𝐂𝐑𝐔𝐄𝐋 𝐒𝐔𝐌𝐌𝐄𝐑¹ ▹Belly Conklin

𝒊𝒊. summer traditions

From the corner of her eye, Ellie sees her other brother approaching. Conrad looks rather confused as he nears them, scratching the back of his head as he looks down at the other boys. "Let me guess," he begins, looking around at everyone else. "Jeremiah attacked Dev?"

"Yup," Ellie confirms, gesturing at the boys on the floor who are refusing to get up. "Wanna join them?"

"Um, I'm good," Conrad says, pursing his lips. "Dev, are you alive?"

"I think so."

"Cool."

With her eyebrows pulled together, head tilting, Belly asks, "Hey, where's Steph?"

"She has a lot of work this summer, honey, so she can't stay with us like she normally would," Rosie explains, nodding to her friends with a smile. "But, it's alright. The Golden Trio's back together. And, she'll definitely come visit for the fourth." After a few seconds, Rosie glances down at the heap of boy's on the floor, and nudges them with her foot. "Now, come on, boys. Up time."

"No!" Jeremiah and Steven shout all while Dev lets out another groan, this time out of self pity.

"Boys," Laurel warns in a firm tone, hand going to her hip, one of Rosie's bag in her other one. "Will you please get up and help set the table for dinner?"

"Yes, Laurel!"

With a roll of her eyes, Ellie says, "What a bunch of ass kissers." She raises an eyebrow, watching as the boys scramble up, tripping over each other in order to follow Laurel's directions. "You're just scared of Laurel."

"Girls, help them," Laurel orders next, rubbing her forehead tiredly as she watches the foolish boys racing off down the hall. "They'll need it."

"Yes, Laurel!"

With a soft laugh, Rosie watches the girls now running off, looping an arm around each of her friend's shoulders. "Well, things are about the same as always," she comments.

˗ˏˋ ꒰ 🌷  ☀️   🌊 ꒱ 'ˎ˗

SEATED ALL TOGETHER, Ellie feels at peace as she glances around the table. She sits next to Belly and tries not to make it too noticeable how much she's staring at her. If she could, Ellie's pretty sure she would look at Belly all day. Seeing her friend's face settles something inside her, it keeps her at ease. Belly's kind smile and beautiful brown eyes. All she wishes is for Belly to want to look at her that much too. However, she's well aware how unrealistic that is.

It's like last summer, at the end when she convinced herself she and Belly were going to kiss. As if Belly would ever want to kiss her. Ellie could never in all her life see Belly wanting to kiss her. It didn't make any sense. As her mom always said, Belly is destined for one of the boys, not her. Still, Ellie will wait and hope, watch as Belly falls in love with Conrad or Jeremiah. She doesn't mind, not really. As long as she gets to see Belly smile.

Across the table, Steven giggles at something he sees on his phone, and proceeds to show it to Jeremiah who also laughs. Ellie can already sense Laurel's anger before she's even said anything. Ever since the kids in the beach house got phone's, there's been a rule that if you don't stay off it during dinner, it would go in the phone basket. Or, "phone jail" as the kids liked to call it. Most people would probably be annoyed by such a thing, but Ellie honestly enjoyed it. Though she hates it when teacher's do a similar thing at school, she can't help but love this system in their own house. She wants to talk to her family as much as possible before the summer ends.