Love Thy Neighbor ~ Part 1

Remember Grace Under Fire?

Shaka's Aunt Grace is coming today. We heard her from the parlor so we got up. Shaka was so into his game he bumped into M'Dear.
Cocoa: "Honey, get your head out of that game."
Shaka: "Sorry mom."
M'Dear: "And say hi to your Aunt Grace and introduce Y/n."
Shaka: "Uh, hi Aunt Grace."
We walk over to her and she side hugs him.
Grace: "Hi Shaka. And you must be his girlfriend."
Y/n: "I'm not his girlfriend."
Shaka: "Yet."
Shaka corrected while putting his arm over my shoulders.
Y/n: "We'll see."
Shaka: "You know I'm kidding. We joke about it all the time but it probably won't happen anytime soon."
Y/n: "Yeah. Oh, and my name's Y/n"
Grace: "Nice to meet you Y/n."
We start walking towards the stairs.
Cocoa: "AAAH! RAT! RAT!"
Shaka and I step up the step leading to the porch while everyone else gets in chairs. Mr. Jeb gets a bowl and puts it on the rat. Ami and Mazzi come downstairs
Grace: "No. No. No! Stop kids. There's a rat under the bowl."
Jeb: "And a 250-pound chicken in a chair."
He says looking at Mr. McKellan.
Mazzi: "You found Dontrelle! My friend Jay's out of town, so I'm pet-sitting."
M'Dear: "A pet is something that you can walk. A rat is just cat food."
Moz: "Get that rat outta my house. I mean, M'Dear's house."
Mazzi: "But Dad-"
Moz: "I don't want to hear it, Mazzi. Take it back."
Mazzi: "Okay."
He goes and picks it up. As Mazzi walks by her, Ami slides her finger down Mr. McKellan's arm.
Moz: "Uh, it's on me! It's on me! Get it off me! Get it off me!"
He gets back in the chair.
~Time Skip~
It's now night time and Shaka and I are playing on our switches. We heard a huge thud like someone fell.
Shaka: "You heard that too?"
Y/n: "Yeah. I thought it was just me."
Shaka: "Oh well."
We go back to playing our game.
~Time Skip~
We were upstairs when Mr. McKellan called us downstairs.
Moz: "On the couch now!"
I look over and the kitchen was actually burned.
M'Dear: "I can't believe my kitchen is gone."
Moz: "Me either. What were you cooking?"
M'Dear: "Nothing. This was God punishing you two heathens for ditching him to shake your groove thing."
Ami: "I'm ashamed of you, mom."
Cocoa: "Oh, come on. Even I know that that's not how it works. Clearly this was a human error."
Jeb: "All I know is the adults were outside."
Moz: "Were any of you kids in the kitchen?"
Y/n: "No."
Mazzi: "I came down to get some grape juice and that's when I saw the fire."
Shaka: "I was in my room with Y/n."
Ami: "Me too."
Jade: "I was in the bathroom."
Moz: "Well, somebody did it. That stove didn't just spontaneously combust. That fire could've burned this house down and killed us all. Now, I don't like being lied to."
Jade: "Well, I think that maybe—"
Moz: "I don't want to hear what you think. I want to hear what you know. So until one of you fesses up, you're all grounded. No TV, no Wi-Fi, no nothing. Now go to bed."
We all go upstairs.
~Time Skip~
Mazzi was asleep already.
Shaka: "I feel really bad."
Y/n: "You're lucky I didn't say anything."
Shaka: "That's cause you love me."
Y/n: "Sureee. Maybe because I don't like to see anyone suffer."
Shaka: "And because you love me."
Y/n: "I don't know if I can love a person who got me grounded by someone who's not even my parents."
I lay down and face my back towards him.
Shaka: "Yet you still love me."
He said kissing my temple.
~The Next Day~
We were staring at the burned kitchen.
Shaka: "Dad was really mad."
Mazzi: "We don't know what happened. I don't know what he expects us to do."
Y/n: "Nobody was down here."
Jade: "There's only one thing we can do."
Ami: "Run away and join the circus?"
Jade: "No....Investigate."
I watch as Jade takes pictures, Shaka puts up caution tape, Mazzi blows debris off something and starts coughing, and Ami ate a chicken nugget off the floor.
Ami: "We got nothing."
Y/n: "Ya think?"
Shaka: "Oh well."
Jade: "It had to be one of us, right."
Ami: "Not me. But I'll confess. Nobody guilty does that."
Shaka: "Or it's exactly what they do. The art of misdirection."
Mazzi: "Or as we say it on the playground—whoever smelt it...dealt it."
Jade: "Here's my theory. Two nights ago, we made ice cream sundaes. Ami's favorite."
Ami's eyes widen and she looks around.
(Dream words look like: this)
Jade: "You were just about to dig in when..."
M'Dear: "Ami, I hope you don't mind sharing an itty-bitty bite. Thank you baby."
She says taking more than half of Ami's ice cream. Ami's mouth drops.
Shaka: "Ami wouldn't share ice cream if her life depended on it."
Jade: "Exactly. So when M'Dear stole your fav thing in the world, you decided to touch hers."
(With a sparkler)
Ami: "Uh, no! That's crazy talk. It was Mazzi!"
Jade: "Maybe it was. He hasn't been right since he saw that horrible thing in the woods on our road trip here. "
Mazzi: "That kind of thing changes a man."
Mazzi put a bowl that says do not microwave in the microwave and laughs as it catches fire.
Mazzi: "B-But I swear it wasn't me. What about Jade? You keep texting with Ava about Drew. Maybe one of those texts was Drew saying he doesn't like you anymore."
Jade scoffs.
Jade: "That didn't happen."
Jade gets a text that Drew doesn't like her so her hair catches on fire.
We all laugh.
Mazzi: "Okay, okay, that one was too crazy. What about Y/n?"
Y/n: "I wasn't here, when I got back I was unpacking the clothes I brought from my house and was putting my dirty ones in the suitcase to take them back. That's when Mr. McKellan said to come downstairs."
Shaka grabs his burnt switch case and hides it in his shirt.
Jade: "You know who's been really quiet? Shaka."
Shaka: "Huh?"
Jade: "What's sticking out of your shirt?"
Shaka: "My pecs. I been lifting."
She takes him in a choke hold. He takes out the switch case.
Mazzi: "A smoking Switch case!"
Jade: "It was you."
Shaka: "It was an accident, I swear. I was just making a snack for Y/n and I.
Shaka grabs his snack and grabs a wooden spoon. He turns on the stove.
Mazzi: "Ooh. Thanks for leaving your ammo station unguarded."
He throws the spoon on the stove and it catches fire.
Shaka: "Mazzi you cheater."
Shaka starts walking towards the stove.
Y/n: "I wasn't switching he clothes over. I was watching Mazzi play. I was here the whole time and Shaka told me first..."
Shaka: "I think this is what started the fire."
Mazzi: "Case closed."