Shipped Away

1. Introduction

Tara's Point of View

"We're not throwing a party!" Margaret crosses her arms.

"Why not?" I cry, throwing my hands up in the air "Jake's in charge anyway, it's not even up to you!" Margaret turns to face Jake and he smirks at her.

"You know she's right Mar, Rosa did put me in charge after she left today." Rosa, our housekeeper, doesn't work on Fridays so she put Jake in charge of the five of us. She should really know better, but I think by now she's given up.

My twin brother Daniel turns to my sister Margaret.

"Tara and I promised our friends a sick back-to-school banger tonight so don't be such a loser and help us throw one." My brother Jake laughs and finally Margaret smiles a bit. She looks at the floor and purses her lips thinking it over in her head. My dad makes that same face when he's deep in thought.

"Fine" she says, closing her eyes and sighing. "But this time we lock Dad's bedroom door and we send Janey to a friend's. We don't need a repeat of last time..." she trails off.

Margaret's referring to a summer party a few of weeks ago when one of Jake's football friends hooked up with his girlfriend in our Dad's bed, and our youngest sister Jane almost walked in on them doing it. It was a close call, too close.

"Yes!" I scream jumping up from the couch. "Okay" I turn to face my brothers. "Jake and Daniel, you guys are on drinks and supplies, Daniel make sure you get the folding tables from storage in the basement for beer pong. Mar," I look at my sister "you party-proof the house. Doors locked, expensive furniture moved, all that shit. I'll handle Janey and have a friend's nanny pick her up for a sleep-over or something." I smile and shrug my shoulders. "Ah I love parties!" I smile.

Jake smiles. "We know Tara" he says, rolling his eyes. "Meet you all back here in roughly three hours? Spread the word, tonight's going to be si-ick!"

I know this all seems too planned out, but the truth is that we've done this before... a lot. Our Dad's pretty much never home and when he is, he's at meetings or just about to board another plane to Japan. Rosa doesn't care anymore. She helps us clean the parties up sometimes. But a lot of the time she doesn't arrive until after we've cleaned up so she can tell my father she doesn't know anything about a party. I think she feels kind of bad for us. She knows how busy Dad is.

I climb the stairs to my sister Jane's room. She is sitting on her floor playing a board game with a friend.

"Hey guys" I say, knocking lightly on the door before pushing it all the way open.

"Hey Tara" her friend says, looking up in awe of me from the game of snakes and ladders.

"What time is your mom coming to get you?" I ask her, checking my nails to see if the polish has chipped.

"I think 7:00?" she answers quietly, looking at Jane, but Jane just shrugs.

"Janey do you want to sleep over at hers tonight?" I ask in a very excited tone, gesturing to her friend whose name I'm not sure of. Jane rolls her eyes, she knows what that means. She's only in the fourth grade, which means she's rarely allowed home when we throw our legendary parties.

"Really? You guys are having another party without me! You always do this!" She cries. She turns to her friend, "I want to sleep at your house obviously" glancing at her friend apologetically "but they always do this!" She says this and suddenly I feel kind of bad. Jane sees my face and sighs, "whatever, it's fine I guess" she says and turns back to her board game. I smile and walk down the hall to my own room.