"Is your dad black, LB?" Dillion asked, kicking the soccer ball to my feet. I trapped the ball, putting my hands on my hips and then staring him down. I was already in an extremely bad mood seeing as my nightmare had been recurring and I felt like I hadn't slept in a month even though it had only been a week.

"You don't have-"

"I'm adopted, you dumbass." I snapped, interrupting Declan. "I was born in Maghreb, in Algeria. My birth parents gave me up for adoption because they were scared I would die because of the Algerian Civil War." Both boys look taken aback, I took my foot off the ball. I nudged it with the toe of my sneakers, waiting for someone to make the first move.

"And the daughter, Brigid, adopted you?" I nodded,  signaling yes as my answer to Declan's question. 

"Why do you call Brigid, Aunt Brigid, then?" It was Dillion, again with the blunt questions.

"I didn't feel comfortable calling her mom, it was weird for me. I knew she wasn't my real mom so we decided on Aunt Brigid." I answered, kicking the ball over to Declan and walking back toward Maiméo's house.

"I'm sorry!" Declan shouted after me.

"Suck a fucking horse dildo, douchebags!" I yelled back, not bothering to turn back but putting a hand up to my mouth. I could hear them laughing and a smile tugged at the tight corners of my sour lips.

My bad mood until when I ran into Joey (he was walking Bohemia and Asahi) as I was walking along the dirt road back to my summer home. "Hey, Aofie."

I was shocked for a moment, seeing as this was the first time we had spoken since he had discovered we were cousins much to my grandma's dismay. "He speaks!" I jibed harmlessly, cracking an actual smile, unlike the one my twin friends had caused in the field.

"I figure I might as well not put my vocal chords to waste."

"So, what have you been writing?" I posed the question. Instead of reading Twilight, for the past two days whenever I passed Joey's room, he was on a laptop. His fingers flew over the keys as I strolled past, faint clicking resonating.

"It's my creative writing project. I'm minoring at Columbia. But it's about a kid who's oblivious to the fact that he's a vampire and his best friend is trying to prove to him that he's a vampire while the vampire's own father is trying to hunt down the vampire who is actually his son the whole time."

"Sounds confusing."

"It's not that hard to follow." Joey snapped, suddenly scowling at me. I stepped back, unsettled by the mood swing. He took a deep breath, closing his eyes for a second. "Sorry. I'm a bit stressed."

"It's okay, cous. Anyways your mom tells you like everything, right?" I asked, my actual aunt (Brigid's sister, Slaine) was quite the gossip. She had told me that my other aunt, Aunt Gittan was cheating on her husband when I was five.

"Yeah, pretty much, why?" He asked, stopping down to pick up some of Bohemia's shit with a doggie bag.

"I have some questions," I informed him, discreetly.

Two hours later, at about four in the afternoon, Joey and I were camped out in my room. He was sitting on the floor, leaning against my bed, and I was actually on my bed. Bohemia was curled up on the bed with me, panting her heart out while Asahi was tucked next to Joey's computer.

"You gonna explain what this is all about, Nancy Drew?" Joey asked, pushing his thumb gently against the fur on top of Asahi's head.

"Yeah, it's about this." I pulled the mermaid jewelry box into my lap, flipping the latch, and lifting up the lid. Unfolding the picture I had stolen off the dresser, I showed it to Joey, letting him take it from me and look at it. "Do you know who that is?" I pointed to the third boy, the youngest looking one.

"Oh shit," Joey came to the same realization I had. That was Grandma Nereida and her family, but there was an extra brother.

"Exactly!" I tapped the picture with my point finger again. "We need to find out who that is."

We formed a plan. Joey would do some research, then go into town to get take out and while he was at it, ask people about it. I, much to my disgrace, would be the one to jump right into the lion's mouth. I was going to ask Maiméo directly.

Our plan would go into action tomorrow, however, because Joey wanted to write and I wanted to read his works. I had started to select my chill Disney music playlist (Disney songs played by classical orchestras) but Joey stopped me, turning on his own chill music playlist. A voice that I recognized as Ed Sheeran was singing about a castle on a hill while Joey's fingers hit keys, causing letters to appear on the screen one by one.

"Can I braid your hair?" I couldn't help it, my fingers were itching to touch Joey's long hair which was pulled up into a man bun. I just wanted to play with his light brown hair.

"Sure," he said, without pausing his typing. I pulled the hair band out of his lengthy locks and let it fall around my wrist. I ran my fingers through it, combing out the tangles before starting a French braid at the crown of his head. I began to read over his shoulder.

"There's no such thing as vampires, Hank." I scolded, feeling my canines poke at my lip as I fumed.

"Dude, you're such a dumbass. You literally have all the signs. We literally saw someone get attacked by a werewolf, you can't deny it." Hank waved his hands around by his ears, his expressive nature coming out in his gestures.

"Stop reading," Joey nudged my leg with his elbow. "I can't concentrate."

"Sorryyyy." I let the word slip from my lips as I finished the braid off. I admired my work, loosening the braid a bit to soften the look.

Tada, next chapter you'll meet a new character and maybe everything will make a little more sense 👀👀

Anyways I love Joey and you'll see more of him now, btws he has a man bun and it's really cute so like 👍

Love, your favorite yellow marker that was used to color over something darker and now colors a really ugly and upsetting muddled yellow-brown,

Laurel ❤