Revealing Kia (4 page)

Nessie’s jaw gaped. Sparks of anger flashed in her eyes and I could tell she was about to unleash an unholy tongue lashing upon her brother when a groan interrupted the tension. All eyes turned as the second figure on the sofa shifted and pushed upright. Silver rings glinted as long fingers were shoved through unruly strands of bleached
hair. He yawned loudly and stretched his arms before hefting himself to his feet. He squinted one, brown eye around the room before blinking open both and focusing on the five people crowded around the table.

“
Good morning!” he said jauntily, a complete contradiction to the black eyes I’d given him. “Mm, something smells delicious! I’m starving.”

Maybe it was because he was so tall, but it only took three strides for him to reach us
where it would have taken me at least half a dozen steps. He yanked back the chair next to Adam and flopped down.

“Looks good, Mrs. C!” he
said.

There was a bar through his right eyebrow and a dozen studs glittering along the curve of his ear
s. His thumb nails were painted black, but not the rest of his fingers. He had three silver rings on his fingers that glinted when he rubbed his hands together with anticipation.

Without waiting for an invitation, he stabbed his fork through no less than six pancakes and dropped them onto his plate.
He cut into them with the edge of his fork with one hand as his free hand stretched out for the syrup Mrs. Chaves set down.

“How’s your nose,
Kenny?” she asked, putting a plate of bacon down as well.

Kenny
stuffed a forkful into his mouth. “I’ve had worse,” he said around the mouthful. “Besides.” He swallowed and peered across the table at me. “She hit like a girl.”

I would have been affronted if the lopsided grin he offered me hadn’t been so
… goofy. Instead, I found myself grinning back.

“
Kenta Kimura.” He wiped his hand on his pants before extending it across the table. “But everyone calls me Kenny.”

I
accepted the slender fingers held out to me. “Kia Valentines, but everyone calls me Kia.”

His eyebrows
winged in interest. He released my hand. The bar in his eyebrow winked as he turned his head a fraction to the left, towards Adam. “Kia, huh?
”

My heart
missed a beat at the implication in the way he said my name, like it sparked some kind of personal joke. My gaze shot to Adam. Confusion and something like delight sparkled in my chest as I wondered if he talked about me and what he could have possibly said. But if Adam was thinking anything, it was never made clear as he resumed the steady motions of eating. Dear God what if he’d told Kenny about the Halloween party at Claudia’s and Kenny tells Nessie? What if Nessie figures it out?
Damn it! Look at me!
I wanted to scream at Adam as the heady sensation was replaced by the cold fingers of dread.

“
What do you know of Kia?” Nessie demanded with a snide sneer.

Kenny
drummed his long fingers alongside his plate as he chewed his food and eyeballed Nessie. “What would I get in return for telling you?”

“
Kenny.” The warning in Adam’s calm voice interrupted whatever Nessie was about to say.

Kenny
snorted, rolling his eyes. “God, what is up with all the uptight tension? Relax. I’m joking.” He looked at Nessie. “I know nothing about
your
Kia.”

The way he said
your
made me wonder if he was being sarcastic or condescending. I wasn’t sure how to address either.

Nessie’s cheeks darkened, but Mr. Chaves cut her off before she could
offer a rebuttal. “All right, children. That is enough. We need to discuss the bedroom situation.”

“What for?” Nessie demanded. “They’re not staying.”

“Well of course they’re staying,” Mrs. Chaves said, folding her willowy frame into the chair at the head of the table. “Why wouldn’t they?”

“
But that isn’t fair!” Nessie said, practically shouting. “I promised Kia she could spend Christmas with us.”

“And she still can,” her mother
continued calmly. “We’ll just move her into your room and the boys can share Adam’s room.” She turned her eyes on me. “Is that all right?”

Share living space with Adam sleeping five feet away
… um, yeah, I was so not all right with that.

To the rest of the table watching me I replied,
“Fine.”

Mrs. Chaves beamed. “Excellent.
We’ll make—”

“What happened to
the whole follow through with your commitment speech you’re always giving me? Adam said he would be gone this whole week with his friends. Isn’t that where he should be?”

Mrs. Chaves buttered a
piece of toast before answering. “He decided that family was more important, to which I agree.”

“I wanted to spend Christmas with Kia, but you told me I couldn’t
because of the whole family angle. But it was okay for Adam to go, which I didn’t mind. I liked the idea of having a Christmas without him. But then you just let him back in like—”

“You couldn’t go because you are still in trouble for that
English test you failed,” her father said while drowning his pancakes and bacon in syrup.

“Besides, we fully agreed to let Kia join us, didn’t we?” Mrs. Chaves finished.

“But I bet I wouldn’t be allowed back if it were me in his place,” Nessie muttered. “I’d be sent back over there and told to make the best of my decision and … whatever else.”

“Stop being a brat,” Adam muttered.

“I’m not being a brat!” Nessie exclaimed. “I’m pointing out the hypocrisies in this family. They treat you like you were sent from heaven and I get shitted on.”

“That’s because I
was
sent from heaven.” Adam grinned at her broadly. “It can’t be helped.”

“Yet we are taught equality,” Nessie bit out. “Clearly it’s something to be
preached and not practiced. We’re obviously catering to a culture where you’re worshiped for being a boy while I was saved from being buried alive at birth because I was born a girl solely by the fact that it’s illegal.”

“
That is enough, Vanessa,” Mr. Chaves said with more than a hint of impatience as he cut his pancakes into neat little squares. “Can we please get through one meal without hearing how unfair your life is? One!” he snapped when Nessie opened her mouth. “Eat your breakfast.”

The tension could be cut with a knife after that. Nessie stabbed her pancakes repeatedly
with her fork the way a killer would stab her victim, while muttering intelligible things under her breath. I met Kenny’s gaze for a split second and he widened his eyes as though to say,
yikes.
I said nothing as I turned to my friend, but I had no words of encouragement. I very rarely got yelled at by my parents so I had no idea what one said at a moment like that.

“How’s that slap shot coming along, Adam?” Mr. Chaves stuffed one square sliver of pancake into his mouth and observed his son while he chewed.

Adam nodded slowly. “Fine.”

“Are you working on it? You know you won’t get anywhere if you slack off.”

A muscle quirked in his jaw. “I’m working on it.”

Mr. Chaves waved a fork at him. “Work harder! You don’t want to get benched for the remainder of the season, do you? Make sure the coach sees how hard—”

“Dad, I got it.” The usual humor was gone from Adam’s tone. His annoyance showed in the white caps of his knuckles around his fork.

“Maybe you and
Kenny should hit the rink—”

“It’s Christmas, Donald!” Mrs. Chaves interjected. “No work and no sports on Christmas. That’s the rules.”

Mr. Chaves waved his hand dismissively. “Fine. Fine. But I want you to put in extra hours when we get back. It won’t do if you fall behind.”

“It’s only a week, Dad,” Adam muttered.

“It doesn’t matter. You must always be on top of your game.”

Adam set his fork down and studied his dad with a look
just short of enraged. “I don’t have extra hours to put in. I have three tests the first day I get back to school and four practices that same week and a game the week after. I barely have extra hours to sleep.”

“Then you need to manage your time better!” Mr. Chaves retorted with equal sharpness. “It’s all about how to organize your life, Adam. Maybe you need to spend less time with your friends.”

Adam stiffened. “I see my friends for an hour on Sundays. How is that—?”

“That hour could be used studying or working on your butterfly
stroke.” Mr. Chaves splayed his hands open as though he’d just done some awesome magic trick. His hazel eyes suddenly jumped to me. I actually jumped. “What do you do, Kia?”

“Uh…” My
panicked gaze darted from Nessie to Adam. “I…”

“You’re clearly an intelligent girl,” he went on. “An amazing fact considering the friends you insist on having.”

“Leave her alone,” Nessie shot back. “Kia isn’t one of your kids. She doesn’t have to do anything.”

Mr. Chaves put up his hand, his gaze fixed on me. “Kia?”

“I, uh.” I cleared my throat. “I don’t really do sports,” I stated slowly. “I’m not really … coordinated. They don’t trust me in gym class. I think I’m an insurance risk.”

Across the table, Adam burst out laughing. Even Nessie chuckled.
Mr. Chaves didn’t look amused.

“But you have a particular activity you enjoy, right?”

I grimaced. “I … read?”

“She’s brilliant,” Nessie interjected
snidely. “One of the smartest girls in our school. Probably the only smart girl in our school. She’s in all the AP classes and will probably have her pick of any university in the world.”

I wanted to cry.
I wanted to throw my arms around her and squeeze her tight. Then she continued speaking.

“
Kind of makes you wonder if we were switched at birth, doesn’t it? No doubt she was probably meant to be here in my place, being the perfect doormat … I mean daughter to you.”

I knew it wasn’t a jab at me, but I flinched.

Mr. Chaves didn’t seem disturbed by the offhand remark. He took a bite of his pancakes then, in a tone that suggested nothing he replied, “Maybe there’s time to talk to her parents.”

I was looking down at my plate when something bumped my foot under the table. My head came up and I caught Adam’s gaze.
Something in my chest fluttered.

“I’m sorry,”
he mouthed.

I
offered him a small grin before lifting my fork and moving food around my plate.

Mr. and Mrs. Chaves left after breakfast to do some shopping
, but not before doling out chores. Nessie and I were elected to handle the dishes while the boys were given the task of straightening up the sitting area. We didn’t speak as we cleared off the table and filled the sink. Nessie took the dishrag before I could offer to dry. I relented willingly and without complaint.

“You okay?” I asked.

Nessie sniffed, pitching a fork into the sink with brutal force. It struck the metal basin with a resounding clang and sunk beneath the suds.

“
It’s not fair how he treats us,” she muttered bitterly. “Not so much Adam, but me. He always acts like I was the greatest curse to ever befall this family, while Adam could do no wrong.”

I glanced over my shoulder
as I rolled up my sleeves. Adam and Kenny were both busy vacuuming and dusting the sitting area and were oblivious to our conversation. But I could still see the tension in Adam’s shoulders and in the hard lines around his mouth. I may not have known him very well, but even I could tell he was upset by the conversation over breakfast.

“
Adam didn’t exactly get a pat on the back either,” I said, moving to the sink.

Nessie made a snorting sound
. She tossed another fork into the sink, nearly splashing me as it hit the water. “He brings it on himself. He willingly does everything they tell him to do. I have no sympathy for him.” Nessie rolled her eyes. “You don’t get it.”

“Why are you so upset?” I asked.

She shook her head, scrubbing a little too hard at a water glass. “I’m just sick of everyone thinking how perfect Adam is.”

I
frowned. “I don’t think he’s perfect and I’m pretty sure your parents don’t think it either.”

Whatever she was about to tell me was interrupted by the soft chirp of her cell phone. She dried her hands quickly and reached for her back pocket. The thing was shiny and pink with a
Hello Kitty
charm dangling from it. The cat head swung as she read the text. I turned back to the dishes.

“Whatever,” she muttered a second later as she stuffed the phone back into her pocket and snatched up the rag.

“Everything okay?” I asked, dropping a spoon into the rinse sink.