I slide the back door open onto our deck that looks out at the lake. The sun shines down on the rippling  water. Someone's boat drives through the middle. I give Massimo a hug startling him from his barbecuing. 
"Hi baby how was your walk?" 
"Good, got some firewood flowers. I'm going down to the dock. Right now is when the minnows are most active." 
"Alright, have fun baby. Be careful though. Stay on the rocks. Call if you need anything." I give him a thumbs up and walk away. Bucky catches up to me and trots next to me. 
Ever since I started this new life surrounded by nature I have discovered a passion of mine. One that I would've never discovered had we spent our summer back home in Toronto. I love nature. Everything about it. From the way certain plants that we don't even know about have medicinal qualities. Or from the intricate network of the species that co-exists with each other and depend on the other to survive daily. 
It's so fascinating that I spend most of my days studying and drawing these plants or animals. Lucien said that his friends older sister went to the University of Toronto and studied biology. She then specialized in her last two years of her undergraduate degree in wildlife biology. She now spends her days studying monarch butterflies. 
That's what I want to do. Just not with butterflies. 
When Massimo and Emilio found out about my new hobby they got me a stack of books and tools to help me with my research. Dominic got me a leather covered sketch book. Sometimes they sit with me while I sketch what I see but most of the time I sit in peaceful silence. Pencil to paper I sketch what I see and I have never been happier. 
An hour has passed of me just relaxing on the dock. The minnows are getting bigger everyday I measured one and it was 4 cm long. Last week it was 3.4 cm long. 
After I measured the minnow I decide to sit on the end of the dock and just soak up the sun. Bucky rests his head on my thigh and I lean back on my hands letting my legs make small ripples in the water. 
"Bucky don't you love this?" I ask the dog who won't respond. But I don't care. I talk to him sometimes. He's my best buddy. We spend almost every minute together. 
I think back to the beginning. Standing in front of our old house, the one I spent the first five years of my life in. I think about when I got to my old room that afternoon and cried myself to sleep. I thought that if I kept silent and kept to myself, that I would make it out alive at eighteen. I didn't know how wrong I'd be. I grew into my skin. I talked, which was something I vowed to never do again. I allowed myself to trust my family. It took a while, a lot of crying, anxiety, and trips to the hospital. Yet every time, my brothers were there. They always supported me. 
I tear up thinking about it. I spent my whole life afraid. I was assaulted, bullied, and harassed. I thought for so long that I didn't deserve happiness, that all I was meant for was to be a punching bag to take your anger out on. 
Massimo taught me that I can look up to someone and trust them to be there for me no matter what time it is. No matter how tired he is, or how busy he may get. Massimo made sure I was priority number one. 
Emilio is more like me than our other brothers. We like to do our own thing. We are introverts. In the past six months he's taught me that it's okay to be who I am. He taught me it's okay to say no if I just can't mentally handle anymore socializing for the day. He taught me to find joy in what I want to do, not what others want me to do.