3. Day off

After Dennis left with his head low looking a bit depressed, Stephanie was the first to react and looked at Robert with a sparkle in her eye "little Roby, how about you came play with your big sister Stephanie today. I already finished all my chores for today the day before so mum said I can do whatever I want today". Sasha was just feeling pleased with herself and looking forward to receiving her little brothers praise when she heard Stephanie, she quickly snapped out of her little world and cursed herself for not reacting fast enough.

"Hold on their Stephanie, you can't keep Roby to yourself all day. I'm also finished all my chores for the day and already got permission from dad before breakfast to have the day off. So at most, you will have to share Roby if you want to spend all day with him". Stephanie looked at Robert after she heard Sasha and saw the distressed look on his face and knew that he would never be able to pick one sister over the other, she sighed and gave in. "fine Sash, we'll both spend the day with Roby". Seeing that Stephanie gave in so easily, Sasha nodded feeling pleased with herself again. Robert just looked relieved there was no fight this time.

"Wait big sisters, you two might have got permission to have the day off but I still have classes with mum after launch". All three siblings were homeschooled by their mother and while only Sasha struggled with some of the more advanced subjects, they could all read and write and were bright for their age. This was all thanks to their mothers' strict requirements when teaching even though normally she was very gentle usually, even Dennis didn't dare disturb Mariah when she was in teacher mode.

At the mention of their Mothers lessons, both sisters stiffen for a beat. Their mother was only ever strict when she was in teacher mode and even Stephanie, the more book savvy of the two sisters didn't dare to slack off. Not to say Sasha wasn't smart, far from it. She was just better at things with a more hands-on approach, whereas Stephanie was comparatively worse at such things. As for the possibility of skipping class they no longer dared to.

One day the twins had decided to sneak their little brother out to play with him all afternoon instead of going to their lessons. When they came home for dinner expecting to get in trouble, but Mariah didn't even bring it up and told them to wash up for dinner. Although their father kept giving them sympathetic looks, they didn't think much of it at the time, all three raced off to get ready for dinner. That all changed very quickly when they all come back to sit around the table and saw what was for dinner, a horrible looking pasty gruel was sat in front of the three children.

Mariah Leone was actually a very good cook and she enjoyed making all the meals in the house and sometimes she would even make extra to give to the farmhands, who were always excited to eat her cooking. So when they saw the horrible looking gruel placed in front of them and the even more sumptuous than usual food in front of their parents, they knew exactly what was going on. They didn't even dare not eat it, so after much struggle and plenty of glares at their father who was praising how delicious that night's dish was.

They eventually managed to force it all down, little did they know their suffering had just started. All three quickly got up to brush their teeth to get the taste off their tongues, when their mother called them into the kitchen. Sitting on the kitchen bench was more of that night's dinner and more than enough for all of them to have seconds! What's worse is that none of it was for them, they had to bring it all out to the farmhands to eat, and all they could do was be tortured by the smell.

It didn't end there either, they had the same happen for breakfast and lunch the next day as well. Needless to say, all three siblings were apologizing and pleading for her to forgive them. All Mariah did in response was give her usual soft smile and say "that's ok sweeties, the lessons you're mommy painstakingly prepares for you every day must be too boring and too much of a nuisance for you, so we'll stop the lessons for now and you can go play all afternoon as you want." This did not comfort the children at all.

It was only after this continued for a whole week of them suffering with gruel for three meals a day along with begging and pleading of wanting to learn again and praising their mothers' lessons, did they return. Most importantly they didn't have to eat gruel anymore and did not need to give away their portions of their mothers cooking anymore.

At the thought of this memory, all three siblings couldn't help but shudder a little, even the normally fearless Sasha was no different. "maybe we should go ask mum permission first if Roby can have the day off and play with us". Robert and Stephanie both nod at his sisters' cautious wards and they all proceeded to head back to the house.