Juliana's POV

I don't know how he did it, but Elijah, the amazing cousin he was, was able to convince Uncle Stefano that we should make this sleepover an overnight affair.

So that's why, at 2 in the morning, we were blasting 80's music as we cleaned up the mess we had made from the brownie disaster.

I swear it all happened so fast. One minute, we were simply decorating our own pans of brownies, and then suddenly, boom. Exploding brownies everywhere.

And here's the thing, I didn't even know you could make brownies explode. I mean, they're brownies! Possibly the easiest dessert to make. If they smell done, they probably are. If they smell burnt, they're probably burnt. If they don't smell... You fucked up. But exploding? That's a new one.

I understand why they don't let Justin in the kitchen now. They had someone supervising everything he did, his went in at the same time as ours did, came out at the same time. He put the exact same things inside.

But it all fell apart when it came time for the decorating. I think he was putting icing on when his butter knife went a little too far into the brownies. A small little pop could be heard and then suddenly both Justin, Nonna, me, the counters, cabinets, everything was covered in brownie.

When that kid makes a mess, he makes a mess.

Gotta say, it was fun though. After we got the mess cleaned up, I let Justin help me decorate my pan, and the final product had M&M's melted into the actual batter, white cream cheese icing on top with skittles (per Justin's request) and reeses pieces on top.

I was right to be sceptical about the skittles, because they tasted like shit when eaten with the actual brownies, but if you picked them off it was really good.

Now we were sitting on the couch, eating our personalised brownies with some ice cream, and Uncle Stefano and Aunt Stephanie were telling stories about the boys.

"When Massimo was four, he was in that stage of wanting to do and try everything I did, so when he saw me getting ready for a date night with your uncle he got curious. When I came home, he was passed out in our bed, makeup smeared all over his face, he had one of my dresses put on with his head in the arm hole, and some of my thigh high heels dangling from his legs." Aunt Stephanie laughed as she pulled out her phone and showed me the cutest picture of little Massimo.

"Mom," Massimo groaned. "How do you still have that?" When I looked at Massimo I couldn't help but giggle whenever I looked at him, envisioning him with makeup smeared all over his face.

"Shut up Juliana." He said in a semi threatening voice and that only set me off into a round of giggles that probably made me seem like a lunatic.

"Look what you did." Massimo complained and Aunt Stephanie reached over and pinched his cheek while cooing at him.

"We should put makeup on Massimo." Justin leaned over, whispering into my ear. That made me giggle again, but one thing about Justin is that he is a shit whisperer, so the entire room heard him.

"Absolutely not." Massimo spit, looking at us in disgust.

"Oh come on, it'll be fun." I tried and Massimo shook his head.

"Yeah Massi, let them make you into the pretty pink princess you always secretly dreamed of being." Elliot joked and Massimo looked at him horrified.

"I joked about that one time and you will never let me live it down." He growled, and I swear I saw him pouting.

"Wait what?" I asked, confused at what they were talking about.

"I had a prince and princess themed birthday party one year, and Massimo said he would rather be one of the princesses because their dresses were prettier."

"I was joking. Also, that was literally thirteen years ago, how do you remember that but not what time our meetings start?" Massimo said, and Elliot shrugged.

"We should do makeovers for everyone." Justin suggested and I saw Elliot cringe.

"Don't like the idea so much now, do you fratellino?" Massimo teased.

"We don't even have enough makeup for that," Elliot said, ignoring Massimo. "Do we mom? Please say no."

"Wel-"

"Actually," Elijah spoke before anyone could object. "I planned ahead, and while we were playing the game, I had a few of the night guards go to the store and get some hair and makeup products." Elijah swept his arm to the side, bringing the dozens of plastic bags that sat in the corner of the room closest to the front door to our attention.

I smiled ruefully while turning back to look at Massimo. "Now you can't say no."

"Oh yes I can."

"No you can't."

"Yes I can."

"No you can't"

"Yes I can." He enunciated, like I hadn't been hearing him clearly the other times and I got up, walked over to where he sat, squeezed between him and the arm of the couch. I pouted at him, giving him my best puppy dog eyes that I haven't used in forever and said:

"No you can't." In a sad voice. I probably looked ridiculous, but I saw the millimetre smile that cracked through his facade before he groaned and agreed.

I grinned in victory, shrieking when he reached over and yanked me across his lap, face up, and started tickling me.

"But I get to do your hair." He said as I squirmed around, shrieking with laughter as I fought a middle ground between pain and being ticklish.

"Okay, fine." I blurted between laughs.

"And you have to say, 'Massimo, you're the best cousin ever, and I love you the most.'" He said in a high pitched girly voice.

"I do not sound like that." I squealed, wincing from the pain when I jerked wrong, but I think Massimo thought it was from him tickling me because he simply continued to attack that spot.

Tears gathered in my eyes from the pain, even though I continued to laugh and squirm out of reflex.

"I thought I wasn't supposed to lie?" I squeaked out, and Massimo gasped.

"You mean to tell me that I'm not the best?" He asked, and I should have heard it in his voice.

"No." I shook my head, giggling. Relieved at the momentary break. Massimo got a rueful look in his eye right before he stood up, catching me and swinging me over his shoulder before he gently "slammed" (more like let me fall) me back onto the couch.

Even though I could tell he was being gentle, it still hurt like hell, sending pain through my ribs, arms, back, and even chest. But I didn't have any time to process much more before Massimo was tickling me again.

This time he had me pinned to the couch, so I really couldn't go anywhere. Or so he thought.

Putting me in this position actually gave me a bit of an upper hand, because I could use the space between him and the couch to my advantage.

I was able to grab his wrists and use the pole like things to push me at an angle where I was on my side up against the couch, my legs still pinned down. I used the momentary confusion I had just caused him to use all my weight, and the leverage of the couch, to knock him off the edge, completely freeing myself.

Before Massimo could register or react, I launched myself over him and across the room, jumping onto Elijah's back and using him as my own personal shield.

"Cheater." Massimo said after he got his bearings.

I stuck my tongue out at him halfheartedly, but I couldn't miss the assessing gazes all the elders seemed to be giving me.

"Cool! Where did you learn to do that!" Justin exclaimed after he picked his jaw up off the floor.

"Yeah, where did you learn to do that?" Elijah mimicked, adjusting his grip on me so that I was a little higher up on his back and wouldn't struggle so much to see over his shoulders.

"Someone showed me." I said simply, shrugging as though it was no big deal. Because it wasn't.

"I thought we were painting Massimo's face? Why don't we do that?" Hunter said, taking the attention off of me after seeing how uncomfortable I was getting.

Everyone agreed, and we did indeed start with Massimo, much to his disappointment.

When Elijah does something, he does something. He has just about all types of beauty products in that bag. Everything from face masks to colourful makeup to hair products to nail polish. He had made sure there was a little bit of everything.

Justin had suggested that we put face masks on everybody, and I agreed, but told him I didn't want one because I didn't like how they felt. Plus, some of them leave your skin feeling more oily than when you first put it on.

I've got to say though, seeing all the 'big, bad and scary' mafia leaders with bright pink, blue, and white face masks kind of took away from the whole scary part.

We skipped doing it on Massimo so that we could do his makeup, and Justin showed us (Hunter and I) an idea of what he wanted to do, and I think Massimo is going to look like the very pretty princess he's always wanted to be once we're done with him.

I couldn't help but cringe however when Justin pumped a bucket load of foundation onto Massimo's face and just let it drip down before he started smearing it all over the place with a large brush.

I may not be the best at makeup but even I know better than that.

Hunter just gave me a look that told me he knew exactly how I felt and grabbed a sponge, holding one out to me, before he started blotting and blending the foundation the best he could.

Between the two of us we were able to make it pretty even, though I have a feeling that this shade was a bit too dark for him. Oops. What can you do?

While Hunter went in with concealer, I started with the bronzer and Justin started painting Massimo's lips the brightest shade of red we could find.

Sometime in the middle of that the timer for the face masks went off, and we stopped momentarily so that we could help everyone take their first face masks off, and put another one on. This time, we put these hysterically gigantic lip masks on them, as well as eye masks. I have no idea if those actually do anything, but Hunter took the time to snap a few pictures before we went back to Massimo.

It wasn't until we got to Massimo's eyes that the disagreeing started. Hunter and Justin couldn't agree on the best way to do them, and I suggested that they each do an eye while I go change because I had suddenly got startlingly cold.

I fought myself as I started up the stairs, trying to walk normally until I was out of sight before I gave into the wince, doubling over as my ribs screamed their protests. However, bending over was obviously a mistake, because that made it pretty hard to breathe. Chalking it down to just a side effect of the pain, I stumbled my way up the rest of the stairs and to my room.

Once I was in my bathroom I locked the door for good measure and stripped off my t-shirt. I'm not going to lie, I'm a little concerned. All my other bruises have basically healed over the week and a half that I've been here, but for some reason my ribs are being stubborn and almost seem to be worsening.

I ran my finger lightly over some of the bruises, tracing a few of the boot marks. Someone who didn't know what had happened probably wouldn't be able to identify them as boot marks, since they were made with the toe of the shoe, but I knew exactly which bruises were made with what.

In all honesty, I had a bad feeling that a few of my ribs might have been cracked, but I've had cracked ribs before, and I lived. So I must just be being dramatic.

I changed into a slightly heavier, looser, long sleeved shirt and swallowed down some pain killers I had stashed in my nightstand before I prepared myself for the walk back down the stairs.

By the time I got back, apparently Justin and Hunter had had enough time to finish with Massimo and were having a competition. Justin had Nonna, Hunter had Aunt Stephanie, Elliot (don't ask me how they convinced him to participate is beyond me) was doing Elijah.

I sort of leaned on the stairs for a moment, partially to catch my breath, and partially to take in the scene. I didn't stand there for long, because Massimo caught my eye and motioned me over by crooking a finger.

I started to sit down by him on the couch but he stopped me, and directed me to the floor in front of him.

"You get to do my makeup, I get to do your hair, remember?" He said and I smiled, turning back around and facing the coffee table which I hadn't noticed had a bunch of hair supplies on it. From brushes and hair ties to hair chalk/wash-away hair dye and kid-ish clips.

I felt Massimo gently undoing the current ponytail I had in, before taking a brush and working his way through any of the tangles. I saw someone flipping through disney movies before settling on Toy Stories. I had seen some of the trailers for this one, so I was kind of excited to actually watch it because I didn't want to watch it alone.

I didn't see much past the opening scene because Massimo started pulling the brush smoothly through my hair. I didn't realise I was almost asleep until Massimo stopped brushing my hair and popped me lightly on the head, making me jerk wide awake.

"No falling asleep now. Hey Elijah, why don't you go get some coffee or something." Massimo said, and Elijah gladly took the chance to get away from Elliot, who was not being very gentle. Elijah's face was getting to be very red, and I don't think it's from the blush.

In however long it took for Elijah to come back with a bunch of coffee, Massimo popped me a total of 3 times. Each time I turned and tried to snatch the brush out of his hands but he just swatted my hands instead.

Elijah set a bunch of mugs of coffee on the table, and Justin was handed a mug with light brown contents. He looked excited as he took a sip and then gave an exasperated look.

"Oh come on, hot chocolate? Really? Can't I have coffee just this once?" Justin whined.

"No," Elliot said as he handed me a regular cup, mine was definitely coffee, however it was iced, and I looked at him with a surprised look. "We all know how you get when you have caffeine. Be lucky you're getting that."

I sipped the contents of my glass while Elijah handed a mug to Massimo, and I was kind of confused.

"This is how I make it, but somehow... better?" I said bewildered. Elliot let out an undignified huff as he grabbed a mug off the table as well.

"Elijah's hidden talent is making coffee. He would be an amazing bartender if he wasn't so dedicated to his doctorate."

I mentally stored that away for later, trying to come up with ways that I could rope Elijah into making more coffee later on as I took another sip of the amazing drink.

It's safe to say that the coffee did the exact opposite of what it was supposed to, and I was getting a headache from the amount of times that Massimo kept hitting me.

After the fourth time of me almost spilling my drink because I refused to put it down, but I kept dozing off, Elijah came up to me and took it away, poured it into some sort of closed up, before giving it back.

I didn't really look at the cup after that, but I know that it was much easier to drink out of, despite the fact that massimo got a little grouchy when I kept tipping my head back to drink. Even after finishing the coffee and having my cup refilled with water I still kept falling asleep. After a bit Massimo stopped waking me up because the next time that I woke up I was laying on top of someone, the lights had been turned off, and the movie had changed from Toy Story to Ratatouille.

I couldn't help but take a moment to think back on this experience. Smiles and laughs seemed to be constant, the whole atmosphere and vibe of tonight gave me a feeling that I couldn't quite identify. But it made me feel like I was at home.

And that is a very, very dangerous feeling.





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I would like to apologize for how late this chapter is, I was distracted with getting ready for school, and enjoying my last day of freedom because I have to go back tomorrow. 😭

Question: Do you like longer or shorter chapters? (Because I had a surprising amount of people who seemed to really like the last chapter.)

Also, do you like the fluffy, bonding time chapters more, or do you like the drama?