Bad reputation

•Three•

•Brooke•

I woke up to a pair of eyes staring me down. I jumped a little before sitting up.

"Do you like my brother?" Aaliyah asked before I could even sit up.

"I mean yeah. He's a good friend and all-" I started but she interrupted me.

"No...I mean like like him."

"Aaliyah, I've known him a good five days. We're just friends." I said running a hand through my hair. She nodded and then got up from the floor.

Middle schoolers. I rolled my eyes and laughed.

"What's so funny?" I head Shawn ask from behind me. He appeared from around the corner holding two glasses of water.

"You're sister's got a real active imagination." I said taking the glass from him. He chuckled as he sat on floor beside the couch.

"I could move my leg, you don't have to sit on the floor. It's your house, not mine." I said after taking a sip of the water.

"Even if you moved your leg, I wouldn't sit up there, I like the floor." He said, odd child. Is he a child? Odd man child? Yeah that's better.

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"So I was thinking, what if you just stayed here tonight," Karen states as we finished up dinner, "and all the nights after that."

I chocked on the sip of lemonade I had in my mouth.

"Like move in?" I asked, wiping my mouth with my napkin. The four of them nodded at me.

"I don't, I mean, I couldn't. I don't want to be a burden." I said, stumbling over my words.

"You wouldn't be a burden, we want you here." Manuel said. Aaliyah, Shawn, and Karen nodded in agreement.

"I could be a serial killer, you've known me for what, five days?" I said. I really wanted to get out of my crappy apartment, but I didn't want to impose on them.

"Are you a serial killer?" Aaliyah asked, raising an eyebrow.

"I mean, I'm not, but I'm not a saint either. I've got sort of a bad reputation, I don't want any of you to get caught up in it." I said, looking down at my fingers and peeling the skin off of them.

"Brooke," Shawn said reaching across the table and grabbing my arm, "nothing you say is going to change our minds about wanting you to live here." He said smiling.

I looked at the four faces staring at me for a while before making my decision.

"O-okay." I said nodding slightly.

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"Just grab some stuff for tonight and the morning. We'll come back after school and get the rest." Shawn said as I opened my apartment door.

"Two trips won't be necessary, I don't have much I want to take. The rest of the stuff in here can rot for all I care." I said laying the keys on counter.

I hobbled over to the makeshift closet and pulled all the clothes down into the basket. I put all of my bathroom stuff in an old grocery bag and stuck that, along with a few other tiny things, on top of the basket and I was ready to go. Well I did grab the dirty clothes hamper too, but same thing. Well actually I didn't grab anything. Shawn grabbed it all and put it in the back of my car that his dad was driving back to his house so I'd have it.

I struggled once again to get into the passenger seat of his jeep before we drove away from one of my own personal hells.

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"This is all you own?" Karen asked as she helped me settle into the guest room. I nodded and she sighed.

"This weekend me, you, and Aaliyah are going to have to go shopping." She said smiling.

"You don't have to do that. You're already giving me a place to live, I couldn't possibly ask you to buy me anything." I said grabbing the pillow from behind me and propping my leg up on it. He smile faltered just a little, in a sympathetic type way.

"I wasn't asking if you wanted to go shopping dear, I was telling you that we are going. And I'm telling you that what ever you want we are buying it for you. No if's, and's or but's about it. You're a teenager in high school, you deserve to be spoiled every now and then." She said grabbing my hand and rubbing circles around it with her thumb. "Anything you want is yours, you just have to ask." She said before getting up and leaving the room.

I'm definitely not ever going to get used to people wanting to be nice to me.

This ones a little shorten but I hope you like it still....

3/8/17