KEEFER Of The Lost Cities(EDITING IN PROGRESS)

CHAPTER TWENTY ONE

Keefe woke up the next morning by the shouts of Lord Cassius and a LOT of slamming doors,

Ugh. His parents always argued so dramatically. It was bad enough that they were all arguing at literally almost all times of the day. Either Cassius and Keefe, Gisela and Keefe, or Cassius and Gisela.

Keefe had to deal with his parents arguing dramatically. So, by definition, not just yelling but:

Slamming the door.

Leaving the room and re-entering.

Dramatic hand gestures that usually ended up with half of their furniture shattered on the floor.

Faces full of so much hatred that you actually felt like throwing up.

Cold smiles. (This was maybe one of the worst ones.)

Punching walls and doors.

Keefe dragged himself out of bed and glanced at the clock.

5: 14 a.m.

He looked away and headed toward the bathroom to brush his teeth when he stopped, smiling.

An imaginary lightbulb flickered on top of his head, lighting up his thoughts.

Idea...

Keefe pulled open the drawer in the back of his closet. Boxes full of beautiful prank supplies stared up at him and he grinned again.

He had two hours to do anything he wanted.

Knowing his parents, Lord Cassius will have fled to his Atlantis apartment by 5:30 and Lady Gisela would have been long gone by then to.. wherever she goes when she's not at home.

That means he had basically all the time in the world to set up all of his beautiful traps and pranks.

He let out a giggle that was so high pitched that he would die if any of his friends heard it.

***************

All his pranks were set up by 6:30, and by 6:45, he had a whole list of places that he was going to give to Helia and the gnomes so they'd know to avoid stepping there.

He was ready for school by the time he was supposed to wake up, so he had time to help Helia make breakfast.

When he got to school, he was still in a pretty bad mood that his parents had woken him up so early.

So he decided to ditch first period. The best time to ditch, because then, you could just tell teachers you had arrived at school late, and the front office people wouldn't ask a single question when you asked for a pass.

He walked through the halls, grinning as he imagined how his parents would react to his pranks.

A scream from Lady Gisela seemed like a dream- she was always so careful to keep her emotions hidden. She'd had a lot of practice, living with two empaths, but none of them ever touched each other, so she probably had less practice than she would with a normal family.

A normal family.

Which was not what they were, and yet, it was the thing Keefe wanted more than anything in this entire world.

Keefe knew he'd made it to his ditching spot when the pale yellow and off-white walls turned stark white.

He reached the bench and was about to sit down when a flash of golden blonde hair caught his eye.

Keefe realized that if it weren't for her hair, he wouldn't have been able to find her half the time. She was so short and was always hidden among other students.