Early Bird | ✓

04 | blue jay

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"What are you watching?" Lizzy asked her younger brother the next morning, leaping into the couch's cushions next to him.  He didn't answer her for a moment, his eyes glued to the TV screen, his body tense and coiled like a spring.  She sank into sofa's pillows delightfully and her lips released a content sigh, grateful that the weekend had finally arrived.  Her eyes fluttered like a hummingbird's wings, still sleepy from waking up just a few moments ago.  Everything was fuzzy and slow, like an ancient television, and it felt as if Lizzy hadn't left her blissful cocoon of dreams.

Logan finally gave her a quizzical look before returning to his intense staring, which flipped every so often from the TV to the game controller he was clutching.  "I'm playing Xbox, not watching Netflix, my wonderfully smart sister," he responded sarcastically.  "Less watching, more playing.  Learn the difference."

    Lizzy rolled her eyes, yawning and blinking as the world became less and less dreamlike.  "Fine then.  What are you playing?"  She stretched out her pajama-clad legs until they rested on the coffee table that was positioned in front of the sofa.  She had just woken up approximately five minutes ago after almost twelve hours of sleep.  It was much needed following a long and exhausting week of school that, in Lizzy's opinion, never seemed to end.

    "I just completed level 15 with a score of almost half a million points," Logan replied proudly, declaring his high score for Lizzy's amusement.  Lizzy, of course, lacked experience in video games so she just stared dumbly at the TV screen, tilting her head in confusion, her eyebrows furrowed.

    "You know you have work in, like, a half hour," Logan told his sister after a few minutes of silence, his fingers a blur as they collaborated with the game controller.  His eyes were pasted to the screen as though they were cemented, his body sitting on the edge of the beige sofa with anticipation.

    "Ugh, I know.  Don't remind me," Lizzy moaned, dramatically tipping over until she dumped her body on her brother simply to annoy him.

    "Oh my gosh, get the fuck off of me," Logan yelled at his sister, squirming under her weight before shoving her off of himself and the couch until she collapsed on the floor.

    Stunned, Lizzy stood up with her hands on hips and concealed Logan's view of the TV screen.  "Where did you learn that word?" she inquired in disbelief, shaken more at the word that had escaped his mouth than his action of pushing her onto the floor.

    "At school, Mom," he muttered, a slight sheepish blush dashing his cheeks as he realized what he had said and was beginning to regret it.

    "Who do you hang out with?  Crazy kid," Lizzy mumbled under her breath.  Logan, who was rather irritated at his sister, chucked a pillow at her, which she successfully managed to dodge.  Unfortunately, she couldn't avoid the second pillow Logan threw at her, and it smacked her on the face.  Lizzy's patience was eroding like rocks submerged in rivers but being angry was too much work.

    Speaking of work, she thought to herself just as Logan asked, "Don't you have work or something?" His tone was smug and a proud twinkle illuminated his bronze eyes.

    Lizzy rolled her eyes and stuck her tongue out at him before disappearing into her bedroom to get ready for her job at the florist's shop.

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    Lizzy climbed into her dark gray car (It wasn't necessarily her car; her parents technically owned it—Lizzy just used it to get to school, home, and work.) and rolled out of the driveway smoothly and stealthily like a snake.  Her destination was the flower shop called Once and Floral where she'd been employed since summer.  It was a quaint boutique, overflowing with peonies, daisies, forget-me-nots, carnations, and other flowers and plants.  She thoroughly enjoyed being an employee there; her boss was amiable, her fellow coworkers were other teenagers like herself, and sometimes, if Naomi was particularly pleased, she was sent home with a flower that varied depending on the season that she could plant in her makeshift garden.