Punch!

Chapter 6: All in the Family

Chapter 6

All in the Family

Ivy didn't say anything as they peeled out of the dark, nearly empty back parking lot. She didn't have to. Suzette was already sinking down in her seat, burning her palms on the rough fabric. "He's a jerk." She whispered.

Ivy clicked on her turning signal. "A hot jerk." She glanced out her rear view mirror. "He knits?"

Suzette pushed herself back up to a regular sitting position. She could feel her spine thanking her. "That's just it." She said. "He doesn't."

Ivy didn't seem too shocked. "So the knitting club was a-"

"Cover up." Suzette finished for her. "Yes."

"So what are they really doing?" Ivy asked as she spun the steering wheel. "Drugs?"

Suzette looked out the window at the apartments with their lights on and the downtown businesses closing for the night. "I don't know."

Ivy rolled her shoulders rhythmically, something she did when she wasn't sure how to respond. "Oh?"

"All they gave me was this address." Suzette waved the now crumpled paper in her hand.

"Read it to me." Ivy demanded.

Suzette did as she was told. "253 Port Avenue."

Ivy's neatly plucked eyebrows shot up. "Sketchy, much?"

"That was my reaction at first," 

Ivy cut her off. "At first?"

Suzette itched her wrist, trying hard not to look at Ivy. "I thought about it some more. Just because it's in a neighborhood that doesn't have the best reputation..."

"Suzie, you shouldn't go."

"Ivy, I'm not going to be one of those stuck up girls who judges something before she even gets the chance to experience it." 

"You're right!" Ivy exclaimed. "You're not one of those girls, you're better! That's why you aren't going to go."

"Careful, Ivy." Suzette warned as Ivy pulled into a parallel park in front of Health Mart, a healthy foods market that her mother was manager of and her family lived above in a spacious apartment. "I'm starting to think you're turning into the stuck up one." She didn't wait to hear Ivy's reaction, but she was pretty sure her friend was just sitting in the driver's seat, rolling her shoulders.

Feeling a mixture of guilt and power, Suzette entered through the side door of the Health Mart, which revealed the familiar wood staircase she climbed every day up to her family's apartment. She reached the deep green door and knocked twice, the Kimberly's signal that it was one of them entering. She pocketed her key as the door opened and inhaled the smell of chicken floating from the kitchen. 

The Kimberly's apartment had lot's of color, each wall was different, and art pieces from all over the country. Mr. and Mrs. Kimberly had traveled quite a bit before they had Suzette and her brother, and had picked up their fair share of odd jobs, making them equipt for pretty much everything. Suzette could understand how most people would think her parents were pretty eccentric, and they wouldn't be wrong. Suzette and her brother Damien, though, were pretty normal.

"Hey, Suzie!" Suzette's mother Georgie had grown up in the south, and had never been able to shake her thick accent. 

"Hi Mom." Suzette called back, setting her keys on the key ring by the front door. 

"How was the History Buffs meeting?" Georgie asked. Suzette could hear the chicken sizzle in a pan. 

Suzette slipped out of her Converse and contemplated. She figured it wasn't time to tell her mother about the run in with the boy just yet. "Uh, it was cancelled." That wasn't a lie. "I was hanging out with Ivy." That wasn't really a lie either. Pleased with herself, she padded into the kitchen.

Suzette found Georgie working away on dinner. Georgie really was beautiful. She had tumbling waves of dark blond hair, and seemingly flawless lightly tanned skin. She was pretty skinny, but not to a point where she looked scary or unhealthy. She had a twisting tattoo of colorful feathers that started a little below her knee and ran down to her ankle on her right side. For awhile Suzette thought her mother's tattoo was embarrassing, but over time she had grown to like it. It showed some personality. "That sounds nice." Georgie said. "We're having some new chicken from the Mart today." Georgie often called the Health Mart the mart for short. "It's supposed to be all natural." 

"Sounds good to me." Suzette walked a few feet and collapsed on the plush green couch that sat in their open living room.

She hadn't even realized Damien was sitting in the recliner chair next to her until he spoke. "Is the remote over there?"

Suzette dug in the sides of the cushions. "No, but there's a pencil and some lint."

Damien stuck his tongue out in disgust, making Suzette laughed. He smiled and stood up to walk over to the television set and turn it on. Damien looked a lot like Georgie. Same hair, same hazel eyes, and even the same smile from time to time. The biggest difference was that he was a fifteen year old boy, a sophomore in high school.

As the television flicked to life, Suzette heard loud footsteps coming down the hall. Without even having to look up, she welcomed the person. "Hey Dad."

Rick Kimberly was Editor in Chief at the St. Augustine Times. Suzette borrowed her eyes and hair from the guy, but unfortunately not his towering height. He always looked disheveled and was never clean shaven; there was always stubble looming on his face. "Hi Suzie."

Damien mentioned the remote, and Rick started looking for it with him. Suzie inhaled the chicken smell once again and closed her eyes. Saturday was the furthest thing from her mind.