Five large boxes were piled into Alberta's tow truck. The shiny dark blue metal contrasted the brown. It felt wrong. But when did someone moving away not?

"Are you sure you don't need me to come along aswell?" Manitoba asked as Saskatchewan and Alberta packed into the front seats.

"Don't worry Mani! Sask is helping me unpack and get set up there."

"For a week," he grimaced.

"Yeah yeah," Alberta muttered, rolling her eyes.   "I'm not a kid anymore y'know? I'm turning 19 this year."

"Ha, yeah," He hit the truck door and looked up at Alberta. "Visit, please." He turned his attention to Saskatchewan, sitting in the passenger seat. "And you, keep your sister out of trouble, you hear me? I don't want a call from BC, aight?"

Sask nodded her head and the truck's wheels started to turn. Soon enough all that was left of his little sisters was smoke and tire tracks on the old road.

"So did that all happen before or after you broke down into the bathtub?" British Columbia asked Manitoba.

He stuffed his face with another spoonful of ice cream. "Does it really matter?" He lowered further into the bubbling water with a frown painting his face.

"Manitoba Winnipeg Canada, you need to pull it together! They'll always be your little sisters and they might occasionally visit your poor excuse for a house. It's only been a few days since they left anyway," British Columbia tried to cheer him up. It did not work. He just slumped down further in the water. "C'mon Mani! If Northwest was able to do that for all of us, you can too."

"Northwest Territories has daddy issues, anger issues and leaves woodcutting tools around anarchist toddlers."

"I never said he was perfect," she reflected. If he didn't drown she might have to strangle him herself. "How about we go and try and have tea with Yukon? You seem like you could use company."

"No."

"Vicky I'm--" Yukon cut herself off.

"But I don't wannaaaa!"

British Columbia snapped back at Manitoba, "You're going to have tea with Yuki and you're going to like it!" Her hands were wrapped around Manitobia's legs as he dragged him through the prarie house to the table. She gave Yukon a little wave as she shoved Manitoba into a chair and started to pour herself a cup of tea. "Join us?" she asked.

"If you want me to leave I can..." she backtracked, slowly stepping out the door.

British Columbia shook one of Manitoba's shoulders. "Oh please, Manitoba and would hate to see you leave so early. Right Manitoba?"

There was a clear kick under the table.

"Ow! I mean... oh yay. My siblings. Woot," Manitoba said slowly with a roll of his eyes.

Yukon, fearing retaliation from her sister, sat down across from the two. She took a small teacup and BC filled it up with a hot brown liquid, tea. The cup was pretty. A wave design with little boats floating through it decorated around the cup like a ring. The handle had swirls and jagged edges molded onto it with British Columbia Victoria Canada printed small across it. "Are these yours?"

"Of course! I got them when I joined the union. Pretty aren't they?" she explained, putting her tea down to admire her own cup. Her voice was soft and drained when she continued with, "I never leave my house without them."

"Huh. All I got from joining was a decorative piece of my own gold," Yukon mumbled.

"Well... you didn't exactly join the union, dear," BC replied with a pitiful smile. Yukon could hear the lecture already. "After Rupert died... you guys were sort of just... drawn up." She paused, thinking over her words. "It's hard to explain."

"Yeah yeah," Yukon muttered. "Old colonies got special privileges because blah blah blah. Provinces get special gifts for becoming provinces because they're special. I've heard this plenty of times, Vicky."

British Columbia frowned, putting down her cup. "I'm sorry Yukon. This whole confederation thing is weird. If you weren't as freezing I'd bet you would've gotten a province-hood gift too."

Yukon crossed her arms and laid her head down. She just nodded a little and looked off to focus on somewhere else in the dining room. Anywhere but British Columbia.

BC looked down at her cup, biting her lip. She had messed up, how exactly being a different question entirely.

"Didn't you invite Northwest as well?" Manitoba mumbled to her, completely out of the blue.

"He said he was busy," British Columbia replied. "Nunavut's back homeschooling and fire is spreading through his territory like... well... wildfire."

"I thought fire season was over," Manitoba groaned, stretching back on the chair. "Why can't we have one normal week?"

"You bring that up with Mother Nature next time you see her."

He rolled his eyes. "I'll give her the entire presentation. Just for this family."

"Just for this family," BC repeated, retracing the words in her head. British Columbia pushed herself up from the table and walked over to the prairie kitchen. "I'll make ourselves an early breakfast. I'm already hungry anyway."

"M'kay," Yukon said, half-spaced out.

"Can I just have ice cream?"

"Are you just going to be an emotional failure in-front of your sisters?" BC snapped.

Manitoba blinked. "... noted. On that case, can we have waffles."

"I'm not your mother, Manitoba. If you want waffles you can get off your ass and go find the waffle grill for me."

Manitoba raised his hands in defeat, backing away slowly from BC. He walked that way all the way into and through the front door to check the garage. Apparently waffles weren't a common enough breakfast to earn themselves a spot in the kitchen.

Yukon stared out to space, not paying mind as BC got out the ingredients and bowls for the waffle batter. BC on the other hand, was very worried about Yukon. Whether it was her sudden quietness about the burns that still hadn't healed from last fire season. Something was bothering her.

"What's wrong?"

"Hmm?"

British Columbia slowly poured in the milk, butter and eggs into the dry ingredients. "You've been anxious all day. I just want to make sure you're okay. Sister to sister."

Yukon shifted her pose. Moving around her arms to cradle her head. "I... I don't know, okay? I'm just really tired. And hungry. Northwest barely cooked supper last night. Not like we could afford too anyway."

BC's lips pursed into a frown. "You know, you could come live with me down in Vancouver. I wouldn't mind someone who could liven up the place."

Yukon laughed a little at that. Her sight lifted to watch British Columbia's sunny eyes. "I couldn't. Northwest needs my help. She might not seem like it but Nunavut is quite the handful."

"Yukon, I'm not asking Northwest," British Columbia stated. "I asked if you wanted to. You need to do what you want, darling. You deserve a few hours of sleep not woken up by a toddler."

"But—"

"I can see the eye bags and burns, Yuki. Don't try to lie to me. Burns will only heal if you put out the fires and start to actually get some rest and take care of yourself," BC lectured, focusing back to her waffle batter, now working her arm out to stir the thing. "They still hurt don't they?"

Yukon turned away when she mumbled a, "yeah."

"Healing the land that was affected helps too, reduces the risk of scarring," BC added. "Nothing on the list of healing burns is there a 'just get over it' or 'I have work instead'. Hear me?"

"Yeah."

"Good. If you would've said no I would've made you do thirty pushups. Now can you go get Manitoba. It does not take this long to light a barbecue up."

"Yes Ma'am," Yukon said, jumping off her chair to the door. As soon as Yukon opened the door the two hear Manitoba's voice. He was yelling something, panicked out of his mind. A few names fumbling in and out of his mouth in a jumbled mess. All they could really make out was.

"Why didn't you call me when she hit you?"

———————-
1375 words

Guess who's not dead :D

The amount of angst I have planned for this arc is rivalling statehood. You have been warned.