OLIVIA 

They all awoke to the blaring of Elijah's alarm.

While Olivia tried peeling her eyes open, she heard a thud and a groan and lifted her head from Elijah's leg to find Blake on the floor, massaging his arm where it hit the coffee table. His hair was flattened on the right side and he had drool halfway down both cheeks.

She laughed at his expression and he glared, which only made Elijah laugh too. Blake shoved his face into the carpet and muttered something they couldn't hear. 

As she made her way to shower and get dressed, she stopped in front of her door where she had the Ten Commandments taped up. She glanced at the list, counting how many rules they had broken yesterday.

1. You can't pick me up from school. Ever.

2. We can't ever be seen in public together. Ever.

3. No one can know we're living together. Ever.

She rubbed her sticky eyes, pushed past her door, and pretended she didn't see anything.

While she ate breakfast, Elijah sat down in the chair next to her. He said, "Olivia, if that police officer ever comes back, you can tell him you don't want to talk to him. It's not legal for him to do that. That was wrong."

"Okay."

"And if you ever feel scared or panicked, you can go to the office and they'll call me or Blake. No one other than the office employees are going to know we live with you. Alright?"

"Yeah, I know."

He gently put a hand to her cheek and tilted her face to look at him. Olivia had never noticed that her brother's eyes had a little gold in them. His stare was making all her secrets come up her throat.

"If you ever need anything, I'll be there," he promised. "If you ever feel like there's something you can't tell anyone, you can tell me."

Suddenly, she was sure that if she looked at him one moment longer, she was going to start to sob. She turned her face away from his and nodded before shoving more cereal in her mouth.

*****

"Olivia!"

She turned to find Milo running up to her at her locker. She was surprised. She never saw him before fourth period.

"Hi, Milo," she greeted him. His eyes were wide and he looked slightly anxious.

"Hi," he said briefly. "And where did you go yesterday? Me and Emily and everyone got worried when you didn't come back from the office."

Olivia shrugged and hid her face inside her locker. "My dad came to take me home. He had work later and he wanted to drop me off at my uncle's."

"So early in the day?"

Olivia slammed her locker shut and nodded at Milo. "Yeah," she said, itching to tell him to stop asking more questions.

He must have seen something in her eyes, or felt something in her voice because he lowered his own and asked, "You sure everything's okay?"

He reached out for her hand and she didn't pull away. He laced his fingers through hers.

"I told you, Milo," she sighed. "It's really complicated."

"Does it have to do with - with them?"

"Kind of." Why on earth was she telling him this?

"They didn't try to come for you again, did they?"

Maybe they had in the form of Detective Julian, but Olivia didn't know. Detective Julian's last name was Herrera, and that wasn't on either side of the paper. Since she had only had last names to go off of, she was clueless. 

"No, they didn't. It's just family things."

"Okay," he said uneasily. "If you're sure."

She wasn't sure if Detective Julian was one of them, but she was sure she didn't want to tell Milo anything else about it. "Yeah, I'm sure."

*****

During lunch, Emily reached across the table and took Olivia's fingers in her own. "Hey, Olivia, on a scale of one to ten, how much do you like ice cream?"

Olivia smiled. "Possibly a ten."

"Possibly?" Milo raised an eyebrow. "How about absolutely?"

"Just possibly."

"Okay, Miss Just Possibly," Emily cut in, tugging on her fingers to make sure she had her attention. "Come to the ice cream place down the street after school. Bridget and Jake can't come but Milo can."

"What about you?"

"Oh, I haven't told you yet?" Olivia shook her head, and Emily said, "I work there."

"You're allowed to work?"

Emily nodded. "Sometimes the state grants some leeway in special circumstances so fourteen year olds can work."

Olivia wondered what special circumstances allowed Emily to work, but she didn't question. "I just have to text my dad and ask him."

Emily grinned and clasped Oliva's whole hands in hers. "Thanks!" she said. "I get so bored there sometimes. At least now I'll have some company."

"Hey," Milo protested. "You always just overlook me!"

She waved him away dismissively. "Oh, Milo, you're old news now."

"What's that even supposed to mean?"

*****

After school, Olivia walked with Emily and Milo to the ice cream place, a small, homey shop with just enough chairs and booths for the customers that came in. Olivia saw that the place was full mostly from students that went to the middle school and high school nearby, looking for an afterschool place to hangout, but there were also a handful of old and loyal customers there as well.

Emily disappeared through a door marked employees only and reappeared tying a bright yellow apron around her black shirt and black jeans, a seemingly silly pop of color around the usually darkly dressed girl. She waved at them before taking over for an older woman at the counter and greeting the next customer.

Olivia and Milo got in line behind a couple of middle schoolers and looked at the menu posted up behind the counter. Olivia half listened to Milo explain which flavors were good and which flavors were bad, and which could be alright on certain days of the week. Mostly, she was watching his hands move back and forth like they always did when he was really focused on a conversation, and the brilliant white grins he got on his face when he made a really, really bad joke.

"Olivia? What're you smiling at?" Milo looked behind him to make sure there was nothing there and then looked back at her.

Olivia straightened out her face as best as she could. "Nothing, nothing," she reassured him. "Just - go on."

"There's nothing to go on about," he said, rolling his eyes. "I was asking you what flavor you wanted."

Eventually, it was their turn at the front. Emily leaned across the counter so she was a little closer to them and drawled, "Good afternoon, Miss Jones, Mister Cortez. What can I get you today?"

They both gave their orders and sat at some high bar stools against the window, talking as they waited for Emily to come by with their orders.

When the conversation lulled to a silence, Milo sighed and put his head between his hands. "Olivia, can I tell you something?"

She was a little surprised, but she said, "Yeah, anything."

He didn't look at her, instead suddenly finding the little cracks in the counter very interesting. "You know when Cody was throwing those papers at you yesterday?"

Oh no.

"Well," he said, "I might have, you know..." He rubbed the back of his neck. "I saw what it said."

Olivia's face suddenly felt very hot and sweaty, as if she had been caught in a lie. It felt like she had done something wrong, reading something about Milo that was passed to her by someone she didn't know she could trust.

She didn't know what to say to him. She didn't have anything to apologize for, but she felt sorry nonetheless.

He clenched his hands in his hair and exhaled slowly. "I did go to juvie."

Olivia's jaw dropped. She hadn't been expecting that. She thought he would tell her Cody was playing a cruel prank on her.

"You did?"

He rubbed the back of his neck and looked out the window. "Yeah, I did."

His voice was so dejected and sad that she said, "Milo, you don't have to explain it to me if you don't want to." He had never tried to force her to tell him about those men in the girls' locker room, and she wouldn't pressure him either.

He shook his head. "I know, but I don't want Cody to try to tell you something that's untrue."

There was a small silence while Olivia waited for Milo to go on.

He took a tissue from the dispenser at the counter and began ripping off small pieces of it, hands trembling with suppressed emotions.

"My dad... he isn't a nice guy. He's always been in and out of jail for violent crimes. And that night... he was out of his mind."

He tore off a piece with such force that the little ones around it went flying. Olivia put a hand on his to stop him, and slowly, his knuckles faded from white to his normal tan.

"I hit him that day," he whispered in a broken voice that cut deep in Olivia's insides. She held his hand tighter as he said, "I hit him so hard. I didn't realize how hard it was until he had to go to the hospital for his broken nose and stitches to the forehead."

Olivia tried to push away images of Milo's dad hitting him, of Milo finally fighting back. "But it was in self defense," she said. "Why would they give you time for that?"

Milo's voice grew hard. "They said it wasn't self defense because it had been my aunt he was hitting, not me." He swept the torn tissues into a pile and clenched them in his fist. "And so I got a year."

Olivia's heart clenched for Milo, who had only tried to help someone else. Who had tried to fight back against an abuser and only been punished for it. "That's awful," she whispered. "I'm sorry."

He put his chin in his hands and looked at her for the first time. "You don't need to be sorry," he sighed. "I guess life isn't always fair."

They were silent, lost in thought, until Emily came up to them, her black pigtails bouncing with every step. She stopped short when she saw their faces.

"Why so sad, huh?" she asked, setting down their ice cream bowls in front of them. "There is nothing so sad that it cannot be fixed with tons of mind numbing, brain freezing, sugar coma inducing ice cream. Eat."

Milo cracked a smile at her as she forced him to give her space on his small stool and shoved herself into half the tiny round seat. "You got that right," he said as he took the spoon she handed him.

"I do got that right," Emily huffed, taking an extra spoon she had brought with her and taking a bite from Milo's chocolate ice cream.

"What the hell?" he gasped, his somber mood suddenly gone. "I'm going to tell your manager you're eating out of customers' ice cream bowls!"

"Yeah," Emily laughed, taking another spoonful and licking it with relish. "You let my sister know."

Milo grumbled and pulled his ice cream out of her reach when she tried again. Olivia offered hers to Emily, who shook her head but relented when Olivia insisted.

"Oh my gosh," Emily groaned on tasting it. "I didn't know black raspberry was fresh on Tuesdays. It's actually good!"

Laughing, Olivia let her eat out of her bowl until the next group of customers arrived.

When they left the ice cream shop to walk back to school, Olivia stopped outside with Milo. She reached out and took his hand in hers.

"Milo, that was a brave thing to do, to stand up to your dad for someone else."

"Yeah, well." He rubbed the back of his neck again. "I guess I wasn't really thinking."

"Either way, you stopped him before he could do worse."

He tilted his face to the side, his expression not to stiff as before. "Yeah, I guess," he relented. 

As they began walking back, Olivia asked, "Do you know where he is now?"

Milo nodded. "He got a year for assault and battery when - you know, it happened. But when he got out, he couldn't stay out for too long. He's back in for possession."

"I'm sorry," she said.

A sad smile appeared on his face. "Why are you sorry?"

"I'm just -" Olivia was sorry for so many things in so many people's lives that it took a moment for her to speak. " I'm sorry terrible things happen to good people. I'm sorry it happened to you."

He put an arm around her shoulder. "Thanks, Olivia," he said. "It means a lot."

Olivia knew too well that she wouldn't be able to take away the pain in someone else's heart, that only time could ease it, but at the moment, it seemed enough for Milo that someone was there that knew the truth, that understood the stakes and what he was fighting for.

As they walked back to school, she wondered if she would ever do the same thing. 

I just want to thank xxAconite for editing this chapter, I was feeling pretty blah about the whole thing and kind of wanted to get rid of it before she looked over it. Thank you!

Anyways, updates will probably be this time every Friday unless life happens lol. I did start my classes online again, and despite what I thought, it IS a lot of work, plus I'm studying for my MCAT about five hours a day. So you know, all fun things :P

As for the results from the favorite brother poll: last I checked, it was pretty evenly split between the three! I didn't expect that at all, but it was a nice surprise to see that everyone's loved <3

For next time: all this talk about fathers is going to make Olivia pretty curious about where hers is...