Unconditional

Chapter 19

"Sol!" My voice rang throughout the house as I set my final bag down, "Ready?"

"Coming!"

Tiny footsteps echoed in my hall while I watched my brother speedily rush down the steps. The sight of his odd attire caught my eye as he came into view,

"Oh, interesting outfit,"

A huff resonated from Sol as he adjusted the fedora atop his head, "Runa, you know everyone who travels wears these outfits."

His stern voice was amusing to say the least, my lips twitching towards a smile. I nodded back, further scanning the bright outfit he chose to wear.

"If we were traveling to the tropics, yeah, it's not going to be Hawaii-warm you know." I mentioned, noting the white Hawaiian shirt dotted with blue flowers paired with his neon green shorts, "Not to mention the matching... Or lack thereof,"

Aggressively shaking her head, my mother stood against the living room wall watching quietly. Noticing her urgent message of shutting up, I realized this most likely had a reason as the clock hit go time. With any more time spent with Sol finding an outfit, we risked the chance of missing our flight.

"Mommy," Sol whined, running over to Mom, "Runa's not being nice, we should leave her here,"

Watching as my mother embraced Sol in a hug, a light tremor of laughter could be seen as she patted his back.

"Oh no, well just have to call Malikai and tell him she can't go, hm?"

Sol's playful giggle sounded as I felt my phone vibrate in my pocket.

Speak of the Devil, Malikai's text appeared to notify that he would be here momentarily. With this new knowledge, I shot my mother a signal notifying her we'd be leaving shortly.

As the two laughed together, I took a moment to smile at the scene before me. My heart began pounding as we approached closer and closer to the reality of the situation. So many factors zoomed through my brain, some that brought fear and anxious pains, and others left my heart skipping a bit in excitement.

We're really doing this huh?

Admittedly, there was quite a change in plans when I had originally proposed the trip to my parents. Their reactions were one of the same, a distrustful look and an unwavering denial of allowing their youngest out of the country without them. This soon caused a halt in plans, leaving Malikai and I going back to the drawing board.

Unsure how to proceed, I knew it would be easy enough to take the answer as it was and go by myself, though truthfully it didn't feel right. Not to mention the accidental mistake of telling Sol about the trip before getting our parent's approval, a minor detail that caused me to turn into my brother's lawyer. It was time to figure out a way to make this possible.

Surprisingly enough, little work had to be done on my part as Malikai relayed the roadblock that prevented further planning of the trip. With this knowledge of my parents' hesitancy of letting their seven-year-old go out of the country without them, Alexander spoke to his wife about a change of plans.

Having graduated, July soon came knocking on our door with plans of the unknown.

And now, here we are getting ready for a family trip out of the states. After a bit of back and forth on details from both families, a week in July was scheduled and booked for a flight of seven.

In all honesty, my mind questioned Evangeline and Alex's intention of inviting my family along. I couldn't understand why they would bother with other kids, not to mention booking flights for my parents. It seemed odd the amount of effort they were putting into having us go considering how little effort they put towards their own children. One could say they're trying to make it more enjoyable for their own kids, but has that thought even crossed their minds?