Real-ish

Straight and Narrow

Jason~

One moment I'm laying on a bed with my Instagram up on my phone, the next I'm being hissed at by a tiny girl in a hurry.

"They're here! Hide!" She whispers frantically. Tim and I share a single look for a split second, the first time we've looked at each other in hours probably, and we bolt for our hiding places.

Unfortunately, we chose the same one. I send him a glare as we both hide under the large bed, keeping ourselves held up against the bottom of the frame.

"This is my hiding spot, get your own." He whispers, arms straining to keep him up. I scoff quietly.

"I was here first, and you're so skinny you can fit anywhere else. You get out." I hiss back. He sends me a hate-filled look.

With what I'm sure is all the strength he has, he shifts his weight to the leg furthest from me, right before kicking my ankle with his free one. I grit my teeth, but I don't budge, nor do I make a sound.

With how close we are, retaliation is easy. I hip check him, hard. He flinches but doesn't fall. He removes one arm, just to elbow me in the face. Or, as much as he can manage without falling.

I open and close my mouth, my jaw getting sore. I knee him in the thigh, and the ensuing spasm I caused makes just that one leg fall with a heavy thunk.

We freeze, listening.

"Sorry, just a leg spasm, I won't drop the suitcase don't worry," Cora says, muffled by the door.

"Oh honey, is your leg acting up again? It's been so long, did something happen?" A lower yet feminine voice asks. She might have an accent, but I can't hear it clearly.

"No! No, nothing happened. I was just sitting for a while and my leg fell asleep. I'm fine mom." Cora speaks again. Tim raises an eyebrow at me, to which I shrug.

"Well okay, if you say so. But you really need to be careful darling. I won't have-" the voices fade away as they walk down the hallway.

We wait, and wait, for just a few more seconds before we slowly let ourselves sink to the floor. It was not long after that that I start to hear music. Not blasting music, but music nonetheless.

We crawl out from underneath the bed like monsters from a horror movie I watched last week.  I send him a glare silently.

"I was right there, you couldn't have found a better spot?" I seethe quietly. He huffs.

"Not one that wouldn't make any noise. Where did you expect me to go? The wardrobe?" He hisses back. I throw up my hands in exasperation.

"Yes. You can hack into NASA on a whim, without detection, but you can't shut a door quietly? I call bullshit." I state. He scoffs.

"Those are not the same thing." He throws his hands up the same way I did. I open my mouth to retort, but I hear two sets of footsteps, even over the music. I opt to just glare at him with my arms crossed. I find the best revenge is to ignore the brat.

He sticks out his tongue at me, and I vaguely regret rooming with him. We sit at opposite ends of the room. He clicks away at the laptop he borrowed, and I try not to smirk at the sunflower stickers adorning the otherwise sleek silver.

It takes what feels like hours for him to scramble toward me. I scowl at him but he shoves the screen in my face before I can even ask what he's doing.

"Look at this." He hisses. I don't have a choice, but it's intriguing enough on its own.

"Are those, screenshots?" I question. He nods, handing me the laptop so I can scroll through the folder of pictures.

Each one has a photo of a gorgeous European woman and a caption that reads almost the exact same text.