The girl sitting cross-legged on the floor, passed the joint above her head to her older brother, who was currently having some kind of existential spiral. Today was her birthday. Goddamn nineteen. Chance was nineteen when she married.
Minerva had stayed up til midnight to celebrate, and Vince had bought her a new CD and some weed to listen to it with. The box fan blew the smoke out the opened window into the cool summer night.
"I mean shit, sometimes you look around and wonder when you're gonna get a piece of the limelight too, yknow?" Girls have it easy, Abner thought dully.
"Girls do not have it easy," She popped him on the head with the back of one of her six hands. "You ever had to sex up old men for cash lately?" Ok, so apparently he'd thought that out loud.
"Point taken." Uncomfortable on the floor, Minerva scooched over on the matress, turning the horizontal Abner over and propping herself up against the headboard, setting her legs on her brother's torso.
"Oof, hey, I ain't a footrest."
"The boys in this family all have the same plan: Grow up, join the family business. What's my plan? I don't wanna get married. I wanna have a life first." Either Abner was really tired, or she wasn't making sense. He sat up slightly.
"Are you saying marriage will kill you? Last I checked, ma's been married forty years, and she's alive as ever." Abner snorted, before realizing just exactly what he's said.
"Yeah, but her husband isn't." Minerva interjected, offering a strange, wry grin. She shouldn't be happy, after all, Hans' end had been a brutal one. But it was also a deserved one. The conversation went onto other things quickly. "Marriage isn't life. It's a prison! Every man I've met talks that way. Why can't I?" She cried into the lonely room. Being buzzed made her melodramatic, Abner thought, taking care not to say the statement out loud this time. He rolled his four amber eyes her way.
"You're a woman. Girls? They're supposed to want to get married and have kids," he pressed his hands over his eyes, blinking as he fought off sleep. Minerva crossed her arms; she'd heard enough of this shit from her past dad without having to hear it from her brother.
"Oh," She shot back, "and you're a man. You're supposed to have a wife and provide for your family. How does that feel?"
"I'll get married…someday," Abner looked in his mind's eye to the future, "And I'll be an asset to the family business, so there's no question I'll be uh, able to provide. If I have kids, there's a good chance they'll be able to take this whole place over once I'm gone," the fact his brother had no children either, was huge competition, and not a drug addict hadn't escaped his mind.
"You're not foolin' anyone," Minerva laughed. When she laughed, she showed those needle-like teeth, flipping her head back. Her brother with a wife? And kids? Bull.
"Just 'cause it's your goddamn birthday doesn't give you free reign to laugh at my dreams, okay?"
"It's just, well, you know," she pulled her legs off him to sit cross-legged, elbows digging into her knees and chin perched atop her palms, "It's pretty obvious to me. You don't have to hide it." Whatever the fuck she was talking about, it sure as hell wasn't obvious to him.
"Ahhh, you better damn well elucidate, sis, 'cause you've got me stumped."
The Araneae didn't want to come right out and say it, so she proceeded with what she saw as very heavy handed clues instead, "You. With a wife. That's a joke, right?"
His entire face swirled together like he'd tasted a bad lemon, "What do you mean 'a joke?'" he rose, eyeing the girl with his hurt pride on show.
"You just got a reputation is all," she shrugged, blowing a swirling cloud of smoke out of the corner of her mouth.
"I'm- I'm young. I don't gotta be strapped to a woman just yet. I can still have fun," The lanky spider set the ashtray sharply and crossed the floor to close the window.
"Hey, no, leave that open. It feels nice out."
"It's getting a little late. You'll need to be up for your birthday breakfast in the morning," He dismissed his sister as he turned the music dial downwards. He decided he wasn't so keen on that Anarchy shit Minerva had been blasting for the past hour. She was fond of Vince's tunes, and that made him pretty wired too. Vince wasn't the most trustworthy guy for his sister to hang around with.
"Come on! Why're ya mad, huh? Quit being so grouchy."
"I have the right to be grouchy! This is my room. I can- I can be as grouchy as I want!" He protested, two arms going up in a weak exasperation.
A knock at the door preceded Hector opening the room to Abner's door a cautious few inches.
"Hey, maybe think about keeping it down. Chance is sleepin'. She had a tough night." The two spiders nodded solemly at that. Their shiftmother's sleep was important. He squeaked the door slightly more open to see Minerva sitting pajama-clad on the bed, "Oh, and a happy birthday, Min."
"Thanks, Hector."
"Actually, Minerva was just going." Abner looked at her expectantly, made a shooing motion, but she shook her head in a cheerfully defiant manner, placing her hands in her lap.
Hector didn't want to disturb the scene anymore, especially with his brother's nasty glare, so he decided to duck out, "Well, goodnight."