Neighbors

Basement Introductions Part 2

Madison jumped when she felt an arm go around her shoulder, she had zoned out while the four boys packed their instruments out.

"So, Mads-" Madison raised an eyebrow in question of the new nickname that she had acquired.

"You have a lot of letters in your name and I'm too lazy to say them all" Jack informed her. Madison rolled her eyes and laughed at his peculiarness.

"Well, then what do I get to call you?" Madison nudged him in the arm while Jack pretended to think.

"Hmmm, sex god works for me" Jack replied in complete seriousness causing Madison to throw her head back in laughter. Jack put his hand over his heart and pouted in mock hurt making Madison laugh so hard that she snorted which caused Jack to break out into a childish laugh too.

Alex sat on the other side of the room with Rian and Zack watching the two teenagers laughing like hyenas. He couldn't stop the smile that found its way on his face as he watched Madison try to stop laughing but then only break out into a new set of giggles every time she looked at Jack. Her face was red from the lack of oxygen and tears were streaming down her face.

"Okay" "Okay" he heard her say in between laughs while she tried to pull herself together until finally she was able to take a deep breath and look at Jack without laughing.

"I'm sorry for laughing at you, sex god" Madison snickered at the nickname that Jack had assigned for himself.

Jack pretended to ignore her and turned his head away but watched her from the corner of his eye.

"Forgive me?" Madison begged, Jack bit back his smile and shook his head.

"If it makes you feel better, I bribed Alex into buying Chinese for everyone...."

"Okay, I forgive you" Jack smiled and crushed his body to hers before getting up and prancing over to Alex. She laughed when Jack sat down on Alex's lap and began petting his hair, he was a weird one but Madison enjoyed his flamboyant personality. Being around Jack was like getting a breath of fresh air that she hadn't known she needed. She couldn't even remember the last time she had genuinely laughed, much less laughed until she cried but Jack had made her do it without even trying. She could only hope that the other boys would want her to stick around too.

"Hey" Madison was brought out of her thoughts. She turned her head to see Rian sitting next to her smiling; she couldn't help but notice his perfect teeth, which in all honesty was probably a weird thing to notice.

"You have nice teeth" she accidentally blurted out before she could stop herself. Her cheeks turned pink and she hid her face behind her hands out of embarrassment. Rian laughed and shook his head; he could definitely understand why Alex had taken such a strong liking to the girl.

"Look, I just really want to apologize for how rude we all were earlier. I guess we're all kinda protective over Alex. He went through a pretty bad break up a little while back and was left in a really bad place. You're the first girl he's taken a liking too and we just don't want him to get hurt ya know? But honestly, you're a cool girl, and as for Zack he's just quiet in general so it might take a while before he actually holds a conversation with you" Rain explained in an attempt to show Madison that they really did all like her and genuinely wanted to get to know her.

However, Madison only felt conflicted because she knew that no matter what she did that in the end Alex would get hurt. She knew that he wouldn't listen to her if she tried to push him away because she had already tried that but she didn't want him to like her either. The more she thought about it the worst she began to feel because now it wasn't only Alex that she would be hurting, but it would be his friends too, or at least Jack. She wasn't sure how close she would get to Rian and Zack seeing as she had hardly spoken to either one of them but she definitely knew it was inevitable that she would become good friends with Jack.