Courage

Chapter Six

[Maya]

"You know, Gigi is about to have baby number three." I was speaking with my mom over the phone. She had just informed me on my brother's girlfriend Gigi who was having a baby.

"I know. Brandon told me already."

"I sure hope that's you in the future," she sighed.

"You want me to be a boy?" I was confused.

"No, I mean, I hope you're the pregnant one in the future."

"Mom, I'm not trying to think about babies right now. I'm eighteen."

"I know, baby. But I do want a lot of grandkids and you are my only daughter. But anyways, how is it living with the Russo girls?"

"It's nice. They're . . . nice."

"You're not fan girling or anything, right?"

"No, Mother." I rolled my eyes.

"You should've courted one of the boys in high school when you had the chance."

"I wasn't even interested in them, I'm still not. And I'm pretty sure one of them was taken."

"Whatever, Maya. I'll talk to you later."

"'Kay, bye." I hung up quickly and laid down on my bed for a few minutes, and then got up to go downstairs.

I glanced in the extra room we had where Francesca's was. I stopped by the door to see what she was doing, standing in the middle of the room.

"Francesca, are you okay?"

"No. I'm trying to figure out how I want my closet to look. These white walls are so triggering. They make me want to— never mind."

"You should get some furniture," I suggested. "You can go to IKEA or Home Depot."

"I don't even know where that is."

"Well, IKEA is on 400 Alan Wood—"

"Just drive me there."

I put my shoes on and took her to my car. She got in the passenger seat next to me.

"You can change the radio station if you want," I muttered to her. She didn't touch the radio at all for the whole ride. It was pretty silent, except for when I sneezed and she said "bless you."

When we entered I showed her where the paint buckets, brushes and color swatches were.

"Periwinkle, I need periwinkle," she stated. I grabbed a metal bucket with light purple on it and looked at her for approval. "That's lilac. I don't want that."

"I don't think they have periwinkle." I scanned all the metal buckets. Teal, purple, pink, green, maroon . . . no periwinkle.

She tilted her head back in frustration and sighed.

"Fran, you can still use this," I held up the bucket with lilac paint.

"No, I can't. That's lilac."

"Lilac and periwinkle are basically the same."

"Ugh, you don't know your colors."

"They're literally both pastel purple."

She stared at the metal bucket and contemplated. "Fine." She snatched the metal bucket from me.

We paid for everything we needed, passive aggressively, and then left. While driving I took little glances at her to see if she was actually mad; she was.

"Are you actually upset about the color of the paint?" I asked.

She sighed. "No."

"Well, then, why do you look upset?"

"I'm actually hungry."

"Want to eat at Jon's Diner? It's coming up."

"Sure," she answered.

The hostess at the diner ushered us to a booth by the window. After a waitress took our orders we sat in an uncomfortable silence. I gazed out the window as if the street and cars passing were the most interesting thing in the world.

Eventually I got tired of the awkwardness and spoke.

"So, are you going to have people come over and paint?" My endeavor to make conversation.

Her eyebrows furrowed a little. "No. I'm going to paint the walls."

"Oh," I nodded. "All by yourself?"

"Yeah." She said it as if she were talking to someone mentally challenged. "I've painted before."

"Well, I didn't know that. I don't really know anything about you except for what Us Weekly says, and I don't doubt that most of the things they say isn't true."

"Hm," was all she said.

"So what have you painted before?"

"Landscapes, people, well, my siblings . . . the sky, moon phases . . ."

"You want to be an artist?"

"I already consider myself an artist, just a reserved one."

"Will you let me look at your work?" I'd honestly love to see Francesca's paintings.

"Maybe." I take that as a no from the way she said it. "What do you want be in the future?"

"A veterinarian, I love animals," I answered honestly. "Ever had a pet?"

"No."

"Yeah, me neither." My shoulders slumped. "Wait, actually, I did. I had a guinea pig when I was six, his name was Linny, because, that was the guinea pig's name from Wonder Pets." I smiled while explaining, even Francesca chuckled when I brought up the short origin of my guinea pig's name. "But, my brother killed Linny right in front of me." My smile quickly faded away.

"Oh, wow." Francesca sounded a little disturbed. "What was your brother's punishment?"

"See, Brandon's my parents' prized possession so he didn't get a punishment. Instead, I got in trouble because my parents came up with the excuse that I didn't feed Linny for weeks. Mind you, I was six having to go to Pet Smart by myself to get Linny's food because my dad would forget."

"Brandon's your parents' favorite child."

"Yeah. He is." I gulped. "Do—Did your parents have a favorite?"

"My father, no, he despised us equally." I snickered at her joke though she didn't say it in a jokingly manner. "I think Leonardo was my mom's favorite because he was the quiet one."

"Did it ever . . . bother you that he was probably the favorite?"

"Not at all. I mean, it's not like my mother compared Mila, Elio, and I to Leo. I know she loved us all equally and did her utmost to protect us from . . ." she swallowed, "never mind." She sighed. "No, Leo probably being my mom's favorite never bothered me."

I had a few questions that related to what she'd just said, but I decided to just leave it at that when the waitress came with our food.

"Let's make a deal," Francesca suddenly said when the waitress was gone. "I'll show you all of my paintings if you help me paint my closet."

"Deal."