He couldn’t believe his luck. His mouth watered at the prospect.
“All of the above?” he ventured.
He still expected her to change her mind. Or make him pick one option.
“Sure thing!” Mom said in a cheery voice without missing a beat. She walked briskly into the kitchen, pulling out the mac and cheese box—his favorite kind with the fluorescent orange powder. “Anything for my favorite little guy.”
“What about ice cream, too?”
He knew he was pushing his luck, but he had to try.
“Of course!” Mom said looking up with a warm smile. “Chocolate? Better yet, I won’t make you wait until after dinner to eat it. Why don’t you have some right now?”
Best day ever!
Giddy, Barrie started to set the table—his usual chore before dinner.
But his mother shot him a confused look.
“You don’t need to do that,” she said, her eyes still unfocused. “It’s your sister’s job to set the table, remember? Why don’t you go watch cartoons until it’s dinnertime?”
Barrie broke into an evil grin. That’s right—Rita could do his chores. She was all grown up, after all.
He settled into the sofa and flipped on his favorite sci-fi cartoon with the baby alien and the space wizards. As the robots beeped and blipped across the screen, chasing the alien, he sipped his soda and munched on the cookies, feeling the grainy sugar coat his tongue. His mother dropped off a heaping bowl of chocolate ice cream, which he ate all the way to the last bite.
Dinner went even better than expected. He got mac and cheese with cartoon-shaped noodles, crispy chicken fingers with ranch dressing and barbecue sauce, more cookies, and chocolate ice cream. Plus, soda to wash it all down. It was the single best meal of his life. Everyone else had to eat dry chicken breast, brown rice…and spinach.
Barrie couldn’t fathom how leaves were considered an actual food. They were inedible. Rita seemed to share his sentiment, pushing the spinach around her plate unhappily. She kept shooting him jealous glances.
“Rita, eat your veggies,” Mom said. “You’re sixteen now. Start acting like it. They have important nutrients.”
She pouted. “Ugh, can’t I just take a vitamin? It’s like science. You love science.”
“Your mother worked hard to make dinner,” Dad said. “And we both worked hard to pay for it. Stop complaining. You’re too old for that.”
“Why doesn’t Barrie have to eat spinach?” she said, shooting him a spiteful look.
“Your brother’s still just a kid,” Mom said. “You know that. You’re sixteen. Soon you’ll be in college. It’s time for you to grow up.”
“That’s right,” Barrie said, shooting her an evil grin. “Eat your veggies.”
Rita glared at him, taking a grudging bite of spinach and grimacing at the acrid taste.
If looks could kill, he’d probably have dropped dead on the spot. But Barrie didn’t care. He just grinned at her and stuffed another cookie in his mouth. He ate until everything was gone. Mom even let him have another serving of chocolate ice cream. He wolfed it down, savoring the rich sweetness.
As he slipped into bed after playing video games for hours, he was certain that this had been the single best day of his life—even if he hadn’t gotten to have his birthday party and his triple fudge cake. Staying a kid was the best thing that had ever happened to him.
* * *
Scratch. Scratch. Scratch.
Barrie woke with a start. It was dark outside. He sat up in bed, his mouth clammy from all the sugar he’d had earlier. He felt exhausted, and his brain felt foggy. He had stayed up much later than normal for a school night.
Barrie rubbed his eyes, letting them adjust—then he gasped at what he saw above his bed.
Slash marks were gouged into the ceiling in a jagged X pattern.
Barrie stared at them in shock. Feeling his heart pounding, he stood up on his bed and reached his hand out. He ran his fingers over the slash marks. They were deep.