at the breakfast counter bar, tessa turned in her stool round and round, pausing every few minutes only to spoon cheerios into her mouth. she loved to eat cereal, ramen noodles, or a meal cooked by smurf in her favorite bowl-a blue ceramic bowl with a seahorse crafted handle. she had gotten it for her twelfth birthday, a gift from deran. seahorses had been her most treasured animal since she was small. stuffed seahorses, paintings of seahorses, anything seahorse, tessa loved. she collected small seahorse items, that she lined up and displayed on a shelf in her room above her bed. 

smurf was messaging frantically on her phone, frowning, when she stopped all of a sudden, rushing to turn the tv on and turn the volume up. "what's wrong?" tessa inquired, but smurf didn't even have to say anything. it was on the news, front and center. a cop had been killed-on the job done last night. "oh, fuck." tessa covered her mouth in shock. the job had gone south, and tessa was actually thankful she hadn't been on it. it would just be another earful of bullshit from baz she would have to take, even if it wasn't her fault. 

craig had been shot on the job, but thankfully he was okay. tessa had woken up from her sleep, finding her brothers crowded around craig, cleaning his wound. it had looked grisly, and once she was sure he was okay, she had headed back to bed, wondering how j felt to be in the midst of an unusual family. 

//

the family was gathered around, smurf standing in front of them. it was time for a meeting. she wasn't happy with the errors that had occurred, and now there could be heat on them from the cops. it was decided (by smurf of course) that deran, craig and tessa would break up the car into pieces, which pissed deran off enough to inquire as to why j didn't have to help. that was how j ended up being assigned to help them. 

tessa crossed her arms, leaning back against the plush red couch. "i didn't even help on this job. why should i have to help?" she uttered. "because you're a part of this family, and you earn your keep. you want a cut without doing any of the work? here's where you pitch in." smurf responded. "this is all baz's fault." tessa put her head in her hands, pinching her nose from a growing headache. "excuse me?" baz raised a brow. "nothing." she raised her hands in defense, not ready for another spat. "yeah. good choice." he turned back to the conversation at hand, assuring smurf that the tweakers wouldn't be able to identify them. pope shook his head at the stupidity of how the job had been handled. 

it was a good thing he was back, he thought to himself. "why was j all banged up when you got home?" smurf questioned pope. tessa lifted her head at that, wondering what smurf was talking about. "you don't believe me? ask him." pope motioned to j, who swiveled his head from pope to smurf before getting the words out. "i...he stopped short on the way back. i hit my head on the dash." he shrugged, trying to play casual. tessa narrowed her eyes, but was silent. pope didn't drive stupid unless he wanted to. j was lying. 

//

the sun beat down, and sweat trailed down tessa's back beneath her wife beater tank top she stole from deran's drawer. she was braless-in her defense, it was too damn hot to wear a bra today. not that she needed a defense not to wear a bra, tessa was all for women empowerment and 'freeing the nipple', which is what she would yell when any of her brothers told her to put a bra on. 

she lifted a sledgehammer, which took all of her strength, and brought it down on the front of the bumper. craig had his arm in a sling, and he worked slow, stopping for pain pills. deran was ripping the seats out, talking as he went.

 "i'm sick of it. we do all the hard work, and she controls the cash? nah man. i'm pulling my own jobs if this keeps up." he grunted, jerking a seat to the left. tessa cocked a hip, pausing her work to pull her greasy hair into a low bun. "i second that." she scoffed. 

//

craig was going to mexico. his wound was getting worse, and he needed the doctor they had used many a time before when they couldn't go to the hospital due to a potential police presence. baz was going to drive him, and tessa was relieved she would get a few days break from the pain in the ass brother. she lit a joint in celebration, poring over her algebra homework in the meantime. 

"god, i can't wait to drop out." she said between the roll in her teeth, smoke escaping from her mouth. deran had the best weed. "are you sure that's what you want to do, sweetheart?" smurf ran her hand through the girls dirty tangled hair from a day of hard work in the sun. "um, yeah. i can't keep doing this math shit. i can whip up a bullshit essay any day, but these work sheets are actually psychotic." she kicked her legs up onto the counter from her spot at the bar stool, bare feet wiggling in the air.

"gross. get your dogs off the counter." deran wrinkled his nose in disgust as he walked to the fridge for a beer. tessa responded by taking a long drag from her joint, blowing smoke out the side of her mouth and grinning, wriggling her feet. 

//

mint chocolate chip ice cream dripped from tessa's nose, prompting deran to wipe it with a finger, licking the excess sweet. "gross! you didn't have to eat it." she laughed, tossing the empty finished cone in the trash. "you're my baby sister, it's not gross." deran fist bumped her shoulder. "as you and everyone else constantly remind me. i'm not a baby, you know. i'm sixteen." she scuffed her shoe on the sidewalk, kicking rocks along. it was quiet for a few minutes, the cool breeze of oceanside california washing over the siblings.

 "i hope craig's okay." tessa pulled at the collar of her shirt in anxiety. "he'll be fine. he always is. it's craig, you know?" deran assured her, squeezing her shoulder. tessa's eyes lit up, and she grabbed hold of deran's hand, pulling him forward. "hey, can we ride the ferris wheel? please?" she let go of his hand, clapping her own in anticipation. "what? no. we gotta meet back at the house and discuss the next job or some shit. i got a text from smurf."

 he dug his phone from his pocket, holding it up to display a screen full of texts. the girl stopped short, pulling her own phone from her baggy sweatpants pocket. the light illuminated her face as she unlocked it, entering the code amidst her lock screen picture of her and deran and craig at deran's friend adrian's surf shop, when she had got her first board.

 she was holding up the purple striped board, a goofy childish smile on her face while deran helped her hold up the other end of the board, and craig stood with his arm thrown around her shoulder. "oh, shit, yeah. i got the text too. and like, five more." she responded to her mother with a quick 'okay', and pocketed her phone. "you gotta stop leaving your phone on silent. you know it pisses her off." deran alluded to smurf. 

"as if you don't purposely piss her off all the time. so does craig, and baz, and pope probably will too, now that he's back." tessa counted off all her brothers on her fingers. "yeah, but that's not the point. hey, i'm just trying to make things easier for you." he responded, jingling his keys and sliding into the drivers seat of his car. 

"i know. and i appreciate it. i just...i need people to know i can handle things on my own. or at least, i can try to." she slammed the passenger side door shut, and deran pulled out of the downtown parking lot and started up the road back to the cody residence. 

//

"you want my help on a job...that smurf doesn't know about?" tessa set her phone down, coming to a stand where pope stood in front of her. "yes." he said simply, a one word firm response. that was like pope, alright. "i'm in." 

she spit on her hand, reaching out to shake on it. pope gazed down at her hand for a long few seconds, before slowly saying "i'm not touching your spit. too many germs." before turning around, leaving tessa to get ready for the job-whatever it was. she bounced on her toes, excited at this prospect of doing something without smurf attached to it. "don't mess this up, tessa." she whispered to herself, fingers crossed behind her back.