the next holders//mlb fanfiction

28//adoption

As El crosses down February 15th on her calendar, she starts to smile. Today is the day she'll finally move in with her new mom.

El stuffs her last few things in a bag, tells her former roommates goodbye and leaves the room. On her way to the exit, she meets Miss Blanchard, who tells her she's glad she'll finally have a family of her own, although she admits she'll miss her. El smiles, promising her she'll sometimes stop by to catch up.

Then Lila walks in, sees El and walks up to her with a smile on her face.

"Are you ready?" She asks her new daughter, El nods, waving goodbye to Miss Blanchard as she exits the orphanage with Lila.

As they arrive at their new house, Lila shows her her room and tells her she can explore the whole house if she wants to, although she'd rather not have El go to the attic.

After El moved all the stuff into her new house, she and Lila went to buy some wall paint and furniture for her new room, which took about half the day. But it was worth it. The rest of the day is filled with them painting the walls black and white, assembling the just-bought furniture and ordering pizza so they can continue without having to cook a meal. Even though El's room isn't done yet by the end of the day, she sleeps in it anyway just to continue working the next day. On the last day, the only things that still need to happen are the finishing touches. Like El painting a detailed painting of Ladybug and Lady Noire on her wall, which Lila wasn't happy with at first, but agreed to after seeing El's sketches. By the end of the weekend, she's completely finished with her room and is ready to live her new life. Autumn had stopped by to catch up with El and to give her the cake she baked that Sunday and she had stayed over for dinner, too.

After dinner, it's time for Autumn to return home. They tell each other goodbye and Autumn starts walking towards her own place, it isn't that far away from El's new home.

"She seems nice, El's new mother. But there's something about her, I can't explain it. She seems too nice." Autumn tells Tikki after checking to make sure no one else is near. Tikki comes flying out, unsure if she's allowed to tell her she knows Lila. She chooses not to.

"I'm sure that if something isn't right, you'll find out sooner or later. I've noticed you're usually right about these kind of things." Tikki says, Autumn nods.

"I know, but I hope I'm wrong this time though, I don't want El to get disappointed again." Autumn explains, Tikki nods understandingly.

Nothing much happens in that next week. There's another school break and El wanted to meet with Autumn, who couldn't because she was going on a one-week holiday with her parents. So, instead of meeting with Autumn, El went to have some fun with her mom. They had a game-night on Tuesday and went to a restaurant to have dinner on Friday.

Then, that next Monday, school starts again. As the classmates are being loud while sharing their holliday stories with each other, the door opens and two people walk in: their teacher and a young person around their age. As the class slowly starts to quiet down, their teacher starts to talk "This is Rune, your new classmate. Rune, can you tell us something about yourself?"

Rune looks up to the class, takes a long time to look at each classmate for at least six seconds and then says "I'm Rune, I'm 16 years old and I moved here from Los Angeles. I also don't care how you refer to me, it might be best if you just don't." (fast A/N, Rune uses they/he/she pronouns) The class stays quiet after their introduction. After making sure that Rune doesn't have anything else to say, the teacher continues.

"Okay, well if that's all then you can sit down wherever you want." Rune walks to the back of the classroom and sits down at an empty desk, ready to do nothing at all this whole day. She gives off the same kind of first impression El did, but it feels different somehow. Rune feels more mysterious, like they have something they'd rather not talk about, like they have something to hide. No one dares to go up to him and ask him a question, it's his first day and everyone's already on guard around him. Everyone except El, who likes to chat with the new student as soon as she gets the chance.

"So, I'm El." She starts, she doesn't want to get to the point right away. Rune, however, acts like El isn't there and continues staring into nothingness. "And you're Rune, I'm seated three seats in front of you in class." El continues, Rune looks up this time and manages to stare at El without saying a single word. It creeps El out.

"I only came over to say you could join me and some others for lunch if you want to, they all wanted to invite you but no one wanted to actually walk up to you and ask." El continues, then whispers "And I'm starting to understand why."

"I don't want to." Rune says fast, El is unsure if they sound mad or sad, maybe a combination of both.

"Is something wrong?" El asks, Rune shakes his head, "No." it doesn't sound convincing but El will let it be. It's not like she knows them that well after all. Yet, something about them reminds El of herself before she became friends with Autumn again. El wants to be the same person to Rune that Autumn was to her, she will help them.

Hi! A lot happened this chapter so I hope it doesn't seem like I rushed it. I didn't want to have a whole chapter of detailed 'El moving in' so I felt like speeding it a bit up.
Secondly (damn this is becoming a whole essay now lmao), I finally have an idea where this story is headed, as I now know what's gonna be the main storyline til the end of the story. (Just wanted to say that, there's nothing more lol)
Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this chapter.
bug out! :)