The Elementalists

20.

I shook my head. "I mean, why aren't you with Wafi and Mich?"

He shrugged before he bent to pick up a can. "I could ask you why you're not using the front door, but I guess that's obvious. We did show up unannounced." He paused. "To be fair, Wafi promised me we'd be gone before you came back."

I rolled my eyes, moving away from the door towards the kitchen island. "Sure, like the fact that it was supposed to be behind my back will make me feel better."

Christopher took a swig of the soda before he spoke. "I told him the same thing. We're already on rocky ground."

"Then why are you here, and my brother and guardian there?" I asked, taking a seat on the stool.

"Wafi wanted to introduce me to your guardian. Also to tell him that I'll be your instructor— it's better I met him in person." He took another sip. "By the way, beautiful house."

"Thanks." I mumbled absent-mindedly. "I beg it's nothing compared to yours."

"No, it's not." Ow. Modest. "But it has a very nice feel to it. Like someone worked hard on it. It feels like... It feels like a home."

I cocked my head, confusion passing through me at the comment. I wasn't one to disown a compliment but I should understand it first.

"Thanks?" I said slowly. But Christopher wistfully eyed my dining room.

"Our dining room seats thirty at the long table." He continued, not having heard me. His gaze was focused somewhere in the distance, reliving memories. "It's very impersonal. We don't even use it everyday. Only when mother is home because she forces us all to come down. I try not to be home for those times. We end up having these huge fights and she jets off somewhere again." Bad memories. "Father goes back to work, he thinks I don't know that he just goes in there to get away from us."

I shifted uncomfortably. I also shifted off my stool. Trying not to be visible, I turned to leave. But apparently that's the only power missing from me at the moment.

"Where... where are you going?" He asked as I turned. A slightly hurt note in his voice.

I turned back around and tried to play it off. "I was going to keep my b-"

"Fiera?!" An incredulous voice I well recognized by this point cut me off and I grimaced.

My eyes were squeezed shut for a few moments before my shoulders slumped in defeat and I turned around. Wafi had a few lines on his brow, with his mouth slightly open. Mich had an eyebrow cocked in amusement and curiosity, but no expression of surprise.

I sighed, the gig was up. "Hey, Wafi... Mich."

Mich nodded. He leaned comfortably against the entrance to the dining room as Wafi tried not to meet my eyes.

"We were meant to leave before you came back." He spoke softly.

"I know." I jerked my head to Christopher. "He told me."

"Sorry."

"Go screw yourself."

"Swear jar." Mich chimed in.

I pulled a note out of my pocket and slammed it on the counter. "That's a fiver for all that I'm about to say."

Mich gave me his 'oh boy' look as I walking towards Wafi. Wafi was carefully watched my face as I stalked towards him.

"What part of you was thinking when you brought Christopher home? Not only that, you tried to do so behind my back. You thought I wouldn't notice? Do you honestly take me for such an idiot?"