[Anthony,Ethan,Dalton] Family Dinner

[Claire Jayne Madden]

Claire dropped her duffel bag down to the side when she stepped inside. Ethan was the brother that you went to if you wanted to have a good time and not be scolded. So he was a lot of fun in that sense. He protected her, but he also let her color outside of the lines a little. Dalton was the brother that she turned to, when doing those types of things, tended to kind of explode and she needed someone to talk to. She could be honest with him- well as honest as she could. She wasn’t about to tell him that the subject of their conversation had been Anthony. And Dalton was there for her. Ninenty-nine point nine percent of the time. That small little fraction she should have realized was off limits was her sex life. Though pointing out that it wasn’t exactly like he waited didn’t really help her situation. She was the ‘little’ sister so that by default meant that they watched over her life and her actions. “ Hey, welcome home”. Claire smiled at him sarcastically before running upstairs to her room, peeling off the sweatshirt that she had put on over her tank and tights that she’d covered with cheerleading shorts. It wasn’t an official practice so she hadn’t had to dress appropriately for it.

Claire laid back flat onto her bed before she picked up her phone and texted Natalia to see if they were still on for breakfast the next morning. She sat up tiredly and looked at her feet. It was strange that they were her favorite part of her body and her least favorite at the same time. Pointe shoes did a major toll on your feet, and she felt self conscious to let anyone see them, which is why she wore ankle socks so often. But they were also her favorite part of her body because of the art and dance it let her accomplish. It was weird that something that made her feel so powerful and beautiful, resulted in making her feet look horrible in her opinion. She stretched her feet out in a pointe position lazily before she hopped up and ran to take a quick shower. She knew it was dangerous to leave Ethan and Dalton downstairs so long, giving them an opportunity to talk about her, or anything. After the shower she towel-dried her hair quickly so that it was still slightly damp and changed into a pair of cheerleading shorts and a t-shirt, quickly pulling on ankle socks to cover her feet before she headed back downstairs to the kitchen. “ So now that Anthony has moved in, you’re going to be all domesticated for your boyfriend?” she looked over the food, making a slight face as she headed to the fridge.Claire yawned as she twirled the purity ring their father had given her around her middle finger, taking a bottle of water out from the fridge before she hopped back onto the counter.

Outfit

[Ethan John Fox]

Ethan was grilling the lobster to place on the sandwiches when he heard the door open, followed by the thud of Claire’s duffel bag, her running upstairs, and Dalton coming inside. “ Hey, welcome home,” he called out to her, leaning out of the kitchen to wave at her with the grilling forks he was using over the stove. He narrowed his eyebrows as she basically gave him a big ‘f you’ with her eyes. Shit. That wasn’t good. Had Natalia told her what happened on the cruise. He blinked as he watched after her before he looked at Dalton.”What did you do?” he said before he smiled slowly and headed into the kitchen. He checked his phone again, looking to see if Natalia had texted him back yet or not. He’d been texting her a lot more lately, but he still wasn’t sure where that was headed. He did know though that he didn’t want to mess around with her anymore until he figured out how he felt about it. It wasn’t fair to use her for that. He liked her, or atleast he thought he was starting too. He liked her enough to not want to toy with her while they both figured things out.

Ethan looked over his shoulder to look back at Dalton. Sometimes he wondered if Dalton thought that Claire would be better suited to live with him rather than with himself. There were pros and cons to both, but if he had enough of an issue with it Ethan was sure he would have said something at this point. “Hey man grab a beer from the fridge if you want.” he said,tilting his head towards the fridge before he started to take things off of the plate. Claire had come down a lot quicker than he expected, but he was hoping that him and Dalton could actually have a conversation later. As different as they were for being brothers, his brother was still one of the people he was closest to in his life. Plus it helped that he respected him a hell of a lot. “ Oh funny, Claire. My boyfriend doesn’t care if I can cook or not anyways. I’m just eye candy,”He watched Claire as she made a face at the food and shook his head. “ I grilled you some chicken and I am steaming some broccoli for you right now. So don’t get all teenage angst on me” he said , pointing to the pot on the stove where he was boiling broccoli. He turned to look at Dalton , and rolled his eyes while mouthing ‘ ballet’.

Outfit

[Dalton James Fox]

Dalton closed the door behind him and watched Claire go upstairs. He sighed and shook his slightly and walked into the kitchen. The conversation they just had, did not go too smoothly. Claire was still a child in his eyes and the idea of his little sister having sex, was not okay with Dalton. He had missed so much not living with his siblings and because of his job. He was always so busy with work, that he had no time for his family. It was one thing that Dalton hated about work. When he got the chance to see Ethan and Claire, Dalton was there. That's why he was here tonight, dinner with the family. Dalton laughed as he walked into the kitchen, "Oh you know, just being the big brother and pissing off my little siblings." he walked past Ethan and over to the fridge. He noticed Ethan check his phone and he noted it. He opened the fridge just as Ethan said he could help himself, "On it bro." He closed the fridge and opened the beer. "Smells delicious." he said as he leaned against the counter and took a sip.

Dalton watched Claire walk into the kitchen. He looked back to Ethan, "I guess I missed the maroon memo." he smirked and then brought the beer back to his lips and took another sip. They were dressed casually and he still had his work clothes on. He placed the beer on the counter and unbuttoned his jacket, He took it off and walked into the hall and hung it up. Dalton walked back into the kitchen and heard the door open and then close and someone heading up the stairs and a voice call out, "Gotta change and shower quickly. I'll be right down." Dalton looked to Ethan and Claire, "Anthony? Im guessing." He walked over to the counter near his beer and leaned against it again, "So how did Anthony come to live here?" this he wanted to know.

outfit:here.

[Anthony Marcus Owen]

Moving in with Ethan and Claire was great. He had only been there for one night, but Anthony could feel a weight being lifted off of his shoulders. It was nice to be out of his parents house. One thing he liked to do to help get his mood up was workout. That's exactly what he did today, with Natalia. He opened the car door, got out and then closed the door. He peeked his head in the window, "I'll text you later." he smiled to Natalia. "Good luck meeting Dalton." The car pulled away and Anthony sighed. He had heard about Dalton and never really met him. This was going to be the first time he was officially met him. Anthony opened the door and closed it and headed up the stairs. "Gotta change and shower quickly. I'll be right down." he called out and ran into his room. Anthony grabbed a towel and headed into the bathroom. His shower was quick and he was back in his room.

After he was dressed, Anthony took a breath and then headed out of his room. He didn't think he was ready for this. He took one more breath before he reached the bottom of the stairs. Anthony walked into the kitchen and sniffed, "Mm, whatever you're cooking, it smells great." he smiled and walked over to the fridge. He grabbed a gatorade and closed the fridge again. He opened, took a sip and then placed the cap back on. He looked over at Dalton, he was already looking at him. Anthony stuck his hand out for a shake, "I'm Anthony." he was surprised when the shake was returned. "Dalton." was the reply he got. He let go of his hand.

outfit:here.

[Ethan John Fox]

Ethan grinned as Dalton said that he was pissing off his younger siblings. Ah, Claire got lectured. Better her than him. “ Do you know how to do anything else?” he asked trying to feign an expression of genuine curiosity. He looked over at Dalton as he got out a beer and smiled at his outfit. ” It feels like dad just came home from work,” he said as he smirked and watched him go hang his coat up in the hallway. “ Thanks I was watching the food network all day. Don’t comment on that,” he said,pointing the grilling forks at Dalton before he turned and started taking the lobster off of the stove and preparing it over the bread for the sandwiches. He made a slight face at the maroon memo comment before he turned and looked to see what Claire was wearing and shook his head. “ This matchy matchy thing is not cool.” he said, as though it was her fault,but looked back at Dalton. “ Do you even get memos ever? Or is it more of a ‘ this phone will self destruct in ten seconds…boom”

Ethan turned his ear towards the front entrance as he heard Anthony coming in and looked back at Dalton, giving a nod. “ Yeah you know how close Claire and I are with our friends. He seemed like he was having a hard time at home.. I mean, I don’t know about Claire, but I never pushed him to talk about it. If he wants to, he will. Otherwise, all I can do is offer him somewhere else to say where he can actually feel like a part of a family. And he’s here.. so it must mean something. I’m taking in strays,” he said with a small smile across his lips. “Claire, do you mind setting the table?” he asked, hoping it would give him just a couple of moments alone with Dalton. He watched her as she hopped off of the counter, grabbed some dishes and silverware and made her way out into the dining room. He waited to make sure she wasn’t coming back before he looked at Dalton. “ Anything I need to know about?”. He wiped his hands off with a kitchen towel after making the sandwiches and putting them on a plate and took Claire’s broccoli off of the stove and went to the sink to drain it out.

There was no sense in bringing Claire’s chicken and broccoli on serving dishes, it would just take up room on the table so instead he started putting it on a plate. He looked up as Anthony came into the kitchen and looked back at Dalton and gave a smile. Dalton was a pretty damn intimidating guy to meet. Hell, him and Claire still got intimidated by him and they were related. He bit the inside of his cheek to try not to smile when he saw the introductions between them. That was weird, Anthony kind of seemed nervous and in all reality he had no reason to be. He was just one of Ethan’s friends, meeting his brother. Ethan finally coughed and grinned, looking at Dalton to try and help Anthony out. “ Anthony’s a freshman at Columbia” he said, hoping that tacking on a nice school like that would help Dalton form a favorable opinion of Anthony.

[Claire Jayne Madden]

Claire played with the ends of her hair, going between braiding it, shaking it out, braiding it on the side, shaking it out again. Finally she puffed out her cheeks and sighed as she watched her brothers. As annoying as they all could be sometimes, she loved them to death. And she wished that Dalton’s job gave him more freedom, but she understood. Plus, it wasn’t like he would ever feel normal doing any other job.She laughed as Ethan teased Dalton about his job and rested her chin against her knees. It didn’t take long for Anthony to get home and she sighed quietly to herself as he said he was going to take a shower. Now that she’d seen his body it was too tempting to daydream about him in the shower. She snapped to attention when Ethan asked her to go set the table. “ Yeah,” she said, placing her hands on the counter and hopping down. She grabbed a few plates and silverware before she opened the fridge with one hand. Dalton already had a beer, Ethan would probably grab one.If Dalton wasn’t here, she’d grab a beer for herself but instead she’d stick with her water. So instead she just grabbed a beer for Anthony and headed out to the dining room.

Claire set the table quickly and set the beer down in front of a chair. It would be easy to sit beside him, but she was still kind of mad at him. It was immature and stupid, but she was mad at him.She’d shared something with him and he hadn’t even set time aside for her, like at all. He felt better and the first thing he did was go work out with Natalia. She tried telling herself to be understanding, he had a lot of changes. But she was seventeen. The hurt teenaged girl beat out the understanding girl, every time. Instead she went to the opposite end of the table and sat down, pulling her legs up into the chair before she pretzeled them around each other and waited at the table for everyone to come eat. She could hear them talking in the kitchen and made a slight face before she sighed. “ … I may be like ninety pounds but I am starving! Get your asses in here!” she yelled out before remembering Dalton was in the kitchen, “Please!” she added quickly,knowing better than to yell demands at him.

[Dalton James Fox]

Dalton smiled when Ethan said it was like their dad had just got home from work, "Yeah it is. Man do I miss him. Are they ever going to come visit? Or are they going to make us go see them?" he scoffed lightly. Dalton was just like his father, very work oriented. Their father would come home every night just in time for dinner and spend a few hours with them before their mom put them to bed. People took advantage of that sort of thing, not these kids though. Dalton smirked when Ethan told him not to comment, "No comments here. A guy needs to learn how to cook for his lady sooner or later. You're just getting a head start." Dalton didn't think that Ethan had any girlfriend yet. He knew that Ethan and his previous girlfriend had broken up, but that was about it. "Actually, I have 15 seconds, not ten." he smirked.

Dalton listened as Ethan explained the Anthony situation to him. "You are a good man bro. That's why I have so much respect for you. You have a kind heart, that will get you far in life. Trust me." here he went being the older, wisdom filled brother. He watched Claire get the dishes and silverware and then grab a beer out of the fridge, "I hope that's not yours." he joked. Dalton leaned on his elbow on the counter and looked at Ethan, "Well, she told me she had sex for the first time. I don't know with who, she wouldn't tell me. And I don't know exactly when, all she said was that it was recently. Do you know anything about this?" He took another sip of his beer and stood straight up.

He looked over Anthony as he walked into the kitchen and over to the fridge. Before Dalton could do or say anything, the guy had put his hand out to shake and introduce himself." Dalton." was his reply and he let go of Anthony's hand. He took another sip, not taking his eyes off Anthony. He could tell he was making Anthony nervous, and he was enjoying it. Just then Ethan butted in, Dalton smiled, "Oh really? That's great. What are you majoring in son?" That seemed to lighten the mood a bit. He heard Claire call out and he laughed. He put his arm around Anthoy's shoulders and walked into the dining room and then took his seat, "So tell me more about your college plans." a good icebreaker.

outfit:here.