Chapter Four


      We finally caught my best friend, all four of us out of breath from running and hollering. We collapsed onto the lawn of whoever's house we were in front of and tried to catch our breath.

      That success, however, was quite short lived. Unfortunately, we had picked Old Man Engwer's yard to rest in. He came out of his house swinging his cane that he had absolutely no use for and hollering obsentities that would make my mother blush.

      We all raised her eyebrows at each other before dashing off down the street, leaving the old guy in his white dingy breifs with his glasses sliding down his dirty face, whirling his cane in the air and yelling there was no tomorrow. Crazy old coot.

      Sorain walked with us down to our Tulsan home that we had lived in recently, due to the several fans knowing where our old house was. It wasn't safe to live there anymore. Now that house was Moe Headquarters. We had a new house not too far out of town. In a small suburb of the huge city. But close enough to still be called Tulsa.

      I remembered something out of nowhere as we were about to step through the door. The kitchen still wasn't clean. Mom wouldn't be too happy about that. Of course, if we had two extra hands to help....

      "Sorain? Do you have anything special to do today?" I asked, maybe a bit overly sweetly.

      "Taylor, if you think for an instant that I am going to get on my hands and knees and help you clean that kitchen floor, you are absolutely insane." She obviously wasn't the dull crayon in the box that I had expected her to be. Dang it.

      Zac latched on to her arm and Iasac stood behind her with his arms and both sides, making sure she didn't go anywhere as I opened the door for them to lead her in. There was always plan B!! Thank goodness my brothers caught on quickly.

      We pulled her into the kitchen with her fighting and scratching every inch of the way. Sorain had this extreme hatred for cleaning. The only thing she cleaned ws herself and maybe her room if she was looking for something. Nothing outside of that.

      I dug under the sink to find the spare pair of gloves and apron.

      Finally I found them, both were fuschia.

      I tossed them to her and said, "All right, Cinderella. Now let's get to this with a bibbity bopity boo."

      We had always called Sorain Cinderella. Perhaps because she looked a bit like her, or maybe it was because she watched the movie with us when we were little OVER and OVER and OVER and could still sing every song on cue from that movie.

      So I found it convenient for her to clean the floor like Cinderella had.

      She grumbled under her breath and got down on her hands and knees to scrub the floor vigirously.

      "Taylor, you owe me big time." She muttered.

      I just shrugged and joined her in the cleaning.

      Isaac and Zac followed suit and we cleaned quietly for a few minutes.

      Finally Isaac broke the silence and spoke.

      "Go ahead and ask."

      His command was directed towards me.

      I remained silent for a few seconds trying to figure out what he wanted me to ask. I could see my reflection on the wood paneling where I was cleaning so I moved to the next spot.

      "Ask what?"

      Isaac sighed and dipped his sponge back in the bucket before returning it to the wood floor and scrubbing.

      "Taylor, you know what I'm talking about. Why do you think Zac and I are cleaning this friggen floor? Itz not because we think pinesol is the latest scent trend and decided to get the genuine smell of it by cleaning."

      Sorain snickered at that one.

      "I don't know Ike. Your haircut might have leaked out a few brain cells."

      Isaac threw his sponge at her before she threw it back and he returned to his spot on the floor.

      "What did you guys do? When did you get in?"

      "Well, we got IN at about 4 or 5 in the morning. What we DID is another story completely. Zac, you wanna tell it?" He asked our younger brother.

      Zac just shrugged, not saying much of anything.

      "O-kay...I guess I'll tell it then. Zac met a cute little girl at the Christmas party. Well, I mean, not like 5 year old little, but like Zac's age little. Anyway, he got stuck under the mistletoe for quite some time."

      I looked at Zac and could only see the top of his head but noticed that the top of his ears were burning crimson.

      "Who was she?" I looked back at Ike for the answer.

      "I don't know. She was new. Lea's cousin that just moved into town I think. From what I heard or understood, she moved in while we were away. She lives right down the street I think. I don't know. I wasn't paying too much attention to that."

      "Then what WERE you paying attention to, Ike? Dare I ask?" I caught on to the way he said I with an accent to it. Like it was of significance.

      "Do you remember Tasha? Well, it turns out that she came back after they moved. She didn't like South Carolina and so she came back to Tulsa on her 18th birthday. Anyway, she was at the party. Taylor, man I'm telling you, that girl has changed." Ike started talking about his old friend that moved out when Ike was about 16. As I remember, she had always been a little on the plus side. And her sarcasm could get a bit piercing at times. Never the less, I was happy for Ike that he had found his old friend.

      "Okay. Can we stop talking about what you think of girls? As insightful as it all is for me to know how your little tiny brains function, I don't like to hear it. So stop." Sorain halted our conversation.

      A quiet took over the kitchen again. What did she WANT us to talk about? The latest shoes put out by Steve Madden? We're not girls here. We are supposed to talk ABOUT girls, not like them.

      Isaac stood up and turned on the small kitchen radio that sat on our counter before getting back to the floor. We had about half of the floor cleaned til it gleamed. *AN: HEY! That rhymed! LoL*

      At the tune we heard on the radio, all of our heads shot up.

      Yep. It was definately Isaac's voice that dominated over the radio to the up tempo Christmas song, "Run Rudolph Run".

      I smiled, as did Ike, Zac, and Sorain, and started nodding my head to the beat and singing along softly at the same time that everyone else did.

      We erupted into laughter and started singing along loudly.

      Soon, we found ourselves on our feet, doing the jitterbug and singing at the top of our lungs.

      At the sound of laughter, we all stopped dead in our tracks and turned to see my Mom and Dad standing in the doorway with a camcorder.

      "Uhhh...hi!!" we all meakly waved at the camera before quickly dropping to our knees and resuming the tedious task of finishing the floor.

      As soon as my parents left the room, we all started laughing as hard as we could.

      "That's definately gonna be shown on Christmas." Sorain shook her head pitifully as she said this.

      We all nodded and then it was back to "The sponge Vs. The Wooden Floor."


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Green Eggs And Hanson

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