Elliot's POV

I froze when I saw Juliana fall back and tumble off the bed as a result of me throwing the pillow back at her. I heard a horrible thump as she hit the ground, and then silence.

I jump into action, practically leaping over the bed. Before I know it I'm kneeling down beside Juliana, whose eyes were closed in a not-so-peaceful way. Before either of us could freak out about it though, her eyes were opening. She squinted, groaning as she sat up.

I put my hand out to stop her, but it's too late as she's already sat all the way up. I am aware that Hunter is now beside me, freaking out and asking her a shitload of useless questions that she won't answer.

"Juliana. Look at me." I demand, and she does. Her head turns to me and I see that horrible look in her eyes. Tears.

Her eyes welled up, her face pinched and next thing I knew she was crying while holding her head.

I hear a choked noise from behind me and look to see Hunter with wide, panicked eyes.

'I feel ya, buddy.'

Both of us just stare at Juliana for a little bit longer, because that's totally going to help the situation, before I reach out and take her in my arms.

'Justin. What would you do if it were Justin?' I think to myself, because what do you do when a girl starts crying? Especially one whose only emotions towards you so far has been 'fuck off, I hate your guts.'

To be fair, I did sort of start that one.

I stand up, manoeuvring her into my arms like you would a toddler. I hold her tight to me, her arms around my neck, head resting on my shoulder as she continues to cry and I continue to walk in circles, swaying back and forth.

Hunter stared at me from on the floor, giving me a 'what the hell?' look but I glare at him. It seems to be working though, because before we know it her cries have settled to little sniffles.

"Juliana, are you okay?" I ask after a second. I don't want to rush her, but I also need to make sure I didn't just give her a concussion. Dad would have my hide.

"Juliana?" I ask again when she doesn't answer. "Juliana you have three fucking seconds to answer me before I-" I cut of abruptly when I hear that whine that kids do before they start crying again.

I shush her, rocking her back and forth again to quiet her down. Hunter glared at me and I gave him a 'come do it yourself then' look. He raises his hands in surrender and I roll my eyes at him.

'Sure, go ahead and judge how I'm dealing with the situation, but don't offer any help or anything.'

"Julia." I start in a soft tone. "Are you okay baby? Did you hit your head kinda hard?" Hunter looks at me like he wants to start laughing and I mentally tell him to zip it unless he wants his fingers gorilla glued together. Again.

Julie pulls back to look at me, and her eyes are a little bloodshot from crying, but there's something different about them. They're slightly wider, more expressive than they have been. She sniffles again, moving to hold her head where it hurts while she nods.

"Yeah, I bet that didn't feel good, did it?" I ask rhetorically, and I finally understand when she still nods in agreement with me, letting out a small high pitched, 'uh-huh.'

She's acting like Justin when he's in little space.

Only she's acting a little younger than he normally does. Then again, she just got hurt, and Justin turns into a total baby when he gets any sort of injury. Just as I came to that resolution, Hunter started to speak up.

"Is she acting like-" He paused mid sentence when I nodded.

Juliana, the lovely child that she is, grabbed onto a piece of my hair and yanked it as hard as she could.

"SON OF A-" I pinched my lips together, letting out a low breath while I smiled at Juliana.

'Don'tslapthechild, don't slap the child, don't slap the child.'

Walking over I shoved her into Hunter's arms and she pouted, letting out a little "aww." In disappointment. Hunter smiled, happy to have her as he turned her to face him. He started bouncing her slightly, tickling under her chin.

When Hunter held her it was slightly more awkward than when I did. It's not that he struggled to hold her up, but Juliana came up to his shoulders, while she only came up to my chest. She looked more like a child in my arms, whereas with him it was obvious that she was a bit older.

I sighed and sat down on the bed. I pull out my phone, checking the time. 17:50. We had about an hour, hour and a half, until dinner. Maybe 10 or 20 minutes until everyone else would be getting home. We needed to act fast.

"Hunter." I called over to him but he was too preoccupied with Juliana to pay me any mind.

"Hunter!" I yelled, startling both him and Juliana. Jules pouted slightly, her eyes welling up and Hunter bounced her, redirecting her attention.

"What?" Hunter asked, annoyed.

"Don't be like that, we need to figure out what to do. We really can't leave her alone now, and papa will be back soon with everyone else." Hunter groaned at that realisation and set Juliana down on the floor making her whine, but this time he didn't react to her and she found something to keep herself occupied.

"Where's Justin? I'm assuming you brought him home?"

"No dip-shit, I left him at school." Hunter rolled his eyes but didn't respond.

"I say we have her stay with you in your room." Hunter suggests.

"Eww, absolutely not. I don't want that thing waking me up in the middle of the night. Why don't you keep it?"

"What if someone checks her room and sees her missing. The last place they'll think to look is your room." I sigh because I know Hunter is right. As much as I don't want to be hiding a little all night, it was the smartest option.

"Fine, we'll still need a change of clothes, food, how do you plan on doing that? How do we keep her entertained, and most importantly, quiet?" I pondered.

"Okay, clothes first. How about we sneak her back into her room and get her to pick out some clothes for the night. And anything else she might want." I say, starting to break the plan down in my mind.

I am by no means the person to be dealing with this. I'm horrible with hands, and I'm more street smart than book smart. Coming up with plans isn't my thing, it's Elijah's. But Elijah would most definitely tan her hide and send her back to her room.

Rule following was one of Elijah's biggest things. He may be the more easy going brother but when you start acting out, or being disobedient he will help to nip that straight in the bud. As much as he can, obviously. There's a rule about not disciplining younger siblings unless it can be helped. I think the only time that rule has been in effect was one time when Massimo spanked Hunter when he ran across the road without looking.

It wasn't a full spanking, but a few smacks on the bottom. And to give him credit, the car almost did hit him, plus Hunter was at the age of knowing better. Papa couldn't even be mad because that's probably exactly what he would have done. He and Mama sure lit Hunter's butt up later that evening though.

I look down at the floor and realise that Julie is still sitting on the floor right here Hunter left her. She's just staring at us, the ghost of a pout gracing her lips. I smirk slightly, mentally chuckling when I motion for her to come over here and she runs up like I was gonna change my mind in the few seconds it took for her to cross the room.

I open my arms and she immediately climbs in my lap, wrapping her arms around my stomach and laying her head on my chest.

"Hey Jules, would you like to have a sleepover with cugino Elliot?" I ask softly and she peeks her head up at me, her eyes bright and happy.

"Cugino." Was all she said, giggling softly as though she had made a joke. I just shake my head and take a deep breath. This is what I will be dealing with all night. But hey, she could go back to crying. I guess this wasn't the worst.

I feel like Hunter and I are recreating Mission Impossible. So much so that if I wasn't scared of one of the adults catching us, I would have laughed at this foolishness.

We successfully sneak Juliana across the hall, where I type in the code for the door. Hunter gives me a 'go to hell look.'

"You knew the code the whole time?" He whisper yelled at me once we were inside of her room with the door propped open so we didn't all get locked inside.

"Why do you think dad no longer puts me on lock down? He got tired of changing the code." Hunter huffed and I smirked. I walked Juliana into her closet and set her down.

"Alright, can you pick out some PJ's for me, Julie?" I ask, trying to be as direct as possible. She still just stood there, then looked back at me, then back at the closet.

I sigh, pinching the bridge of my nose between my fingers. Looks like we're doing this the hard way.

As little desire as I have to go through my younger, girl cousin's things, she wasn't leaving me with much of a choice.

I look around the room, noticing for the first time that all of her shelves and racks are bare. It's like she hadn't even entered this room before. That's when I noticed the open suitcase leaning against the wall.

Bingo.

Inside held all of her clothes, including ones I would much rather not see on or off her body again. I sift through her clothes, picking out the first pair of shorts I see, and trying to find something that looks PJ appropriate. Only I don't see anything that she wouldn't kill me for putting her to bed in.

If there is one thing I remember about Juliana from when she was a kid, it's that she is very specific about her clothes. She's not necessarily picky, but she has what she liked to call day clothes and night clothes. And by god, none of her day clothes better be anywhere near her when she goes to bed.

I groan and say fuck it, I'm sure my closet will have something I can throw on her. But hell if I was going to accidentally touch another one of my cousin's undergarments. I'M NOT BEING A CREEP. I'M TRYING TO GET HER READY FOR BED. Just wanted you to remember that.

By the time I turn around, defeated by the suitcase, I see Juliana sitting on the floor again, this time sitting in a frog sit, which made her legs almost form a w, and she had toppled forward, leaning her face against the carpet. Her eyes were closed, mouth slightly parted as she seemed to be asleep.

I sigh again, picking her up while I try not to wake her. Unfortunately, the second she left the ground she was wide awake, and grumpy at that.

She groaned at me, giving me the cutest little glare before looking around all confused.

"Come on Jules, let's go get some sleep." I say, hoping she won't give me a hard time.

"JuJu." She whispers, barely loud enough for me to hear and I'm the one holding her.

"What?" I want her to repeat it again because there is no way I heard her right. Juju isn't even a word.

"JuJu." She repeats, more insistent this time. By now we're back in the main area of her bedroom, so Hunter has heard her.

"The hell is a JuJu?" He asks and I shrug. Fuck if I know.

"JuJu." She demands, not at all happy. She starts kicking her feet and whining at me, like that's going to help her case.

"JuJu? What the fuck could be a JuJu? Ju- Ju- Ju- Jump. Ju-jungle? Juice? Maybe?" Hunter thinks aloud, and I nod along with that last thought.

"She used to want something to drink before she went to bed, maybe this is the same." Hunter exits the room, telling me he'll come back with some juice and to take her to my room.

"Alright Juliana, we're gonna get you some juice." I say, proud that we figured out what she needed. But then she starts kicking again.

"JuJu." She repeats.

"JuJu," I repeat back, more than slightly annoyed at this point. "Yeah, Juliana. We're gonna get you JuJu." I huff back at her as I make my way to my room. It wasn't far, just next door.

"JuJu?" She asked again, less insistently, more reminding than anything.

"Yes, JuJu is on the way." I grit out.

'Don'tslapthekid, don'tslapthekid, don'tslapthekid.' I remind myself as we turn into my room. This seems to pique her interest and I remember that she hasn't been in my room yet. Well other than when she was little. And I've had some renovations since then.

Juliana seemed to notice something and she wiggled, trying to get me to set her down. I do, and she runs to the corner of my room where I have a bunch of paintings. I tense, reminding myself not to snap at her.

"Juliana, don't touch those." To my surprise, she doesn't. She sits down in front of a painting of horses I'd made. It wasn't the best, and I also detest the animals, but it wasn't for me either. It was for dad. He owned an animal sanctuary. One that he unfortunately forced all of us to participate in at least weekly. But those horses were some of the ones he had rehabilitated over the years.

Juliana sat there, fascinated with it. And I couldn't be happier. At least now I had something to distract her.

I set the bag and blanket I had taken from her room down on my bed. I spread out the white blanket adorned by snowflakes on one half of my bed, cringing when I noticed how bad it clashed with the rest of the otherwise dark contrast of the room.

I'd brought it thinking that maybe having something from home would help her sleep better. I also took the bag to the bathroom, laying out her shorts and a hoodie of mine that I knew would completely swallow her in size, so that she could change into them. I also laid out her toothbrush and toothpaste that I had snagged from her bathroom, along with her comb.

I let in a breath, mentally preparing for this.

'Just please don't fight me.' I thought desperately. By the time that I walked out of the bathroom, Hunter was walking into my room, closing the door quietly behind him.

"What the fuck is that?" I demanded, looking at the cup in his hands. That idiota had brought an open cup with him. One that Juliana was bound to spill on a normal day.

"I'm sorry, I didn't have much of a choice. I ran into Justin in the kitchen, and he questioned why I had one of his sippy's in my hand." I groaned. Justin shouldn't even be downstairs until he finished his homework. Now one of us has to go deal with that fight.

Or we could just leave it to dad. Yeah, I'll do that. It's his son anyway.

"Well we can't give her that, I'm not cleaning sticky ass juice up out of my carpet." That's when Hunter held up his hand, and reached deep into his pants pocket.

"Give me some credit, brother. I'm not the same idiot I was last week." I snorted thinking about him giving grape juice to Justin in an open cup. That was a fun disaster to watch.

Hunter pulled out one of Justin's blue sippy cups, the same one Juliana had used last week at the sleepover. The poor girl was so out of it by then that she barely noticed when Elijah swapped her mug of coffee for a sippy cup so she would stop spilling the dang thing. Of course his plan of coffee so

(A/N Something like the one up top, in case you needed help.)

Hunter poured what looked to be apple juice into the sippy, sealed it tightly and then walked over and handed it to Juliana, who took it with a smile.

"There you go, Jules. There's your JuJu" Hunter said, and I could hear the victory in his voice. Juliana's eyebrows crinkled, and she pulled the juice away from her face.

"JuJu?" She asked, looking all around, and a familiar feeling of fear started to settle in the pit of my stomach. "JuJu?" Juliana asked again, her voice more desperate, more confused, as though she suddenly remembered having asked for it a little bit ago.

My face screwed up, and I braced myself for what was about to happen. As though I called it, Juliana's eye welled up, and she looked around more frantically as she called out for JuJu.

Hunter panicked, picking her up and bouncing her around, but that halted nothing as she started crying into Hunter's shoulder.

I groaned, throwing my head back. 'Does this child ever shut up?'

"Stay with her, I'm gonna go do something." I muttered, slamming the door behind me before Hunter could refute.

I stalk down the stairs, welcoming the break from all the tears. When I reach the living room I see Justin is downstairs, watching something on the television and eating chocolate.

"Go finish your homework." I grunt on my way through the living room, to the kitchen.

"How do you know I haven't already?" He whined and I glared at him.

"I'm not an idiot. And put that away, you'll spoil your dinner." I snapped. Justin opened his mouth to say something but I cut him off. "Now, Justin." He sulks, but follows me into the kitchen, throwing the chocolate onto the counter muttering that I was a horrible brother and stomping out of the room.

I ignored his theatrics, which I was more than used to, and reached up into the medicine cabinet, pulling out the liquid melatonin. I was reading the label to try and see how much I should give her when I heard the garage door open. I curse, slipping back up the stairs to my room right as I start to hear the voices of everyone coming back from the warehouse.

When I got back to my room, Juliana was of course still crying, but it wasn't loud sobs, but light sniffles of unhappiness. Luckily, she seemed to have worn herself out. This would just help with that.

Opening up the sippy cup that was now against the same wall as my door, I assume she threw it, and poured a decent amount of the melatonin in there. I was careful to not put too much in, I didn't want to put her back in a coma. But like hell I was going to let her cry all night.

Shaking the cup up I reach over and place it in her mouth, urging her to drink. She did, moving her hand up to support this cup. This thankfully shut her up, and I heard Hunter sigh. He moved her to the bed, placing her down under the blankets. She didn't make much of a fuss seeing as she was already practically asleep by then. When he stood up, he glared at me. Presumably for ditching him like that.

"I hate you." He whispered harshly to me on his way out the door.

"Feeling it mutual. Who do you think got us in this mess in the first place?" I hissed back, closing the door behind me.

"What mess?" Mom startled Hunter and I, appearing right behind us.

"Nothing, mom." Hunter and I say at the same time, making her narrow her eyes at us.

"What he means is, it's a sibling matter. Just a stupid prank that Hunter took too far." I explain and mom nods.

"Both of you must think I am a complete idiot." She hums, walking past us, calling over her shoulder that dinner would be ready soon, so to start heading downstairs.

Hunter and I share a look before we head downstairs. We find everyone is already congregating in the dining room, and I take my seat next to Juliana's empty one. Everyone slowly made their way to their seats, conversations flowing around steadily in Italian.

Speaking in our native language was something we had tried to avoid with Juliana here. We didn't want her to feel excluded, or like we were talking behind her back. It's not that we never spoke English before, we had to due to the fact that we were a bilingual household. Mom and Dad had used the Cota method of only speaking to dad in Italian and mom in English to encourage the fluency of both languages.

Nonno cleared his throat, drawing the immediate attention of everyone in the room.

"Before we start eating,someone go get Juliana." Fuck. What the actual hell.

Panic flashed through Hunter's face, but before anyone could move I spoke up.

"Why? Thought she was in trouble for lying. You never let any of us off that easily." I mumbled and dad shot me a look.

"Oh please, I never left any one of you in your rooms for longer than three days. And besides, we were the ones in the wrong here." He said and Hunter, Justin and I were all confused.

"What do you mean?" Hunter asked and Nonna spoke this time.

"He means, Juliana never lied to us. She was telling the truth." Nonna sent a nasty look in the way of her son, but she wasn't completely without the blame. It's not like she did anything to stop him.

"How do you know that?" Justin inquired and out of the corner of my eye I saw Massimo's hand tighten on his glass of water.

"Her brother called. He was worried since she wasn't answering her phone, and he explained that she did in fact, fall through the bannister." Elijah explained and I was pissed. But I can't be mad right now. Right now, I need to protect the fact that Hunter and her broke the rules.

"I'll get her." I grunt, shoving away from the table.

"Why? You two don't even like each other." Massimo narrowed his eyes at me, and I did the same back.

"Well I know the code, and I'm not one of the people who falsely accused her of being a liar." I retorted, and I saw a flash of hurt go through Massimo's eyes. I walk out of the kitchen, and go upstairs to check on Juliana.

Like expected she was still sound asleep. I was grateful that I wouldn't have to worry about her at dinner. I take the empty sippy cup from her and place it on the nightstand so I would remember to place it back tomorrow.

I winced when I realised that she was still in the clothes she had been wearing all day.

'Let's just hope she won't notice.' I thought hopelessly. She's gonna notice. She always does.

I leave to go back downstairs, making sure to close the door quietly so as to not wake her. Though I doubt much would, right now.

When I make it back to the dining room I'm greeted with odd looks from everyone when they realise I'm Juliana-less.

"Well?" Dad asks, breaking the loud silence that had accumulated after I'd sat down.

"She's asleep." Was all I said. I saw a few faces deflate, and before we knew it the maids were bringing out grilled chicken on white rice with green beans. Yuck. Green beans are horrible.

We finish dinner in almost complete silence, not something that is too out-of-the-norm. We migrate to the living room and turn something on the tv, fuck if I'm paying attention.

I wait maybe half an hour before I head upstairs, a grumbling Justin following suit after dad reminded him it was a school night.

I make sure Justin's door is soundly shut before I slip inside my room, confused when I see that the bathroom light is on.

'Damn it, why is she awake?' I whined in my head. Walking towards what I take note is the open bathroom door, I knock on it gently, from a position where I can't see her, and call out for her.

I don't get an answer, but I hear the tiny padding of footsteps as she walks over to me. Juliana stops in front of me, looking up with wide, tired eyes. Her hair was all messy from being asleep, her high bun now resting on the nape of her neck, barely any hair still in the holder.

I wonder for half a second if maybe she's snapped out of it, but that idea was quickly proven wrong when she wrapped her arms around me, resting her head where my stomach and chest meet.

I hesitate for a second, then wrap my arms around her, rubbing my hand soothingly up and down her back.

"Hey Jules." I whisper, and she whines softly, repeating her name back to me. "How about we go get ready for bed, hmm?" I don't really ask, as I let go and start to lead her back into the bathroom. I grab the clothes off the counter and hand them to her, pointing to where her toothbrush and all that was, letting her know that if she needs help to just yell for me.

I crack the bathroom door, leaning on the side of the doorframe praying that she doesn't need help. Turns out she really didn't, because she comes out of the bathroom seeming like she's done everything I asked of her. Except for redoing her hair, but I honestly didn't expect that.

I know for sure that she brushed her teeth because her face was smeared with toothpaste and I chuckled, taking her back into the bathroom so I could wipe her face off.

I contemplated helping her with the hoodie because she'd put it on backwards and the hood was half obscuring her vision, but I concluded that that was something she could live with until tomorrow. I did lift it up, even though it went down to her knees, to check and make sure she had the shorts on correctly, which she did. The strings securely in the front of her body.

I take her hand to lead her back to the bedroom, but she whines, holding her arms out and I concede, picking her up with a slight sigh.

'She's just tired' I reminded myself. Glancing at the clock I noted that it was nearing 10 o'clock. No wonder she was tired. With how little she's acting it wouldn't surprise me if she was back to the toddler face right now.

I just hope she sleeps in. And wakes up feeling herself. I do not want to be the one to explain all of this.

I lay down on the bed with her, getting under the covers and setting her down on the other side of the bed. I cover her up, and lay down, but I feel wiggling. I crack one eye open, watching her wiggle her way towards me, she lays practically on top of me. She manoeuvres my arm so that it's wrapped around her. She pulls her blanket to cover the both of us, but she gets frustrated when she can't manoeuvre it past my knees. She huffs, laying her head down on my chest defeated.

The entire time I lay still with my eyes mostly closed, and she's asleep within minutes.

"Good night il mio piccolo gioiello." I whisper, before I close my eyes and drift off into a dark slumber.

—————————————— I'm baaaaaack

Hope y'all liked the chapter! And I'm sorry if you found Juliana a little annoying in this chapter, just remember that she's sleep deprived with a possible head injury.

Also, I have to get a freaking MRI on my ankle to see if I'm eligible for surgery, so that's going to be fun. (I say eligible cause that sounds better than in need of.)

I hope y'all all have a good rest of your day!