User blog:Corbierr/House of Anubis: The Rise of Corbierre ~ Chapter 15

''' Y'all ready for some development? You guys will enjoy this one. '''

&lt; Chapter 14

 Chapter 15-

 The next morning, everyone had gone out for breakfast at a restaurant again. Patricia easily realized that it was a way for everyone to get their minds off things- but it didn’t exactly work, especially not in Eddie’s case.

She watched him as she picked at his pancake with his fork, and asked, “Not hungry?” This was a big warning flag.

He looked at her and shook his head. “Uh…no. I’m just…I’m thinking. About…Dad. My real dad.”

After he said that, suddenly everyone was listening, as her boyfriend continued speaking. “It’s just… at times like this… it gets hard, you know? I try to trust him… I give him a lot of chances…” Eddie’s voice cracked. “But he just keeps turning on me… sometimes I think he’d be happier if I was still in America where he left me… instead of here, ruining things for him.” His voice had dropped to a low mutter, and he was staring at his drink now.

Things were silent for a bit. And then, Jerome said,

“I hear you, dude. You know, my Dad and I are good right now, but my Mum…” He laughed a bitter laugh. “What can I say? She wanted me to stay in Anubis and rot for the rest of my life. I think she was angry because I looked like dad. You know, those dumb genetics. Oh, but Poppy, she didn’t get that treatment. So there’s your favoritism for you.” He took a drink of his juice and added a final, dark statement, “I wonder if she’d have noticed if Rufus killed me, so long as Poppy was okay.”

His story struck a chord with her- the parental favoritism part. Old, buried memories and emotions from past fights and trouble with her parents resurfaced, bubbling up until she blurted,

“Jerome, don’t talk to me about parental favoritism, okay? I know parental favoritism. Mum and Dad, they always liked Piper better. And don’t think that I’m just being dramatic here, it’s been proven. Every day, at least ninety percent of their conversations were something like…”Piper figured out another song, Piper is such a great daughter, Piper is perfect.” But me?” She let out an angry laugh and leaned back in her chair. “They only liked to talk about how horrible and rebellious I was being, with my dangerous usage of hairstreaks and biker boots.” Her voice was laced with sarcasm. “So of course, when miss perfect got to go to her special music academy, I was sent to creepy towers…because why would they send away their good daughter, but keep the bad one?”

She paused to take a drink and think for a second about what she had said. Then, she added, “Piper was a good sister. I took my frustrations out on her a bit too much, but she always cared… so maybe it wasn’t all bad.” That was a bit of an understatement, she realized; when she was younger, Piper was possibly her only friend due to her formally shier, loner attitude, and Patricia had returned the favor by taking care of her sister when she needed it- even though Patricia was the younger one. They were close back then- and she believed they were still as close today, despite being separated.

“I don’t even know if I had siblings,” Nina said. “I never wanted to ask Gran about it… and she never told me. I was always too scared to know that maybe I had lost more than just my parents…” She shook her head. “It would have been nice to have a brother or sister. Someone else to help take care of Gran… it was difficult, supporting her as a ten year old.” Nina sighed. “I love her. You guys know that. But sometimes it got… really tiring. She got sick a lot.”

And that was all she said about the topic, because KT began sharing her story, too, and Nina seemed thankful that someone else had took over the conversation.

“Nina, I understand. Even though I lived with my aunt, I spent a lot of time with my Grandfather… and he was always in the hospital. I grew up getting used to the timed visits, the possibility of him being on medicine, and the inability to help him.” She took a deep breath, and drummed her fingers on the table, before continuing on. “He liked to tell me about my ‘special destiny’, though. My aunt thought he was a bit...crazy, but I didn’t. He sent me to stop the great evil… but he died before I could leave… his, uh, funeral was a day before my flight to England. It was tough.”

KT sniffed. Patricia realized that her friend was on the edge of tears, and she took a gulp of her water to calm down.

“A-anyways. Now my great-grandpa is alive, and he’s nice now, and he’s in Egypt…but I never get to see him. And it hurts. He’s so old…I’m afraid he could drop dead while he’s in one of those tombs and I would never get to hear about it. I want to know him better… I want to know him as a great-grandfather. But I’m worried that I’ll never see him again… he may already be dead.”

<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in;line-height:150%">The tension was getting pretty strong. She gulped down some of her juice, trying to distract herself from the powerful and painful emotions in the air, but it was no use as Joy began to talk.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in;line-height:150%">“You know, my dad, he…he’s made a few mistakes in the past. Like… kidnapping me, and lying to me… keeping me from my friends,” She gave Patricia a meaningful look, and Patricia sighed and gave her one back, understanding. “Things of that nature,” Joy laughed just a bit. “He didn’t even let me watch TV so I wouldn’t know what was going on outside of our house, as if my friends were in the news or something.” She rolled her eyes. “It became very hard to trust him… even now, I can barely hold down a conversation with him without getting upset.” Joy shook her head. “And I wasn’t even the Chosen One, so it all turned out to be a waste of time anyways, and he didn’t even apologize. He apologized to Victor for getting it wrong…apparently getting a time wrong is worse than kidnapping your own daughter. It’s annoying.”

<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in;line-height:150%">“You want to speak about annoying fathers?” Alfie groaned. “My dad still likes Jerome more than he likes me.” Patricia caught Jerome hiding a smirk and splashed some juice at him so he’d stop. He flinched and glared at her as Alfie continued.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in;line-height:150%">“It’s always, “Jerome this, Jerome that, why can’t you be more like your friend, Alfred? Stop reading that book on Aliens and go make some money.” And he doesn’t understand that I’m not Jerome. And hello? I am amazeballs! I am the only one in my family who knows how to do a ninja flip. But does my dad care? No, He’d rather just worry about money and business practices that I don’t care about! It’s not like we’re dealing with anything fun or interesting… just money and business and talking about Jerome!” He let out a loud, dramatic groan again and leaned back, causing his chair to fall over as he let out a panicked yell and hit the ground.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in;line-height:150%">As Fabian helped him up, Mick started talking.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in;line-height:150%">“Come on, dude, my family is way worse about those things. They know I’m not good with science- I was going to a sports school for crying out loud! But not even my dad can convince everyone else in my family to quit badgering me about it. It’s like, I’m the sports guy, yeah? They all think I’m just the dumb guy. And it’s really annoying. I can’t talk to one of them for two seconds without them making me feel like an idiot. Not even moving to Australia could end this kind of treatment.”

<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in;line-height:150%">Patricia realized he was so upset that he had stopped eating his banana… it was serious, and for once she wasn’t thinking of that as being a joke.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in;line-height:150%">“My family is the exact opposite,” Mara jumped in now. “I’m the only one who’s not an athlete.” She groaned. “And I try to tell them that I’d rather solve equations than kick a football around, but they just don’t get it. My parents don’t even understand that I just suck at sports. And when I told them about Mick, oh, all they could talk about was how I might finally learn to play something because I was “dating a sporty guy.” I mean, it’s not like I don’t know how to do these things… I just don’t like doing them.” She complained. “My family is normal otherwise… but they just push me to a standard of physical excellence that I have yet to reach.”

<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in;line-height:150%">“You want to talk about high standards of excellence, Mara Jaffray?” Amber asked. “My dad is the CEO of a huge corporation and that means that whenever he isn’t actively proving his disappointment in me as a daughter, he’s buying me things. Material things. Things that sometimes, I just do not need. Besides, he has a terrible taste in fashion, like one time he bought me these earrings that were so last year, and…” Realizing everyone was beginning to look a bit annoyed, she quickly said, “He thinks he can just show me affection with money and items, but sometimes I’d just like a hug. Won’t get it from him, he’s too busy. Oh, and he’s still mad about that sleepwalking incident… long story short, I couldn’t visit you guys simply because I had to be punished for my crime of accidentally walking into the gatehouse while I was asleep! And if you think those are easy conversations to deal with, you don’t know my dad. Trust me. It was terrible.”

<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in;line-height:150%">When Willow began her story next, her usual cheeriness was replaced with a quiet, sad voice. “My parents never understood me. They thought my belief in faeries and magic was too “strange”, so they tried to make me act “normal,” and I mean, come on, what is “normal” anyways? I was just doing what I wanted to, It’s not my fault I didn’t think the same… and if I didn’t do what they thought I should, they would punish me! They wanted to change me, and that’s just not right. It’s like trying to change the pattern of a tiger’s stripes or the flow of the orca as it swims majestically through the waves… They put me in Isis because I was considered “too weird for them to handle.” I spent much of my first year crying about it.”

<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in;line-height:150%">Patricia was surprised, not having expected such a show of depth from both Amber and Willow. She knew they both had their moments… but she never realized that both of them had their own scars, just like the rest of them.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in;line-height:150%">Finally, only one person had not shared their story. Fabian was silent for a bit, then murmured, “I never knew my parents. When I was born…they put me in an orphanage. They just didn’t want me. I don’t even know my last name.” His voice cracked. “Uncle Ade adopted me. That’s…that’s where my interest in Egypt comes from…his friend, Jasper, became my Godfather… neither of them are related to me, but…it’s just…they’re all I’ve ever had, and… they’re good people and all…but I just… I wonder why my parents gave me up. What was wrong with me…was I too small? Did they not want a kid? What was it? What did I…what did I do?”

<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in;line-height:150%">Fabian took a long, deep breath and started talking again. “Jasper was never around much… I was raised by Uncle Ade, who…eventually sent me to Anubis House, when he ran out of money to take care of me… I stopped visiting him, I didn’t want to stress him out about it…but maybe that was a mistake. And Jasper…J-Jasper, he finally came back, and then…”

<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in;line-height:150%">He cut himself off, as Nina began rubbing his shoulder to try and calm him down. “Then he started lying to me…I know he had his reasons, but I just… I just feel really betrayed… I grew up with only him and Uncle Ade…and now I barely speak to either of them.”

<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;line-height:150%">Following that grim note, the rest of the breakfast was spent discussing more stories about their home-lives. They started out simple, about things like common punishments or arguments they’d had…then they got deeper, and darker, and more detailed. Patricia herself, for example, told about the time her dad started yelling at her…Piper stepped in, and he nearly hit her. He had held himself back, and apologized for the scare… but Patricia had spent the rest of the day locking herself in her room, with Piper, both sisters keeping each-other company until their dad came and officially apologized to Piper. Patricia figured she was supposed to just feel lucky that she wasn’t punished for the argument- which was over something completely pointless, anyways, definitely not worth all the pain it caused.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in;line-height:150%">By the end of their meal, Jerome said, with a darkly amused tone, “So…moral of today? Our families suck…or at least, certain members do,”

<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in;line-height:150%">“Maybe not…” Fabian said. “You see what this was? We’ve basically become a family of our own… R-right?”

<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in;line-height:150%">“That’s right, Fabes.” Joy told them, patting Fabian on the back. “I believe this group is all we might need.” She knew what her friend was really saying. She was saying, “Screw our families, we’ve got each-other and that’s better than what we had before, so let’s cheer up and make the most of it.”

<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in;line-height:150%">And Patricia agreed.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in;line-height:150%">

<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in;line-height:150%">''' So yeah. This was not full of excitement and danger…but it’s the kind of talk I think we needed on the show. I hope you all enjoyed it, and are ready for your double feature tomorrow! Also, please advertise this on the chat if you are the first to read this and happen to be on said chat, thanks love you <3  '''

<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in;line-height:150%"> Chapter 16 &gt; 

<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in;line-height:150%">