A Flower for You

Chapter Two

Lily rushed at Braiden, throwing her arms around his waist, clinging to him. “I missed you so much!”

“I missed you, too, Lilypad.”

She grinned at her nickname, the one nickname she refused to let anyone but Braiden call her. She pulled away from her, crossing her now open arms. She turned to Cole and Carter, grinning at their still red faces. “Hey, Cole, Carter,” she smiled before turning to me. “Let Mom and Dad know I’m walking over to Emily’s, okay?”

I nodded at her, watching as she walked out the door and turned to walk down the street.

“Bray, the two dorks over there are Cole and Carter, the brown hair being Cole, black being Carter. They’re both idiots, if you hadn’t figured that out yet, and while we wait for them to stop being idiots we should, I don’t know, go search through Cole’s car for our old notebook so you can read everything she said about you. She’s a very passionate person, you know. Everything she’s planning –“

Finally, apparently having had enough, Cole growled, picking up the roll of paper towels off the table and throwing them at my head, grinning when she struck. “What were you telling him about, I?”

“Oh, just about your plans you were devising once he came home. Surely you remember—“

She growled, then, charging towards the couch before jumping over, tackling me on to the floor. “Ow!” I yelped as my back crashed onto the floor. Carter huffed, coming to get Cole off of me. Braiden laughed loudly, wrapping his arms around my waist.

“You’re a klutz,” he grinned, keeping a firm hold on me. I glowered at him before narrowing my eyes at Cole, who conveniently looked away just as I looked over.

“Sorry, Iris,” she grumbled under Carter’s glare.

Cole was the crazy one. She was out of control all the time, something that not even Carter, Lily, my parents, myself, and Jon and Lisa could handle. But, Carter had been her best friend since they were born, much like Braiden and I. Carter could make her do things you’d think she would refuse to do, even if it meant she could have every last penny in the world.

Carter was more controlled, but she was nowhere near normal. She was hyper and crazy, just as much as myself and Cole, she was just more controllable. I always thought it was because of her father, who had died when she was twelve. She had been more defiant and proud, something that kept her from being calmed when she was crazy. But since her father passed away, she had been much more languid, which she was slowly growing out of.

“Rissy,” Braiden pouted after a moment or two of silence. I turned to him with a raised eyebrow, signaling for him to continue. “We need to get my school supplies,” he told me, grabbing my upper arm.

“Oh, yeah.”

“What? Why?” Carter asked, whipping her head around to look at us.

“He’s coming to high school for senior year,” I grinned. “You should come shopping with us. He’s starting tomorrow, due to his request.”

Cole raised an eyebrow at him, as if he was crazy, he simply returned it with a mock-confused expression. “Yes?”

“Why are you starting tomorrow?” she wondered, picking up her keys and purse from the table.

“I’ve never been to public school,” he shrugged. “Rissy wanted to miss today so she could meet me, and she has to go back tomorrow. I’m in four of her five classes. It’s amazing how persuasive my mom can be. She just said that I’d never attended public school and it’d be much easier this way. But I’m not taking psychology, so I’m not in that class.”