The girl next door, - ᴛ.ᴋᴀᴜʟɪᴛᴢ

Chapter one.

• SORRY NOW (SUGAR RAY

𝕄 𝔸 ℕ 𝔻 𝕐 ' 𝕊
𝐏 𝐎 𝐕
☠︎︎

I didn't understand. This was all a jumble. Suddenly moving from Greece to Germany? I never even knew the language-- let alone English. Well.. kind of? Hello, my name is Mandy.

"Hello, my name is Mandy." I repeated to myself, occasionally hearing my brother snigger or giggle.

I did know English, of course, but it was.. very restricted back with mum. Even if she slowly forgot how to speak our tongue.

"It isn't that bad, is it?" Seb looked at me, grinning and tapping the steering wheel. In response, I nodded a little, my eyes flickering to two boys wrestling each other and fighting on the street, and then at a man chasing crying children with a belt.

I bit back something I was gonna say, nodding slowly and looking at Seb as he sighed and just smiled, his eyes going over my face. "You don't look too excited."

"That's because I'm not." I responded, smiling back at him.

My brother, Sebastian, and I had escaped my abusive mother seven nights ago. The first place my brother thought of was Germany. Possibly due to his connections here.

We wanted to go further to visit some old family, but it was just too far. Fuel was cheap, but we didn't have much money. It was just something we couldn't do.

So Germany it is.

»-☠︎︎-+>

We got out of the car, the musky air surrounding us. It was nothing new, of course, the same as Greece with baggy-clothed boys who didn't know proper English. It was the hood all over again.

Our mother wouldn't call the cops. I don't think she even knew we left. She never said goodbye or asked where we were going. We just left.

"Damn, honey. Back that ass up!" A few men whistled with thick accents, walking their pitbulls with ragged, thin leashes and having oblivious women beside them.

Seb did a forearm jerk towards them, muttering under his breath and pushing me towards the car as I stood there, utterly confused. I had no clue what they had said.

My English wasn't the best; It always sounded better in my head. How could I understand people, let alone in German? I thought of this earlier, but I'm just realising how thick German accents are. It was too difficult to understand.

"Don't worry about them." Seb muttered under his breath, still looking at the men while they mumbled and walked off. Seb then glanced at the car, pulling out his keys and unlocking the boot as I lifted it open and leaned against the back.

Seb is eleven years older than me. He managed to talk to his long-distanced friend, Mario, to let us stay with him until he obliged.

--Mario is pretty careless. He smokes weed and listens to rock music all day. There's nothing to really fuss about.

"Yo," Seb called out as Mario walked out onto the lawn, nodding towards my brother and approaching to give him a rough headlock, and then a smile to me. "Hey, kid."

I returned the smile, my eyes drifting to the house next door, and to the two boys sitting on their porch talking in German obnoxiously loud. Hitting each other with giggles and snickers.

One of them had a beaming smile, and the other was staring at me with a smirk on his face. I furrowed my eyebrows but didn't say anything.

They were pretty cute. I liked their hair but that was it.

And it took me a solid minute before realising the dreadhead could obviously see me staring. I quickly turned my head away, then shifted to face the car as I started to lift and grab things.

𝕋 𝕆 𝕄 ' 𝕊
𝙿 𝙾 𝚅
☠︎︎

"New neighbours?" I said quietly, taking a drag of my cigarette and leaning forward, my elbows resting on my knees as I took in the sight of the girl.

She certainly wasn't from around here.

"She's... foreign? Not German foreign?" I tilted my head, "Twenty bucks if you go over there." I looked back at Bill.

"Forty if you do." Bill added. I got up, rubbing the corner of my mouth and approaching the girl with a smirk.

"Need a hand?" I asked, tilting my head to catch her gaze.

"No,"

My gaze drifted to Bill, my eyebrows furrowed. I looked back at the girl, then at the box she was struggling to lift.

"You sure?" I crossed my arms, taking a drag of my cigarette and tilting my head to catch her gaze. She glanced at me for a second before quickly looking away.

After a minute, she lifted the box and looked at me with her eyebrows furrowed and a kind-of afraid look. "No. As if," She repeated and turned to walk in the house.

Oh, so she was one of them. Entitled, rich, probably not from around here.

I raised an eyebrow, turning and hearing Bill laugh at the encounter. "Shut up," I swatted the side of his head playfully, sitting back down and watching the girl walk inside curiously.