Misunderstood (A Neighbor from Hell YA #1) - R.L. Mathewson Page 0,62

talk about it. Not yet,” she said around a few more adorable sniffles as his father put his bag down.

“Bad day?” his father asked as he reached over and plucked Mikey from Sebastian’s shoulder and threw her over his.

“It really was,” Mikey mumbled in agreement.

Sebastian grabbed his father’s bag and followed them inside just in time to hear his brother and sister asking their mom for a ride to the mall. When his mom spotted Mikey over his father’s shoulder, his father said, “She’s not ready to talk about it yet,” as he carefully placed Mikey down on the kitchen counter where she continued to pout.

With a damning finger pointed at Sebastian, Mikey said, “That boy promised me ice cream.”

Worrying her bottom lip, his mom said, “I don’t think we have any ice cream,” as she went to check the freezer.

“There’s ice cream across the street,” Mikey mumbled sadly.

When Sebastian stood there, glaring at her, she added, “It will make me feel better,” making it impossible for him to say no.

“You really are spoiled,” Sebastian said, sighing heavily as he headed for the door only to feel his lips twitch with amusement when she said, “Appropriately adored.”

Hoping that this helped, Sebastian quickly made his way across the street, around the back of the house and went inside where he found Aunt Kasey in the kitchen, cooking. At her questioning look, he said, “Mikey,” putting a world of meaning into that one word.

With an understanding smile, she gestured with a dough-covered spoon toward the first freezer. “There’s homemade chocolate chip cookie dough and peanut butter cup ice cream in the back.”

Mikey’s favorite.

Nodding, Sebastian grabbed a quart of homemade ice cream only to smile when one of the twins threw a ball outside their play area. After placing the ice cream on the kitchen island, he walked over to the play area that Uncle Reese had created for the boys, pausing along the way to give Happy a scratch behind his ears and grabbed the ball off the floor. “Here you go,” Sebastian said, leaning over to hand the ball to Nathan and give him a kiss on his forehead. With a smile, Nathan pulled his arm back and sent it flying again. With a mock glare, Sebastian obediently retrieved the ball and handed it back to him as he glanced at the crib in the corner, noting that Nathan’s baby brothers were fast asleep, along with his twin.

“Are you joining us for dinner tonight?” Aunt Kasey asked as Sebastian headed back over to the kitchen island and grabbed the ice cream.

For the past week, they’d been alternating between his house and this house, working on their essays and filling out their applications with their parents’ help. They still needed to get letters of recommendation, but that shouldn’t be a problem. At least, not for Mikey. He still didn’t know what he was going to do since he doubted that any of his old teachers would jump at the chance to write a letter for him, and he didn’t really think that any of the schools would be impressed with a letter from his mother.

He’d figure it out later, but for right now, he wanted to make this better for Mikey.

“Not tonight, Aunt Kasey. Mathew and Elizabeth are trying to convince my parents to let us go to the mall.”

“Does Mikey want to go, too?”

“Yes,” Sebastian said even as he couldn’t help but hope that she said no so that he could avoid going to the mall and spend the rest of the night trying to cheer Mikey up alone.

“That’s fine. Why don’t you grab some money out of my purse for Mikey?” she said while he resigned himself to spending the rest of the night surrounded by his family.

Not that he didn’t love spending time with them, but sometimes he just wanted to relax and not have to worry about anything other than tormenting Mikey. He wouldn’t be able to do that if he had to keep his brothers and cousins out of trouble. He wasn’t worried about Jessica since his sister normally stayed out of trouble, but he would have to keep an eye on her at the mall. He’d seen the way boys had started looking at his sister and he didn’t like it. Granted, he didn’t like the way they were starting to look at Mikey, either.

“What are you planning to do now that Mikey is going to be busy with the team?” Aunt Kasey asked as Sebastian