Paying the Price

Chapter 20: June

She looked a little surprised when I said this. "He's letting you come with him?"

"Yep!"

I went into the bathroom, changed out of my pajamas, and put my hair up into that low ponytail with a ribbon. I then put on my shoes and went to the door to meet Oakley.

"You ready to go?" He asked.

"Yeah let's go." I grabbed his hand and we walked out the door.

We walked out of the apartment building and I was very excited to get out and see the town.

I had never been more excited in my life, to be honest.

I think my brother could tell I was super excited because he looked at me and told me "June you need to calm down. Average people are not this happy about going grocery shopping and you are going to draw unwanted attention to us."

He was right so I calmed down a bit.

We walked for a few blocks before we finally reached the bust market. There were so many people here, pushing a shoving past each other. I began to walk closer to Oakley, leaning my whole body on him.

I think he sensed my discomfort and so he put his arm around me and pulled me close. "Not so excited are you now? He sarcastically smiled down at me.

"Shut up"

He just grinned at me before walking over to a man with a cart selling bread.

"Two loaves please sir," Oakley said.

"That's gonna be $5 boy," the man told my brother.

Oakley handed the man the money and took the bread and continued walking.

We went to many different shops, carts, and stands and ended up with enough food to probably last us for a month.

We had tons of fruit and veggies, bread, different jams, butter, and spreads. We also got lots of eggs, milk, and cheese. Oakley also insisted on getting some "manly meat to help him grow strong" and so we ended up with plenty of food for the four of us.

We were heading back home when I spotted a group of boys probably ages 10-12 all chasing after a much younger boy who looked to be half their age, only 5 or 6 years old. They were chasing him down, yelling names at him, and throwing things at the poor boy.

I should have ignored it but I couldn't. Deep down I felt like I needed to help.

I tapped on Oakley's arm and pointed at the boys. "Oakley, would you please go help that little boy? Those older kids won't leave him alone, we need to help him."

He looked over at the boys and dropped his voice down so it sounded much deeper than it normally was. "Hey! You boys need to leave him alone. Pick on someone your own size punks."

The boys looked like they just wet their pants. What can I say, Oakley can be pretty scary looking. He's 6 foot and has lots of muscles, most people wouldn't believe he's only 14.

"Yes-s sir-r sorry-y sir-r" The boys murmured timidly before they all ran off to where ever they came from.

The little one they were chasing looked even more scared than the older boys. He had tears running down his little cheeks and was covered in dirt and bruises.

I got down to his height "Hi buddy, are you okay? Where's your mommy and daddy?" I asked in a very gentle tone, trying not to scare him any more than he obviously was.

He didn't answer me and started crying even more.

"Shhh sweetheart, it's okay. No need to cry, we just want to help you. Can I pick you up?" I asked. I just wanted to hold this sweet little thing. He was so cute and looked so scared.

He surprisingly nodded yes and lifted his arms up for me to hold him. I picked him up off the ground and he laid his head down on my shoulder almost instantly.

I rubbed his back and rocked him back and forth until he stopped crying.

"There you go, it's okay. Now I need to know how we can help you. Where are your parents at?" I asked, still holding him in my arms.

"I ran away a few weeks ago." He said softly.

He was a runaway just like us "Why did you run away buddy?" I asked.

He sniffled a bit, "I had to find my big brother. He went away about a month ago and said he would come back for us but he never did. I need to find him, he promised he would be back and we need his help."

"Who's "we" who else are you talking about?" I asked him.

"My twin sister. I need to go back and get her before they hurt her." He said with tears coming back to his eyes at the mention of his twin sister.

"Before who hurts her?" I asked the boy.

"Mommy and Daddy," he said with a little wobble in his voice and a quiver in his lips.

Poor thing. He was just like us, runaways from bad parents.

Oakley then asked him "Who were those boys chasing you? Do you know them?"

The little boy shriveled back into my arms away from Oakley and didn't respond to him. I don't think he liked Oakley very much.

"So you're a twin? So are we!" I said trying to change the subject.

I pointed to Oakley. "This is my twin Oakley and I'm June, what's your name sweetheart?"

"Owen," he said softly, still a little afraid of Oakley.

This made my brother smile a bit. "Hey, we have matching "O" names! Isn't that cool!" Oakley said in a really upbeat and cheery tone to try and get Owen to like him more.

I think it worked a bit because he smiled and said "Yeah that's pretty cool!"

"What about your sister? What's her name?" I asked him out of curiosity.

He giggled to himself before he said "Her name matches yours June! Her name is Jenifer."

Oakley and I both looked at each other like we were thinking the same thing.

"Owen? You wouldn't happen to know your last name would you?" Oakley asked.

"Sure! It's Price! Owen Price!"

AN: omg guys what do we think of Owen? I think he's the cutest little thing, and he's got the same last name as the quads? (hmm, I wonder what that means? *wink wink*)

I'm doing great with updates right now, expect at least one if not two or three more updates this week. This book is about to take a bit of a turn if you haven't already figured that out.  

I LOVE YOU GUYS SO MUCH <3