In Search of Tomorrow ✓

Fourteen

When I let Cameron out of the house two hours later, my homework was still unfinished and we hadn't gotten to any tutoring, but I didn't care. He hugged me goodbye carefully, his lips gently brushing my forehead, and then dropped down the porch steps and out into the driveway.

"What was that all about?"

I whirled around and found Clare standing in the foyer, her arms crossed. She looked as if she were about to scold me.

"Sorry?" I asked her, forcing myself to bite back a smile as I went into the living room and started cleaning up the few books I'd strewn across the floor.

Clare watched me pointedly as I put all my pencils in my pencil bag and then zipped it up. "Cameron didn't tutor you today."

"So?"

When I looked up at her, I saw that her frown had deepened until there were actual creases on her forehead. Just as I was about to ask her what her problem was, she snapped, "I think it was sort of unproductive that you spent two and a half hours cuddling and kissing instead of studying, or doing paperwork, or something."

My temper flared at the thought of my little sister telling me what to do. "Excuse me for having a life," I snapped, tossing my pencil bag into my backpack and beginning to gather up all my papers. "I'm sorry if I can't act like a perfect mother figure every second of the day. I actually deserve to be a teenager once in a great while, you know."

"You said Cameron was here to tutor you. Can't he leave now that that's clearly not what he's doing anymore?"

"Why do you hate him?" I demanded, rounding on her. "You used to adore him. He's helped us out of a lot of tight spots, and now I think I might actually have feelings for him. The least you could do is be supportive."

Clare was acting twelve instead of nine, and I knew then that she'd been forced to grow up too fast, just like me. Girls her age shouldn't have had to worry about things like this. She should have been engrossed in her homework or playing a game, not arguing with her older sister about her relationships.

Instead of yelling at me like I expected her to-like anyone would have expected any nine-year-old to-she just sighed and said huffily, "He doesn't need to bring his perfect, problem-less life into our house and start snooping. It doesn't help that all you do is lie to him, either. 'Cameron, our parents our on vacation.' 'Cameron, they're on a business trip. They'll be back soon.' Blah, blah, blah."

She put her hands on her hips, her rant clearly not over. "All you ever do is lie to him, and then you're all 'Cameron, I'm sorry. Let's kiss and make it all better and-'"

"Enough!" I yelled, throwing my hands up in the air. "You want me to be your mother? Fine. Get up to your room and go to bed, and don't come down here until morning. Clear?"

"I..." she spluttered, but I interrupted her.

"Up to your room, now." I growled. "You can't have it both ways. Either I'm your mother or your sister."

Just as she rolled her eyes and stormed off, her stomping shaking the frame of the house, Maddie poked her head around the corner.

"Is it over?" she asked, walking over to me with her thumb in her mouth. I quickly pulled her arm away, trying to break the habit-she was much too old for sucking her thumb.

"Yes," I said. I pulled her into my lap and she buried her face in my chest. "It's all over."

I smoothed down her dark brown hair, my heart still pounding from my evening with Cameron and then the fight with Clare. Why couldn't my sister be happy for me? She expected way too much of me if she thought I'd just pick up groceries and cart them to daycare day after day without having my own life. I'd made a lot of sacrifices since I'd become their caregiver, but I wasn't willing to give up my future.