There are few things that raise her ire like a brief glimpse of Solomon’s anger; even a hint of it has always had a tendency to ignite her much more easily lit fuse. She clamps her lips together until they’re white with the effort to keep them shut. There is a long pause, the air around her almost sparking, but as quick as it rose, her temper recedes back. If Solomon had wanted a fight he would have used a different tone, would have let her feel the full brunt. “You think it’s an excuse,” she says instead, none of her anger but all of her petulance visible; she’s not perfect enough to leave it lay entirely.
He calls it crap, how she’s trying to protect his status. It’s never mattered to him, she knows that, nobody who really knows her brother could say that he’s aiming for prestige, but she’s trying to protect it all the same. “It’s not.” Final, familiar, possibly stupid, but Torrie wouldn’t say that. There is always the enormity of the fact that if she asked, if she begged and pleaded, Solomon would move mountains for her. She can’t do that, she’s lost count how many times she’s acted on Sol’s love for her out of a selfish, broken place.
But she takes the humor, smirks at the eye roll from her affable, charming brother. It’s a good thing that she hasn’t rubbed off on him. “You aren’t the most predictable,” she counters and steps back another step, out of his space even more as she fights to pop the top of the cookie box open. “And it’s been longer since you’ve seen her than me,” she adds, though the truth is not by much. She settles back on the corner of her bed, draws her legs up cross legged as she breaks open the cellophane wrapper and pulls one chocolate cookie out. “You know how I’m doing.” Her fingers shake a little, and she hates that she can’t control it.
"How's the case?" The headache of Sol's that she's helpless to control.