. My old friends didn't visit ever and neither did Dylan's which he was pretty upset about. For me I didn't really care. I did occasionally think about them some but being away showed me that I didn't really need them to be happy. Nolan called a few times but he ended it claiming he didn't want to date if we couldn't see each other since my dad wouldn't let me.

Kelly was really nice to me. She taught me a lot of things about animals at the zoo that I hadn't come across yet. We often did our chores around the same area and spent time talking for a few minutes afterwards.

The foxes were still by far my favorite animals and they even became pregnant with little babies, which Kelly told me I can name. I decided on Vixen, Zorro, Gus, and Henry were my boy names and Harley, Scarlett, Abby, and Willow were my girl ones. (Idk if foxes can have babies at age 2 but let's just go with it) I went to their exhibit a lot when I needed to think or when I was angry with my family. It happened a lot. On some days Sam and Alex would let me chill in the cage with them and read.

Slowly the zoo was begging to look like an actual zoo and my life was getting better. I should have seen that something was bound to go wrong eventually.

———

"Guys, I forgot to buy butter." Dad told us as he walked into the kitchen where we were preparing corn. We all stopped peeling the corn and looked up at him.

"How important is butter, to this meal tonight? Let's take a vote." He continued. "And remember. It's nine miles each way to the grocery store. Nine miles." I looked back down at the corn and began peeling again.
"Nine miles there, nine miles back. So the think the question we need to ask ourselves as a family, is butter worth your dad driving 18 miles right now to get. Let's vote."

"All in favor of going out to get more butter raise you hands." Dylan and Rosie slowly raised their hands and mine followed shortly.

"Damn it." Dad shouted as he slammed his hand down on the table and grabbed his keys on the way out of the house. Rosie froze in place from the way he stormed off and it took a while to get her to thaw out again, but soon we resumed our previous task.

———

Dad came home 30 minutes later and all the food was cooked thanks to me and Dylan. He even found some butter in the fridge tucked way in the back that went unnoticed by our father.

"Food's ready!" I called out to my dad as soon as I got outside.

"18 miles for butter!" He shouted, lifting the bag and turning towards me. "But I'm just telling Kelly here that she's gotta...She's gotta have some time to herself." He turned back to face the blonde. "So, just tell me what, you know, just give me a list of what to do, and I'll do it."

"Are you sure?" Kelly asked.

"Yea we got it." He reassured her. And that was when I noticed it. My dad was in love with Kelly. He just tossed mom away like she didn't even exist. He had already forgotten about mom and moved on to Kelly.

"-and the monkeys need fruit as well." Kelly finished what she was saying.

"Go home. Go out. Go to the city. Go find your girlfriends." My dad commanded her.

"I think I'll just find my pillow." She joked with a warm smile.

"Alright. Good night."

"Night." Kelly went to turn around but abruptly stopped. "Oh that thing! You wanted me to remember that thing and I..."

"Go home." Dad told her.

"Okay." With those words and a bit of hesitation Kelly walked away.

"9.2 miles." My dad turned around and stomped to the door with his grocery bag. "So technically that's 18.4 miles for butter."

"You know Dylan found some right?"

———

"Alright so Rosie and I'll go to the tiger enclosure and give them some water. Dylan, why don't you go feed the monkeys some fruit and Avery you can go to the garage and make sure all the lights are off in the side room. Okay?" Dad gave us our jobs. While I nodded Dylan crossed his arms.

"Dad! I have a sick amount of homework tonight!" He complained. "Dad!" Dylan shouted as Dad just walked away.

"Get it done!"

"If you want I can feed the monkeys. You can do the garage." I offered my brother.

"Okay fine."

————

"Juice box. Yogurt and water." Dad handed Rosie stuff for lunch.

"Goldfish, I have." A package of goldfish was handed to me.

"Cereal bar for you. You're late dude." Dad said as he threw a feral bar to Dylan. "Did you even read that book? Man..."

"You're funny with everyone else, but never with me. Which I find funny." Dylan interrupted. I signed realizing that Dylan wasn't in a good mood.

"You know what I find funny? I gotta drive you 40,000 miles to school each morning." Damn dad wasn't in a good one either. He grabbed 3 lunch boxes and walked to Rosie who held sandwiches in her hands. "Here you go. 1, 2, 3. There we go." He thanked Rosie as they began walking to the car.

"And don't think I don't notice you changed the subject."

"Dylan likes Lily." Rosie exclaimed out of the blue.

"Please, she's way younger then me. She's 12." 13* I thought mentally. "It doesn't work like that." Dylan finished pleading his case as he threw on his shoes.

"She's about a foot taller." Rosie countered.

"Don't be a tiny person." Dylan argued as he opened the door. My eyes widened as I saw snakes on the soil of our front yard.

"What the heck did you do Avery! Dad shouted at me.

"I didn't do anything. I didn't go anywhere near the snakes." I explained to my fuming father who was approaching me.

I was met by a loud slap and a stinging sensation across my left cheek. "Don't lie to me. You were the only one in there last night."

"I swear, I didn't do this." I cried with tears threatening to spill from my eyes. "Dylan and I switched jobs. I didn't go in the garage."

"I'm gonna go call Kelly." Dad walked off ignoring me statement heading to the kitchen where he left his phone.

————

A/n: this is twice as long as my normal chapters so I hope this can kinda make up for me being gone for so long. Anyways I have no idea what I'm doing for my writing so we're just gonna come up with stuff randomly as I write more chapters. I hope you are enjoying it so far. Have a good night.