Although on second thought, why Paul had any flickering of concern over a tortoise was beyond her. The thing looked like it hadn’t moved the whole trip. The mountain air chill was probably making it think of hibernating--or rather, the reptilian equivalent, burmate.
“Who even names a female tortoise Chopin.” That question was so rhetorical it was no longer a question. The answer of course was Paul’s sister, the Prodigy, bane of international customs agencies because she apparently could not tour with an orchestra or return home without her beloved pet and car. No matter the genius there were always going to be eccentricities, or rather some stupid behavior they couldn’t survive without.
“I didn’t know that when I first got her,” Rebecca cooed, focused solely on her pet, sticking her finger in the cage as if she had regressed to a seven year old girl. “It’s hard to tell the gender of a tortoise.”
She snapped out of her childishness for a ferrety look about the grounds. “You don’t suppose anyone is watching?”
“What are you freaking out about? It’s a tortoise. It’s not going to go running for the hills.” Exotic as it was it was the most benign of pets. Paul had tired of such reptiles so quickly. Really, Rebecca was freaking out over nothing. As long as Chopin got her heat lamp there likely wasn’t going to be a problem.
“You owe me for moving in like this.” Rebecca only half nodded, distracted by getting the tortoise misnamed for a Polish virtuoso composer owned by a clearly bonkers virtuoso about to teach away from potential prying eyes. It was this kind of tedium Paul didn’t need. Outside of this road trip she would have her own life at Buttercombe and ideally the less she dealt with her sister’s nuttiness, the better. She still wasn’t sold on this whole Buttercombe Academy prep school thing, no matter the prestige. Paul had a different set of criteria; the selection and price of the soda machines amongst other errata.
“It better not have crapped on my blender,” Paul said to no one in particular.
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