A/N: Again, I apologize for taking so freaking long to update!!! Believe it or not, this chapter has been more or less done for the last week, but I've just been too lazy to connect my computer to the internet and upload it. But yeah, here it is! Thanks for waiting and Merry Christmas, etc. )
Disclaimer: I don't smoke pipes and I'm not an old British man—stop looking at me like that! He was old! So that means that Bo is, unfortunately, not mine.
Caitlin excused herself from her family's company very early, stumbling up the stairs to her old room. It was so nice of her parents to keep it for her, even if she never came home anymore. She didn't even bother turning on the light, because the only business she had with the room involved the bed, and she knew exactly where that—
"Ow." From her new position sprawled on the hardwood floors, the faint shadowy outlines of furniture began to appear. Then her mother's quivery voice sang through the floor.
"Caitsey? You okay? I rearranged the furniture a little!"
Caitlin crawled to her feet, using some sort of wooden contraption to support her and reached for the light switch by the door. Thankfully, it at least, hadn't moved. The light bulb hummed and strained above her, flickered on, popped once, and then cast a steady, if weak, light across the room. "Rearranged a little?" If it weren't for the signature bubblegum-pink aura of the room, she wouldn't have recognized it. The floor was cluttered with old furniture in various stages of wholeness. The walls were littered with old dusty pictures. The windowsills housed several species of insects. It looked as if her room had become the attic. It was difficult to find the bed, so surrounded was it by boxes and crates, and covered with old letters and empty picture frames. Once Caitlin had made her way to it, she looked down at the dusty worn cover and sighed. "Darn it."
Caitlin turned and made the arduous journey back to the door. Isabel could sleep on the floor for all she cared. The spiders and junk could have the "attic." She was going to sleep in a real bed if it was the last thing she did!
Even if Isabel was an awful cruel and slutty sister, her room was positively marvelous. The walls were a warm blue and she had creamy white curtains and spindly furniture of the same shade as the curtains. More importantly, she had a mattress that definitely ranked above average in terms of comfort. Caitlin smiled tenderly at it and then, with no further ceremony crawled between the smooth sheets and promptly fell asleep.
An uncomfortable pressure on her shoulder woke Caitlin sometime in the night and she opened her eyes to see a frowning Isabel yanking on her arm fiercely. "Go 'way," Caitlin grumbled and buried her face in the pillow.
"Caitsey, this is my room and I'm tired!" Isabel whined.
Caitlin lifted her face bare centimeters from the pillow and mumbled something about her sleeping on the couch. Or that was what she thought she said, but seconds later, she felt the bed shift and someone pushed her over so that she was barely even on the mattress. Next ensued a fierce battle of tug-of-war with the sheets, which, predictably, Caitlin lost miserably. Isabel did not even have the decency to leave her the scratchy blanket but clutched it greedily and turned away from Caitlin. Glaring proved ineffective, and Caitlin feared that if she were to go in search of a blanket, she would be doomed to the rock-hard couch that smelled like old coca-cola—ancient coca-cola. And so, she resigned herself to curling into a pathetic ball and holding the pillow protectively in her arms. She wouldn't put it past Isabel to attempt to steal that last piece of comfort.
A disturbing dream ensued when she finally recovered the precious stage of sleep. She did not remember the details of it in the morning, except that tall yellow bunnies and talking tomatoes were involved. She lay on her back for a few minutes after waking, staring at the yellowing ceiling and trying to make sense of the bizarre vision. The door opened and Isabel slipped through, wrapped in a fluffy blue towel, vigorously drying her hair.
"Isn't it time you got up?" she asked mildly. Caitlin grunted: she was so close—it was something about the tomatoes trying to take over the world…or was it the bunnies who were aiming for world dominion? And what did a wedding have to do with anything? "I'm going shopping in a couple hours." Caitlin grunted again, wishing Isabel would leave so she could go back to sleep. Isabel dropped onto the bed, effectively cutting off all circulation to Caitlin's lower extremities and crushing her kneecaps.
"Ow!" Caitlin growled irritably and tried to kick her sister while twisting away. "What the hey?"
Isabel turned her head and smiled cheerily, "You just don't get a hint, do you, pudding? I'm going shopping." Her fingers began to weave through the air, vaguely resembling a person walking. "Do you" her fingers now pointed at Caitlin, "want to come" she gestured at the both of them and smiled.
Caitlin's eyes that were still sleep-crusted narrowed. "Are you asking me to spend an afternoon with you?" Isabel nodded and finally rolled of Caitlin's legs as her sister jumped up theatrically and threw her arms into the air. "Quick! Someone call a doctor! She's sick!" She turned and grabbed both of Isabel's forearms and stared searchingly into her eyes, "What have you done with my sister? Where is she?"
"Shut up!" Isabel slapped her hands away and frowned, although Caitlin could see the amusement in her eyes, "Come on, Caitsey: we're adults! Can't we just let the past be and move on?"
It was the younger's turn to frown. "You frenched my boyfriend. My boyfriend. Remember?"
Isabel shrugged guiltily. "Maybe we should look at it as me doing you a favor." Caitlin repeated the last two words incredulously. And Isabel nodded emphatically, warming up to her assertion, "Yeah! A favor: I mean, seriously, if Cory would kiss his girlfriend's sister, there's no telling who he'd have kissed!"
"You came onto him!" Caitlin reminded her, her anger growing. So much for being over her cheating first boyfriend.
"He didn't walk away!" Caitlin glared at her, even though she was right that Cory had been at least partly to blame. Isabel grinned, "You're right! I'm a sleaze! But I'm your sleaze!"
Caitlin laughed despite herself and crawled out of the bed. "That's so not funny."
"Does that mean you're going shopping with me?" Isabel asked hopefully. Caitlin grunted. "Just us though—not Bo. I mean he's hot and all, but I just wanna spend some time with my favorite sister!"
"Suck-up: I'm your only sister." Caitlin tossed a pillow at her and smiled despite her surly tone.
"My favorite." Isabel jumped to her feet and skipped to the closet, "What to wear?"
Caitlin stood in the dressing room outside the door that veiled Isabel from the outside world. "Why can't I just come in?"
"Because I want to surprise you!" Isabel whined, rather petulantly. Caitlin banged her head on the dressing room door. "Okay—you can come in now."
She opened the door and allowed Caitlin stepped in. Her mouth fell open and she gaped, speechless, at Isabel. She struggled to find the right words, but nothing would escape her lips. "Well?" Isabel giggled nervously.
"I…I like it!" Caitlin was unsure if she was more surprised that she actually liked her sister's clothing, or that it was actually modest. "You could, like, actually go outside in it without completely humiliating yourself!"
Isabel made a face and turned slowly, sliding her hands over her waist and hips, smoothing the salmon skirt. She wore a white ruffled blouse with pink trim that was tucked into the neat knee-length skirt. "You prob'ly want to know why I'm wearing this."
She shrugged and laughed. "Well, I wasn't going to actually ask you, but…yeah."
"Honestly?" Isabel laughed and turned so that Caitlin could unzip the skirt for her, "It's your boyfriend." Caitlin stiffened and stepped away, glaring at Isabel, who laughed breezily. "Jeez! Seriously—you're so uptight all the time! It's totally not even like that. It's just that…when he looked at me, he wasn't even turned on, ya know?" Caitlin smirked. "He looked…disgusted: like I was a slut or something."
Now Caitlin laughed. "Uh, Is? Hate to break it to you, but…" Isabel glared at her and slapped her playfully.
Caitlin felt more like a pack-mule and less like a sister by the end of the seven-hour shopping marathon. It seemed that Isabel had bought something from nearly every single store they had walked by. And, of course, she was completely incapable of carrying her own bags, and so it was that Caitlin's arms were decorated with some twenty bags. It actually wasn't that bad: she couldn't even feel her arms any more. At least she did get a new pair of jeans and Chinese food out of the trip.
"So we should go see a movie!" Isabel exclaimed, smiling brightly. Caitlin glared at her. "What?"
The Focus' trunk opened and Caitlin fell into it. Her sister pulled the bags off her arms and pushed Caitlin away: she felt strangely light without the bags—almost as though she might float away. "Do you never run out of energy?" she asked sourly, clutching the side of the car as the light breeze threatened to lift her into the air.
Isabel shook her head and grinned. "Shopping invigorates me!" Frowning, Caitlin stumbled to the shotgun seat and collapsed, asking resignedly what Isabel wanted to see. "I was thinking White Christmas."
Caitlin barely glanced at her. "It's September, you doorknob."
"So?"
"Christmas is in December."
"Or July."
"What?"
"Never mind." Isabel backed slowly out of the parking lot.
They sat in silence for a moment and then Caitlin poked Isabel in the arm and grinned, "Besides, we'd have to rent it—no theater is showing it." Isabel grinned and Caitlin got a sinking feeling in her stomach. Somehow, she got the feeling that the day had nowhere near begun.