I dry myself up in Liz's room. I look at the one piece dress I have chosen, but I don't feel like wearing it anymore. I opt for a more neutral look with pants and a t-shirt.
I only wear panties. I don't bother myself with a bra. Anyway, I'm small. I return downstairs just as Liz finishes cleaning up the kitchen. She raises her eyebrows when she looks up to me and asks with concern.
"What is it?"
I look into her violet eyes, and shake my head.
"Nothing."
I go to sit at the dinner table, but I can feel the soft but persistent gaze on me. Though, the persistence only lasts for a few seconds. I focus on the dishes before me, their bright colors bringing me joy, and I ignore the fact that Liz must have known what happened.
She has become such an attentive cradle of gentleness. After months doing her best to be more than a sister and a friend, she can recognize when some things come up to the surface.
When I look up, she has already resumed and finished her work. She washes her hand and comes to sit across from me before smiling at me.
"Let's eat."
"Hm."
I don't know if she is aware, but Liz's smile definitely has a healing power. It is even softer than mom's, to the point where I can't even say that she inherited it. But it soothes me, and calms my mind.
If I am to write a book and take inspiration on Lizbeth to create a personage, she will wield the water of life, definitely.
I can't help the smile that spreads on my lips, and I lower my head to truly focus on the food, and not just use it to not focus on my depressive thoughts.
As if afraid that I will lack nutrition, Liz has not been sparing any effort to make the meals as rich and plentiful as possible. Must be why I healed well from the sequela of the accident. Though, maybe I have my decision to exercise to thank for not putting on weight.
Though, again, maybe there is another reason for the rich diet lately. I raise my eyes to the full curves holding firm without a bra across from me. After all, production demands supply. I don't think this world with mind reading is supernatural enough to slap the law of conservation in the face.
My thoughts are funny enough to cheer their owner up, so my smile turns deeper, more genuine, and the food more enjoyable.
My smile brings happiness to Liz's own smile, and the atmosphere at the table turns warmer, more wholesome.
I miss some background noise, but I don't feel like getting up for the TV, and taking out my phone for music or a video feels like it would be pollution to the current comfort.
The meal time thus passes at a speed neither fast nor slow. When we are done, I help Liz put the dishes away after washing and drying them. This time, I'm the one to tidy up the kitchen and the dinner table. When we are done, she finally has time for her shower. And I have the motivation to act on my desire for some background noise.
The news was about the recent happenings, in other words, nothing particularly important. What is good about this world is its greater stability. The wars of interest have truly been translated into struggles in the world of economics, technology, and so on.
In short, it has become more of a mind game of geopolitics and less of the crude, barbaric exchanges of the past.
Yeah, apparently, wars, when they bring enough damage, have their ways to make everyone wiser. Or maybe it is a more profitable model that has made the world and its elites change.
Anything else is subtler, because I don't doubt the existence of the darker aspects, but this world is indeed brighter than the past in the echoes in my mind. Just that cleaner and brighter society, more friendly for the short few decades, give or take, that we all have to live, makes this world a paradise of sorts, comparatively.
I don't think more can be asked for, not with how humans are.
*Step* *Step* *Step*
As I watch the news, I turn at the sound of Liz's footsteps. Her loungewear consists of a simple blue long skirt reaching her ankles and an off shoulder white crop top with a frilly band that caresses the top half of her abdomen, right below her impressive chest asset, with three fingers wide slightly puffy sleeves a few inches down her arms, on the same line as her armpits. And both the top and the skirt have strings that she has tied up right above her chest, in the middle of the curved line that runs over it, and at the waist right below her belly button.
The fresh look is completed with her thick books to give her that university big sister's look. I give her a once-over with a smile, and she twirls when she reaches the floor.
"Not bad, right? Do you think I need glasses?"
"Humph! Show off."
I roll my eyes at her, making her laugh. I turn away to lower the volume of the TV.
When she comes to sit down beside me, the tableau is complete with the university big sister and the high school little sister, because in front of me is a book on marketing I have gone to pick up in our shared room to take when she has been bathing.
She puts down her thick books and looks at my book.
"I noticed your new books lately, different from the novels you used to read before. What brought the change?"
I wave the title at her.
"I'm preparing for the future. I'm even considering finding a part-time job."
"Why? Are you having some trouble that requires money?"
Saying that, Liz looks at me with some blame in her violet eyes under her slight frown.
"Being sensible and mature is good, but wanting to shoulder everything in your life by yourself is not good. Not when you are still young, and not when you still have me. Do you think we are that poor already? Or do you think your sister is incompetent?"
I smile instead of finding her naggy. The concern and love warmth me.
*Muah*
I kiss her on the cheek to poke open the ball holding her indignation and I push her against the backrest of the sofa and pose my head on her soft lap. Only then do I speak.
"It is nothing like that, sis. Consider it me trying to experience society and learn to be independent, even if only slightly. I was not joking when I said I'm preparing for the future. I'm even pulling Emmie along."
"You… sigh…"
Liz shakes her head, and stops opposing. My smile spreads wider, and I make to turn to my book but the softness very close to my head, practically pasted against it, captures my eyes, after the smell coming from it had my attention hooked.
When Liz doesn't feel me moving on her lap for a while she takes her eyes off her own book and looks down. Well, she leans forward to look at me over the big obstacles on her chest.
"What are you thinking about, spacing out like that, Max?"
"I'm wondering how a cake with your milk will taste."
Liz taps me on the forehead and laughs with her characteristic softness:
"Hahaha, you girl, you have changed. You are growing up to be more and more of a little pervert."
I grin, and push up her crop top to access the source of the milky smell which I put in my mouth. Liz only laughs, and after shaking her head, let me get my dessert while she returns her focus to her learning, though she does harden in my mouth.