Their Little Princess

Chapter Six

We walk into the house at around 5. Carlo is sitting on the sofa watching Friends. Elijah brings the leftover food into the kitchen before walking back out. "Diego's brought your things up to your room, angel. Carlo, can I talk to you a minute?" He says, walking into the hallway. I'm afraid Carlo is mad at me for lying about Elijah earlier this afternoon. Carlo stands up and follows Elijah into the hallway and I hear a door shut not long after.

I stand awkwardly in the foyer, unsure of where to go before walking into my bedroom. It was actually set up quite nicely when I got here yesterday, the walls were painted a neutral pink color and there was a full sized bed set up by the wall. The room is huge, a lot bigger (and nicer) than my old basement.

I get to work folding and hanging my things. I hurriedly pull out my battered old phone and put it on the new charger I bought.

I continue putting my clothes away with a smile on my face.

CARLO

I follow Elijah into the study, he sits on the armchair and looks at me, "Yeah?"

"I talked to Maddie in the car earlier," He says.

I narrow my eyes, "Did you figure out why that—That little creature lied to me? She's like a teddy bear that's really hiding a snake." I'm proud of her for lying to me to be honest. Day 1 and she already has my ultra instincts in deceit. 

Elijah rolls his eyes, "Okay, I'll act like your sentence makes any sense whatsoever. She said she'd wanted to tell you something."

"What was it?" I ask curiously, tilting my head slightly.

He sighs, "Not sure. She wouldn't say anything past that. She'd walked up and knocked to tell you something but decided it was 'stupid' and 'embarrassing' and panicked. She's just scared is all. She'll come into herself."

"She's scared of me?"

"I don't really know what's wrong with her yet. She's really jumpy, and I don't think it's because of Elena and Daniel's deaths. I just can't put my finger on what it could be. Maybe she was bullied?"

The thought of her being bullied puts a dark spot in my mind. The thought of my little sister, being unhealthily small and pushed around by other kids her age makes me want to kill a 13 year old.

"So, like...What should I do? Should I talk to her?" I ask. I'm not usually an unsure person, I can say that because I don't usually think before I do things. But since Maddie got here, I've been all but avoiding her. I don't wanna do the wrong thing and push her further away.

"I think that could help. Tell her dinner's ready too. Just try not to be invasive, don't push it, alright? She'll tell you if she's ready to."

I stand up, "Right. Okay, yeah. Yeah."

I walk out of the study and upstairs to Maddie's room, her door is open because of the few bags in the hallway. I stand in her doorway and watch her for a moment, she has a smile on her face as she deals with her stuff, she's sitting on the floor surround by hangers and piles of clothes. This is just from one day of shopping? They had to have bought her an entire new identity with the amount of clothes and tags lying everywhere.

"Cool stuff," I say.

Her head snaps up from her phone. "I'm sorry for lying," Is the first thing she says. It seems like it was building inside of her like a time bomb.

I wave it off, "It's fine. I've lied more times than I can count, you'll get used to it."

She smiles slightly, "Are you lying to me about that?"