𝐌𝐄𝐌𝐎𝐑𝐈𝐄𝐒 𝐈𝐍 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐒𝐇𝐀𝐃𝐎𝐖𝐒

23|| 𝐁𝐑𝐄𝐀𝐊𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐃𝐎𝐖𝐍 𝐖𝐀𝐋𝐋𝐒

aleiya sat in the living room and watched as mikey played his video games. aleiya couldn't seem to get that nightmare she had out of her head.

"what the fuck!!" mikey yelled. "aleiya did you see that? i literally killed that dude and i lost! this game is ass"

"yea, that was dumb" aleiya lied. she didn't even know what game miley was playing.

"ready to start that training?" raph spoke from behind aleiya, scaring the crap out of her.

"oh my gosh raph" aleiya spoke, putting her hand on her chest. "you scared the shit out of me. and yea sure, mikey i'll be back later"

"ohh are you guys gonna go make out?" mikey teased while he turned to aleiya and raph.

"shut up mikey" raph rolled his eyes as he led aleiya to the dojo.

aleiya couldn't help but feel nervous. she didn't want to mess up any steps and although she had lived with them for over a month she wasn't that close to raph so she had no clue what to talk about.

"so" aleiya started. "what are we starting with?"

"well your pretty horrible at the katas" raph simply said.

"wait really?" aleiya asked a little disappointed. she thought she was pretty good at the katas.

"chill" raph laughed. "i was kidding. do ya have anything you wanna work on?"

"um" aleiya started. "i cant think of anything at the moment"

"do one of the katas and i'll see if you need any help" raph said and aleiya nodded.

aleiya began to do one of the katas master splinter tought her on her third day of training. when she was finished, she looked at raph to see what he was going to say.

"that was pretty good" raph complemented. "but you need to fix your form on one of your front stances, get into one and i'll help you"

"okay" aleiya said and got into one of the front stances that was in the kata. raph came from behind her and put his hands around her waist, fixing her form. he then moved his hand to the back of her knee and bent it a little more.

butterflies started to fly around in aleiyas stomach as raph corrected her stance. it was the way he was being so gentle, and so nice that caught her off guard but she wasn't complaining.

this was the first time since they met that raph didn't seem to hate her. she thought and hoped that he was finally starting to warm up to her.

"there" raph said as he backed up. "now, let's move onto the next thing"

TWO HOURS WENT BY, raph and aleiya were finally done with training. aleiya had to admit, training with raph was a lot more fun then with his brothers and splinter.

aleiya was happy that her and raph were finally starting to get along, aleiya had been careful to not say anything to set off raphs temper, which was pretty easy.

"did you guys make out??!" mikey asked as aleiya sat next to him on the couch.

"no mikey, we didn't make out" aleiya laughed. "he just helped me with some katas and stances and shit like that"

"sureee" mikey teased. "wanna play gta or cod?"

"well we've been playing cod for like two weeks now so gta" aleiya said and mikey nodded, handing aleiya a controller.

"sometimes i wish we could go outside" mikey said out of the blue as the loading screen of the game went on and aleiya looked at him.

"what do you mean?"

mikey shrugged. "i dunno. i just wish we could have normal lives and be friends with normal people instead of being cooped up down here all the time"

"i'm sure one day you'll be able to go above ground. see the city lights, and stand by the statue of liberty" aleiya promised as she gave mikey a warm smile, to which he returned.

RAPHAEL didn't know how to feel about aleiya. he knew he liked her, it was obvious to him that he had some type of feelings for her. but she's so pretty; beautiful. why would she like a hot headed impatient short tempered mutant turtle?

all raphael wanted was to keep aleiya in his arms and just tell her about his feelings but he knew she could never feel the same. every time raph looked in the mirror, he saw a monster. why couldn't they just be normal humans? why couldn't they have a normal life and go to school, go out to eat, go to public places like everybody else?

or why couldn't they have just not been mutated? sure, they would be normal turtles but at least they wouldn't have to spend their whole lives in the sewers.

it wasn't fair.

A/N: omg i felt so bad writing the end of this chapter 😭 i honestly love raph and all of the turtles with all my heart and i wanna give them all big hugs so bad. it hurts my heart knowing they struggle with insecurities 😭😭

ALSO! if you struggle with your body image or struggle to love yourself, YOU ARE BEAUTIFUL!! i promise, every single one of you are so beautiful in your own ways!! it's okay to have bad days but just remember to get back up and don't back down to anybody because at the end of the day you weren't born to impress anybody! so be you, do what makes YOU happy and don't listen to anybody! it's your life, not theirs!!❤️❤️