I remember how quiet you sometimes were, and I asked about it, and you said it's a feeling you

get, you don't know how to talk about it, and I'd like to think

we own that feeling—how we bested the myths. We didn't become murderer

and victim. We didn't cheat on the other's birthright.

After a few months, things start to fall into a steady path. It's like I can finally start to breathe again after everything that has happened lately. Silas has stayed away from me, which I strongly appreciate. Although I do see Jay around, I've adjusted to that and he's actually started to grow on me. He doesn't talk about his family, we only talk about things that involve Micah.

As far as Bonnie goes, she only showed up for a few days to get her side of the story out there and then she disappeared again. I haven't heard from her again, and that's completely okay with me. That's how I would prefer it, really.

Josie's dad has started allowing me to see Josie again, which took a lot of convincing on my part after getting arrested while she was under my care. He's a good dad though, and protective of Josie, so I didn't blame him for that but I'm allowed to see her now about every few weeks and we're still in contact via text a lot too. She still hasn't told her father about what happened with Davis, so when she wants to talk about it, she comes to me.

Her dad even let me bring her with me to Casey's science fair to support him. He's been so excited and working so hard on this thing that he still hasn't told me about. So walking into the school gymnasium with Micah and Josie is pretty exciting, so that we can all finally figure out what Casey has been working on all this time.

The gym is full of tables set up with experiments. I see an air hockey table, a ton of poster boards, and the nervous students standing at their booths as they explain their project to the people walking around.

"Do you see Casey?" I ask as I'm scanning the gym for my brother but it's pretty crowded and he's relatively short.

"There," Josie finds him first, pointing to a booth to the left of the room. I don't see him at first, so I just follow Josie's direction until I finally see my blond brother standing by a poster with two other boys that I've met when I have come to visit Casey before. Joel and Kenneth are their names and they've been working with Casey on this project.

"Ellie," Casey smiles when he sees me and quickly ushers me closer to his booth. "Okay. This is it. What do you think?"

I read the title of the poster that says "Going Green by Growing Green" and then under that, there's a whole lot of charts, words, and pictures of grass. I see a paragraph for the abstract, some materials listed, and a conclusion but before I can read any of it, Josie speaks up.

"I don't understand any of this, Casey," She admits to him, looking at the pictures of grass too. "Which probably means that it's really cool. You're totally going to win."

"The objective is to create an entire house that is self-sufficient in every way," Casey begins to explain. "And this is just one step of that. Did you know that you can extract energy from grass? That's what we did. It's called biomass energy, and we planted three different types of seeds to see which type of grass produces the most biomass, to see which type would be the most beneficial to use as an energy source."

"This is really great, Case," I assure him.

"Yeah," Micah agrees with me. "I think Josie was right. You're definitely going to win."

"There are a ton of great projects," His friend, Kenneth, warns us in a very pessimistic voice.

"Shut up, they're just trying to be supportive," Casey scolds him and then looks back at us and says, "Thank you for coming. We've been growing grass and analyzing their biomass patterns for months now. I'm glad that you can finally see it."

"So you're going to live in a house where you just grow grass for all of your electricity?" Josie asks him teasingly. "You're going to turn into one of those hippie freegans that goes through trash for their meals."

"Being aware of greenhouse gases and wanting to create renewable energy doesn't mean that I'm going to be eating trash, it just means that I care about the planet," He defends himself with a laugh because he knows that she's just teasing him.

They start going back and forth with their cute bickering and Micah leans into me and says, "Their flirting is so cute."

It makes me laugh a little bit and when Josie and Casey hear us laughing, they can tell exactly why we're laughing and their bickering stops. I don't want to embarrass my brother in front of Josie, so I don't bring up their flirting again. I will, however, ask him about it again when we're alone. He always insists that it's nothing and that I'm reading too much into it, but he is very smiley and they tease each other a lot when they're together. I'm not going push him to date her or not to date her, I just want him to be happy. And I don't want him to run away from his feelings.

"Well, we can't clog up your station, so we're going to go look around. This is really awesome, Casey. I'm so proud of you," I assure him as I try to go in for a hug but he ducks out of the way to avoid my affection.

"Come on, Ellie," He mumbles, running his fingers through his hair to try and recover from what was almost a very embarrassing incident for him.

"Alright, fine. Are you coming with us, Josie?" I ask her so that I can give her the opportunity to stay here and hang out with Casey instead of walking around with me and Micah.

"Um, is it cool if I hang out here?" She looks at me and then to Casey, who nods.

"We'll be back later then," I tell them, holding Micah's hand as we leave their booth to explore the rest of the science fair.

"So he'll get a scholarship for an entire year," Micah says as we're walking. "If he wins, right?"

"Yep. And he'll get to meet the president, which is insane. He'll be crushed if he doesn't win, he's been working so hard for this thing for months now," I mutter quietly.

"He'll be fine," He assures me. "Since he has you."

I smile at him and kiss his cheek lightly. We're in a really crowded gym, so PDA is pretty much frowned upon. "I know, he'll be fine. I just hope that he gets it, that'd be so cool. I mean, he's turning grass into energy... how does that not win?"

"It is very impressive," Micah agrees with me. "I saw a rocket over there. It's some tough competition. If he did win, what would you do with your extra money?"

"Just keep it saved up," I answer him. "If he wants to go to Ivy League, that's going to cost a lot and I want to do everything in my power to get him where he wants to go."

"Because you're the perfect sister."

"Exactly," I jokingly agree with him. "Because I'm the perfect sister."

"You should save some of it for yourself," He slowly suggests, knowing that he's getting into dangerous territory because we have this conversation frequently and it never goes well. "He could get grants or scholarships or loans to go to college, and so could you. If you use some of that money for yourself."

"I'm not thinking about college until I know what's going to happen with Casey and you know that," I remind him. We walk past the other experiments and projects but we don't stick around to hear their spiel. We just glance and keep moving.

"Yeah, I know that's what you said," He confirms with a sigh. "It's just that you said that you want to go into social work, and you could be doing that if you try. If you don't go for it now, you'll spend the next few years of your life just stuck."

"I'm not stuck," I argue. "I've got you and Casey, I like my job, and I like where I'm at right now. So if going back to school is right for me, I'm going to go when I know that I can get Casey through school too. You know that I'm not going to budge on this, I don't know why you keep bringing it up."

"I just love you and I want you to make the best out of your life. You're so great, and you can do great things, if you were just a little bit selfish sometimes," He explains to me. "But you're right; I know that I can't convince you, I'll drop it."

"You're going to be a hot shot lawyer," I remind him with a short laugh. "I could just be a trophy wife, a stay at home mom, something like that. Just feed off of your money for my entire life."

"You could focus on writing your poetry during the day," Micah offers.

"I was kidding," I inform him slowly.

"I know that," He nods. "But spending our entire lives together doesn't sound like a joke to me."

My face gets red at how cute and very smooth that was of him, and I lean my head on his shoulder. "You're such a nerd."

It makes him laugh as he holds me tightly to him. It's nice to be so close to him, but a bit uncomfortable to walk that way, so we separate and keep our hands entwined as we walk through the gym. "I know, but you love it."

"I know," I sigh, giving into him so easily because he's right. I do love how cute he can be, how his compliments come so easy. They just slip off his tongue shamelessly and whenever they come to mind, he's never afraid to say how he feels or what he's thinking. Complimenting him doesn't come so easy to me.

Not because I don't love him, or I don't have anything to compliment. Micah is great, but I still get blushy or embarrassed when talking about my feelings. I can much easier write them down and then show him how I feel that way.

"Are they going to announce the winner today?" Micah asks me, changing the subject.

"Yeah, in about an hour," I confirm after looking at the time on my phone. "I'm nervous for him."

"Even if he doesn't win, he should still be proud of what he's accomplished, you know that and Casey knows that too. All he wants is for you to be proud of him, so as long as you make sure that he knows how proud of him you are, he'll be fine," He tells me as we're walking.

"Okay," I know that he's right. I just have to support Casey no matter what, win or lose. I just know that he'll be so disappointed if he doesn't get this with how hard he's been working on this project. I've barely been able to tear him away from it to talk on the phone. A weekend visit was a near miracle. I'm glad that he's found something that he's passionate about, and he's really good at it, so I'm happy for him. It's just a big adjustment from when I'd see him and talk to him everyday before he left for boarding school across the city. "You're right."

"I'm always right," He assures me jokingly, kissing my temple.

"Also full of yourself," I respond with a small laugh.

"Yeah, that too."

"You know, he's starting to look up to you too," I inform Micah. We pass the rocket project and I notice that the rocket is only a prototype that doesn't actually fly. It's still wildly impressive, but it makes me feel less intimidated about Casey's project. "You have to tell him that you're proud of him too."

"No he doesn't," Micah disagrees with me with a small scoff.

"He does," I insist. "He's started wearing plaid, growing his hair out. He asks about you too. I think that he wants to be like you."

"That's a lot of pressure," He realizes, blinking a few times. "Can you tell him to not look up to me? I'm not a role model."

"You are now," I laugh at him. "And you're a good one too. Other than the fact that shaggy hair doesn't look that great on Casey, I'm glad he wants to be like you. You're smart, ambitious, graduated high school and college and then moved on to law school. I've done none of that, so he needs somebody like you to show him that it's possible. You are kind, not a heartbreaker, treat women with respect. You're the perfect role model."

"Well, when you put it like that," He trails off. "I guess that I can allow it."

"That's good because you can't go back now. He's already bought the plaid," I say jokingly.

"As long as I don't have to give him the sex talk," He decides.

"That's taken care of," I laugh a little bit at him. "I did all of the really awkward stuff before he started high school. Although, he's probably far from getting any action, he's too shy."

"What about Josie? They've been flirting like crazy."

"They're both shy, I don't think either one of them will make the move. And if one of them does, I think that Josie will want to wait to do anything. But I don't really like to think about my fourteen-year-old brother's sex life, so I'm going to leave it at that," I decide.

"That's a good idea," Micah agrees with me. We continue walking around, eyeing up Casey's competition. I know that no matter what happens today, I'll be proud of my little brother. I already am so proud of him. Watching him grow up to be so smart, passionate, and happy, it proves to myself that all of my sacrifices, and all of my pain, has been worth it.

Finding my mom in a pool of her own blood, getting put in the foster home, it was worth it. Every knock on my bedroom door, knowing that it was Davis coming in to "kiss me goodnight", it was worth it. Using my body to pay our rent and to pay for his school, it was all worth it knowing what a happy kid that Casey is turning out to be. I did it all for him, and I don't regret a second of it.

And through those experiences, I met Micah. I met my friends at the company like Gina and Ashe. In one of my favorite poems, the poet claims that for every good thing that happens, there is a bad. I always thought of it as a good thing happening for every bad thing. I always thought that those good things were happening to other people, when the knocks came on my door through my teenage years. Now, I'm starting to think that the universe was just saving it all. For every bad thing that happened to me, I get a good thing.

The blood bath, the abandonment, the knocking door from Davis, the prostitution, Silas... it was all bad, but now, I'm getting all of the good to balance it out.

For every bird there is a stone thrown at a bird.

I've been hit with my fair share of stones, now I'm ready to see what the universe has in store for me. I am so excited.