“Stop crying. It’s not even that bad,” my sister said, her hands on her hips and eyes rolling. Only she didn’t realize that it was ‘that bad’, in fact, it was much worse then she could probably imagine.
Grasping my thumb, I gave a few last breathy cries and managed to squeak out “Wh-h-eres D-dad?” With a snap on gum and poorly pointed finger she directed my eyes down the hall. Dad approached us, shaking hands with a man in a tan suit and bellying a big bear laugh. This sight by itself wasn’t alarming, but combined with my brother racing towards him was a concoction for chaos. Everyone knew whoever told Dad the story while he was in a good mood would be believed; everyone knew that in the end, Dad decided what’s true.
“What happened?” he growled, his folded arms giving away his lack of surprise. His eyes glared, burning holes in our inner-most souls. “ONE AT A TIME,” his words covered mine and my brother’s as we raced to tell our story first.
“Here’s what happened,” My brother said. His face scrunched up and lips pursed.
I just knew that he would lie.

Sam’s story:
It all started when she went to pick me up. In fact, this was probably all the church’s fault, since if they would just let me leave by myself she wouldn’t have had to come up in the first place. But anyways, I was in the game room. You know, the one with the blue tiled floor and broken window from when that one kid hit the puck too hard? Well, I was there, just minding my own business. Ryan and I were play air hockey; I was winning, ‘cause I’m a beast. Ha-ha. Then Mrs. Wolfe came in the room and told me that Abby was here to pick me up. We had just learned about how Jesus loved EVERYONE, and I wanna be just like Jesus so I decided to give Abby a big hug. I think she must be allergic to kindness because she kept freaking out when I was just trying to be a good little brother. She started screaming, and I didn’t want her embarrass herself so I stepped away and gave her some air to breathe and calm down. The next thing I know, she started grabbing me and pulling me. I was so scared! I thought she was goin to kill me, I swear! In all the craziness, I musta fell, ‘cause the next thing I knew, she was dragging me. She was about to drag me down the stairs, Dad! So, in self-defense, I pushed her, just to free myself so she didn’t KILL ME. It’s not my fault. She’s just insane. You should ground her.
“Daaad! That’ so untrue! He’s a liar!” I knew this would happen. Parents always believe the youngest kid. Even if he does always lie. “He needs a beating.”
“Nobody is inflicting violence on anyone else. Just chill out,” Dad said, exhausted and annoyed.
“Want to hear the true story?” I shot, fully aware that this would make Sam, the master at being mad, even angrier. Thumb pounding, I told what really happened.

Abby’s story:

I went upstairs to get Sam just like you told me to. I asked Mrs. Wolfe where he was and she told me that he was in the game room. She called his name and we waited. After about five minutes, she went in to get him. He and Ryan must have been playing some game because when they came out together, Sam was hollering about how he had won. Being the annoying showoff that he is, Sam ran up and tackled me, but I thought he was just joking around. He must have fallen down in the process of tackle, because when I went to leave, he was lying on the ground and wouldn’t come with me. I figured he was in a fun sort of mood, so I grabbed his feet and drug him towards the door, jokingly of course. When we were still yards away from the door, I let go of him and helped him up. I HELPED HIM UP. That doesn’t sound very malicious, does it? Anyways, just as I was walking down the stairs he pushed me, and I managed to grab the railing just before I still have the scraps of the paint from where my fingers dug into it. See all that baby blue? Yeah, that’s from the railing. Not that it did me any good since that dirty white floor is so darn slippery that my feet flew forwards anyways. Plus, My grip was about as good as mom’s attempt at cooking, so my thumb slipped and bent backwards when I tried to hold on. I heard it crack and I just knew that he would try to turn it back on me. CLEARLY, this is all his fault.

Sighing, Dad looked at both of us. His first two fingers rubbed his forehead and the others were clenched tightly in a fist.

“Get. In. the. Car,” he commanded, his voice the kind of calm that was a million times scarier than any degree of yelling. Our eyes flew forward, looking in the distance but not quite seeing anything. We knew we were in trouble. Both of us.