Page 49 of Rules of Association

I rolled my lips into my mouth and swallowed as I looked at them. In front of me stood all four of my siblings looking like someone had kicked their dog. Alta and Mattí were standing side by side with their heads bowed like they were ashamed of something. Lis was standing off to the side with her arms crossed staring quietly. And Ox was behind them all, in the center, rounding them up like he was a teacher making classmates apologize to each other.

I felt my teeth click together and lock. This was annoying.

“Did you hear me?” Ox asked, narrowing eyes on me. His strong features were hard as he held my gaze, not wavering for a second as he searched my face.

A face that was starting to get hot.

I loved Ox. I looked up to him, and this was one of the reasons why. No doubt he had rounded them all up and lectured them down here on how he thought they needed to apologize to me. I loved him for it, but it didn’t mean I wasn’t annoyed.

“What are you guys doing here?” I asked.

“We’ve barely seen you in weeks. We just wanted to say hi,” Al hesitantly said.

“I was at dinner last week. I’ll be at dinner tomorrow.” I shrugged, not knowing what else to say. “There was no need to come here.”

Lis narrowed her eyes. “You came to say hi and left.”

“I was busy.”

Mattí spoke next, “You usually come by to have lunch or talk or hang out during the week.”

“I’ve been busy,” I iterated again.

“Please don’t be mad at us Ceci!” Alta piped up as if she couldn’t contain her plea for another second.

I gritted my teeth, but that didn’t help. I was already snapping, never one to hold my anger well. “I’m not fucking mad at anyone. I’m just fucking busy.”

“Now, now. Be nice to customers, Poca. We talked about this.” I jumped as Paulo appeared behind me out of the back storage room. Hissing, I gave him a look over my shoulder. He did that silent cat shit on purpose, I swear. He liked scaring the shit out of me. When he caught my eye he raised an eyebrow as if to say‘well?’

With a tight smile I turned toward my siblings and said, “Feel free to help yourselves to some wine samples while you browse. Thisisa wine store after all, so if you’re not here tobuy wine, then get out.”

Turning to Pau, I returned a look that said,‘how was that?’His mouth ticked up at one side and I found myself smiling in triumph. He thought I was funny sometimes, I could tell, even though he tried to hide it.

Moving under the counter, I grabbed the bread and cheese we kept in the little mini fridge, setting them out next to the wine samples. Noticing, Mattí stepped forward. “I like these samples, Pau. Who thought of these?”

Paulo shrugged and looked at me, so I answered as I reached over the counter to hand each of my siblings a tiny jar of wine. “Al did.”

“I did?” Al asked as she took her jar and unscrewed the top. I hummed, and she looked up as if she was trying to recall a memory. “Oh.”

“Lie. It was the ant girl,” Paulo piped up. “I think she said something like—ahem—you’re crazy if you think I would buy shit this expensive without tasting it first. And I said, okay I see your point. And she said, finally you grew some brains. And I said—”

“Okay! That’s enough of that!” I interjected, giving Pau a look. Turning back to my siblings I shook my head in confusion. “Are we done here?”

“That was a really great idea Ceci—”

I slammed my hands down on the table, “Please don’t start.”

“What? We just—” Alta started

“Don’t say another fucking word.”

“Ceci—” Lis tried.

“What? What?What?” I groaned. “I don’t want your apologies and I don’t want your half-ass compliments for my participation prize. Is that okay? Am I allowed to have that? Please?”

Okay, maybe I was being sensitive. But maybe they were being overbearing, too. This wasn’t about them teasing me, I could take that. This was about the glaring truth. While we could debate whether I was clumsy or just inexperienced in that first week, what was undeniable was that I wasn’t anything special. Not like them. Nothing at all like them. And I didn’t need them trying to placate me and act otherwise.

If it walked like a duck, and quacked like a duck, it was probably a motherfucking duck. And I was the ugly-black-sheep-duckling of the family (ha, Con would like that one).If he even still wanted me around.

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