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MEREDITH DIDN'T CRY when her mom died. She didn't cry at her funeral, and she didn't cry when they buried her six feet under. The first time I ever saw her cry over her mom's death was weeks after the initial event when all of us were playing Wii Bowling in Silas's basement. She'd gotten a bit too excited and accidentally threw the remote at the TV when she won, causing a huge crack to appear. This had been emotionally devastating enough to bring her to her knees as heart-wrenching sobs overtook her. She hadn't stopped crying until three hours later, after we'd treated her to enough Oreos to feed a small country and took her over to Atlas's house, where Pepper was more than happy to lick her down until her sobs turned into laughter.
Meredith had a very difficult time adjusting. For some reason which she refused to speak about, she blamed herself for her mom's death. She used escapism to cope, diving into Netflix and RedBox rentals to keep her mind off things. She did what she did best and buried her feelings so deep inside of her, she'd never have to confront them. She turned antisocial, touchy, and irritable; she became less spontaneous-fun-grab-life-by-the-balls Meredith and more emotional-teenage-wreck Meredith. She refused to leave her room; she refused to hang out with us; she refused to talk to us at all. If it hadn't been for Silas's persistance, we might have lost her with her mom.
Similarly, it proved to be a difficult task to adjust to living with the strange girl that'd been experimented on for her whole life and had never set foot in the outside world before I'd broken out of the hospital where she'd been held prisoner. Although Thea quickly adapted to our friend group (having her there with us had become as natural as having Silas) and instantly seemed to belong with my family, my second sister (seemingly overnight, I'd become the middle child, and I was not happy about this arrangement), she had great difficulty with anyone that wasn't us. Once, she punched a Kroger employee because he'd asked her if she needed help reaching something. She also had little-to-no understanding of how the modern world worked, which became evident when I tried to show her the wonders of the Kardashians and she almost broke our TV trying to save the little people trapped inside the bright box.
Worst of all, though, was the constant fear that came with having Thea in my life. The fear that something might happen to her, and we'd have to take her to the hospital — the real one, not the Mendoza Institute. Because how could we explain her to them? And, more importantly, how would we be able to pay for her treatments? We almost had to sell Cerberus to pay for the expenses of my stitches. Also, why hadn't the people at the Mendoza Institute cared more about her going missing? Why did they seem to be doing nothing to find her? Why did they do nothing to find me, or my dad? It didn't make sense.
However, having Thea around was more good than bad. She had quite the way with animals — she practically had demonic little Cerberus wrapped around her pinkie finger, which Dad was pretty pissed about. When she first met Pepper, she burst out in tears. An hour later, she'd trained her to sit, stay, lie down, shake a paw, and roll over. Other things she loved included sugary cereal and my dad's cooking. Even just the process of him cooking amazed her — she could sit and watch him cook for hours. She also liked going on hikes with us, Disney movies (and singing along to their soundtracks in the car), and YA novels. Lordie-Lordie-Lordie, did she love YA novels. She'd spend hours upon hours in the library, browsing the books and trying to find the perfect few to check out. When we got home, she'd have them all read by sundown, and we'd have to go back to the library the next day. Hey, she was addicted to books. At least it wasn't heroin.
