ʏᴏᴜ & ɪ | Modern Family

1.2 COAL DIGGER

I come downstairs, dressed in an oversized white sweater, dark blue ripped jeans along with converses.

"Morning." I say to everyone in the room, I start preparing my school lunch, I see Haley at the corner of my eye approaching Mom.

"Hey mom, Can I have forty dollars for lunch?" She says with a sneaky smile on her face. "Forty dollars?!" Mom says taken aback. Even though this is pretty typical of Haley, Mom still gets shocked everytime. Because each time she asks the number gets higher! "Oh! I also need a book for school." She says. "What book?" She questions. Just as her eyebrow furrows, Haley then blurts out how she wants a dress.
"You're such a bad liar, Hails." I say as I laugh before taking a bite of my apple for breakfast. I then proceed to sit next to Alex at the table. "I'd be more worried that she couldn't come up with any book titles." She says, eating her Cheerios. I let out a little giggle as we exchange eye contact.

Not shortly after, Dad enters.
"C'mon Luke, we're going to be late!" He hollers.
Luke enters the kitchen with everything that he's wearing, inside out or backwards. I give him a quick glance as I get up and grab my text book I left out the other night. "How do you manage..?" I roll my eyes slightly.

"That's a new one. Inside out AND backwards. At least it's not zipped into your-- oop, there it is." Mom says as she looks away uncomfortably. "I have a broken zipper." Luke says.

"Alright well, Alex and I are going to school because we cannot stand being in this hell hole for any longer." I say as I put my textbook and lunch into my bag. I slip it over my shoulder, grab my cap hat from the coat rack, put it on, and head out the door. "Bye! Love you!" I shout before I leave.

As we both arrive at school, we both say bye and part ways. It took us longer than usual to walk to school as we stopped for smoothies on the way. As I walk into school I take a sip of my half-drank beverage. I hastily make my way to my locker as I suddenly bump into someone. Or do they bump into me?

"Oh, I'm sorry!" I say as my smoothie explodes and spills all over his shirt. I don't make eye contact as I'm so embarrassed. "That's okay." His velvety, silverly and confident voice replies back to me. I finally look up at him. He's so tall, he practically overshadows me. His hair is as fluffy as a rabbit's tail, and as blonde as a summer's day. His eyes, don't even get me started on those. His eyes are as blue as a pool of sapphires. They're so pretty I can't stop staring at them. His body, so athletic, so muscular. I freeze, practically in a trance because I'm admiring how handsome this man is. How have I never seen him before?

"I'm— I'm Spencer." He says, breaking the silence between us. I quickly snap back to reality. "I'm— Eleanor. But you can call me, Ellie." I say as we shake hands. "Look, I'm sorry about all this. Definitely not the best first impression." I say as I roll my eyes. "Hey, don't worry about it." He says to me as he reaches for tissues in his bag to wipe away the stains. "So, uh—" I say as we move out of the way of the crowd, standing to the side. "How come I haven't seen you around?" I say as I continue our conversation. "Oh— I'm new. I got kicked out of my last school because I was too much of a troublemaker, and well.. my grades weren't exactly the best." He says to me as he looks down at the floor. "My grades are that bad that I've gotten pushed back a few years. I'm meant to be a junior but instead I'm in stupid sophomore year!" He says a bit agitated. "I'm so sorry. If it helps, I could, help you study? To you know, bump those grades up?" I suggest. "You really love saying sorry don't you." He says with a smirk. "And about your offer, sure. I'd like that." He says. "Great!" I say. "Here's my numbe-" Just as we were going to exchange numbers the school bell rings. "I guess I'll see you later, Eleanor?" "Uh— yeah. See you later." I say a bit disappointed but smiling.

School has just ended and my parents inform me that we're going over to my grandparents house later tonight. I walk back home with Alex as Haley got a ride from her "boyfriend" Dylan and Luke already went with his buddies.

"We're home!" I announce as Alex and I come inside. We put our bags down beside the shoe rack and enter the kitchen. "Hey guys, don't forget we have to be at Jay's and Gloria's by 5:30pm sharp so please be ready by then." She says to us like we forgot. "Yes mom. We know." I tell her as I grab a few grapes and eat them. I go to my school bag and grab some homework that isn't due for a few days but I wanna get it out of the way so I have time to myself.

I quickly run upstairs to my room to get dressed. Nothing too fancy, just a t-shirt, jacket and some jeans. And I head out the door and into the car, ready to head over to Jay and Gloria's.

"Hey everybody! Come on in! Hi
hi. Nice shirt. Somebody got a
haircut. Did you grow again?" Uncle Cam says to us all. All of us kids enter the house while mom, dad and my grandparents are having a chat. Alex and I sit down but Luke and Manny are up to something else. Ever since we got here they can't stop fighting.

"Food's in there, drinks are in there, and I'll be in here." Jay says as he makes his way to the living room. Just as he's about to sit down, Dad says, "Hold on, Jay. I think we should address the elephant in the room. Luke, Manny, in light of what happened at school today, if there are any
feelings that you’d like to express, I think this would be the appropriate forum--" He gets cut off by Jay. "Oh for God's sake." He says to Luke and Manny. "Both of you come here!" He says as he throws an arm around each of them.

"Do family members kick and punch eachother, or do they love eachother?" He asks them both. "Love each other." Luke and Manny respond in unison. "Great talk, I'll be in the den." He says as he pats them on the shoulder and walks off.

"So who's playing?" I question. "Notre Dame and Missouri State." Jay responds to my question. "Nice." I say before my sentence gets cut off by Alex and her explaining the whole plot of The Hunchback of Notre Dame. I put my hand over her mouth to shut her up because no one wants to hear that. "HEY!" She says, muffled.

We've been watching the game for over half an hour and Alex decides to make another comment. "Ellie and I like football. Haley hates it. Which is weird because it's all boys and requires no reading. Do you know she spends about forty-five minutes every morning doing her hair? And sometimes she tries on--" She gets cut off by me. "Am I going to have to shut you up again?" I say sternly and pretty annoyed. She then nods her head no and continues watching the game. "That's what I thought." I whispered.

Just a few minutes later Missouri State seem to be the better team. "Go State!" Uncle Cameron shouts with enthusiasm. "Who let the bears into my house?" Jay says quite piqued. "I didn't know he knew that term!" Uncle Mitchell says to Uncle Cameron.

1.2 COAL DIGGER

Please comment if I misspelled any words. The story is often going to mention just the Dunphy's rather than everyone else. (But every family will be mentioned, or have a line in my story.)

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