Under Normal Circumstances

Familiarity

Just as we were getting off the phone, Grace poked her head in the room, followed by Matt behind her, both of them looking like they'd find us in a very compromising position. A look of relief passed over Grace's face when she saw we were just on the phone and fully clothed still. Matt just looked confused.

"Who was that?" Grace asked.

"Hank," Slivko answered.

"Oh," she whined. "I wanted to meet him."

"What are you listening to?" Matt muttered behind her, looking at the record player as if it smelled foul.

"Don't worry," Slivko said to Grace, ignoring his brother completely. "I'm sure you'll meet him soon."

I turned sharply.
"How do you know that?" I asked. "Are you two planning something else?"

"No, nothing like that," he assured me. "Just a guess."

"Well anyway," Grace said, sitting next to me. "Where do you guys want to go for dinner?"

"Dinner? Didn't we just eat lunch?" I asked.

"That was like four and half hours ago," Grace informed me. "Where to? My treat."

"Why are we all in here?" Matt questioned but still no one paid him any attention.

I looked to Slivko.
"Where do you want to go? I don't know any places around here."

Slivko pouted in thought and finally looked at his brother.
"What's open right now? It's Sunday."

"If we went to the city things are open later," Matt offered. "But locally, hmm... Lake Monsters?"

"What's that?" Grace asked.

"Burger place," Matt answered.

Just then, a sleepy eyed Billy came wandering in, rubbing one eye and reaching for Matt with his other hand. Matt seemed surprised to be the chosen one and just looked down at him, sliding his hand out of his pocket for the kid.

"Mommy? I'm hungry," Billy said, still rubbing his little face and holding onto Matt's hand.

"Do you want to go get a burger?" Grace asked him, making the five year old decide for us adults.

Billy nodded wordlessly and towed Matt out the room assuming we were leaving now. Matt threw me a 'well this is interesting' look over his shoulder before disappearing down the hall.

"Well then," Grace stated with the signature tone of an older sibling. "After you two."

I got quiet as Slivko drove us to town, I was busy looking at the sights he saw everyday and knew as well as I knew my own town. The three of them kept up a lively conversation and Slivko kept a hand and an eye on me. His arm rested across the back of the seat and his fingers twirled a lock of my hair as I looked out the window, the sunset glowing yellow, pink and purple on the windows of the buildings we passed.

Detroit had a vastly different feel to it than Tennessee. It reminded me just a little of Singapore in that it seemed poised on the edge of falling into a bit of chaos and lawlessness. But, beneath that, it had its charm too.

"Where's your dad's shop?" I asked Slivko, interrupting the laughter to a joke I hadn't heard.

"Oh," Slivko said. "We passed it already."

I raised my brows at him.
"We passed it and you didn't point it out?"

"Well, we'll go there tomorrow, I didn't think it was a big deal," he said, slipping his fingers through my hair.

"I guess," I sighed and turned back to the window.

"Reg," my sister piped up from the back. "You know Maybelle isn't like, normal, right? You know she spends like all her time up in her head?"

I furrowed my brows and glanced back at her.
"At least I don't have to leech all my energy off other people," I muttered.

"You read too much," Grace griped.

"No such thing," Slivko said, giving me a reassuring smile.

"Just so long as you know what you're getting into," Grace sighed.

"You know," Matt added to the conversation. "There's that saying, 'it's always the quiet ones'? They're the ones that think everything through ten different ways before they say or do something. I went to high school with a girl like that."

"Was she dreamy and annoyingly pensive all the time?" Grace asked.

Slivko played with my ear.

"Actually," Matt said with a heavy exhale. "She got along with everyone. She did English tutoring and everyone she tutored, a guy from the football team and a popular cheerleader to the misfits and the poor kids, they all got higher marks and they'd always talk to her afterwards. Kinda like she tore down the walls of the boxes they thought they were supposed to stay in."

"Good god," Grace said. "You're one of them. Don't worry May, you've found your people. Well done."

I turned in my seat to look at Matt who sat right behind me.
"Was your mom like that too?" I asked, resting my chin on Slivko's arm that I'd pinned between me and the seat semi awkwardly.

Matt smirked at me. His eyes glinted like he'd just made a connection.
"Yeah," he said. "She was a lot like that."
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Hello my lovelies!!! I'm so sorry for the long hiatus. I know this chapter is short but it's the best I could do right now. I felt I owed it to the one who left comments saying she was rereading it AGAIN like wow that's such a compliment, and also my smart watch was going off like crazy today because someone else went and voted for ALL my chapters and then begged for an update so I really REALLY owed y'all something. I think I'm almost at 300 comments on this story, let's see if we can get there since comments are my favorite thing in the world. Leave me one telling me 1)what your MBTI personality type is. 2) if I published a story that was nonfiction me just ranting about things would you read it 😂 3) do you think I should try and write a serious original novel and try to publish?

**Update!**

My nonfiction story is published 🤗 thank you so much for the encouragement to do this!