“Everything doesn’t set me off! Your entitled ass sets me off. Why should it be our money, when I’m the one that does all the work? And anyway, you don’t even know what the hell we’re talking about, but you feel so free to give your stupid opinion!”
Her body hummed with a thousand volts of electricity ready to split him down the middle. It was too much. She’d lost to Lauren and made no progress in her investigation. Could anyone really expect her to tolerate her brother too? Even Mr. Rogers couldn’t be expected to maintain this much charity in his heart.
“Okay, okay. Let’s not fight.” Her father stepped in front of Junior as if the grown man needed protecting. “The business belongs to the family. We decide things together.”
“Together? Okay.” Sylvie seethed. “When he gets up at two o’clock in the morning every day for ten years, we’ll make decisions together.”
Junior grinned. “You’re the workhorse, Sylvie. I’m the brains.”
“Let’s go eat,” her father turned Junior around and urged him down the hallway. “Before anyone loses an eye.”
“He’s just teasing you.” Her mother stood and walked across the room to put her arm around Sylvie’s shoulders. “Just ignore him. He loves you.”
Sylvie scoffed. “Sure. He loves me. Listen, I’m going to skip dinner. I’m tired and I just want to go home and take a shower. I have to get up early. . .” unlike Junior who will wake up at noon and play video games in his tighty-whities all day.
Defeated, Sylvie drove out of her parents’ gated community and into her own. With a little rest she’d come up with another game plan. No matter what she couldn’t give up.