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A silent Thatcher is my favorite Thatcher. Because when he’s speaking, nine-times-out-of-ten it’s to reprimand me.
“Love is pain, and you know what…I feel sorry for anyone who hasn’t met it yet.”
So you know Winona Briar Meadows as the fourteen-year-old fearless animal lover with a spirit as wild as the Meadows family. You follow her Instagram account that’s littered with nature photography and rock climbing excursions. If she’s not advocating for animal rights with Ben Cobalt, then she’s hanging with her girl squad and keeping to herself. You beg her to post more selfies, and you criticize her when she doesn’t.
You know Ben Pirrip Cobalt as the sixteen-year-old savvy environmentalist who makes friends easier than all of my family combined. He’ll even be your friend. He’s probably already followed you back on Twitter or Instagram, and he’s liked your pictures ten or twenty times. You think he’s one of the coolest Cobalt boys—with his accessibility, his windswept brown hair, baby blue eyes, and pretty boy charm—and you wouldn’t be wrong.
Shit, the youngest guy in this car is the tallest at six-foot-five.
His brows slowly lift at me like I’m the geekiest fucking geek that ever did geek. “Of a dead Roman philosopher?”
But if you know my dad at all, he’s a hard sell. Saving my life is like half-a-brownie point. For my mom, Farrow earned every brownie that ever existed in every universe.
So if you need me to tell you five-thousand times, a million, that I’m so fucking in love with you, I will.”
“Cicero said, ‘The life of the dead is placed on the memories of the living. The love you gave in life keeps people alive beyond their time.’”
“Dum spiro, spero.” I circled that phrase in my paperback. I know he took Latin in college, but I ask anyway, “You know what that means—” “‘While I breathe,’” he translates, “‘I hope.’”
Farrow is close to laughter. “You told your dad you’re naming your son Batman.” My eyes pop out of my head. “No I didn’t.” He has to be fucking with me. “Yeah, you did,” Farrow smiles wide. “Your dad asked you, what son? And you said the one in the Batmobile.” I blink slowly. “I killed my dad. He’s dead, right? Death by Batman talk.”
Akara continues, “All of us here—we are Omega. Even if you’re transferred to another client, even if you quit or get fired. We’re the bodyguards on SFO until further notice.”
Akara is playing with her chocolate brown hair, and he coils a long strand over his upper lip in a fake mustache. Sulli cracks a smile and shoves his chest.
“When I love someone,” he says in a rough whisper, “I love them proudly, and you deserve the achingly normal, romantic shit more than anyone. Everything you’ve never had. All the pictures you post, all the videos you do on your own, I want to be in them—and it’d kill me not to give you that. Especially now that we’re public.”
My dad’s brows scrunch at me. “Did your mom and I not teach you the art of being a couch potato? Jesus Christ, I’ve truly failed as a parent.”
“Choose the path where you’re not fighting yourself, don’t be afraid of change, don’t live for less than what you love—those are your words, Farrow. To me, it’s obvious what you need to do.”
“Can’t blame her.” Donnelly reaches for a new package. “Who wouldn’t want to have some Cobalt babies?” Thatcher casts a reprimanding look but stays quiet.
I swing my head to the Omega lead. “And Akara…o’ captain my captain.” I wouldn’t call anyone else that but him.
“We’re getting our Meredith back.” He slow-claps. I smile. “Man, you know I’m a Christina.”
It opens before I even grab the knob. And my boyfriend fills the doorway. He looks at the welt on my face, and then his eyes basically murder Thatcher a hundred different ways.
On the semi-flipside, my mom overcompensates and will tweet fifty times a day about us: #Marrow for life! This is what love looks like #Marrow Proud mom #Marrow
I told Jane what her bodyguard said, and immediately she told me, “I won’t speak to him. I can’t.” Out of loyalty to us, she’s been on a gigantic silent treatment with Thatcher until further notice.
“And I ran a mile yesterday.” Sulli looks horrified. “Alright, it was a walk, not a run,” I clarify. “A PT was there so I wouldn’t kill myself.”
My dad raised me to be like Ryke. Because he loved his brother more than he loved himself.
All I know is that Janie deserves the best, and Thatcher is one of the only names on my very short shit list. He’s not the fucking best. He’s far from it.
He gestures from his chest to my chest. “I’ve taken so much away from you, and I can’t stop it. I can’t change the fact that my family is chaotic, messy, and bizarre-as-fuck because I love them as they fucking are, and I feel selfish wanting you to be a part of that.”
@KinneyGothHale: Older brother has been talking about Aristotle for 30 min at breakfast.
@KinneyGothHale: Also Moffy’s boyfriend and me are the only ones who can make fun of him. You try, you die.
That’s the title of the daily series. Alphas Like Us. Based off the summary: Admittedly territorial, admittedly protective, Maximoff Hale and his new boyfriend are the couple of the year. Whether you love them or hate them, they’re everywhere.
“Every night Beckett is on stage, he strives for perfection in ballet. It’s an impossible goal, and he’s worn his body down to the point of pain. A couple years ago, he found a fix.” A lump makes its ascent in my throat. “Cocaine,” Charlie says plainly, clearly.
And for someone who’s a kindergartener with stress—you know: he’s like rubber, stress is like glue; it bounces off him and sticks to you—working
I know him as my little cousin who will be the first to fall into chaos. Who chooses to run towards danger instead of away, and who calls me up every Saturday to talk about that guy in the back of the class he has a crush on. He means more to me than any words can describe. Fair Warning: if you fuck with him, we will both fuck with you.
You know Audrey Virginia Cobalt as the thirteen-year-old hopeless romantic. In her spare time, she reads adult romance novels and narrates all the “blush-worthy” parts on her Instagram. You think she talks like she’s been factory-made from a Jane Austen novel, and you salivate for any photo she takes with her big sister Jane. You wonder what it would be like to grow up as the youngest with five Cobalt brothers, but she rarely tells you.
“If you’re just lookin’ to be eaten out, I’ll eat you out—” “Hey,” Maximoff cuts in on the bottom stair, eyes narrowed. His dark hair is wet from a shower, but he’s already dressed: jeans and a green crew-neck. “What the fuck, Donnelly?” He shuts off his machine. “I like eating pussy.” Maximoff looks at him like he lost his mind. “That’s my sister.”
Donnelly tattooed a wolf with a pirate eye-patch, and two letters are inked on the patch. WS.
Connor is mental. He taught Maximoff intelligence, emotional restraint and confidence. Lo is emotional, the sarcastic, loving and empathetic pieces of him. And then Ryke is physical, all determination and stubbornness and unshakeable strength.
Maximoff mouths something to Ryke, and that prompts Ryke to throw a wadded napkin at Connor, who easily leans back and dodges the affront. “Excuse the Rottweiler,” Connor tells me. “Continue.”
“No DC at the table,” Lo snaps. “I swear to all living Marvel things, I grabbed the wrong child in the Home Goods store.”
Connor tells the table, “In other news, I was offered a condom sponsorship this morning.” Ryke almost spits out his water. “You have seven fucking kids.” “Royal sperm,” Lo quips. “Don’t fucking encourage that,” Ryke says and points at Connor’s billion-dollar grin with a butter knife.
I watch as Lo digs into his pocket and pulls out a crumpled piece of paper. “Questions for the Overly Tattooed Boyfriend of My Perfect Son Dot Com.” He gives me an iconic dry smile. “I hate tattoos.” “I know,” I say with a nod. “Good thing your son loves them.”
She plays favorites with her four daughters. And that hierarchy directly affects me and my siblings and my cousins. I’ll give you the breakdown. 1. Rose Calloway – Jane’s mom 2. Poppy Calloway 3. Daisy Calloway – Sullivan’s mom 4. Lily Calloway – my mom is dead last. Always.
“I like him, by the way,” Beckett tells me honestly. “Farrow, he’s really good for you.” My eyes almost grow. Is this letter magical or something?
And I realize now, loving Maximoff entirely means letting his family in. Because the day that I’m the reason there’s tension between him and you is the day I’ve failed him.
Whereas Akara and Farrow are panting, both drenched in sweat and catching their breaths. Jack is also beat, but he has the added weight of a light steadicam contraption attached to his chest.
She holds out her hand to stop him from edging near. “I just feel like you stole him from me. Like Jack was supposed to be the perfect fucking friend, the guy I could hang with, the one I could talk to about anything without fear—and now you two are best friends and where am I?” She pauses. “Not that…I mean, I wouldn’t claim a friend like that…I just…” Her cheeks roast bright red.
Beach parties with the Hales, Meadows, and Cobalts consist of one massive sandcastle competition, and since I’m with Maximoff, I’ve been recruited onto Team Hale.
Bodyguard Facts: if you’re looking to win a wager, you don’t bet on the Hales. I was the only one who ever did.
“So now they’re children?!” he yells back. “Because for two decades, I thought you’ve been calling them gremlins.” She does call her kids gremlins. It’s widely known.
“I love being a concierge doctor to your family. I don’t want that to change.” “You can do both,” he says those words and it’s like someone has offered me something that makes no sense. Like golden eggs and fairytale bullshit.
“Dum spiro, spero,” he reads the Cicero quote. His eyes well up again. On a day that rocked us both, he said he loved that quote. It was a quiet moment inside a storm. The memory is as tranquil as the quote itself. While I breathe, I hope.
