neighbors

two: him

neighbors- two

Three weeks had passed, along with my very lonely sixteenth birthday, since the day we moved into our new house. I laid in bed awake all night staring at the star-lit sky through my big glass heaven, head too full of thought to sleep. As the hours droned on, and my own drowsiness increased, I somehow managed to convince myself that school, in the morning, would be okay. There's always nice people somewhere. It may take a matter of weeks but I'd always had a knack for picking out the best people.

The neighbor boy's name was Calum, and it was him that was naked in the kitchen. However, when he reappeared, he had a slouchy grey tank top on and sweatpants that hung loosely around his hips. He introduced himself to my father and I, shaking our hands politely, but then dismissed himself to do god knows what. Both of us were blushing insanely through the encounter, which I later learned was interpreted by my father as a 'crush' on each other.

The morning school began, I had gotten two full hours of sleep, one hour of half-awakeness, and five hours of "oh shit I should go to bed now." When Noelle crept into my room at six o'clock, I'd already woken up.

"Dammit Katie, I wanted to wake you up." She huffed, plopping down on the foot of my bed.

"Sorry." I breathed, running a hand through my dirty blonde locks. "Are you excited to start sixth grade today?"

"No. I hate school." Her thick eyebrows pulled together, and her head tilted back to look through my skylight.

"I thought you liked school." I reached out to my younger sister, "You're starting middle school, dude, that's huge."

"Yeah," she shrugged deeply, crawling toward me. "I liked school in New York. I don't know anyone here, I'm nervous."

"Well, does this school have a cross county team?" I laced an arm around Noelle's shoulders as she slid her legs beneath the plain white comforter on my bed.

"Yeah." Noelle sighed, "but try outs probably won't be for a long time and I'm nervous."

"Well, I'll tell you what, I have to take the bus with you for a few weeks until I get my license, so you can sit with me, and everyone will think you're the coolest kid ever."

Noelle is the spitting image of my mother, with dark hair cascading in waves past her shoulders and eyes bluer than the sky on a clear day. Her cheekbones are high, and her jaw wide. If I didn't know better, I would have thought that she's far beyond sixth grade.

She nodded slightly, and looped her arms around my neck, pulling me into a hug, "Thanks Katie,"

"No problem," I rubbed her back gently, "Now go get ready for school, we've only got like a half hour."

I watched the thin girl disappear into the darkness that was the rest of the attic. As she neared the top of the spiral stairs, she reached out with one hand and flicked on the light switch, washing the space in dim yellow light. Shelves lined the entirety of the attic, excluding the atrium, and over the first weeks of living in the house, I'd filled a good portion of them with books. Some of them I'd read, some of them I hadn't. It didn't matter. I just loved books.

-

"Someone looks like they didn't get much sleep," my mom remarked, kissing my temple and handing me a black backpack and a bagel. "Good morning sweetheart."

"Morning," I mumbled, slinging the bag over my shoulders.

"Be honest, how much did you sleep?"

"Two hours." I smiled as innocently as possible.

"You and you teenagers with your crazy sleeping habits," she said, exasperated. "The bus stop is just down the road, you better get there soon."

Chewing on bagel, I nodded and ushered Noelle out the front door. A feeling of dread fell over me when I saw the neighborhood in the dim morning light. Teenagers leaving from nearly every house hopped in fancier cars than I could have ever imagined. It seemed that the neighbor to our left wasn't the only one with a cute teenage son.