The Summer (Stepsister X Stepbrother)

1

With one earphone dangling down my top, the other half blasting California Girls, that song only felt right, I tap my feet as I wait for the conveyor belt so I can haul off my luggage. "Rosa? Is that you" I turn around to the familiar voice, which is my dad's. I walk towards him, trailing my suitcase behind me. "Wow, you've grown so much," He says. That's the thing with my dad, I haven't seen him for four whole years. He was different himself, clean-shaven, and was he wearing khakis and loafers? what I remember him for was his scruffy beard, which smelled of stale beer, his suit that would always get the tie ripped from whenever he was angry, mum and I's sign for 'he's had a bad day at work, tread carefully and large bags under his deep-set eyes. Here, standing in the airport, he seemed like a different man; laid back and approachable, almost like a dad.

He walked out on me and my mum when I was twelve. He didn't warn us and since then he has never even tried to contact us or even pay his share of looking after me, but I learnt to cope without him, so much so that mum and I are both very happy with no men in our lives. Well, that was all until we got a call from dad, asking me to visit him in summer, with his new family, for the whole 7 weeks of my summer holidays before going to college. Why did he call? Well, even I would love to know that. Guilt? Intrigue? Genuinely concerned about me? Who knew, and I didn't have a choice anyway. My mum was amazed he was even trying again and urged me to say yes, but I can guarantee she only prompted me so much just so she could get the low-down on his new wife.

The walk to the car was awkward and silent. As well as the car journey, although to be fair that's what I wanted. I have my earphones back in and I'm staring out of the window. It looks so different compared to the rainy city London where I have lived all my life. My dad didn't just leave us he left the city and moved to sunny Los Angeles. We passed clean white mansions and authentic identical houses as we zoomed down the highway. All that I knew of my dad's new life is that he re-married and had one kid as well as his new wife's two other kids and that he was still a lawyer. I'm nervous, like really nervous. Talk about being thrown into the deep end, this isn't just struggling to tread water, this is straight out drowning.

The silence polluted the car until we eventually pulled up at a large cream-yellow house with brown slated roofs. It was much bigger than our 2 bedroom rental house in London, but that's what you expect from a LA villa.

I unclipped my seatbelt and opened the white Hyundai Santa Fe, the warm Los Angeles air swept my hair as I walked to the boot of the car. "Let me carry your stuff," my dad says lifting my neon blue hardshell case from within the back of the car. He led me along the grey cobblestone path and stopped at the large red-painted door. He knocked twice and stood back. "Everyone should be home apart from Lucas." dad says shortly before the front door opens.

I take a breath.

This is it, Rosa. This is it.