Two Arts

Chapter 43

A.N. Hey friendsss I'm getting a bit too close to what I'm currently writing so there will be two updates a week, the group chat voted for Mondays and Thursdays so that's when the next one will be out.

To join the group chat the link is on my profile, see ya there.

Spending time with my family meant getting to know everyone's grown-up life all over again every time.

It meant figuring out who my brothers truly were once out of the house and the high school environment.

I noticed subtle changes in my parents' attitudes.

Everything seemed to be moving much faster ever since I had left my hometown and slower at the same time.

People were completely different and places had stayed the exact same.

We could talk about former schoolmates and our favorite burger spots as if no time had changed at all, but then again they were completely different individuals from the last time I had seen them.

Sadie and I were sitting peacefully at the massive breakfast table when people started to join us.

Our parents, with Rory, at first, and the rest of our siblings and their partners later. It was going to be the last meal with just the closest family members. Before an array of extended family and friends would arrive to celebrate the upcoming wedding.

"You two seem cozy," Chelsea pointed out, looking at Sadie and me.

She had been the last person Sadie had spoken to before we went on our beach walk.

We were not showing particular signs of affection towards each other, or were we?

Sadie's left hand was lazily sitting on my lower back, tucked in my pants' waistband. I was leaning slightly in her direction and I was playfully picking bites of scrambled eggs from her plate and swapping them for a corner of my waffle. Nothing seemed too out of the ordinary, or too cheesy.

Lani raised an eyebrow at us and I shrugged it off. Until I noticed Maggie elbowing her and shaking her head, as to ask her to keep quiet.

Sadie seemed to pick up on it too and nodded to her parents in a silent question.

"She asked!" Lani shrugged to her wife.

I suddenly felt like maybe Sadie shouldn't have asked if Aunt Maggie wanted Aunt Lani to keep quiet.

I braced myself for whatever was about to hit us.

"I wasn't going to say much, just that I wish they were in a room further from ours, that's all," She shrugged and raised her hands defensively.

I felt my cheeks build up color immediately at the implications of her sentence.

Mom Laura rolled her eyes and looked at me with an apologetic tight smile. Mom Amelia on the other hand was way too amused and immediately tuned into the conversation.

"Let the kids be, they don't get nearly enough time together, they can talk whenever."

Way to go Mom.

"If you want to swap and be woken up by—" Aunt Maggie's elbow hitting her ribs again prevented her from saying whatever she was about to bring up, "Be my guest," Lani finished quickly.

"We have the kid," Mom Laura was quick to answer, pointing at Rory, who was sitting with Amy out of earshot—as if there was the actual risk of having to swap rooms with their friends.

"Some of us are trying to have breakfast," Daniel winced and abandoned his fork on the plate for a moment.

"Don't act like you're innocent, we're sparing you for Libby's sake," Aunt Maggie retorted.