Is This What You Call a Family?

Papa and I ended up just grabbing some food from Wendy’s so we could eat on our thirty minute drive to his hometown of Huntington Beach. I knew Mom and I had passed through this area plenty of times when we were moving around, but we had never actually stopped in the city limits, even if I was in a desperate need of a bathroom break. At least I had a general idea of why now.

Soon enough we were pulling up to a quaint looking two story home. It was a light beige color with deep brown on the door, shutters, and window panes. It was a cute and simple little thing. Looking around I noticed that the rest of the neighboring houses looked similar. It looked like a nice, quiet neighborhood and I could see why Papa and his wife chose to settle down here. There was a sudden tapping on my window which made me jump and lean away from it. Papa stood outside with a smile he was trying to hide from me. I guess I had zoned out a bit. My bad.

“Welcome to your new home away from home,” Papa spoke, giving an over dramatic sweep of his arm in the general direction of the house as I opened my door and climbed out of the car.

“It’s cute. I like it,” I said with a small smile of my own. Papa grinned at my words and nodded in agreement.

“Good. Because I expect to see you a lot,” he joked. Well, maybe he was serious. In the short amount of time I’ve been around him, I’ve noticed that though he says some things in a joking manner, he does actually mean the things he says. “C’mon, you have some people to meet.”

Indeed I did. And that was the most unnerving thing in the world to me. He had reassured me plenty of times that everyone would ‘just love me’ and he was excited enough for the both of us. I carefully shut my door before hesitantly following him up the walkway to the front door. He chose the right key on his keyring before unlocking the door and pushing it open, allowing me to step in first. We were deposited into a small entry way that branched off into separate rooms with what I assumed to be a small closet right near the front door.

"Suzy, Kenna, we're home," Papa called as he shut the door behind himself. I instantly heard soft footsteps coming from a room on the right side of the hall. Within moments a woman appeared with a wide smile on her lips. She had deep red hair that fanned around her face and honey colored eyes. Papa swooped forward to give her a hug and quick peck on the lips before wrapping an arm around her shoulders. "Honey, this is my granddaughter, Juliet. Juliet, this is my wife Suzy."

"It's a pleasure to meet you," I spoke politely with a small smile as I held out a hand. Suzy let out a 'pfft' before moving my hand aside and taking me into a soft hug. I focused on keeping my breathing calm and not the arms encircling me and making everything feel too close and - suddenly the arms were gone as soon as they had come and Suzy was smiling even brighter at me. Luck must be on my side for her to not have noticed my small freak out.

"I'm so happy to finally meet you, Juliet. You can just call me Suzy. I don't really prefer grandma, especially since I'm not technically your grandmother by blood," Suzy explained with the slightest of shrugs. I frowned as my eyebrows knitted together in confusion.

"But I thought..."

"Your father and your uncle, Brent, are from my first marriage that ended quite a while ago. Your aunt McKenna is from my marriage with Suzy," Papa explained upon seeing my puzzlement.

"I have an uncle?"

"Yeah, but he's nowhere near as cool as me," a new voice boasted from above us. I looked behind Suzy and Papa to see a girl with pink and purple hair nearly skipping down the stairs. Funny enough, she dressed a lot like how I enjoyed to; skinny jeans and band shirts. She came to a stop in front of me and stuck out a hand. "McKenna Haner at your service. No need for the aunt formality unless you want to have me threaten someone. Because, let's be honest, it would be a bit weird for you to call me aunt when you're like, what, four years younger than me?"

"Agreed. Juliet Evans." We gave a firm shake before letting out hands fall back to our sides. I glanced around the house at what I could see and it looked a lot like the kind of house I had wished Mom and I would have moved into instead of another ratty old apartment with questionable water reliability. “You guys have a lovely home.”

“Oh, please. You've only seen the doormat, really,” McKenna scoffed as Suzy and Papa chuckled. “C’mon, I’ll give you the grand tour!”

I looked at Papa for confirmation that I could and he nodded. “Go ahead. I’ll just go help Suzy finish up the cookies.”

Oh, so that’s what that smell was. I haven’t had fresh baked cookies since I was seven. The smell was practically making me salivate now that the smell seemed more potent to me. I didn’t have long to think about it since McKenna was soon grabbing my hand and pulling me into a room opposite of where Suzy had come from. She had taken us into the living room and from there continued into the backyard and back through another door which deposited into a small room with a washer and dryer. Through yet another door was the kitchen that Papa and Suzy had just entered. With promises to bring us the sweets when they were done, McKenna led us through yet another connecting door (this time a swinging door) to the dining room.

“That door leads down to the basement,” McKenna explained as she pointed to a lone door sitting on the very edge of the dining room that was separated from everything else. “The basement is mostly a no go spot. Dad’s studio is down there and he’s kind of picky with people touching his equipment. The only time we’re allowed down there is when he’s down there. Sadly, Brian’s mostly the same.”

“My dad?” McKenna nodded at my words before motioning for me to follow her out of the room. We entered back by the front door again and she quickly bounded up the stairs with me following at a much more leisurely pace. Once I was next to her in the upstairs hallway, which was lined with doors in a horseshoe kind of idea, she began to point at each room in turn.

“That’s Mom and Dad’s room. That’s one of the spare bedrooms next to them, the game room is next to that, then a separate bathroom, the room you’ll be staying in, and then my room. Your room and my room goes into the same bathroom while Dad and Mom have a separate one. If you don’t want to share a bathroom with me, the separate one is all yours,” McKenna explained. She pushed open ‘my’ room’s door long enough to let me see what it looked like (it was just a room with a queen sized bed, chair in the corner, and a dresser with a TV on it. The colors mostly used were blue, green, and white) before shutting it again and leading me through the door she had dubbed the game room.

This room a bit more impressive to me than the other rooms I had been shown so far. There was a large screen TV on the wall directly in front of us with two leather couches between us, one directly facing the television while the other one was perpendicular to the other. The windows were covered with thick curtains so the room was only illuminated with christmas lights that went around the top of the room. I could at least make out an Xbox 360, Playstation 3, and some Rock Band equipment for one of the systems. There were also floating shelves around the room filled with games for both game stations along with shelves filled with movies.

“And this is Brian, Brent, and I’s pride and joy,” McKenna announced as she jumped over the back of the couch and plopped on it, her arms raising on either side of her in a ‘ta-da’ fashion. “For the record, this is another one of the rooms that has an almost exact twin at Brian’s house. He has the newer consoles too and better furniture and tv, but it’s basically all the same.”

“I know where I’ll be spending most of my time then,” I remarked as I chose to walk around the couch and sit next to McKenna. She leaned forward to the coffee table she had her feet resting on and grabbed a remote and Playstation controller.

“Big gamer?” she asked as she turned on the tv and console before placing the remote down on the armrest next to her.

“I would if we had game consoles. The only thing I really had for a while was a Gameboy advanced. I had a friend that had newer consoles though so if I was ever over, she let me play games a lot,” I explained with a small shrug at the end.

“Well, believe me, while you’re here, you can play all you want. Brian will probably play with you. Wait, no. Matt and Johnny would probably play more. They’re the big gaming nerds. Matt’s more into first person shooters while Johnny likes role playing games.” McKenna finally looked over at me after explaining all this and signing in and noticed my confused look. “Oh. You don’t know who Brian’s friends are yet?”

“Not really? I mean, I think Papa mentioned one or two of them in passing but not really.”

“Do you know what they do for a living?”

“No,” I sighed out. “Papa keeps saying that Brian should explain whenever he gets back from his business trip.”

“Oh! Okay, then I’ll just give you the basic rundown for now. What do you want to watch?” McKenna asked as she pulled up Netflix. One of the first things I saw was Bob’s Burgers, a show Mom and I watched a few times before, and said as much. She picked it before beginning to explain about some of my fathers friends he’s known since high school, including the woman who were by now married to them.

“And then there’s Arin. Arin is a new friend of theirs. He’s only been around for a year or so by now though,” McKenna said as we continued to watch the Belcher kids run amuck.

“How’d they meet him?”

“Through a business venture. But really, most of the time, the people who they meet through those situations become part of the family.”

“You make is sound like they’re a gang or something,” I laughed while made McKenna chuckle too.

“Worst gang ever,” McKenna teased. At that moment the smell of cookies became much stronger than before, causing the two of us to turn around. Suzy entered first with a plate stacked with cookies while Papa followed with four glasses of milk delicately being held in his hands and arms. I couldn’t tear my eyes away as he carefully kneeled down to release the glasses being held between his arms onto the coffee table surface. Once they were successfully placed, he let out a sigh and passed McKenna and I each a glass still in his hands.

“So how do you like the house?” Papa asked as he and Suzy settled on the other couch.

“It’s still lovely,” I said as I dipped a cookie into the milk before taking a bit. I practically moaned as the cookie basically exploded in my mouth, the milk and chocolate chips mixing together too well. “These are delicious! Thank you so much!”

“No problem, sweetie. And thank you,” Suzy chimed with a slight blush as she ate her own. McKenna let out a quiet groan as she chewed.

“Damn, Mom. These are the best yet. You are definitely stepping up your cookie game,” McKenna complemented with Papa nodding in agreement.

“All of you stop, you’re embarrassing me,” Suzy spoke while the smile on her face said she appreciated it. We soon all lapsed into a comfortable silence we munched on our snack and continued to watch the show. By the end of the episode (the second one to play), we had all devoured the cookies and finished off our milk. Suzy stood to her feet and piled the glasses onto the empty plate. “Well, we’ll leave you two alone now so you can enjoy yourselves.”

“Let us know if you need anything,” Papa called as he finally tore his eyes away from the television and smiled before shutting the door behind himself. McKenna went back to the homescreen of the Playstation and turned to me.

“Have you heard of the game Bioshock?”

“Heard of it, wanted to play it, but never did,” I said with a shrug. She signed out of her account and handed the controller to me.

“Whelp, today is your lucky day. Make an account or sign into one you have. Then click on the game,” McKenna explained as she grabbed the game she wanted off the shelf. I did as she said and used the information I had used on Emily’s Playstation. Soon enough I was loading up the game and McKenna was practically shaking with anticipation. Oh, this is going to be interesting.