Shelly admired the tranquility of her sisters’ sleeping. The twins were cuddled next to each other like always, holding hands. Her other sister, Rose was snoring softly and mumbling in her sleep. Shelly smiled. The worst part of getting them ready for school was disturbing the peace. Shelly took a deep breath.
“GIRLS WAKE UP ITS TIME FOR SCHOOOOOOOOL!” she yelled enthusiastically.
Simultaneously all of her sisters groaned and threw their pillows at her.
“Come on guys, it’s time to wake up!” she said in a shout-whisper. Shelly climbed on top Rose’s bed and pulled of her blanket. She knew that the only way to get these gremlins out of bed was to drag them.
“Let’s go Rosie,” she tugged her sister’s skinny arm, “You better get into the bathroom before the twins do.”
In an instant Rose’s dark eyes opened wide and she frantically made her way out of her bed, throwing her Hello Kitty comforter on the floor.
“I’m up, I’m up, I’m up, I’m up,” she said while running to the bathroom.
Shelly heard the flick of the bathroom light switch down the hall and the light shone into the girl’s room and illuminated the twins’ faces. She saw both of their faces react to the light and as they reached for their blanket to hide from the light Shelly grabbed it.
“Uh uh uh, time for school munchkins,” she said authoritatively. She yanked their blankets off and pulled their arms so they would sit up.
Once they were sitting up they were still half-asleep. Shelly reached for the switch on the wall and said dramatically,
“LET THERE BE LIGHT!”
The twins did not seem to be phased. They rubbed their eyes and slid out of bed.

Twenty minutes later the girls were ready to take the day, all dressed in their green school shirts and their stomachs full of peanut butter toast. They were ready to head to the bus stop but Shelly always made sure that they all popped into mom’s room and gave her a kiss on the cheek and an I love you before they did. Shelly also made sure they gave Sadie, their wonderful golden retriever, a rub on the belly and a kiss on her forehead.  They walked out into the cold dark morning and avoided the coffee brown-mud puddles that seemed to appear every other footstep.
Shelly loved their road, even though it was just an old dirt road that had never been paved before, most of her early childhood memories were found here. She remembers when Rose was still in diapers they would rush outside as soon as it stopped raining and splash and swim in the puddles and run into the garage when they heard a car approach.
Their road was a private road, owned by some old family that never bothered to maintain it so everyone in the neighborhood does their part. Every once and awhile one of the uncles down the road would full the puddles and potholes with dirt or glass or something. But our road was stubborn, in a couple of months after the Kapahi rain would come and pay a visit the puddles would reappear and Shelly and Rose would be swimming once again. Shelly missed all of those memories, she used to laugh at them and now thinking about them makes her sad.
The girls kept walking down the road, the twins a little but ahead, their curly hair bouncing in the pigtails that Shelly spent so long trying to perfect. They were holding hands and humming some song. Shelly looked at them with a sad smile, in complete disbelief that they were actually six years old already. Rachel was a bit taller than Raven and was much more outgoing. She never took no for an answer and always kept her chin up. She was born 8 minutes before her and likes to remind her whenever they get into fights. Raven on the other hand was much more shy, gentler. She was the baby of the family. She cried much more easily but she was always smiling. Rose was walking next to Shelly, rubbing her eyes, still fighting off sleep. Shelly put her arm around her and pulled her close. Rose’s straight glossy hair rested right under Shelly’s chin. Shelly took her hand.
They walked past the long row of mailboxes that signaled that they were at the end of the road. Since their road was so windy and full of potholes, everyone put all of the mailboxes in the front of the street so the mailman’s mornings were that much easier.
“Shelly, I don’t want to go to school today,” Rose said.
“How come? I thought you liked school Ro,” Shelly replied.
“I don’t know 5th grade is hard, and Mrs. Kohl has been so grumpy lately and she likes to take it out on us.”
Shelly laughed.
“I had Mrs. Kohl, remember? She’s not so bad, she probably just needs to drink her fancy coffee.”
“Yeah she needs to drink an ocean of coffee,” Rose said, exasperated.
“Chin up, buttercup. When you’re in middle school, you’re gonna have more than one teacher and most of the time they’re gonna suck,” Shelly said, “Plus you only have one more year of elementary school and then you’ll be up at the middle school with me,” Shelly offered a smile. Rose returned it but with less enthusiasm and let out a sigh and closed her eyes.
They waited at the bus stop for a 10 minutes. The elementary bus always came first, and the Rachel hopped on ready to start the day and Raven trailed behind. Rose gave Shelly a hug and then climbed on. The bus driver, Aunty Ruth, gave Shelly a wave and a toothy smile before she shut the door and made her way to Kapa’a Elementary School.
Shelly’s bus didn’t come for another 5 minutes and in that time she thought about many things, such as college, Sadie, Ryan, their cute neighbor who lives down the street, her mom and her dad. 
Shelly really did not like to think about her dad. But often the thought of him kept her up at night. She wondered where he was, what he was doing, if he was thinking about her or any of them for that matter. She closed her eyes for a few seconds and tried to remember what he looked like. She knew her Mom had pictures of him around somewhere. But Shelly felt that she should be able to remember his face. After all, she was the oldest and she should be the one to remember the most.
He was a lot taller than her. When she hugged him her head would rest right on his chest and she could hear his heartbeat. His eyes were warm, but distant. His voice reminded her of gentle rain on good days, but on the bad days it sounded more like a thunderstorm.
He had nicknames for all of the girls, and for mom too. Shelly was honeybunches, Rose was sweetie pie, Rachel was angel cakes and Raven was sugarplum. On good days he and mom always called each other silly pet names; she was his pumpkin pie and he was her cinnamon roll. But, on their not so go days, the names they called each other were not as sweet.
Shelly opened her eyes before she would remember something that she didn’t want to remember. She shook her head, put a smile on her face and waited for her school bus.