NFH

The Phone Call: Part III

“Please don’t do this,” Mikey said with a long-suffering sigh even as she resigned herself to getting her number changed after this.

“Shhh, not while I’m talking,” Sebastian whispered with a patronizing pat on her head as she laid there, glaring at the wall, refusing to so much as grunt or whimper when the large jerk shifted on top of her to get more comfortable as he leaned back against the wall and crossed his legs over her with a satisfied sigh.

She should have hit him upside the head with her backpack when she had the chance, she thought, biting back another grunt as he shifted again. Now, she was stuck here, lying on her stomach while the big jerk tormented another soul and there was nothing that she could do about it, but wait until he was distracted and try to crawl her way to freedom.

Easter/April Fool’s Day Chronicle

“Yeah, we’re not doing it,” Cole said, shaking his head as they looked at the group of men grinning before glancing back out the window at the large backyard covered in Easter eggs, chocolate, and the typical Bradford Easter goodies that could only be considered a minefield at this point.

“Is there something wrong?” his father asked, blinking innocently as Cole stood there, thinking about the empty shaving cream cans, glitter bottles, glue bottles, egg cartons, and paint cans that he’d found as he narrowed his eyes on his father.

“April Fool’s,” he simply said, daring his father and uncles to try and lie to him, because they weren’t falling for this.

Not this time.

The Phone Call: Part II

“Have I mentioned how sorry I was about the cupcake?” his one-time best friend asked from beneath his bed where she’d decided to take refuge during a game of hide and seek that he’d suggested so that they could have a discussion about hiding baked treats. “Because I am!”

“Uh huh,” he said, reaching into her bag and helping himself to her Kindle, hoping that she had something new for him to read otherwise they were going to have to take a trip to the library in the morning.

“Would it help if I promised to ask mom to make more tomorrow?” she offered, but since he didn’t need a middle man to get cupcakes out of her mom, he simply ignored her and searched her library with a disappointed sigh.

“So, I’m just gonna crawl out of here now,” she said, but he noted that she didn’t actually move to do it.

 

The Phone Call: Part I

“I don’t want to watch that!” Jessica said, tightening her chokehold on Mathew as their brother did his best to keep the remote out of her reach.

“Too bad, so sad, I was here first!” Mathew said as though that meant anything in this family.

“Yeah, too bad,” Jonathan said, plucking the remote out of Mathew’s hand only to glare at Sebastian as he stole the remote and tossed it to Mikey, who caught the remote, swallowed nervously and quickly tossed the remote back to Jonathan.

“She’s the guest,” Sebastian said, gesturing to Mikey only to have his brothers and sister roll their eyes.

“She’s not a guest,” Jessica argued as Mathew said, “She practically lives here.”

Vacation from Hell: Part VII

“Mercy!”

“Please stop!”

“Oh, my god! Mercy!”

“Wait…no!”

Sighing heavily and really hoping that no one called hotel security yet, Zoe pushed the covers back, sat up, stretched, and yawned before heading towards the open doorway that connected the two rooms they had for the week. When she stepped into the room and found Jessica beating Joshua and Mathew with a pillow she yawned as she took in the rest of the room, noting that nothing was broken and that Cole and Elizabeth were quietly sitting on one of the double beds with an iPad and-

“Please! I didn’t mean it! I didn’t mean it! Oh, my god! I didn’t mean it!” Jonathan’s somewhat hysterical scream had her sighing as she headed for the door and-

Vacation from Hell: Part VI

“If it’s all the same to you, Uncle Trevor,” Mikey said quietly as she continued to sit there, hugging the pharmacy bags against her chest as she avoided looking at him, “I’d really like to sleep in the van tonight.”

“It’s forty degrees out,” he pointed out, biting back a sigh as he gestured for the boys to go inside, but of course they ignored him and continued to stand next to him, because apparently they had a death wish, something that should concern him, but at the moment he was just too fucking exhausted to care.

Sighing heavily, Jonathan said, “We should have grabbed some Pamprin to help with the mood sw-” and before his son could say something to get his throat torn out, Trevor slapped his hand across his son’s mouth and pushed him out of the path of Mikey’s homicidal glare.

Vacation from Hell: Part V

“We’re hungry,” Mathew said as his little brother Joshua stood by their cousin’s side, glaring down at Cole, who simply gestured back to the pile of Tic Tacs, old gum, and the expired granola bar that he’d managed to scavenge from the bottom of Aunt Zoe’s purse, Uncle Trevor’s backpack, and his old gym bag before he returned his attention back to the YouTube video that he was watching.

“Can I have a ribbon in my hair?” Jessica asked as he frowned down at the video, wondering how he was supposed to pull this off braid off without a hundred mini hair elastics.

“I don’t think we have any,” Cole said absently as he worked on the next series of braids.

“Mom might have some,” she said, sounding hopeful and as much as he would love to wake Aunt Zoe up, he couldn’t.

Mostly because Uncle Trevor would kill him.

Vacation from Hell: Part IV

“It’s okay. I have…” Mikey started to explain as she held up the box of pads and tampons that she needed only to trail off when she realized that they’d taken it upon themselves to handle this.

Something that she really wished they wouldn’t do.

As she stood here, watching in horror as Uncle Trevor, Sebastian, and Jonathan argued over the level of absorbency that she was going to need, she couldn’t help but regret not waking up Aunt Zoe and begging her to take her to the store when she had the chance. Then again, she hadn’t exactly been in a position to do anything more than groan when Uncle Trevor kind of lost it and threw her over his shoulder and raced towards the door, telling Cole to watch the kids, because he had to take her to the emergency room.

The Vacation from Hell: Part III

This can’t be fucking happening, Trevor told himself, but as he watched his baby girl throw herself across one of the double beds with little Elizabeth joining her as she announced, “We’re sleeping with mommy!” destroying a little more of his soul.

“We’re sleeping with Dad!” Mathew announced as he jumped on the other bed with Joshua and immediately kicked off their shoes and shifted their attention to the remote control and the small flat screen television while Trevor stood there, wondering how everything had gone wrong so quickly.