I should have known better than to take a shortcut through the kitchen. The smell of ground beef sizzling on the stove ought to have been warning enough to find an alternate route. Dinner preparations were underway, and if I were spotted wandering through, there’d be no escape. Mom always had a long list of chores to dole out to those stupid enough to get caught. And with the crappy day I’d had, I was determined not to let that happen. Channeling my inner feline, I silently rotated and stealthily crept back toward the door I’d just traveled though.

“Oh, good, Emma,” Mom said, relief evident in her overworked voice.

Don’t look up. Avoid eye contact of any kind. Fiddling with my MP3 player, I hoped the earphones in my ears would fool her into thinking I hadn’t heard my name being called. A getaway, however ugly, was still possible.

“I know you can hear me.”

It was a shameless bluff. Unless she’d crawled into my ears, there was no way my mother could know for sure that I’d heard her. The door was a step away; I could still make it if I tried.

“Emma! Do I need to take your CD player away?”

I stopped dead in my tracks, veins pulsing in response to my mother’s ignorant threat. How many times did I have to tell her it was an MP3 player? It wasn’t the 1990’s, for god’s sake.

“What is it?” I asked curtly, purposely averting my eyes because I knew it annoyed her.

If she detected my snooty sixteen-year-old girl tone, my mother wisely chose to ignore it. Lately, it seemed, I was a hornet’s nest just begging to be poked. I didn’t enjoy the anger that slowly simmered inside, and at times, I felt powerless to control it. My parents blamed my impatience on hormones; I blamed it on their banal nettling.

“Can you please set the table for me?”

Heat burned my cheeks. I wanted to stomp my feet in protest. Why did every little thing out of her mouth set me off? Had she always been such a controlling dictator, or was this a recent development? Obviously my mother was too self-absorbed to care that I had bigger issues that needed addressing: namely, my ex-best friend, Kara, openly crushing on the guy I liked. Talk about a conniving little slut. She knew how I felt about Drake, listening to hours upon hours of my blubbery declarations of love. How could I not have seen Kara deviously plotting her deception? A wicked smile formed on my double-crossed lips. No one messed with Emma McKallister and lived to tell about it. By tomorrow morning, my former best friend would be systematically annihilated.

“Why can’t one of the boys do it?”

“I didn’t ask one of the boys, I asked you.”

“Because I’m a girl?” I said, all sass.

“No, because you’re a part of this family, and I need help.”

No, because I walked through the kitchen at the wrong damn time... and I’m a girl! I let out an exaggerated sigh of displeasure. There was no point in arguing since my mother was a world-class nagger. She’d just follow me around bitching and complaining until I did what she wanted, so I might as well get it over with now. Kara would have to wait for her punishment… but she would not be spared.

“Fine, but I’m not clearing the table afterward.”

Mom didn’t answer other than to roll her eyes and mumble something I couldn’t hear. I went to the cupboard and pulled down the plates, eight in all. Only a couple of them matched. Over the years, some would break, and Mom would buy new ones to replace them. But my mother always bought different patterns because, in her words, she “wanted to mix it up.” So new designs would be mixed with old, and fruit themes would be sitting side-by-side with floral ones.

I completed my chore and then looked down at the finished product. Four different style plates, five different size cups, and hastily placed silverware. Even the napkins weren’t folded ornamentally like in the magazines. Ours were just lying limply next to the plate. I shook my head, struggling to contain my irritation. I had recently developed an aversion to anything mismatched. For me, everything had a place and purpose, complementing each other whenever possible. Mom didn’t see it my way. In fact, when I’d brought up the issue to her recently, she’d instantly turned hostile and alleged she didn’t have time to worry about insignificant stuff like that. Geez, she didn’t have to be so testy.

When I was younger the slack attitude toward societal guidelines hadn’t bothered me as much; but now that I was sixteen, and chaos surrounded me at every turn of a corner, I sometimes fantasized about coming home to a different family – a fancier, more cultured one, or at least one that cared about the natural order of things. Someday, when I was a mom, I was going to have it all together. My table would be immaculate, and I also wouldn’t be recycling the same eight tired dinners over and over for the rest of my life. My rich husband would provide for swankier meals, like… well, I didn’t know any swankier meals, but someday I would. And those would be served on a pretty table with folded napkins and matching plates.

My baby sister burst into the kitchen, her shiny blonde hair trailing her like a cape. Before I knew what was happening, she’d latched onto my leg like a blood-sucking tick.

“Grace,” I said, mumbling as I shook my leg in irritation and attempted to unfasten her. “Get off.”

“No. I love you!” My sister squished her defiant little face harder into my flesh. Love was not why she was clinging to me now. Gracie was just being her insufferable five-year-old self.

I tried to pry her off me, but the pint-sized brat wouldn’t detach. “Let go! MOM! Tell her to get off.”

“Grace, leave your sister alone,” Mom said, but not with the urgency the situation clearly called for.

“No, I love her. I won’t let go EVER.”

Oh, but you will. Maybe Mom didn’t think it was imperative to act swiftly to extinguish such bratty behavior, but I, for one, would not stand for it.

“Get off,” I hissed, before grabbing a handful of my sister’s soft, silky baby hair and yanking. Grace screamed and instantly disengaged. Bolting to safety, she buried her head in Mom’s leg instead of mine. Good riddance!

“Emma!” Mom screeched. “What’s wrong with you?”

“Me?” I asked, indignantly. “I warned her.”

“So you think it’s fine to resort to violence when you don’t get your way?”

“In this particular situation,” I said, crossing my arms angrily and standing my shaky ground, “Yes, I do.”

“Well, that’s not the way it’s done in this house,” Mom said, through gritted teeth. “Give me that CD player and go to your room.”

“UUUHHGGG! IT’S AN MP3 PLAYER!” I screamed, slamming the electronic device into her open palm before stomping off in a display of blistering outrage. On my way down the narrow hallway, I crossed paths with my older brother Keith. It was obvious he was about to make some snarky comment, but he thought better of it as he caught sight of my expression. Keith wisely flattened himself against the wall as I passed. Good choice.

Finally at the threshold of my sanctuary, I gripped the side of my door and slammed it with enough force to ensure every person in the house could fully appreciate my fury. Even the mirror hanging on the back of my door was not spared; it swung out and violently crashed into the wall.

So intense were my emotions that tears formed in my eyes. A nagging guilt tugged at me, but I stubbornly pushed it aside. It was exhausting being this angry all the time. Why couldn’t everyone just back off and leave me alone? It was like they wanted to rile me up. Dramatically, I flung myself on my bed and spent the next hour or so of my spiteful existence spinning a web of deceit for Kara to fall into, complete with a written outline of how I wanted things to go down. She might get Drake, but that was all she’d get. By the next morning, if everything went as planned, Kara wouldn’t have a friend to speak of.

* * *

The smell of dinner that had been wafting through the confines of our cramped five-bedroom home was now gone. I wondered if Mom had not called me to eat because of what I’d done to Grace. I probably shouldn’t have pulled her hair, but a girl can only take so much. I hated having so many damn kids running around the house. Nobody bothered to ask me if I wanted any more siblings.

My stomach rumbled as I reluctantly opened my door and made my way down the hall. Knowing I was probably going to get screamed at, I readied my response. I was planning to go the sympathy route. Usually if I threw the whole You never have time for me anymore in my parents’ faces, their guilt kept my punishment light. But when I walked into the kitchen, our dinner was just sitting on the table getting cold. Mom was pacing back and forth, her face pinched in irritation and her fingers tapped nervously on the counter.

“Why aren’t we eating?” I asked.

“Because the boys aren’t home yet. Dad’s been out looking for them for the past hour. They weren’t at the skate park.”

“Oh.” I blew the tension out of my lungs. There was nothing that got me off the hook faster than one of the boys doing something stupid. Luckily I could always count on Kyle to be an idiot.

“So should the rest of us just eat, then?” I asked, indifferent to my Mom’s obvious distress.

“No. We’ll wait for Dad to get home with the boys,” she said, in a clipped tone. “And don’t think we aren’t going to discuss your behavior, Emma.”

“You need to control her better.” I spat the words from my mouth.

“And you need to start acting like a human being instead of a spoiled snot.”

The sound of tires rolling over cement caught our attention. Mom’s back tightened as she opened the door.

“Did you find them?” she called to him, her voice catching in her throat.

“No.”

Mom’s eyes widened, as her skin slowly faded to an ashen white. “Where could they be?”

Dad lumbered into the kitchen, each step more distressed than the next. “I’m telling you, Michelle, I have no idea. I’ve gone everywhere. I stopped by Drew’s, and Jason’s and Peter’s. None of them have seen the boys, and all three were at the skate park when Jake and Kyle were supposed to be there. Something’s not right. I’m actually getting worried.”

“It’s not like them,” she said, more to herself than to my father. “They know better than to be out past dark.”

I glanced between my worried parents, completely unconcerned about my brothers. They were making a big deal out of nothing. Those boys were always into something. I was hungry. When exactly was Mom planning on serving dinner?

“I’m going to call around and see if any of their other friends have seen them.”

His brows furrowing, Dad absently nodded. His thoughts were far away as he pulled the baseball cap off his head and drew in deep, calming breaths. Perhaps sensing me staring, Dad caught my eye and his pained gaze startled me. My father was the happy-go-lucky type, not the overly dramatic worrier, but the look on his face was clear: he was scared. And that, in turn, caused me to shift in my chair and experience the first prickly sensation that something bad might actually have happened.

I checked the clock. It was almost eight. I’d been so wrapped up in preparing Kara’s funeral that I hadn’t realized so much time had passed. With Kyle being twelve years old and Jake thirteen, they had a strict sundown curfew.

Keith trotted in with Grace riding on his back, an imaginary whip forcing him to move faster. “You haven’t found them yet?” His playfulness ceased once he caught sight of Dad’s frowning face.

“Can you think of anywhere else they might have gone?”

“I mean, just the places I told you about earlier,” Keith answered.

“Any new friends you know of? Is Jake playing with a new band, maybe?”

There was something so unsettling in Dad’s anxious words that shivers crept along my skin. I crossed my arms, trapping the breeze.

“No, Dad. I don’t know,” Keith said, lowering Grace to the ground. She ran to the table and dipped her hand in the cheese. Mom didn’t bother to stop her. She was preoccupied, on the phone, calling everyone she knew.

Six-year-old Quinn had joined Grace in dinner. Neither was particularly skilled at putting a taco together, and within seconds all the fillings were strewn across the table. Normally such a sight would annoy me to no end, but the nagging anxiousness settling deep in my belly kept me silent. I watched restlessly as the kids chatted happily with one another, blissfully unaware of the panic beginning to take form around them. The oxygen in the room began to thin, making it harder to breathe as my thoughts focused on Jake and Kyle. Where were they?

Mom, still on the phone, had the high pitch of a woman on the verge of hysteria. Her lips trembled as she asked the same question: “Have you seen my sons?” Not to be outdone, my father paced the floor, repeating the same words over and over again. “Should we call the police? What should we do?”

Time passed slowly as an ominous feeling of doom settled over the whole lot of us, and the longer we waited, the darker and more sinister the possibilities became. The police were called by 8:15, and as we waited for them to arrive, frantic screaming from somewhere down the street brought the four of us to our feet. We raced from the kitchen into the darkened night and followed the sounds of hysteria. There was no doubt in any of our minds that our questions were about to be answered in the cruelest of ways.

We met Kyle several houses down, his nostrils flaring and his eyes wild with fear. He flung himself into our mother’s quaking arms. He was speaking so fast and so frantically that none of us could understand the words. Mom, her face contorted in horror, gripped my brother’s small body and pushed him back, getting a first look at her injured son. Blood from a wound on his forehead traced lines through the dirt on Kyle’s face, and his arm hung at an awkward angle by his side. Mom grasped his flushed cheeks and lifted his head. All she managed to say was, “Jake?”

Kyle drew himself up and then burst into tears. “Gone.”