you're doing it wrong

August 2080 - Orion Deppiesse is 47, Violet is 46, Dallas is 16, Delphie and Dakota are 10. (Lucy Harris is 14.)

Dallas Deppiesse just turned sixteen this month, and finally got his drivers' license. The Deppiesse family might live on Lakeshore Road, but they are deceptively not wealthy. Maybe it's having three kids in private school? But his parents do the best they can for Dallas. Orion says, "I got you a car!"

Dallas says, "That's not a car."

"Sure it is, when you're done with it," Orion says. "You're a smart kid, I'm sure you can figure it out."

Money is a little tight since Violet opened up her literary cafe, which really brings in little to no profit at all. She finally named the place. "The Lit' Cafe..." she says, with a laugh. "It's a clever play on words. Little... literary?"

"Right, Mom," Dallas says.

So Dallas has spent the whole summer working on this car, and while Vicky isn't really eager to get dirty or break a nail, Lucy is more than happy to help out!

He's been out in the sun all afternoon, every day, and Lucy notices that he's got a little tan, or well, tan for Dallas anyway, which is still paler than most people... And she wonders if his muscles are a little bigger. Heavy lifting, you know...

He's so good at this mechanical stuff. And Lucy thinks there is nothing hotter than a man who's good with his hands!!! Oh my!!! Lucy is doing a terrible job of not having a crush on Dallas!

Especially since she really likes his hair longer, like he's wearing it these days, and he has such a nice smile, especially when he's smiling at her...

Which is problematic, because he's still dating Vicky. You know, Vicky with the long legs and the big smile? Well, she does have a big smile, but she's a little uneasy when Lucy's around. "It's raining," Vicky says. "Don't you guys think you should come inside?"

So they do go inside. Delphie and Dakota adore Lucy, so she hangs around sometimes even when Dallas is "occupied." She tries not to pay attention to what's going on in the background, because it's honestly a little heartbreaking.

***

Orion wants to take advantage of the tax credit for new crafting businesses - because he figures, game programming and robotics are pretty similar, right? The girls are excited about the idea - you never saw two ten-year-old girls so excited about electronics, but then, being the Deppiesse twins, it probably isn't very surprising. Violet just says, "I hope you're planning on getting that noisy thing out of my living room soon."

"Um, Dad, I think you did it wrong!"

Violet has always had an aversion to noisy contraptions in the house - it disrupts her creative flow. She's still trying to write that third book in her trilogy, and pressures are high so she's feeling kind of stumped. The first thing she needs to figure out is what the story is about, and she just doesn't know! The first two in her series are being released in paperback now, and they're really pushing her for the third, but all she can do is stare at the computer screen.

***

Vicky is a nice girl, really. She's cute as a button! Just look at how adorable she is! And nice too, most of the time, even sweet to his little sisters. But it's eight in the morning, and can't a guy even get out of his pajamas before she comes wandering over?

He was planning on working on his car a little more, and maybe taking a swim. He was going to take his sisters fishing, and surely she won't have fun doing that. But since she's already there, he invites her along.

Vicky never says it out loud, but it's apparent in her attitude, she is absolutely very jealous of Lucy. Vicky says, "You know she has a crush on you."

"I know," Dallas says.

"You know?"

"Yeah," he says. "So what?"

"Maybe you shouldn't spend so much time with her," Vicky says.

"It's just a little crush," he says. "It's not a big deal." He likes Vicky a lot, but sometimes Vicky demands a little more attention than a sixteen year-old boy wants to give. And he certainly doesn't need his girlfriend telling him who he can and can't hang out with. Sometimes he just wants to work on his car, or lay out under the stars, or talk to his friend, Lucy. Maybe this is his fault? He was only fourteen when they started dating! He wanted a girlfriend, but he didn't know that meant having someone who would tell him when and how and what he should do. But he really doesn't want to break up with her, he just wishes she would chill out a little.

They talk some more, and he asks her what she thinks of aliens. "What do I think of aliens?" she says. "What kind of question is that? Like the X-files?... it's okay. The earlier seasons were better, then it got kind of stupid." But he didn't want to know what kind of TV she liked. He's just kind of testing the waters, because there's something she doesn't know yet about his family. But then she starts talking about something else.

Delphie whispers, "I like Lucy better." Dakota whispers back, "So much better."

Cute as Vicky is, sometimes Dallas likes Lucy better too. He didn't actually invite Vicky back with them, but she came anyway. She's talking about puppies, and he's thinking she reminds him of a puppy sometimes, the way she's adorable but is always following him around. He's going to read a book in a minute - about anger management. Because if he doesn't learn anger management right now, he's going to lose his mind!

***

At ten years old, the girls feel their world view expanding far beyond the secrets they tell about their brother. In fact, they don't talk much about their brother at all anymore - though Vicky is often a hilarious topic of conversation - they also talk about Angelo Shaw, their cousin Natalia and how she generously shared her newfound knowledge of why boys and girls have different "equipment", and that Lucy's sister, Sarah sometimes thinks about kissing girls. "It's called being a lesbian," Delphie says. "I knew that," Dakota says.

The girls know a lot of things, and Dakota also knows that their brother had surgery on his nose when he turned twelve, and she wants to have surgery on her lips too when she's old enough. She thinks they look "too alien." Her lips aren't bad, her parents say, they're fine. Their father claims to be all out-and-proud about his alienness lately, except he still wears his sunglasses outside of the house. Dakota says to Delphie, "Do you know what the word hypocrite means? I looked it up in the dictionary." Delphie says, "I already know what it means."

Orion takes the girls with him to meet with Madison Riley about a business grant. "No, not rockets," he says. "Doubtfully rockets, just robots." Madison was really enthusiastic about those rockets, but she thinks robots are cool too.

And they're approved for the grant. $5000 to spend on a new robotics business.

The girls are excited about making robots, even though they're not old enough to use the machinery yet, but right now they're just wondering about something else. With everything there is to make sense of at this age - sex, lesbians, Angelo Shaw, and the reasons why some people date annoying people rather than the ones they really like - the girls are thinking about how Madison was such a nice lady, and she sure seemed to approve of rockets and robots and even aliens too. And Orion doesn't think there's anything more heartbreaking than when his little Dakota looks up at him - that same girl he just told she shouldn't have surgery on her lips because she's beautiful just the way she is - and she says, "Daddy, why do you always have to wear your glasses out?"

"I don't have to," Orion says. "See?" And he takes them off.

Well, if anyone on this planet should stand up for their rights to be accepted, it should be their father, right? So they go, his black beady eyes for the world to see, and people stare because that's what people do, but he just holds his head up and keeps walking.

"Good job, Dad," they say.

***

Meanwhile, Dallas has a plan for today too. First, he's going to eat a toaster pastry for breakfast, and then he's going to read a little bit of the newspaper. Then he's going to talk to his sisters about mechanics, because they're into stuff like that, and then he's going to have a shower and get dressed. He's going to have this day just like he wants it, because he's sixteen and it's summer break and he can. And maybe it doesn't sound like the most exciting day in the world, but it's what he wants to do and nothing would make him happier in the world.

And when he's done, then he's going to call Lucy over to finish the paint job on the car. He wants her to be there when it's finished, since she helped with it all summer. And because he doesn't at all mind Lucy being around. Sometimes he thinks he could spend forever with Lucy and still not mind her being around.

So Dallas got his day, just how he wanted it, and Vicky surprisingly didn't stop over, and he didn't call her either. It's evening by the time he and Lucy finish the paint job, and Lucy picked this color, because if Dallas had picked it, it would have been something much more bland. He asks if she wants to go for a ride.

And oh, does she ever! Silly boy, did he really have to ask?

They did drive around a while first, but finally ended up at Lakeside Beach. She laughs at him, "You can go anywhere you want now, and you end up across the street from your house?"

"It's nice here," he says. He likes to go there when it's quiet, to think. And he wanted to share his quiet place with Lucy.

Dallas makes them some hot dogs on the grill, and somehow, this crazy little girl knows, in the space of throwing hot dog buns at each other, that this is no little crush - Lucy Harris is in LOVE! She's in love all the way down to her bones!

They hang out on the swings for a little while. He says, "If I tell you something, will you promise not to laugh?"

"Okay," she says.

"My dad says we're part alien. I had to have surgery on my nose when I was twelve."

"Is that true?"

"So you've heard it before?"

"Well, you know, people talk," Lucy says. "Some people say it's just a skin pigmentation disorder. Where do you think they come from?"

"My dad says a planet near the Cassiopeia constellation." He says, "You think I'm crazy, don't you?"

"No, I don't think you're crazy," she says. "Wait, you had a nose job? For real? Can I see?"

They both find it a little hilarious, the fact that she wants to inspect his nose, but he stands up, and so does she. She reaches up to poke at his nose with her finger, and as expected, it just feels like a nose. So they laugh, and then they're just standing there, face to face. She doesn't care if he's part alien - he could be 95% yeti and she'd still want to kiss him as much as she does right now. But she doesn't. Because she made that mistake once before, and she doesn't feel like making a fool of herself again.

But this time she wouldn't have to do a thing, because Dallas has tried his hardest not to have a crush on Lucy, but he fails, because how did he never notice her eyes before, all deep and brown and hypnotizing like they are, and bright in the boardwalk lights? Maybe any young man would likewise lose all coherent thoughts, like that he has a steady girlfriend...

Or maybe Lucy's glow feels a little warmer when she's in love, like she is now...

And so ends what has been by far the best night of the best summer of Lucy's entire life! And maybe for Dallas too, though it's a little more complicated for him. It was too nice to be a mistake, but it definitely wasn't intentional. He doesn't know what it was. But it's midnight, and they completely lost track of the time. "It's really late," Dallas says. "I should get you back home."

It must have been sometime after dropping Lucy off, once all coherent thoughts resume again, Dallas finds his bliss suddenly overcome with befuddlement! What has he gotten himself into?

His father is waiting up by the time he gets home. He apologizes for breaking curfew, and promises it will never happen again - but Orion can see that curfews are the least of his son's problems. Dallas is in a mess, and his father doesn't need to ask anything about it. Dallas has it written all over his face, and they've all seen both of those girls around the house all summer.

Fortunately for Dallas (or maybe unfortunately...), his father seems to know a thing or two about women, having been very happily married to one for the past eighteen years, and Orion likes to give advice. He says, "Son, women are like blowtorches... don't even try to handle two of them at the same time, or you're just going to get burned."

***

notes: okay, I'll confess, I helped Lucy out just a little ;) I had to do something, because if she could pine for that boy any more, I swear she would break our hearts!!!

I tweaked his personality a few points playful (I figure anybody who spends as much time with Lucy as he does must eventually lighten up a little!), keeping the zodiacs they were born with, which were already mutually compatible. He fulfilled her mechanical turn-on on his own, and now they're three-bolts (105 ACR). A knowledge/popularity pair, go figure! But... Vicky is also three bolts (99 ACR).

And Dallas is one confused young man, lol! He wants to go steady with Lucy, but not break up with Vicky, lol! I don't think it works that way ;) How funny that our little ant boy, who couldn't even talk to girls, now has more girls than he can even handle :)