My Friends Step-Brother

Ch. 1- My Property, Your Property

RORY POV

"Rory honey, I have to leave for work. I got the late shift again," my mom told me from the kitchen. I got off my bed and went out to say goodbye. My mom works as a nurse in the emergency room in the local hospital of our town.

"You got the late shift again?" I asked worried, my mom works so hard for us, especially after my dad died. I can see the work aging in her eyes.

"Yeah, sorry baby girl," she says, rubbing my check and bringing me in for a hug.

"Don't forget to do your chores, there is frozen meals in the freezer. I'll be back before you know it." She says as she lets go of the hug and kisses me on the head.

"Okay, thanks, Mama, goodbye, I love you," I say as she walks out the door. I was sad but I tried not to show it because I didn't want her to carry anything else.

"Love you too, babygirl," she locks the door behind her.

I watch her walk to our detached garage and wave from the window as she gets in her car and drives off.

I un-freeze the frozen dinner in the microwave and go sit on the couch. I used to love when my mom got these for us, now it brings back memories of my dad then when my mom and I used to sit on the couch watching Gossip Girl while eating Lasagna from a box.

After I get done, I throw it away. I do the dishes, the ones that are there, which isn't much because mom is always working, and I'm always eating frozen meals.

My last chore is watering the garden. I wouldn't call it a chore because I plant our garden every year and beg my mom for more plants all the time. I also wouldn't call it a garden because our whole yard is a plant sanctuary almost.

I love gardening mostly because my dad loved it. He would always come home from work, and we would spend time bonding in the garden. Sometimes, when work was hard, we would sit in silence, but I did not mind. Sometimes, it was more comforting than talking. He used to love watching things grow. He would always tell me, "Remember Rory girl, a garden is not a place. It's a journey." When he died, I wasn't going to let everything go to shambles. So I re plant the garden every year to help me remember him. Also because I love spending time near plants and flowers and watching their journey.

The garden went around our house and around the property line. Our yard was kinda the shape of a rectangle. We had a grass patch in the middle stretching to the fence that was separating our yard from our neighbors and my best friend Jerimiah's house.

I was watering the yard when a football flew over the fence and landed at my feet. Then, this boy hoped over the fence effortlessly. He was tall and had brown, blondish hair that sat perfect and wavy on top of his head. He was tan but looked good. He looked up at me, he had a surprised look on his face, he obviously wasn't expecting me to be here.

"Oh hey, I'm Joshua Jackson, I just moved here," He said with a charming smile that I'm sure attracts all types of people.

Jerimiah told me about him before he moved in. His mom has been dating Joshua's dad for about 4 years now. They decided to get married, and they moved in with Jerimiah. Joshua has had a hard time his mom leaving them when he was little, and he takes it out on a lot of people and things in his life. He gets in trouble with school a lot.

But despite that, Jerimiah and Joshua get along very well, almost as if they were brothers, which is lucky for them. Unlike our other best friend Carmen, whose stepdad is a complete asshole and so are his two kids.

I can't imagine my mom getting married or even having a boyfriend. I guess my dad's memory is still too much alive in both of us we cant move on. Which as much as it hurts to say it, it's a blessing and a curse.

"What are you doing?" I ask a little snotty, but I have a reason to. He landed on part of my garden, and I'm not as welcoming to new people, especially boys like him who know they look good and base their personality off of it.

"What do you think I'm doing?" He replies with the same amount of sass as I did.

"Trespassing," I say and cross my arms, a little too proud of my witty comeback. I get my sarcasm from my mom. Ever since I was little, it has always been very easy to come back with fast, witty comebacks. Which also makes me the class clown most of the time. Even though I hate attention and being noticed.

"Well, my ball went over the fence. How else was I supposed to get it?" He says, smirking at the end, thinking he got me.

"There is this thing called a doorbell. It goes ding dong," I reply, pointing to the front door.

"Do they not have those where you lived?" I say again. I look at him, waiting for his reply.

"Well then, we wouldn't have been able to have this lovely conversation, would we?" He says, walking a little closer. Oh boy. I don't reply to that comment. I finished my thoughts from before.

"I would answer the door, you'd be like 'I am terrible at throwing, and I lost my ball in your yard.' I would say, 'Oh man, let me go get that for you.' I would get it, bring it back. You would take it and leave." I say this with my hands moving around telling the story with me.

He stood there laughing. His head went all the way back. By the time he looked at me again, he had a wide grin.

"You are kinda cute." He said, stepping closer again.

"You know what else is cute?" I say with my head tilted pretending like I'm flirting.

He shakes his head and says, "What's that?"

"The property line," I say, straitening my head back. I use my hands to demonstrate when I say, "My property, your property."

He just stands there grinning. I feel like it was 10 minutes later when I finally picked up his football from my feet and handed it to him. He took it, brushing his hands against mine.

"I'm trying out for the football team," He said, holding the ball up in one hand.

"Just a little tip, because the ball did land over here, you might want to practice a little bit more before trying out." I say sarcastically pointing at the ball. I cross my arms across my chest. He just gave me a wide toothy smile. He tilted his head and looked down at the ground, then back up at me.

"Yeah, I'm sure you can teach me a lot of things," Joshua says, inching a little bit closer. We were so close that I could feel his breath hot on my skin.

"Good thing you have Jerimiah he is a great tutor, very smart, athletic all around, very balanced," I said, backing up, putting a good foot in half between us.

He had a confused yet stunned look on his face. I dont think he is used to girls, not sucoming to his charmes. So I thought I should make things clearer.

"Jer... he is your new step-brother, is he not?" I ask.

"Yeah, he is." He says, looking at my feet. He walks back over to the fence. Before he hops back over, he looks back and says,

"See you at school tomorrow, I guess." Before I could reply, he was over the fence.

Great, I forgot about school tomorrow. I have to face him again. But first, I have to decompress what just happened here, and for some reason, I couldn't stop thinking about him while watering the rest of the plants.