“What?!” Bronx protests. “We don’t need any rent-a-cop protecting us.”
I reach over and playfully slap him upside his head.
“Shut up, Bronx. Just pretend you’re a rapper. Drake uses security wherever he goes, too. People will think you’re a baller.”
“Oh yeah, I never thought about it like that.” Now his eyes light up. “Maybe we should get our own driver too.”
Seven still has his head in the phone but chuckles to himself. Maybe he’s been paying more attention to this conversation than I thought.
“Stone, Ariana, because of your special circumstances you should do all drop offs and pick-ups to school, no bus rides, and no extra-curricular activities unless one of you is there the whole time.”
They both nod. “Agreed.”
Uncle Stone and Aunt Ariana foster an eight-year-old boy and are in the middle of adoption proceedings. I imagine the state wouldn’t allow them to pull him out of school for any reason and even if they did, that wouldn’t look too good to a judge awarding custody.
"I'll leave it up to you and Cam on what you want to do about Benji. He's grown and can obviously take care of himself but he should at least know what's going on."
"Done," Uncle Camden agrees. “I’ll get word to him.”
“And Gigi?” Aunt Jade asks for the millionth time.
“Knox will go stay with Gigi so she doesn’t have to uproot herself.”
“Wait, what!?” I exclaim, thinking that my father must have consumed more whiskey than he should have tonight.
The twins both break out into laughter at my expense. They probably know more than anyone in this room how much of a calamity that Gigi and I in the same living space would be.
In this moment, I become a kid again and turn towards my Mom for some sensible support. My dad may be the captain of this ship, but in my house, my Mom is the one who really does all the steering.
“Mom?”
My mother sighs and appears contemplative for a moment. She looks over at Aunt Jade, who has an expression on her face that I can’t read, but evidently my Mom can understand.
“Knox, she lives an hour away.”
“I can get to her in thirty from up here if I need to.”
“Okay, but thirty minutes away is still a long time.”
“The fact is that we know and trust that you can handle yourself if the time should ever arise,” Dad says.
“But I just got here,” I protest.
“It’s only temporary.”
“But–“
Seven’s eyes flick up to mine. It’s a warning between brothers that we give to each other when we’re walking over a line and headed toward a cliff with one of our parents. Seven has always been the intuitive one of the twins.
“Can we move there too?” Bronx asks as he winks his eye at me. It may his attempt to add some levity to the situation, but I also haven’t forgotten that he’s had a crush on Gigi since he was twelve. His horny ass would probably love to move in with her.
“Absolutely not,” Mom chuckles, not totally understanding the inside joke.
“Dad, can I talk to you in the hall for a second?” I ask him.
“You can say whatever you need to at this table,” Grandpa Joe interjects. “We don’t have private side conversations at family meetings.”
“Speak,” my father commands. “We’re all family.”
