Convincing her

"Did Rachel let you keep that swimsuit?" Lucas asked Jen as he looked at the bag she placed on her legs.

"She did, she said it didn't fit her," Jen said happily. How couldn't she be happy? She got herself a new swimsuit, and it looked like Lucas liked it more than she did from how he had been behaving at the party. He had been discretely slipping a finger through the openings at the sides of the swimsuit.

"We should quickly get home," Lucas said, and Jen felt the car speed up. She could already tell what he was thinking about. It was like he had been in the mood since earlier, so she had already expected that their night would probably end with them tangled up in bed.

*

"Is Jen seeing someone?" Diane asked, and both Alex and Jake choked on their food. It had been six months since their mother asked about Jen. Both of them had noticed that she would always pay attention whenever they talked about her, but she never mentioned her name since she left.

"What gave you that idea?" Alex asked and continued eating her dinner.

"I saw it on the news. They were talking about Lewis & Co. launching a new product and I saw her in the picture with the heir" Diane said and sipped on her wine. Two pairs of blue eyes stared at each other and Jake fidgeted uncomfortably.

"Why don't you call her to ask if you're curious?" Alex said to her mother. Alex looked nothing like her sister with her blue eyes and platinum blonde hair that she got from her mother. She even had her mother's heart-shaped lips compared to Jen's plump lips she had gotten from her father's side.

"I wouldn't have to call if she never left," Diane said as she sipped on her wine again. Alex scoffed and viciously chewed on her food as if she was venting on it.

"Would you have stayed?" Alex asked as she put down her cutlery. Her mother had too much unnecessary pride, so she knew she would never make the first to move to approach Jen. After being asked such a direct question, Diane decided to keep quiet. She knew she had been unreasonable, but she couldn't help but feel like all this would not have happened if her father-in-law didn't die in the first place and if Jen was more competent.

"So is she seeing the Lewis heir?" Diane asked, bringing the topic back to where it started.

"Actually, she-" Jake started but was glared at by Alex and decided to keep quiet.

"Not one more word from you. If you are so curious, call her. If you dare say a word, you can forget getting a salary, you should be doing something to help the family anyway" Alex said as she turned to give Jake a fierce glare. He could only raise his hands in surrender and watch as Alex left the table. She had lost her appetite.

"That girl still has such a hot temper," Diane said as she turned her gaze to Jake.

"Well, it's not like you did anything right," Jake muttered under his breath. He was still regretting his drunk driving incident, so he did not want to antagonize any of his sisters at the moment. What he hadn't realised was that he had spoken his thoughts.

"Say that again," Diane said with narrowed eyes.

"Say what? I have to go… study. Yes, I have to study so I can get into college next year," Jake said as he got up from the dining table and pretty much ran out of there. Why were all the women in his family so fierce?

Diane watched as his figure disappeared and put her face in her hands. She had been selfish with her grief, not thinking of her kids who had lost their father. She did not hate Jen, but she did then. She didn't even know how she would talk to her daughter. She definitely wasn't ready to face her yet.

Diane heard one of the doors upstairs slam shut and she closed her eyes with a sigh before finishing her glass of wine and pouring herself another one.

Alex was feeling very frustrated with her mother. She was never satisfied with whatever Jen did, it was as if she expected her to do all the things that she had done. She admired her older sister for not having a personality like their mother's because she had a victim mentality. If Jen was like Diane, they would all be out in the streets with no money.

She took out her phone from her jeans pocket intending to call Jen but she immediately changed her mind considering the time. She assumed that she might intrude on her alone time with Lucas, so she just placed the phone on her bedside table.

She had missed Jen a lot, and if it wasn't for all the businesses she needed to manage, she would have already followed Jen wherever she was. She couldn't help but feel like she was missing a very important part of her sister's life, especially seeing as she went back to university and even started dating once more. Just thinking about it made her want to go back downstairs and talk some sense into her mother.

She flopped on her bed after picking up her phone again and went to the websites that had reported news on the party that had been thrown by Lewis & Co. to look at the pictures that Jen had taken with Lucas.

She was glad that her sister looked very happy compared to how she was a year before when she was still running around trying to keep the business together while trying to get their father out of jail. She remembered how haggard she looked when she had come for her graduation when she had completed her degree. She had been so heartbroken she vowed that she would do her best to help her sister with the burden she had shouldered by herself.

As happy as she was that now Jen was more relaxed and was finally achieving what she had been aiming for, she still wished she was around to witness her bloom.

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