38 Ainst No Mountain High Enough (1/2)
Speak the truth—that was the game plan. It was a good one, the kind that filled me up with righteous energy, giving me that extra kick I needed to take those stairs down to the first-floor in twos. In fact, I went as far as to jump those last three steps.
With a loud thud, my sneakers banged on the landing. My imagination conjured a round of applause for my perfect jump.
I felt light as a feather. I felt good. My mood better than It's been since the other night. Tell the truth. That was all I needed to lift the weight of melancholy and doubt from my shoulders.
I made my way to the kitchen where I could hear the chatter of my aunt doling out the necessary inquiries adults gave teenagers whenever they visit. Stuff like, ”How've you been, Arah,” or, ”Did you gain a little weight, Ty?”
The smell of sausage wafted out of the kitchen. It sent my stomach grumbling.
”Sausage — tastes — great, Aunt Lena, I heard Ty say between bites.
'Have some more apple juice, Arah,” Aunt Lena's voice prompted.
”Thank you, ma'am,” Arah responded from inside the kitchen.
Damn—hearing Arah and Ty's voice so close sent my confidence spiraling back down to zero.
It felt like the heat turned up a notch. A trickle of sweat fell down my left cheek.
I placed a hand over my chest so I could feel my rapidly increasing heartbeat. ”Calm down, Dean... The supreme art of war is to subdue the enemy without fighting... just speak the truth.”
It was weird how quoting Sun Tzu's Art of War always seemed to center me like the words were some kind of talisman against a teenager's irrationality.
I closed my eyes and breathed in and out. In and out. In and—
”How long are you going to stand there?” Arah's voice asked.
I peeked through my eyelids and saw her head poking out the kitchen door.
”Get in here,” she said without so much as a hello or good morning. ”We need to talk.”
Feeling like a chump, I followed Arah into the kitchen.
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Sitting on the stool next to the marble tabletop counter in the center of the kitchen was Ty. He was gobbling up a plate of sausages.
Aunt Lena was by the fridge by the back wall. She pulled it open and brought out a loaf of sliced bread which she dropped beside Ty's plate.
”Add some carbs to your meal, Ty,” she said. ”It's good for you.”
Ty looked incredulously at her. ”Didn't you just say I was gaining weight?”
”Compared to when you were all sticks and bones...” Aunt Lena gave him the once over. ”This look is better for you.”
She laughed while Ty grumbled. She ruffled his hair, walked over to Arah and patted her head, then moved to me with a big fat hug.
I pulled away from her smothering arms.
”You're such a hippie.” I joked.
”Ha-ha,” she responded while she grabbed her purse from the side table next to the door. ”Alright, you kids, I'm heading out.”
”Going on a date with your girl?” Ty asked.
”Nah... going to spend time with my sister,” Aunt Lena answered.
Her words dropped the temperature in the room by a lot.
This cold silence lasted the few seconds it took me to find my voice. ”Want me to come along?”
”Nah,” she twirled a finger at the three of us. ”You guys fix whatever it is that's causing this tension.”
Aunt Lena gave me a meaningful look.
”Quid agimus amicis?” she asked in Latin. The rough translation would be, ”How do we treat our friends?”
”Nos tractare, quasi cognatione illa,” I answered after the second it took for my tongue to adjust to the pronunciation. My answer was basically, ”We treat them like family.”
She nodded approvingly. ”Work it out, guys.”
Her final words to us before she walked out the door sent the temperature right back up to uncomfortable heat.
I sighed. It was challenging having such an observant aunt who wasn't afraid to speak up even in the most awkward situations. She was just cool like that.
”Sit down, Dean,” Arah instructed.
She'd taken the seat next to Ty which meant I would have to take the seat opposite them. Great, as if we needed any more reminders of the rift between us.
I sat there with my hands on the smooth marble countertop, my fingers tapping the beat for the intro for 'Eye of the Tiger' while I waited for one of them to speak. I was betting on Ty to break the silence—and I was right.
”Aunt Lena speaks Latin, too?” Ty asked as if he'd forgotten we weren't speaking.
”Yeah,” I nodded. ”She took the same Latin class from dad that Luca and I did...”
”A~~and speaking Latin is necessary in the, um, other place?” Ty consciously avoided saying the F-word.
He was probably keeping the mood light and avoided the subject that would just inflame tensions once more. I was grateful to him for that.
”Latin and Primordial are similar... Primordial's like the formal speech over there...” I gulped as my mouth turned dry. The scent of sizzling fried meat was getting to me.
Ty slid his plate of sausages toward me. I took a sausage and chomped it down—and for a hungry guy who spent the previous night exhausting my brain cells, the taste of a well-cooked sausage was like the ambrosia of the gods.
After my fourth bite, I felt a chunk of meat stuck in my throat, causing me to cough.
Arah slid her glass of apple juice toward me. I took it gratefully and gulped down the glass.
Once I was done acting like a starved maniac, I glanced over to my two friends and wondered if them sharing the food and drink was a peace offering.