Thea's Return (Book 2 in the Original SOCIETY Series) ✔

☙37❧

ღ~✹~ღ

ღ~SEVEN MONTHS LATER~ღ

"Gamma, Cousin Kale took my cake!"

My mother mumbled something that was close to a scolding that I heard Kale mutter a begrudging, "Tattle-tale," as a reply.

Eli gasped, whining, "Nuh-uh!"

"Oh, yuh-huh! You act like you were going to eat the whole damn thing, you Pipsqueak!"

There was a sudden mixture of grunting and yelping that made me frown and turn around from looking at the large blown up picture in front of me. Immediately, my brow shot up as Kale yelped---wide eyed--- when a scowling Eli, who had climbed onto my cousin's lap, grabbed a fistful of the redhead's hair and tugged at it.

I looked at my mother sitting nonchalantly in her assigned seat with an elbow on the table and head tilted slightly. She was staring at the wrestling two with a flat expression, the right side of her cheek chewing slowly on whatever she was eating. Just when I thought she was going to sit there and do nothing, my mother finally stepped in.

"Go for his ears, Eli. Make sure to twist them a bit."

Sort of.

"Mom!" I scolded, making her blink between her startle and turn to face me.

Lowering a brow, my mother barely shrugged. "What...?"

I pursed my mouth to the side, placing my hands on my hips and shook my head at her. Her brow rose this time and stared back with doe eyes. She then scrunched her nose and shrugged much more this time, not knowing what to say.

Beside her, Aunt Penny gave my mother an amused smile and placed her hand on my mother's shoulder.

Just as it was for my mother and I's relationship these past months, it took Aunt Penny and my mother some time to rekindle their friendship. It had been difficult at first, only because with their similar temperament and constant arguing going back and forth when it came to, well, everything.

There was still that unfortunate, painful reminder that my mother abandoned both Aunt Penny and I, whenever my mother tried to put her two cents into everything. Usually she'd argue that she was my mother, but then Aunt Penny would shoot right back about how that was a stretch since Emeel Ray had been absent for the past five years.

That usually would anger my mother, snapping back that Aunt Penny didn't have to keep reminding her. That she could live with that shame on her own, without having to be jabbed about it constantly.

There were even times where it came down to the two of them fighting it out. Yes, I'm serious.

What would start off as normal conversation, something---just one thing---would be said that would turn into a heated argument before one of them threw the first punch. I think Thatcher's patched up the holes in the walls of their home so many times, he's thinking of knocking down every wall to save him the hassle.

But either way, Aunt Penny and my mother would duke it out before Thatcher pulled my aunt away while Mr. Dennison would try to handle my mother. I think my aunt calmed a lot quicker when Thatcher held her; only because he'd lock their mouths together as a distraction and my aunt would give up shoving him away, and instead clasped her hands to the sides of his face to pull him closer.