Written: 2/28/23
Word Count: 2,377

"I asked you to be certain you could make a family with this guy before Rinley was born. Then, I asked you to be doubly sure you could stick it out when Stevie was born."

Tears started to run in silent tracks down Tenn's cheeks. "I know. I know."

"Things were never great between you and Evan," I explained, like an ass. "I've told you that countless times."

"I know," she sobbed quietly. "I know."

Finally, I loosed the sigh trapped inside my rib cage. It was my turn to put my face into my hands as my mind worked out what the hell was going to happen next.

"I always thought he would become...what I want," Tenna confessed. "But ever since the babies were born, I've felt so lost. I'm so terrible with them! I'm terrible! And he knows it! He judges how terrible I am, but I try! I'm trying, I swear!"

"Are you?" I peeked out at her between my fingers, pinning her in place with my eyes. "Are you really trying?"

Tenna wailed. "I swear! I swear!"

Down my face went, back into the safe sanctuary of my hands. My voice came out muffled as I asked. "Well, what do you want, then? If it's not someone like Evan, then..."

"I don't know," Tenna cried. "I don't know, and that's what makes all of this so hard! I'm only 23, but I can't travel. I can't go out with friends. I can't do whatever I want! And, and—it's not like he acts like he wants to be around me. Sometimes, I swear, he sighs when I come into the room! Like I'm some monster!"

"Or like you're high-maintenance and he's preparing himself for dealing with you?" I countered, a hard ball of anger forming in my chest.

She was never ready for a family. No free-spirit ever is.

Why hadn't she listened to me, years ago?

"It's not like that," Tenna protested, sniffling grossly through her snot. "I thought, if we had our own little world...I thought, if we only had to depend on each other, then, then...we would really be in love. Then, not being able to go out and do anything wouldn't hurt so much. We could give everything to our babies, and everything would work out."

"But...that didn't happen," I deadpanned.

Tenna shook her head. "We've never been in love. I know it now. And that's why it's so hard...so hard to be there every day. To think that—to think that I'd move with him across the country, where I don't know anyone, and no one's on my side..."

The anger dissipated.

"I know it's wrong," Tenna choked, her voice nothing but pitiful. "I know it's wrong now that I have two babies...But, I want to be in love. I want to spend my life with someone I'm in love with, not someone who marks me off on a chore list that he has to deal with."

"It's not wrong," I said, clearing my throat. I sat up straight, settling against the headboard a bit more comfortably. "It's not wrong to want to be in love. And it's not wrong to want that when you already have two kids."

"But—"

"You're young, but you've never been allowed to 'be' young. You let yourself get pulled into him, into this delusion that everything would work out. And when it didn't, it took until he wanted to take you out of your comfort zone for you to realize it."

Tenna stared at me with wide, shocked eyes. "You—you actually understand?"

My face didn't twitch as her hope-filled gaze pierced at me like needles. "I do. I know how you think."

"Gracie—"

"You've got a choice to make," I said, my voice strong. "Those kids didn't do anything to deserve this. You better think long and hard about how you want them to see you. Do you want to give them any indication that you regret bringing them into your life? Do you really want them to grow up that way?"

"Of course not." Tenna's hope withered and died by my hand. Or, my voice. "What—what do I do?"

"You have a choice to make," I repeated. "What are you gonna do? If Evan's set on moving—and it sounds like he is, if he drove all this way to fight with you about it—then the kids are moving, too. You need to decide if you're going with them or not."

Tenna laid down on the bed, her face pressed into the mattress. Voice muffled, she mumbled, "But that's so scary. That's, like, way too scary for me to decide."

She kicked her legs up and down on the bed, and I sighed, softening my voice. I said, "Mom and Dad aren't in love. I don't think they ever were."

Tenna's kicking paused, the bed shaking with after-ripples of motion.

"They got married because it was expected. They started a family because it was expected. They stayed together because of us," I confessed, knowing this was the first time my innocent little sister had ever heard such things. "They aren't bursting with happiness and joy from being in love. Do they look miserable?"

Without waiting for an answer, I continued, "They stay together because it's more convenient for them. They each have their own lives, but they stay true to a person who doesn't make their heart race, to a person who doesn't want to explore the world with them, living a life of romance at every turn. Their bank accounts and assets are too intertwined to make an easy break, and they've lived a content lifestyle thus far. That's the only thing keeping them together, even now. Do they look miserable?"

Quietly, Tenna asked, "Are you telling me to give up on true happiness and settle, like our parents?"

"No," I shook my head. "Can you say for certain things between you and Evan will never change?"

"I guess...not," she replied, unconvinced.

"You don't seem too sure," I called her out, amused. "And that's why you have a decision to make."

With that bombshell, I stood creakily from the bed, opened my lightweight door, and left her lying there, closing her back in behind me.

The day's light leached in from the flimsy curtains, my entire kitchen awash in a bright, new-day glow.

Kakashi was at the stove, poking at a vat of cubed hashbrowns. Following the mewling, my feet took me to the stained ovular table, where the box of kittens sat.

With a jolt, I blinked, then blinked again. "Their eyes are open."

"Yeah," Kakashi replied, unperturbed at the concept.

I whirled to face him. "Their eyes are open."

He stopped poking at the sizzling potatoes, facing my shock with the calm of a ninja. "Yeah."

Shakily, I sat at the table, staring into the box of wriggling kittens. It felt like my eyes were opened for the first time as I took note of the strength in those wriggling little legs. No longer mere stretches of putty, they were more like weasels. String beans with the strength of millions.

I blinked, patting the creatures on their tabby-coated heads.

"Hello, wee ones," I whispered. "It's nice to see you. What do you think of our little kingdom? I hope you're not disappointed."

"Why would they be?" Kakashi arrived with hashbrowns and bacon plated in hand. I tried not to jolt at his silent arrival.

From the very obvious smirk crinkling at the corners of his visible eye, I knew I had not been successful.

"No one likes a cocky ninja," I warned him.

"Then, what about that Sasuke kid?" he fired back, and I couldn't stop the resounding burst of laughter from my chest.

Oh, to have Kakashi Hatake fight me with the power of anime...

"You think he's cocky as a brat?" I muttered. "Just wait."

"What was that?"

Voice trilling in false innocence, I quickly replied, "Nothing!"

Kakashi sat down at his usual spot across the table, his back to the kitchen window.

Moments passed before he pointed his fork at me. "You're not gonna catch me eating if you stare at the kids all day. If you don't hurry, your food might vanish, too, before you can even think of how it happened."

It was a running joke between us. Trying to catch Kakashi eating with his mask down was as impossible as it seemed in that one episode where Naruto, Sasuke, and Sakura had tried the very same thing.

"I'm just going easy on you today," I replied haughtily, quickly snarfing my food before the ninja made good on his promise to devour mine, too.

"Uh-huh," Kakashi said, amused. Then, straightening somewhat, he asked, "Everything go alright with your sister?"

I chewed slowly, swallowing, before I replied. "Well...she has a choice to make. I can't really say if everything will be alright."

"I see," Kakashi mused. "You're a good sister."

The praise washed down my skin, raising its surprised flesh into goosebumps as I looked across the table to where the sunlight haloed out his silver head.

"I'm not," I shook my head. "I don't really know how to help her. And I can't be nice about it, either."

"Sometimes..." Kakashi focused that fork on me once more. Blinking, I was unsurprised to see half his portion gone from his plate, the mask not having moved even an inch. "Sometimes, hard love is necessary, too."

I chuckled in self-hatred. "You're really too nice to me, you know."

"And you're too mean to you, you know."

He gave me that cherubic grin, the one from earlier this morning. A rising flush burned at the tips of my ears, and I moved my short hair to make sure they were covered from sight.

No one's meaner to themselves than you, Kakashi dear.

"That guy—Evan was his name, right? He was a bit disappointing," Kakashi started conversationally.

But I shook my head. "Evan's not that bad. He's better than a lot of guys."

Kakashi's fork clattered against his—somehow empty—plate. "What?"

I shrugged. "It's true. Most guys our age are pretty scummy. They wouldn't even start a family—even if they sleep with a girl and get them pregnant. They definitely wouldn't want to move across the country with them."

"Ah." Kakashi's brows rose into his headband, always sitting like a permanent tattoo across his brow, even while wearing sweatpants. "I suppose that's the reason behind their argument yesterday?"

I groaned. "Don't even get me started."

"I admit, that surprises me a bit." Kakashi leaned back on the stool, keeping his balance perfect. "His reflexes weren't great, yet he used his larger frame as an advantage against two smaller opponents. Family men aren't supposed to turn the women under their protection into adversaries. It makes me doubt his intelligence."

I snorted. "That's just bravado. He's a dude. That's how they act with women. Domineering, throwing their weight around."

"That's...disheartening." Kakashi shook his head. "Are there no gentlemen in this world?"

"There are," I assured. "Not around here, but there are. Really, Evan's not that bad. He's decent enough. All things considered, if you find someone decent, then you're pretty lucky. Can't really expect anyone you meet to be better than that."

"So, you're saying..." Kakashi's brow crinkled, "the best you can hope to find as a life partner in this world is 'decent'? That means, when I leave, I have to hope you'll find someone like—like him—to create a life together?"

???

"Me?" My mouth twisted of its own accord. Oh, this sweet, naive man.

"I don't know how to feel about that." Kakashi eyed me. "I think I'm going to teach you some defensive skills, at the very least. That way, any time some 'decent' man acts any sort of 'not decent' towards you, you can assert your superiority with your combat skills."

I covered my mouth with a hand, but soon waved the man away while trying to repress the shaking laughter consuming my body. "You don't have to worry about that. I'm a loner for life. No problems there."

"No." Kakashi loomed closer, his silhouette covering the table like a draping cloak. "I'm a loner for life, Gracie. You aren't like me."

"I'm not," I agreed, shrugging. "But I am a different kind of loner."

"That man," Kakashi said, forgetting to even mention Evan's name as a common decency, "yesterday, he said you were 'man-phobic.' What does that—"

My bedroom door opened, and out flounced my sister. Prying my fork from my hand, she swooped a large bite of my potatoes into her mouth before I could even protest.

"Hey!" I swatted at her, but she danced away, laughing like a maniacal villain—like Madara, if I'm being entirely honest. "Sister or not, there are some lines you don't cross."

"Kamron, did you know—" Tenna whirled into the living room, forcing me to go after her to retrieve my fork, "Gracie can't have a boyfriend because he would interrupt her great love affair. The greatest love affair of all!"

"Is this about Beni again?" I chased after her, laughing.

Tenna shook her long hair like a whip, wagging a finger at me. "I'm not talking about your naked firefighter. I'm talking about the one you're cheating on your fictional hubby with!"

I stopped in my tracks, my laughter soundless as it tore from my chest. In the kitchen, I heard Kakashi's confusion resound like phrases from a parrot.

"Beni?"

"Naked firefighter?"

"Affair?"

"Yes!" Tenna punctuated the air with a finger. "Her one true love! Potatoes!"

I collapsed onto the floor, my laughter ricocheting from my chest in giant peals that I hoped the neighbors couldn't hear.

"Potatoes?" Kakashi asked, his voice strained. "Her great love affair is with...potatoes?"

Tenna returned to the kitchen, staring Kakashi down sternly. "If you want to make it in this house, there's really only one rule." She bent down to Kakashi's sitting level, staring at him solemnly. "Don't ever separate a girl from her potatoes."

Kakashi blinked, then blinked again. But before he could even start to form a response to the whiplash that was my little sister, Tenna bounced off to the next topic.

"Are their eyes open? Oh me gosh! When did that happen?"