Lisa settles back on the sofa, my mom smiles at Kayla, and I kiss her on the temple before leaning us back into the sofa.

Just then the front door bursts open and Julie goes barreling down the entrance hallway. I hear her shoes squeak as she makes an effort to stop abruptly, then she slowly walks into the room. My dad comes up behind her and places his hand on her shoulder. She looks at everyone in the room one by one, her eyes land on Mikayla and she does a double take, she takes in our positions and closeness to each other.

“Ooooh,” she says, coming closer to us. She’s examining Kayla’s face up close. “You’re pretty!” Then she looks at me, “Better than the last one, Jacaaaarb.” She says my name like she did when she was a baby, she does it when she wants to be a brat because it pisses me off, but now is not the right time. I’m about to tell her to get lost when she leans even closer towards Kayla.

“Hey! I know you! Your Emily’s sister, right? Man, she looks so much like you. She’s gonna be just as pretty when she grows up. We have dance together. She wasn’t there today though, is she sick?”

“Okay kiddo, time to get some homework done. I’ll let you do it in my office on the big spinny chair.” My dad says, and then mouths a ‘sorry’ to Kayla.

“Oh no…” My mom covers her mouth with her hand. “Emily Jones? Your parents are Kevin and Denise?” Understanding dawns on her face.

Kayla nods. Her eyes wide with unshed tears.

“Oh, sweetheart.” Mom cries.

Lisa looks between my mom and Kayla. It’s not enough that Kayla’s lost her entire family, or that Lisa’s lost her best friend, but now mom’s lost people she cares about too, she just didn’t know it.

“So, there might be a slight issue with the hotel room, Kayla.” Lisa breaks the silence.

We all look at her.

“I tried to book two rooms at the same hotel, or at least a room with two beds, or even a room with a twin or queen bed, but the only ones available are singles and even they were hard to find. Apparently some new ‘Nicholas Sparks’ movie is being filmed here and that ‘Zac Teflon’ boy from those high school movies is in town. All the hotels are booked out.”

She takes a sip of her tea. “I thought you would be staying with James or Megan, but now I see that that’s not an option.” She glances at me, and then down to our entwined hands. “I can make it work. We’ll make a bed on the floor of the hotel until we sort out what’s happening with the house insurance and stuff.” She tries to smile.

“She can stay here!” I blurt out.

Kayla’s head whips to face me.

“Right, Mom?” I plead with my eyes.

“Yes, sweetheart, of course, you can stay here until things settle a bit and more permanent housing has been organized.” She smiles reassuringly at me.

“I can’t stay here-"

“What?” I face her.

“You can, and you will.” My mom states with a tone that means ‘the end’.

***

Lisa ends up staying for dinner, Julie is spending the night at a friends house. Dad apologizes to Kayla again and has assured her that he’s explained the situation to Julie. It might be a little hard for an eight year old to comprehend but he did the best he could. I know Kayla appreciates it.

Lisa and Mom make plans to catch up again the next day to organize some more things. I think Lisa is glad someone is there to help both her and Kayla, and I know Mom doesn’t mind, especially now that she’s found out she knew Kayla’s parents.

After dinner, Lucy and Heidi arrive. I rang them earlier and told them about her clothing situation, the fact the she doesn’t have any, aside from underwear.

I get them to wait in the family room while I run upstairs to get Kayla, she’s been holed up in my room since dinner. She didn’t eat.

I don’t know how she’ll feel about me telling them, and them being here.

I knock on the door and wait for her response.

She opens the door and peeks out. I can tell she’s been crying from the puffiness of her eyes.

“Hey,” I say.

She fails her attempt at a smile.

“Umm, I really don’t want you to get mad, but uh,” I rub the back of my head, nervous habit, “Lucy and Heidi are downstairs…”

“Jake, I don’t-"

“It’s my fault, I rang them earlier. I just, you need clothes, and probably other girl things, and I didn’t know what else to do…”

Her eyes are cast downwards, but when she hears my explanation she looks up at me and a small smile breaks through.

She opens the door wider and steps out of the room, grabbing my hand as we climb down the stairs.

We stand at the door of the family room and Lucy and Heidi both turn to us. At first they see our hands locked, then they look up at us and smile.

Lucy speaks first, “We’re really sorry about what happened Mikayla. If you need anything at all… just let us know, okay?” She’s standing in front of Kayla looking straight into her eyes.

Kayla nods.

Heidi stands up and positions herself next to Lucy, “We just bought some stuff over that you might need, Jake mentioned you can’t get back into your house. So… we just bought the essential stuff. I know it’s not much Mikayla-"

“It’s more than enough,” Kayla interrupts. “And my friends call me Micky.”

I smile at her, let go of her hand and use it to bring her head to my lips, I kiss her on her temple. I love doing it and she doesn’t seem to mind, so I’ll keep doing it until she tells me to stop.