"Wakey, wakey, Sleeping Beauty."

I'm rudely awakened by Odette cooing in my ear. Groaning, I refuse to open my eyes.

"Five more minutes," I grumble.

"That's what you said to your momma fifteen minutes ago," Odette giggles. She croons into my ear some more.

"Come on little guuuuuy. We gotta get going."

When I continue to ignore her, she rips the comforter and sheets right off of me.

"Hey!" I whine, curling myself into a ball as I suddenly become extremely cold.

"You are acting like a five year old," Odette teases.

I blink open my eyes hesitantly, knowing the light from my lamp will burn my eyes. I groan once more and flip from my side to my back before grabbing my pillow and slapping it on my face.

"I can't function on two hours of sleep," I whine.

"Stop your belly-aching," Odette says, yanking my pillow off my face before hitting me in the gut with it. I react with a weird grunt.

"Mother of Neptune, how are you this energetic?" I laugh, sitting up slowly.

"I've always been a morning person a morning giiiirrrrl," she chimes a tune I recognize from Shrek the Musical. We watched it once because it's on Netflix. Odette literally knew all the words to all the songs, so I basically was watching her perform the whole thing.

That was an interesting day.

Snapping back to the present,I take a huge yawn and rub my eyes.

"Most morning people don't have bounds of energy at one in the morning after getting literally two hours of sleep," I point out.

"I'm not 'most people'," she informs me, waltzing towards the door, my pillow still in hand. Then she turns around to face me before saying, "Now quit being a crab cake and get dressed! You can sleep on the plane."

"Except that I can't because I don't do well sleeping in moving vehicles."

"You also caaaaaan't afford to miss your flight," she drones, chucking the pillow back at me. I catch it and thrust it back into its spot on my bed, a smile
lingering on my lips. Odette leaves the room announcing, "For once in my life, I am going to eat breakfast!"

"It won't do you much good. You'll be hungry again by five and all we'll have to eat are plane pretzels!" I call.

"Shut up!" she calls from the hallway, the laughter evident in her voice.

I chuckle to myself and force my legs to swing over the side of the bed. Sighing, I go into my dresser. I throw one of my Air Force t-shirts and a pair of jeans.

I don't even bother to take a comb through my hair; I just let it be the dirty blonde mess it is.

Heading down to the kitchen, I find Odette with a bowl of Reese's Puffs. She has her hair up in braided pigtails which I somehow hadn't noticed upstairs.

"You look like the Wendy's logo," I inform her.

She stops chewing for a couple of seconds and stares at me with a confused smile on her face. Then she swallows her bite and with a swing of her spoon says, "Ya know, I have absolutely nothing to say to that."

"Ok," I laugh before heading into the cupboard for my own cereal. Deciding on Cheerios, I grab the box and a giant green bowl to pour them into.

"Health freak," Odette teases.

I grin at her mischievously before going back into the cupboard and pulling out the powdered sugar.

"Theeeerrree ya go! Sugar!" Odette says with a dopey smile, clapping her hands.

I bow jokingly before taking a seat next to Odette.

"How many planes do we have to take to get there again?" I ask, trying to figure all the weird time changes we'll be going through.

Odette shrugs. "I don't even know. I let the adults deal with that."

"Ya know we are basically adults," I tease.

Odette puts a finger to my lips. "Hush, hush. We will not discuss how very old we're becoming."

She somehow manages to say that with a straight face. But naturally, when I lose it, she can't help but break.

Soon we're both laughing like idiots, trying to keep it quiet so as not to wake my little brothers.

"Caaaan you feel the loooove toniiigghhht?" someone whisper-sings.

I turn around to find Patrick, Isaiah and Eric, all in their footie pajamas, grinning at us.

"That song joke thing wasn't funny the first eight-hundred times," I mutter.

"Awwww!" Odette coos, totally unfazed by their teasing at this point. "I love these kids! Look at 'em!"

"Why the heck are you up?" I ask.

"We wanted to say bye cause we're gonna miss you guys," Isaiah says. Eric nods in agreement, his little thumb in his mouth.

I sigh and look at the ceiling. They had to play the cute card. It always works on me.

Odette's hands fly up onto her chest. "I think my heart just melted!"

"Boys?" my mom's voice calls from upstairs. She appears behind the trio of trouble (as I like to call them) just as she's finishing pulling up her hair into a ponytail. "What are you three doing up?"

Eric attaches onto her leg and says, "Have a good time, Mommy!"

They pulled the cute card on her too. She no longer cares that three boys under the age of fifteen are up at one in the morning. She simply smiles and picks up Eric. "You too, Hon Bun. Don't cause Dad too much trouble."

"The only son of yours who causes trouble is this one," Odette teases, pointing at me. I grab her hand and move it so her finger is pointing at Patrick.

"We all know he's the real trouble maker," I tease flashing a smile at Patrick. He crosses his arms and scrunches up his nose- but doesn't argue which I find funny.

Odette laughs.

Mom sets down Eric and rolls her eyes at us. "What am I gonna do with you two?" she jokes. Then more sternly, "Oh gosh, guys we need to get a move on. We get through all the security at airports and all the complicated stuff that comes with traveling halfway across the world!"

"Are we picking up Jillian and her parents?" I ask nodding in Odette's direction.

"They're meeting us at the airport," Odette replies.

I nod and say, "Cool." Then I pick up my half-eaten bowel of Cheerios and hand it to Patrick, before giving him a quick goodbye hug. I toss Eric's hair and give him little kiss on the top of his head while bringing Isaiah into me with one arm. Odette comes over and picks up each of the little guys and gives them hugs.

"Ya know what my little sisters said to Jillian and me when we gave them hugs yesterday?" she asks me, feigning hurt.

"What?" I chuckle.

"They said, 'This'll be good practice for when you leave for college!'" she answers as if it's the most offensive thing anyone's ever said to her.

I laugh and pat her on the shoulder.

"I'm gonna miss them even if they are little rascals," she admits with a smile.

"I know you will," I say with a smile.

"Come on, you too!" Mom calls.

"Alright, Mom calm down," I laugh.

"We need to catch a plane!"

She opens the front door and calls, "Love you boys! Go back to bed and get more sleep!" before rushing out to the car. Odette and I follow suit, Odette blowing kisses to the boys before heading out.

"Love ya guys!" I say and close the door behind me.

I've lived my whole life with those three boys....

Gosh, darn it, I haven't even left my driveway and I'm feeling homesick.

What do I think I'm doing? I'm no... Hero. How am I even going to be of any help to anyone on this trip?