Claire appeared motionless, as she sat in her seat, listening to music. With her eyes closed, Charlie could only tell she was alive and not dead, by the slow rise and fall of her chest, and slight, almost unnoticeable flare of her nostrils. She appeared to be a beautiful statue, carve with the greatest care and skill. And she didn’t want to talk to him.

He felt awkward, sitting there next to Claire, doing nothing, while their little siblings sat behind them playing and interacting. He shifted a few times, trying to get more comfortable, but was unable. He wanted to poke her, or get her attention, and talk to her. Charlie wondered if it would look bad if he just pulled off her earphones and started talking. He would have lamented over this for more then half an hour, if the vehicle had not hit an area of extremely uneven road, with unpaved areas.

The convoy hit a series of seven large bumps, the last of which seemed to send everyone three inches out of their seats, Jacob and Karen’s card game flying, and Claire’s Earphones sliding down her face and onto her lap. They bounced from her lap and onto the floor, making her groan as she reeled them up by the chord and started wiping them off on her pants, to try and get most of the dust off.

“So, where are you from?” Charlie asked her, before she could close herself off again.

“Maine,” she said. “You?” she asked, her tone borderline uninterested.

“I’m a Texan,” he told her, a grin in his voice. “My parents established Acuff.” Claire started to open her mouth, but was quickly interrupted.

“Hey! Clairey, she’s cheating!” they heard behind them.

“Am not!” Karen yelled back.

“Are too!”

“Am not!”

Charlie groaned as he turned around in the seat to look at the younger kids. “Karen, what have I said about cheating. People aren’t going to want to play with you if you cheat. The only reason I still do, is because I’m your brother.” The way her reasoned with his sister intrigued Claire, but not enough to speak up, or add to the conversation.

“I am not!” Karen yelled at her brother. Her most recent outburst causing a chorus of ‘shhh’s from some older people a few rows back.

“Karen,” Charlie said softly and sternly, giving her a look down her nose.

“Fine,” she said, handing a few cards back to Jacob.

“Sorry about that,” Charlie said to Claire. “She has had issues with cheating for a while now. But, it’s good that your brother called her on it.”

“Oh, it’s fine,” Claire said, almost paying him no attention. She was finished wiping the dirt and dust off her ear phones and was just about to put them on her head.

“Hey, Claire?” Charlie said before she was able to completely immerse herself in her music. “Where in Maine are you from?”

“The center of Maine,” she said, not caring to elaborate on where in the center of Maine, how long she was there, or why she left. She wasn’t really in the mood to start chatting with this boy she had never met before. If it weren’t for the fact that they were on a moving vehicle, she may have gotten off to avoid his constant chatter. She turned up the volume of her music. It was louder then she normally liked, but she didn’t want to deal with him right now.

Being totally ignored by Claire, Charlie decided the best thing for him to do, would be to try and sleep. So, he leaned back in the seat, and tried to stretch out his legs. Finding that uncomfortable, he scrunched his body into a fetal-esque position, but was still unable to sleep. It was as though no matter how hard he tried, he was unable to keep his eye lids closed for more then a few moments. His thoughts quickly drifted to many different places: his father, his sister, the unknown in which he was about to face. He was scared and excited all at the same time. And that quickly wiped him out and put him to sleep.

Claire had seen her little brother sleep quite a bit, but the way Charlie slept was just, Odd. He twitched, a lot. And his mouth moved, as though he were talking a hundred words a minute. She didn’t know that he was having a nightmare, but she could have guessed, due to the sweat he produced and the shivering and whimpering that came from him. She never would have noticed, had he not smacked her in the face while he slept. She watched in horror for a while, before getting poked in the back of her head.

“He’s sleeping,” Karen told her. “He gets nightmares a lot, but he won’t admit it. You can leave him or wake him up, it doesn’t make much of a difference.” She was torn, Claire, whether to stop getting hit, or leave him in emotional agony. On one hand, he wasn’t talking to her, but on another, he was dealing with the demons he was supposed to have left in his closet, back in Acuff.

“Charlie, wake up,” she said, poking him with the tip of her pinky finger, to avoid touching to much of his sweat. “Charlie!”

“He won’t wake if you do that, “ Karen told her. “You need to shake him, or yell at him, or dump water on him. He’s a heavy sleeper.” Making a note to ask Charlie if his little sister always snooped into other people’s business, she put her hands on both his shoulders and shook him. He then sat up quickly, banging is forehead into Claire’s nose. He pushed himself back into his seat, and she grabbed her nose as she sat back into hers.

“You were having a nightmare. I assumed waking you up would reduce the amount of times you’d hit me,” she said. He had a look of horror on his face, as if he were afraid he had offended her, but the look quickly dissipated, when she started to laugh. He joined in as well, after looking to make sure her nose wasn’t bleeding. “What was it about?” she asked when they were done laughing. She assumed that, since he seemed to want her to talk so much, he would have no problem talking to her.

“I’d rather not say.” He was quiet in his answer, as though he were afraid someone may listen in on them. He looked around, and then over to the seat behind them. As he expected, Karen’s ear was pressed against the space between his seat and Claire’s.

“Why not?” She asked, surprised he was suddenly not overly talkative.

“We’re not alone.” As he said that, he didn’t realize the different connotations that could have been connected with his sentence. But when Karen started to giggle, he reached his hand over the seats to poke her in the head. “You’re way to young to be thinking like that.” She just laughed some more. He just rolled his eyes and sat back down.

“You’ve got a, nice, little sister,” Claire said, choosing her words carefully.

“I’d rather have your brother,” he replied, and then received a kick in the back of his seat from the one he was trying to replace.

“She can’t be that bad, can she?”

“She is normally worse.” Claire found the whole thing quite amusing. She and Jacob got a long so well, seeing the two of them go at it, was a nice change of pace. Or, at the very least, entertaining. “What about your brother?”

“Jacob is almost always well behaved.” Claire was proud of her little brother. He was smart, and caring, and even at his young age, was very understanding.

“So, he never drives you nuts?”

“On occasion, but it’s because we’re together all the time. We tread on each other’s nerves every once in a while.” Before Charlie could say anything remotely witty, the Convoy hit another patch of uneven road. The many small bumps made everything vibrate, and the cards Karen and Jacob were using, slide to the floor. “This ride is getting very old, very quickly,” she said as she helped the younger siblings pick up their game. “The sun looks as though it should be setting soon, so we’ll probably be fed in the near future, and be there a bit later then that.”

“Here’s hopin’,” Charlie said, handing a pile of cards to Jacob.

Shortly after, a lady came around with a cart, that had a variety of foods on it. They were all tasteless, rubbery and did not resemble what they were supposed too, but they were food all the same. Karen would not eat hers, knowing nothing of food other then the homegrown variety she had had in Acuff, but Jacob sacrificed himself and ate hers. Both Charlie and Claire picked at theirs, both of them knowing they had to deal with the odd food, but neither of them wanting the lady came back to take their trash, she gave both the older siblings looks, for the food left in their trays, but she didn’t say anything. Not long after, Charlie felt a tug on his sleeve.

"Can I sit next to my sister?" The little boy said, pointing to Claire.

"Sure," Charlie told Jacob, getting up from the seat, and going to sit with his sister again. "What did you do?" he asked Karen when he sat down.

"Nothing..." She said, bashfully. He knew she wasn't telling the whole truth, but didn't feel like harping on it. She would just fuss any way. And, at that time, the Convoy started slowing down, and people spoke of New Haven. They were getting close, and were ready to enter their new home.