One for the road

You made your way down the hallway and knew you would probably still forget something for your trip even after checking to make sure you wouldn’t. Both Lucy and Sarah’s doors were closed shut with no noise coming from behind them so you assumed they were already downstairs.

That assumption turned out to be correct as you saw Lucy still watching TV in the living room and Sarah was setting places at the table, the noises coming from the kitchen telling you Mom was still finishing up the last touches for the meal.

Out of the two of your sisters, you headed over to Sarah and took some of the cutlery off of her to help set the table and used the excuse to be close enough to have a conversation without anyone hearing.

“So Mom came to talk to you right?” you asked, making Sarah look around before giving you a nod.

“That was probably one of the most embarrassing conversations I’ve had in a while” Sarah admitted, stopping what she was doing while you both tried to look busy instead of actually doing what you were supposed to.

“What did you talk about? I know she was pretty direct with me” you asked, curious about what Sarah had revealed.

“I didn’t give her any specifics if that’s what you’re asking, but I did tell her some of what we had done. Just not everything and I think she could tell I wasn’t being honest but she did seem a bit distracted” she replied, looking annoyed at herself for not being convincing enough.

Mom seemingly sounding distracted was hopefully her active effect kicking in to keep you on her mind but it was a conversation you had no part in so you couldn’t know for sure.

The fact that this was something bothering your sister and that you had already told Mom a more accurate version of what you and Sarah had done, also made you want to reassure her that you were fine with Mom knowing the truth.

Before you could however, Mom came into the dining room and saw the two of you stood there talking, pausing in her step as she held a dish ready to be put on the table.

“Stop dawdling you two and get the table sorted. Dinner’s already ready so Max, you go and get Lucy. You can chat afterwards.” Mom announced, setting what she had down and heading back into the kitchen the get the rest.

She paused momentarily at the door to give you both one final look but whatever she saw didn't give her pause for concern as she left immediately after.

"I'll tell you later" you said, quickly placing the rest of the cutlery you held at the nearest place and taking the short trip to the living room. You had to speak over the TV as Lucy had turned it up louder but you eventually got her attention and she followed after you and took her place.

You returned with Lucy in tow and Mom had brought the last of the food in and was just getting seated, a full casserole dish and a plate of salad piled high. You personally opted to grab as little salad as possible once you were sat down, managing to avoid an argument from Mom but she still gave you the side eye when you didn't go for more.

Once your plates were full, Mom held her hands out, palms up as she waited for you to all join her in saying grace. You didn’t opt to say anything again even with Lucy nudging you under the table. Instead, grace was the usual and you were all eating without any other distractions, making a big dent in whatever was on your plates before the conversation started back up.

“You two have got exams coming up next week right?” Mom asked, already knowing the answer but wanting to hear it from you herself.

“Yep, Max has been helping me study.” Sarah answered before you could.

“Emma helped you as well, her notes are way better than mine” you added, hoping to avoid any comments about what a ‘study session’ would entail.

Sarah nodded and the mention of Emma’s name didn’t make either of them question if anything inappropriate was going on, instead making Mom focus back to you for other reasons.

“I know it’s probably too late to be saying this but are you sure you should be going on this trip if you’re having important exams straight after you’re back?” Mom asked, a worried expression crossing her face.

"I'll be fine. More than fine actually. Helping Sarah revise has been good for me as well so we've both spent being productive. I'm sure Grace has had the same conversation with Emma as well.” you replied.

Mom still didn’t look convinced and you knew she wouldn’t call off the trip or anything like that, but you saw that Sarah gave you a look and Lucy pat your leg, a lot more reassuringly than the nudge she gave you earlier given that she knew the purpose of the trip.

"I'll bring some of my textbooks with me and still try to get time in. I'm sure I'll get bored enough on the drive over there that I'll take a look at them" you joked, seeing Mom relax at the suggestion.

The car ride was still something you were worried about and no matter how much planning you went through in your head, you weren't confident enough to guess what Grace was going to say. You couldn't really manipulate her like Mom but you hoped Emma would have a better idea of what to say.

The one thing that did calm you down was that Grace’s main worry seemed to be Emma’s happiness and that was something you were both on the same side for. Emma was the only one in the loop about the KDK and ever since her kink was changed, you were pretty sure almost everything about the app had improved her life.

That might sound like you were trying to give a sales pitch for the KDK but you genuinely believed that both yours and Emma's lives had changed positively since you first got it and you hoped to spread that to more of the subjects as time went on. You had already given Sarah and Lucy intelligence upgrades to help improve their time still left in education but even with just the one upgrade, you expected that to help in ways you probably couldn’t even imagine right now.

Maybe even giving each subject one of each upgrade to help generally would be a big boon but they would probably need to be in the loop for that to happen, the change probably being too great to do in one night. That didn’t rule out you or Emma from taking that deal though and you considered the cost of that compared to what you would have left if you took the ‘Crystal Ball’ shop effect that you recently had your eyes on.

You had sort of zoned out of the conversation as you focused on what your immediate worries and opportunities were but you managed to focus again without the topic being thrown in your direction, trying to figure out what you had missed while the three of them had been talking.

Author's Note: The spoiler chapter will be updated shortly :)