*A/N: Willa Holland as Alaya in the media :)
"Laylay?" I ignored the boy's voice that was coming up the stairs and closer to me. I was here for a reason. I wanted to be alone.
"Laylay?" He called out again. I still didn't respond, but by now I saw his brown curls appear slowly when he ascended the stairs.
"There you are! I knew I'd find you here." He smiled slightly as he came towards the small and old couch I was sitting on, plopping down next to me.
"I'm not in the mood to talk Ash."
"Well, I am and I really want you to be happy. I feel bad when you're like this." His smile faded and he looked at me with a serious expression.
"It's not your fault Ash."
"I just feel like I should be with you all the time so these stupid girls won't go after you 'cuz of your lack of power." I sighed.
"Thanks Ash, but I don't want a bodyguard." He smiled slightly and wrapped his arm around my shoulder, pulling me in a sideways hug. "You know I'd do anything for ya sis."
"Would you stop calling me that? We're not related!" I said, laughing slightly and punching his arm playfully.
"I know we're not, but I love you like I'd love any siblings. If I'd have any."
"Don't be sad Ashy, you're my not-actually-related-to-me brother." He grinned. "I know. And you're my not-actually-related-to-me sister. That's why I call you sis. Duh."
I smiled widely and pressed a kiss to his cheek. I really loved him. As a brother-sister love, since I really don't see him as anything else and I know he thinks the same. He always seemed to know when I felt down or anything and he always managed to cheer me up. And he always seemed to know when I was in my Safe haven.
Any time when I was feeling very down or anything that way, I would climb the long stairs to the highest and oldest tower. People never came there because they believed it was haunted. So it was the perfect place to be alone. Until Ashton found out about it and always got me back to class.
Talking about him, I am so happy I met him. We instantly became friends, best friends quick after that, and even his three best friends became my friends. I practically live with them nowadays, that is how much time I spent at their house whenever we are not at school. And talking about friends, I also have Maya, who is also my best friend. And Victoria, sort of. She is Ashton's girlfriend, but she is really nice and we kind of clicked. Not best friend like though. And that's my friend-list...
Anyway, let's get back to the story for now.
"C'mon, let's go back down. You don't want more trouble with the teachers, aye?"
"Fine." He smiled widely and got up, offering me his hand, which I took. He pulled me on my feet as if it was nothing, what it probably was due to his superpowers, and lead me down the creaking stairs. Once at the bottom, we sneaked out of the tower and out of the very abandoned hallway it was connected to.
We walked through the hallways slowly, talking a bit about everything and nothing.
"Do you wanna come over later today? Mikey still wants a rematch." I laughed.
"I'm ready to beat his ass with gaming anytime."
"Great! We'll walk home together after school yeah?"
"M'kay. I'll meet you by your locker."
"Awesome! But now I'm saying goodbye, since this is your next class and lunch will end any minute. So, goodbye sis."
"Bye bye bro."
~*~
"NONONONOOOOO! YOU'VE GOT TO BE KIDDING ME!"
I couldn't stop laughing as I once again won from Michael with gaming. Making that the third time since I got here and we had started gaming. He gripped his black and red hair in frustration and let out something between a moan and a growl. It sounded really weird, just so you know.
"Awe, sorry Mikey, I'm just better." I grinned evilly.
"Isn't your superpower gaming or something?!" Calum exclaimed, clutching his stomach from laughing at Michael's face which held a mixture of being shocked and impressed.
"I wish." I muttered, my happy mood gone in a second.
"Ahw, sorry Ally. It'll come. You'll see."
"Mhm."
"Laylay!" Ashton came running from the kitchen and plopped down on the couch on his stomach, so his head was near my lap and the rest of his body was lying over the couch and Michael.
"Ashy! What's it?"
"Lukey-poo was mean!" I frowned and rolled my eyes after. "What happened this time."
"I only made him think there was a spider next to his glass! It was worth seeing his face though." A new voice exclaimed from the doorway that led to the kitchen. There stood Luke, grinning quite evilly.
"It wasn't nice yeah? You know I don't like spiders!"
"Well neither do I, but if it were me, and I'd have the power to manipulate minds, I'd probably have done it too." I admitted with a small smile, trying to think of Ashton's reaction.
"Hey! That's not really nice you know." Ashton pouted.
"Sorry Ashy. You know I love you." I patted his head and he stuck out his tongue, getting up and sitting between Michael and me like you should sit on a couch. He put his arm around me and gave me one of his side hugs.
"I know Laylay. I love you too sissy. Now can you grab my glass? I left it in the kitchen when I ran from the spider."
I rolled my eyes, but got up anyways and walked into the kitchen, passing Luke on my way.
I immediately saw the glass with water on the counter and grinned. I grabbed it, threw the water in the sink and walked back to the living room. Once near the couch I held the empty glass out to Ashton, who grabbed it without looking, since he was looking at the TV, where Michael was setting up a new game for him and Calum to play. I sat down next to Ashton and as soon as he noticed the weight difference, he frowned and looked at the empty glass.
"What...?"
Luke and I laughed and as soon as Michael and Calum saw why, they laughed too.
"Alaya! Why did you bring me an empty glass?"
"You wanted your glass, well, that's your glass."
He sighed and shook his head, getting up and disappearing into the kitchen.
"So, Alaya, whatcha doing tonight?" Calum asked, plopping down in Ashton's previous spot on the couch and throwing his arm on the backrest of the couch.
"Nothing. Since it's Friday I'm not planning on making my homework. So again. Nothing."
"How about a movie night? You can stay the night as usual?"
"YEAH! Please Laylay? Stay?" Ashton came back in the living room and smiled widely. I shrugged. "Sure. I just need some stuff. I'll go and get it real quick yeah?"
"I can give you a quick piggy back ride? Saves a lot of time!" Calum said happily, jumping up from the couch.
"Ah, why not?" I got up and walked towards the front door, already opening it, as Calum slowly followed and I grabbed my school bag from the ground. Once outside, he turned his back to me. "Hop on!"
I did as said and soon he sped towards my house, using his superpower, which you can already guess is super speed.
It took no longer than half a minute to reach my front door and I rummaged through my bag to look for my key. I found it rather quickly and opened my door, letting us in.
"Back soon." I said to Calum, leaving him in my hallway as I ran upstairs to my room.
That was the only positive thing about my parents. They left me with a cute house and enough money to buy an entire island. No idea why, but I can take care of myself easily like this. And I don't have to look for a job or something. I see that as a plus. I'm extremely lazy.
Anyways, I ran up to my room, grabbed a random bag and stuffed some underwear, my pyjamas and other necessary stuff in it, slinging it onto my shoulder. I took one last look to think of something I could have missed, before closing my bedroom door behind me.
"Calum?" I shouted down the stairs.
"Still here!"
"Could you look through my living room to see if you can find Muffy?"
"Sure thing."
I waited for a few seconds, so I could check my bathroom if she wasn't downstairs.
"Found your two face!"
"Under the couch I guess?"
"In the windowsill on the big cushion!"
I smiled to myself as I ran down the stairs and peeked into the living room to see my calico cat indeed lying on the big cushion in my windowsill.
"Great! I just need to make sure she has enough food and water to survive and then we're ready to go."
"I'll do the water!" Calum said, before disappearing into the kitchen with his super speed and I followed quickly, grabbing some cat food from one of the cupboards and refilling her almost empty bowl.
"I'm done and at your front door!" Calum shouted, since I hadn't seen him in the kitchen. Damn him with his super speed.
I walked towards my hallway and grabbed my coat, since I hadn't taken it with me to school, and opened my front door. Calum and I walked out and after I had locked my door, Calum gave me a quick piggy back ride back. Once back, he opened the front door and let me in.
"We're back!" He shouted, but there was no response.
"Hello?" I tried. Still no response though. I hung my coat on the coat rack, quickly got rid of my shoes and took my bag into the living room, where no one was to be seen.
"Maybe they've gone out to get some food and all. We're always low on stuff like that." I laughed at the last.
"A typical boy thing I guess?" Calum shrugged as an answer and walked into the kitchen, leaving me alone in the living room.
"I'll dump my bag in my room!" I shouted, not waiting for his response as I ascended the stairs towards their guest room I made my own. I had basically just put up some random posters and pictures of me and the boys or me and Maya, oh, and of Muffy. Next to that I had just put some covers on the bed that were actually mine and I had some stuff I wouldn't miss at home.
As I had opened the door to my room, I frowned at Luke, who seemed to be making my bed look a little nicer. I always left my bed looking like some animal had slept in there. Or well, me. It was nice of him though, especially because we mostly bickered and because of that it seemed like we didn't like each other, at all. You could classify us as friends though.
"Oh, hi." I said, not sure what else I should say. He looked up and smiled slightly at me, being done with my bed. "Hi. The boys are out for some snacks and stuff. We ran out."
"I guessed." He smiled again. Wow. Did I mention I really like his smile? I don't think I even mentioned I might have this tiny crush on him. It's like I like my brothers best friend. That's weird right? So yeah. Nobody knows about it but me, Maya and Muffy. I have thought of telling Ashton a few times, but something holds me back every time I try to. Maybe I should tell him tonight. We will see...
"Shall we go down? I bet the boys will be back soon."
"Yeah. Okay." I tossed my bag on the freshly made bed, earning an eye roll from Luke, before walking back downstairs, with him following me.
Downstairs it was just Calum who was setting up the movie on the TV, so Luke plopped down on the couch and I decided to go and grab Michael's duvet and pillows. Since he and Calum had their rooms downstairs, we always took one, or both, of their duvets and pillows so one of us could watch the movie from the ground. Mostly it was me, because I volunteered for it most of the time and sometimes it was me and one of the boys, though never me and Luke.
This time, I threw the stuff on the floor and took place there myself, without even saying anything to the boys. Not that it was necessary since they knew what I was doing. I mean, I spend almost every day at their house. It surprised me they hadn't gone crazy yet!
"I set up a comedy first, so we can get into the laughing, since Paranormal Activity is up after that." Calum announced, plopping on the couch next to Luke, as I internally groaned. Even though Paranormal Activity was really fake, I couldn't take it. I freaked out about it still, no matter how bad it was or how many times we had already seen it. That was also a reason for these boys to choose them. Just to see me scared.
"We got food!" I heard Ashton yell, before a door slammed shut and he and Michael walked into the living room with quite a few bags full of stuff. I smiled unconsciously at the thought of food and followed the two boys with the bags with my eyes as they walked towards the kitchen.
It took them some time, but they came back into the living room with bowls of chips, popcorn, smarties and gummy bears, oh how I love these, and some drinks for all of us.
"The usual Fanta for the lady." Michael said, as he handed me the Fanta, like he said, as usual.
"Thanks Mikey."
"Shall I accompany thee on the floor today?" He asked in a very official sounding voice. "Only if you stop with the weird talking."
"Sorry, we had literary history today. Stuck in my head ever since." He said, as he sat down next to me, taking a pillow for in between his back and the coffee table.
"Want the duvet too?" I asked, holding it up a little so I could place it over him if he said yes. He nodded and I threw a part of the duvet over him, looking at the boys behind us afterwards. The other three boys had settled themselves on the couch behind us and had one of the bowls with chips sat on Calum's lap, who was in the middle so they could all reach the chips.
"Well, if you took the chips, the gummy bears are ours." I grabbed the bowl with the gummy bears and put it between Michael and I on top of the duvet.
"Now the popcorn and smarties feel rejected."
"At least it's not a secret." We all raised our eyebrows at Ashton's comment on Calum's earlier statement.
"Where did that come from?" Michael questioned. Ashton just shrugged as answer and took some chips from the bowl.
"Okay. Now shush. Movie time." Calum said, as he pressed some buttons on the remote in his hands, while I leaned back against the pillows behind me and turned to the TV.
~*~
Halfway through the movie we decided it was the worst movie ever, which explains why I can't remember the name. It wasn't worth calling it a comedy since it was just too stupid.
So, we decided to watch a random action movie, which was a good one luckily, and Ashton had ordered pizza, as our dinner.
And that's how we ended up in our previous positions, now with empty pizzaboxes on the coffee table and Paranormal Activity ready to play. Brace yourselves...
I tried to not be scared or anything, because I felt like the boys were watching me every now and then to see if I had chickened out yet. I managed to keep up with my 'nothing is wrong, I'm fine'-act for quite some time, but eventually it became just too much and I screeched when something scary happened, diving under the duvet. I heard the boys laugh and I just muttered some cuss words, staying under the duvet.
"Are you okay?" I heard Michael ask me carefully after a few minutes, as he peaked under the duvet. I gave him a sad look and shook my head.
"Awe, come on then, I'll protect you." He held his arms open for me to cuddle into him, and so I did. It was nice to have someone care about you. I knew the other boys did too, but on this moment I somehow just felt sad. Mostly because the bullying had been worse this week. Worse than ever. Ashton had found me at the tower twice this week, since the other three days I had chosen either the toilet or the small shed near the sport fields. I hadn't told anyone though, since they just thought I had spent my lunch with some teacher, like I did every once in a while, to go over a test or something like that.
"Thanks Mikey." I muttered, holding onto him tight, no longer interested in the movie as his warmth made me kind of drowsy, but most importantly, it made me feel save. The whole idea of just having him near me made me feel better.
"Are you really okay?" He asked, looking at me, though I just looked at the duvet as I was sort of afraid to look him in the eyes and betray that when I said, "Yeah", he would see it was a lie.
"I know you're not, but if you want to talk about it, just do so." I felt him press a kiss to my head and turn back to the screen, leaning his head on mine. I smiled a little. His words meant a lot to me and I felt like telling him about my crappy week, but I rather didn't share it with all the boys. I mean, I never told Calum and Luke about my weeks and it was mostly only Ashton who got any insight when it came to my feelings, mostly because he knew how it was to live without power, since he only found out his when he was about the age I am now. Maybe I should let another person in on my life like that. It couldn't hurt, right?
"Maybe later." I whispered, leaning my head on his chest as I closed my eyes, not interested in the movie in any way.