Beyond us

1995, 26th of December

Five children. Five friends. Five stories.

Children's laughter echoed through the empty street in London. Each house covered and surrounded by bright, fresh snow. The creaks of the old swings, which pierced the 5 kids ears that were at the playground on the corner of 2 streets meeting, each time someone went up or down.

"Will you get off that bloody thing, Penelope. Some of us are trying to talk here." A squeaky, demanding voice yelled, with a strong English accent.

The voice belonged to a tall and rather skinny boy, who's ginger hair poked out from under his forest green beanie. The freckles on his nose were now barley visible, covered by the redness on his face caused by the weather. His dark green eyes turned back to the boy and girl in front of him. They were sitting under the rusting, old playground.

The short girl's blonde hair was tied up in two low pigtails. Her neck and most of her chin were covered by a long and thick wooly red scarf. She kept bringing her hand up to wipe her nose and kept sniffling. Her cheeks were pink, almost like they were constantly blushing.

The boy next to her had that same features, even the red scarf. Except his were more masculine and sharp. Their wide blue-silver eyes looked at the ginger, wide and interested, in an exaggerating way. The ginger was showing them a toy he got for Christmas, the previous day.

"Anyways, Aria and Ace. Look at th-" The ginger was cut off, by Penelope, jumping off the swing just like the ginger wanted.

She was tall, getting a jump start with her growth spurts. Her black curly hair was tucked into her purple beanie that had love hearts at the front. Her dark skinned hands were comforted and heated by matching gloves. Her chubby cheeks and brown eyes were roughed up with annoyance. Her long legs walked over to the three, under the playground.

"Well, Leo, if you don't like it, then you could go home, you know?" Penelope's soft, trying to be rough, voice spoke. She sat besides Ace and Leo. Leo put two fingers on the bridge of his nose and closed his eyes in irritation.

"You're not the boss of the playground. Besides, I'm trying to show Aria and Ace my new toys!" He defended himself. On the ground were a few action figures.

"Santa got me 3 beanie babies, did you know?" Aria spoke proudly.

"He did for me too! We're twins remember?" Ace laughed. He picked up one of the action figures and started to play with it with Leo. Aria and Penelope joined.

"I don't why I cant own action figures like these. Mummy and daddy say they're too boyish." Aria complains and groans.

"Well that's why I let you play with my ones." Ace said. She just muttered an 'it's not the same' back.

Their laughters continued on but was soon interrupted. A large snowball came crashing down on the action figures and some on themselves. The four kids jumped and screamed in surprise. Leo the loudest.

A loud laughter erupted from someone standing up. The four sets of eyes turned and knew exactly who it was. Antonio Romano. The tall boy, who's messy brunette hair was comforted by a black beret, had light brown eyes and a crooked nose. He had tan skin, being Italian and all. He had to put his hands on his knees to stay standing as a result from the laughter. Leo, Aria, and Penelope all looked at him with frowns. Ace was slightly laughing from hearing Leo's scream.

Antonio finally stopped laughing and wiped a tear from his eye.

"Was that necessary?" Asked Leo. Antonio jumped on the floor, next to Penelope.

"You should've seen your faces. And your screams! Leo, you scream like a girl!" Antonio exclaimed. With that being said, everyone bursted out laughing whilst Leo's cheeks went red from embarrassment.