“And don’t forget Gordy’s allergies,” Zach snapped his mouth shut directly after he said that, regretting the words the moment they had come out. Their brother was touchy subject with all of them, but he knew Maddie and Dillon struggled with everything that had happened the most. “Being human kind of trumps being a dog,” this was his attempt at moving on from any mention of Gordy, but the damage was probably already done. “There might be brain bleach around here Mads,” Zach joked, before pulling a face at Dillon. “Don’t give her ideas like that, you know she just might do it.”
Even if the current conversation was focused on him and his missed career as a rapper, Zach was just glad they were all talking again. “Maybe it would, Munchkin. Which would mean I would save me from falling prey to your matchmaking ideas,” because yeah, the thought of his sister setting him up still terrified him. “Yeah, maybe if my entire audience was half deaf. I can sing, but I cannot rap. Think I’ll just stick to my current career.” Because he was good at it, and the world kind of needed medical personnel to continue working in their fields. “And you guys seriously need to stop talking about food, you’re making me hungry.” They should have brought something with them. This was what Zach got for being spontaneous and shit.
By the way Maddie clammed up after her remark, Zach had a feeling she wanted it ignored, so for the moment he would do just that. But he was going to revisit that comment another time, maybe when it was just the two of them. “I miss my apartment,” He remarked honestly, it was stupid, but it had been his and his alone. “And I’ve got another year and some months before I hit thirty, Mads,” he just chuckled at the old comment from Dillon. “You realize you’re only a few years behind Maddie, right?”
The awkward moment seemed to pass by easily enough. Zach had to think it was crisis adverted for the moment. Years of experience had taught him out to maneuver through these situations, so he didn’t mind that it had fallen on him to steer things back in a happier direction. One where feelings wouldn’t get hurt, hopefully.
“Nobody believes it was an accident,” Zach pointed out as Maddie and Dillon discussed the Nerf war and the injuries entailed. “And you probably had it coming since you agreed to the Nerf battle knowing full well she’s prone to things like that,” he paused for a moment. “Anyway, I think her attack on me still goes down in the record books.” The sheer fact that his baby sister had gotten the jump on him in Nerf War was something he would probably never live down. “And fine, you don’t need training, you just need better self preservation skills.” Shit. Zach knew that was the wrong thing to say the moment the words were out. Think before you speak! he chided himself, hoping his words wouldn’t be taken wrong.
He smirked. “We haven’t done that in awhile, actually,” Zach didn’t often strive to piss off the library personnel, but every once in awhile even he got himself into trouble. “And we won’t get pissed off, we’ll just take the book away, Pipsqueak.” By know he knew suggesting the library would end with Dillon reading, but for some reason he continued to suggest it.