Three Shades of Blue (UNEDITED VERSION)

Chapter 1: Ideas

Ema:

I spun my chair around until I was dizzy. I had no absolute idea what to write about for the report.

"Mrs. Johnson had said we're supposed to write–"

"Hey, sis!" My loud, talkative brother barges into my room. He's probably my polar opposite. He never gets bullied, has a lot of friends, and doesn't feel bad about himself in any way. "How was your day?"

I winced at the thought of it. "Um, it was fine. Besides the fact that..."

"That what?" His expression darkened.

"That... you know," I shrugged my shoulders, trying to hide how uncomfortable I was. "She happened," I replied vaguely, hoping he would catch on.

"Everleigh?"

I shrugged again, fiddling with my pencil. He was eyeing me for confirmation and I looked away. "Em."

"Yeah. Okay? You didn't have to ask me, it's not like you didn't already know." I muttered.

"For God's sake, Em, one of these days I'm going to have to–"

"No, no, no, you're not going to do anything. Especially not tell mom and dad."

"Why?" He practically growled out the question.

"Because I don't want them worrying about me. You know them, anyway. They won't make a difference."

"Fine. If that's how you want it.

"It is. Thanks, Daniel."

He sighed. "No problem, Em. No problem."

For some reason I felt like it was a problem, for him at least.

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Daniel:

I walked out of the locker room and headed toward the exit of the school building. Matthew grabbed my arm before I passed him.

"Hey, bro? Um, Ema's having a little..." he trailed off. "Situation."

I looked over to my sister and saw that she was ducking her head in embarrassment as Everleigh and her friends were laughing about something. I took a deep breath and nodded towards Matt.

"Thanks for not stepping in." He nodded, and I could tell her wanted to. I knew he had complex feelings for my sister, and he knew she wasn't mentally ready to have a relationship yet. Plus, she was moderately scared of him. She froze up whenever conversations got intimate and being intimidated by Everleigh didn't help with her insecurities.

I stalked over to Everleigh and her entourage, in time to see her glance over at her friends and say, "Luckily we're not in the 1800's, or some poor guy would have to take her. Like anybody would want her anyway." Her voice was the usual high, popular girl voice and it was pissing me off. Matthew stiffened at her words, but didn't say anything. Ema shrunk back.

"Back off, Everleigh." I snapped. "You have no business saying that."

"Oh, here comes big brother to the rescue." She smirked, her voice full of mock-pity. "Luckily, he's always here to save you. Since when have you been able to talk louder than a mouse?" She threw at Ema.

"Never." Britt replied, laughing.

"Just go." I snapped again. She rolled her eyes and left. Matthew walked over and offered his hand to Ema, who was slumped on the ground. She flinched and he quickly drew his hand back, wincing.

"Sorry," he mumbled. He tipped his head at me in a gesture that he was going to leave. I nodded and turned to Em.

"What happened?"

Her voice came out bitter. "You know what happened, Daniel."

"I didn't see all of it." I responded. She gazed at me for a moment, then turned away.

"Let's not talk about it. Don't talk about it." The familiar fury flooded through me.

"You can't just not do anything about it."

"That's exactly what I'm doing!" Tears pricked her eyes. "Just stop, Daniel. Mom and Dad won't care anyway. Cause no one does." She got up herself, and brushed past me.

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Daniel:

"I mean, it's not like you're not going to do anything, right?" Matthew asked as we drove to the field.

"Oh, I'm going to do something," I laughed darkly.

"What are you going to do?" He asked, glancing at me with concern in his eyes.

"Confront her." I shrugged.

"How do you know where she lives?" Matthew raised his eyebrow.

"My mom has the address for some reason."

"I'm not going to pretend that's not weird."

I sighed for the fiftieth time today. "Neither am I."

There was a pause.

"I'm worried about her." Matthew interrupted the silence. "I know there's a very likely chance I... won't get a chance with her. But even besides my feelings, I'm worried about her because she's your sister."

"Yeah, thanks, bro."

He glanced at me and then hesitantly asked, "Why aren't you mad about me liking her? Usually older brothers are... you know, protective. Isn't there a 'code' for me not being allowed to have feelings for her? Isn't she 'off limits'?"

"Honestly, no. I find it stupid how other guys get angry when their best friend likes their sister. Mostly it's because they 'can't trust' him with her. But I'm only friends with you because you're loyal, and I can trust you. I wouldn't be friends with you if I couldn't trust you with my life."

"That's true. I started wondering when Josh told all of us that he loved Savannah. Elijah was indifferent to being angry. He just... told Josh to take care of her. Threats aside."

"Yeah. Elijah is always pretty chill, though."

"True."