If you've read this far, thank you so much for joining me on this journey. I appreciate all of you so much! 

Please remember to like, comment, or vote if you enjoy this chapter or have thoughts and opinions. While I would love to hear what you have to say, I won't tolerate hate. 

Stay safe and take care!~CANGEL

***TRIGGER WARNINGS: Mentions of past child abuse-No specifics***

2 Year Earlier

JULIAN

The car door is pulled shut by Vale who sat in the passenger seat of their black Chevy 2500. Vale's and Octavius' good friend Emilia sits behind the wheel and I watch numbly from the outside as Vale rolls down the window halfway and shoots a glare at my brother. Even though she is nearly completely blind, her glares are still fierce and this one is especially hard. I was glad it wasn't pinned at me, though over the past year, I'd gotten especially good at pretending I didn't care what they thought. 

It was better if they thought I didn't care. But it would be even better if I actually didn't care. Honestly, it was a surprise they'd hung in this long with all the shit I'd been pulling. But Octavius hadn't ever been apart of my life, and after 10 years in Foster Care, I didn't see why that had to change. He might be my brother by blood, but he wasn't my family.

My family was dead. 

"You have twenty miles. Talk to your brother, whom you love and want to get to know. He doesn't understand your silence and I'm beyond sick of 'letting you do it your way'."

Then she turns her glare on me. "And you." She says darkly and takes a deep breath. I glare right back, despite the fact that she probably can't see it. It made me feel a little better, anyways. Before Octavius and Vale became my foster parents, Vale had been attacked by someone. That assault had resulted in the near loss of her vision. Now, she was able to only make out shapes and shadows of objects in the daylight. During the nighttime, or in dark areas, she was completely blind.  "Julian, talk to your brother. You both have twenty miles to go in order to get back home and I swear to all that is holy, I will lock you both outside if you don't talk to each other and sort this out. I'm done walking on eggshells around my own house because you're both being so fucking stubborn."

Vale wasn't one to make a big deal out of nothing. For an entire year, she had been the go-between for Octavius and me. It was no wonder she was finally tired of it. After the shit I pulled today, I'm sure she's resisting the urge to run me over with her car. That being said, there is no way in Hell, that I am walking 20 miles back home. This is a huge over reaction. And for once, I can't wait for Octavius to tell her that and get us back in that air-conditioned car and back home so I can go to my room. My brother is an asshole to everyone and doesn't take any bullshit. And this is definitely bullshit. 

"Vale." My brother starts but stops at the look Vale shoots him.

"The rules don't just apply to us, Tavi. You can't just love someone and expect them to know it when they don't know you. You have to show them." She tells him, shooting a glance at me. I cross my arms defensively and grind my teeth. I hate when they mention those rules. Like it's a code to live by, but really, how hypocritical could you get? Octavius had abandoned me for ten years. Where the Hell was he when I was getting sent from home to home? Now he wants to act like he cares about me?

I don't think so. 

"Vale." My brother says once again.

But Vale isn't finished, obviously, as she continues, "And you are the adult, Octavius Black, so start acting like one and be an example."

"Vale."

"What?" She asks irritated.

I fight the grin coming to my face, because I know what's coming. I just know he's going to go off on some tirade about how stupid this is and how it's not going to work and to take them back home. Right. No--

"Please lock the door when you both get home, I don't like the idea of you being there without me. And if you decide to go somewhere with Emilia, please leave me a note or send me a message."

Vale looks as dumbfounded as I feel as I listen to my brother's level voice and reasonable requests. Where is the insufferable asshole I've been living with for the last year? Where are his demands that she stop this ridiculous bullshit and take us back home immediately.

"Oh, well, of course. I'll have Emilia leave the spare out for you then." She says a bit awkwardly and I notice the faint pink on her cheeks.

I expect Emilia to go then, both of them leaving us alone together like she threatened, but she hesitates, biting on her lower lip, her hand on the shifter, stopping Emilia from leaving just quite yet.

My brother takes a step towards the vehicle and rests his hands against the frame. Maybe this is where he calls it off. It's perfect. He disarmed her by being agreeable and now Vale is very obviously having second thoughts, so he wouldn't have to piss her off and get on her bad side to get us out of this. 

"I love you, Vale. We'll see you when we get home."

Motherfucker. My brother is a complete asshole. A complete asshole to everyone except Vale. I should have expected this in all honesty. I'm pretty sure Vale could ask Octavius to jump off a bridge and he would. 

I watch my last hope of not having to marathon it back home with Octavius fucking Black slip away from me as Vale's worry and doubt fade away and a bright smile fills her face. Now there is absolutely no getting out of this. If Vale was smiling, all happy and content, then Octavius would never change his mind. And he was the only one who could change hers. 

"I love you, Tavi."

I turn away from them, and glare in the direction of home, even when I feel stares on me.

"I love you too, Julian."

I bite my tongue to keep from saying something stupid and childish and decide to just stay silent until I hear a sigh and the sound of the window going up. A moment later the gravel crunches as Emilia pulls the truck away from the side of the road. 

Once she's gone my eyes shoot over to the bastard who's eyes were still following the taillights of the truck that carried Vale away from them.

"Why the fuck didn't you tell her to take us back home?" I ask him almost immediately after the truck's disappeared from sight and Octavius looks over at me. 

"Because she's right."

"Of course, she's right." I mock him, flinging my hands in the air and turning away from him. "She's always right. Vale can do no wrong in your eyes." I continue on with my own pity party, as I start moving in the direction of home. I hear him trailing behind me, but I don't stop, and I don't turn around. I'm going to get home as soon as possible and away from this asshole. "Even when she has her friend drop us off twenty fucking miles from home." I continue my rant. I don't even care if he's listening to me. I'm so pissed at all of them. "I hate it here!" I shout and kick the gravel beneath my shoes, which of course, sends my shoe flying off my foot and into the road. Because of fucking course it would. I stalk over to it--and am yanked back by the collar of my shirt by my brother, and fall to my ass, just as a scary ass truck horn roars out and passes us on the otherwise empty road.

I cover my mouth with my hand as I stare after the truck that just about flattened me like a pancake.

"Jesus, fuck, Julian." My brother curses.

"I need my shoe." I hear myself reply, but I feel numb. Is this what it feels like to be in shock? It kind of feels like how I felt when I was in that car accident with my parents, but not quite. I don't feel quite as out of it as I was then and my brain is still processing the things around me. 

"I'll get it for you."

Before I know it, he's kneeling down in front of me and holding out the shoe. I take it from him and stare at it.

"The truck ran over my shoe." Of course it did. Why not? Why the fuck not?

"Better the shoe than you, Julian."

"Do you really think that?" I ask him, and now I know for sure that I must be in shock, because I never would have asked him that otherwise.

"No, Julian. I lied." I roll my eyes at the sarcasm in his voice. "I'd much rather have one of your run down-smelly ass shoes, than my pain in the ass little brother."

After another minute, I slip on my shoe and stand. I huff and glare down at my shoe, the sole is broken, and I can feel the crack under my foot. Twenty miles with this sarcastic asshole and a broken shoe. Just fucking perfect.

We walk in silence for a while, maybe a half hour, my brother walks behind me even though I know I'm walking slower than his normal pace. How do I know that? Because I'm going a little faster than dragging my feet. Why? Because I want to annoy him. I want him to go ahead of me and leave me alone and I definitely don't want to hear whatever Vale thinks he should say to me and therefore what he thinks he should say to me. 

I don't care why he randomly showed up when I was fifteen. Guess at twenty-five, he suddenly felt like he should start to be a brother to me... I don't care. I was doing just fine before he and Vale came into my life and I'd do just fine after they send me packing. Surely it won't be long now.

"Do you really hate living with us?" My brother asks, breaking the silence between us.

"Yep." I say, popping the 'p' just to be a prick.

The truth is that I don't mind living with them. The school is fine, and Vale is annoyingly kind and open--maybe a little too open about somethings--and Octavius is—well—he's an asshole, but I not in an uncaring way. Just in a 'I'm not taking any bullshit, kind of way'. No matter how much I piss him off, he's never hurt me though. He's never even raised his hand to me in a threat. He has slammed doors and stormed out or demanded that I apologize to Vale—which I never do—when I've been a prick to her. My brother and I actually have a lot in common, like our love of baseball—not basketball—which is one of the only things I remember about my dad, and I wonder if Octavius remembered it from when he lived with dad. We both left-handed and are naturally athletic, but tend towards running, and I've noticed that he tends to run more after dealing with me, like I like to run after dealing with his sour ass. We both hate green beans but love peas, and hate mustard, but love BBQ—which Vale makes with mustard--fun fact. 

We both love to learn—even if our approaches are different. 

But it doesn't matter how alike we are, or how I maybe might kind of, actually like him...A little bit. He could have come back sooner, and he didn't. Who knows when he'll take off again, or how long he'll disappear for next time, but I'm not going to stick around to find out.

No way.

"You know I hated you for a long time." He says and I don't know why, but this makes me pause for a moment before I force myself to keep on walking. "I hated our parents, too. For a very long time. And by the time I learned the truth, it was too late. They were dead and you were in a different home with a different family, and I was an even worse angry, raging asshole than I am now."

I can't help but snort at that. "Even worse, huh?" As soon as the words leave my mouth, I bite my tongue. I don't care. I don't care.

"Yeah. Noah can vouch for me if you don't believe me."

Noah. I shove my hands in my pocket, so he doesn't see me clench them. I don't know Noah well, only that he moved out of the apartment he had been sharing with Vale and Octavius when I moved in. Shortly after, Octavius and Vale bought the house we lived in now. Noah was still close to them but whenever he came over, he never talked to me. 

That's fine with me. Noah carries this energy around him. It's...dark and electric...but I don't plan on getting close, no matter how hot he looks in that black leather jacket he always wears.

I'm not getting attached to anything or anyone.

"You were five when our parents died, right?" He asks, and I wonder if he is asking because he wants to know, or because he just wants to get me talking too.

I give him a clipped nod.

"Did they tell you about me? About why I wasn't there?"

I stop when he asks me this. I don't want to, but there's something in his voice that I'm not sure I've ever heard from him before. Vulnerability. Uncertainty. It's... unnerving and I don't think I ever want to hear it in his voice again. Everything about Octavius is calm, steady, and sure—even when he's ripping someone a new asshole—especially me. 

"They had this big family portrait above the fireplace. Maybe you remember them taking it, I think it was right before...well, before you weren't there anymore, because it was Mom and Dad and you. But I think they chose that picture because Mom was pregnant with me, her belly was so big in that picture. I think it was really the only one they had with all of us together like that. Happy." I tell him. "They loved me, but they missed you, Octavius. And they always made sure that I knew that I had a brother."

I watch him swallow and blink a few times, before lowering his gaze to his feet and copying me by putting his hands in his pockets.

"Did they ever tell you why I wasn't there?"

"Just that you were lost." I tell him. "I was five." I add a bit defensively, because they're my parents, and even though we share them, it's hard to think of them as Octavius's parents as well, even though he actually lived with them longer than I did.

"I was lost, Julian. For a long fucking time." He tells me, not taking offense to my tone.

We start walking together and lapse back into silence.

I know Octavius likes silence, but that is something we don't have in common. I hate it. Because when it's silent, my brain runs, and runs, and runs. Silence makes me fidgety, which is why now, my finger taps against my thigh constantly. I try to stop it, but I always find myself back to tapping.

"I was taken by a pedophile." He says suddenly.

I suck in a sharp breath but say nothing else. Mostly because I don't know what to say.

"I've talked about this a lot in a group therapy session that Vale and I go too and also a support group, so I know that sometimes, I seem a bit like a robot, but it's the only way I can say it. And I have to say it, because...well, damn it, Julian, I want to know you. I want to be your family, and I hate that you hate me because I wasn't there for you. Which I wasn't, and I could have been, but I don't think you would have wanted me there before I came for you. But I don't want us to be nothing to each other, Julian. I won't force you to listen to me, and I know from experience that no one can make someone listen if they don't want to hear it."

I chew on my bottom lip for a while as we walk. "I'll listen, Octavius. But I'm not saying that anything is going to change." Meaning: I still want to hate your ass and be an asshole.

"Yeah, that's fair." I hear him say. "The man who took me. His name was Tom. For a long time, I fought him. I tried to run away. To stop this, he started telling me a lot of lies. Lies that my parents had sold me, that they got sick of me and they decided that since they were having another kid, instead of two kids they could just replace the first one. Me."

My stomach churns as I listen to him talk. Like he warned me, he does sound a bit like a robot delivering the news instead of revealing his childhood trauma to me. He is distant, but I can still hear and feel his pain.

"I didn't believe him right away, but even though he hadn't really touched me yet...the things he did and the things he made me do made me feel very...unlovable and the longer I was with him, the easier it was to believe his lies. What really broke me, was when—and I don't know how he got a hold of it—but he showed me a picture of you three. You three were all smiling. Happy. And I was so miserable. And I hated all of you. In a way, it was almost easier to give in, to shed that last bit of hope, to stop fighting him. And of course, after I gave in, came years of sexual abuse."

"When I was fourteen, I grew out of his preferences. He sold me into a sex ring. Now, Julian, I won't get into those details with you, because I'd never want you to have those thoughts in your head, but it destroyed me. For a long time, Julian, monstrous things were done to me, and I did monstrous things to others. I escaped them when I was twenty years old and lived on the streets for a while. That's where I met Noah. A little over a year later, I got arrested by a cop and that's when I found out a lot of truths about my past. Maybe a part of me knew that I was kidnapped, I mean, I was twenty years old by then, and ten when I was taken by Tom, but fuck, I'd seen so much evil in the world, that a parent selling their child wasn't unbelievable to me, so it was a revelation to know that I was kidnapped, and that they had looked and searched for me. At the same time, I also found out our parents were dead, and you were in foster care, but I was such a fucking mess, Julian and at that time, you'd been in a home for a while, I figured that wherever you were, you were in better care than I could give you."

My throat was dry, but I didn't dare swallow.

"I hated myself, Julian. And for nearly the next four years, I worked with the police to 'buy' kids out of those rings and bring them home or place them with foster family's that would keep them safe and give them a loving home. I keep in contact with most of the families or caseworkers to make sure that none of those kids ever ended back in the places they came from. I stopped when I found Vale—it's really her story to tell you, but I'll tell you that I helped rescue her much like I rescued the other kids, from places they never should've been in the first place. She was 19. It was about 2 years from when I found her to when you moved in with us, Julian. Vale forced me to face my past and to deal with it instead of burying it and hiding from it. And it wasn't easy Julian, and it took a long fucking time, but I didn't stay away from you because I was pissing off and fucking around. I was just lost and I didn't know how to get back. Vale helped me discover the good again. In the world and in myself. We almost didn't make it, she had to leave me to get me to admit how much I was holding back. And then she was attacked--And it was like we switched roles, where I was the only thing keeping her afloat, but you know what it made me realize?" He asks me, not really looking for an answer. "That I could do it. That I wasn't as broken as I thought I was. And that maybe I deserved a chance to get to know you."

I'm not sure how long we've been walking for, but I know we've still got a long ass ways to go to get home. I'm not sure how I feel about what he's told me—okay that's a lie—it makes me fucking sick to my stomach. But I don't know how what he's told me affects us. Obviously, he didn't just abandon me to the system so he could 'piss-off' as he put it, like I had assumed he had, but I don't know that I'm ready to not be angry at him. To open that door yet and actually get to know him. Because I have a feeling that whenever I do open that door, or if I ever, I'll never be able to close it again. If I stop hating him or blaming him, then I might like him. And if I really start to like him, then it would it wouldn't be long before I started to think of him as actually family. And when that happens then I will start to care about what he thinks. I will start to trust him and depend on him. And if he leaves,  I don't know that I would ever recover. 

"It's okay if you still hate me, Julian. I don't expect that to change in an hour. But I want it to change in time. I don't want to be against you. I want to be in your corner. I'm going to be in your corner for the rest of your life, whether you want me there or not. I don't care if we're at war or co-existing, or building an empire together, Julian. 

"What made Vale different? Why did you get better after you found her?" I ask him, deciding not to respond to his last declarations.

"I first met Vale when I was thirteen at her mother's wedding. Tom and her stepdad James had... similar interests and ran in the same circles. I made a promise to her that night—actually quite a few of them and we found each other years later. Vale is my salvation, Julian. She is honest, and kind, and brave, and good. And if you give her a chance, I know you will see that too."

"I don't hate living with you and Vale." I tell him, kicking a rock a few feet ahead with my shoe covered foot. 

"I'm really glad to hear that."

"I don't know how to be different." I tell him after a bit of silence. I don't know how to change. Even if I wanted to. Which I'm not sure I do.

"It's okay to hate the world right now, Julian. I hated the world too, when I was your age."

"You had a reason too, though."

Octavius pulls me to a stop and tugs me around to face him. "Pain is pain, Julian. The pain and the hurt and the anger you feel in here." He gestures to my heart. "Is every bit as painful and real as what I feel in here." He points to his chest. "Don't minimize what you went through because you think it doesn't compare. Pain doesn't discriminate. Life isn't fair, and we sure didn't have it easy, but it's what you make of it that matters."

Two hours later, we arrive home. My brother lets us inside and instead of heading straight to my room as I normally would, I follow Octavius into the kitchen where Emilia is pulling food out of the oven. Lasagna. Yum.

She places the pan on some hot pads on the counter and starts dishing up three plates. Just like it was any other evening, and she hadn't dumped our asses on the side of the road. I sit down at a bar stool and I watch as my brother walks around to place a kiss on Vales lips, who's sitting on the counter next to the sink, sipping a glass of wine. 

"Darius isn't back yet?" Octavius asks, his arms still wrapped around Vale, but his eyes on Emilia. 

Darius was Emilia's husband and the father of their three year old boy, Aziel and two year old daughter, Remmington. Aziel was such a fucking punk at 3 and Remi was a little demon child from Hell. Into everything and climbing up the walls, jumping off of couches like she wouldn't break a leg. They all lived down in New Orleans together, but Darius used to live here and from what I had gathered, his family still lived here. Emilia was from here as well. I didn't know if she was better friends with Vale or with Octavius, but I knew they were close enough to be treated like family. 

They had stopped by yesterday, stayed the night in the empty guest bedrooms, before Darius had headed out with both kids, leaving Emilia here with Vale for the day. I wasn't sure what he was doing, but something about the way Octavius had asked the question, put me on edge. 

"No." Emilia answered as she places the lasagna on the table. 

"Heard from him?" Octavius asks as he sets the plates and forks out for the four of them, before helping serve Vale her food and getting her settled and taking the seat next to her. 

Emilia settled in the chair next to me, helping herself to a plate full. "He called and texted a million times. Everything is fine. The kids are doing great. No issues so far." 

"Why aren't you there with them, if everything is fine?"

Emilia sighs, blowing on her fork load.

"It's not them. Well...it is, but it's me. I'm not ready to forgive them yet. They've made amends and he's in jail, so it's not like he can just stop by anymore. Aziel and Remi deserve to know their grandparents. They were good to me, growing up. I think they'll be good to them, too." 

I feel like I'm invading in a conversation that I'm not meant to hear, but I can't stop myself from wondering what the fuck happened with Darius' parents? Or Emilia's? She said grandparents, so it had to be one or the other, right? So that was where Darius was all day today, while Octavius and I were on our own walk from Hell. 

"I get that it would be hard to turn your back on your child, but you were also their child. And--" Vale cuts off when Octavius covers her hand with his. Vale takes a drink of her wine. "Anyways, you know how I feel about them. And you also know how much I love you and think you are so much better than me, because I would never give them another chance after what they did." 

What did they do? 

"If I was a better person, I would be there with my husband and my kids. And if they didn't live so close to you two, I would never have agreed to it." Emilia rested her forehead on the surface of the table, pushing aside her plate. "I don't want them to be there. Even though he's in jail, I feel like he'll just show up there."  A phone buzzes and Emilia pulls out hers, looking at it, before typing out a quick response. "He's on his way back. It went good, but they are ready to be back with their momma." 

"Darius is such a charmer." 

Emilia blushes at Vale's words. Octavius glares down at Vale, who leans her head against his arm. 

"If you want me to call you a charmer, you'd better figure out how to actually charm someone, instead of just glaring, because you know I'll understand what you mean."

My brother rolls his eyes, but his glare softens into his normal dark, watchful gaze.

I clear my throat, drawing the attention of three adults, as if they just remembered that I was here with them. To be completely fair to them, I am normally eating alone up in my room. I don't think I have sat down at the table to have a meal with them even one time since I came to live with them a year ago. 

"Shit, sorry Julian. You probably don't want to hear about my family drama." Emilia says with an embarrassed, forced grin. I almost tell her that I was actually dying to hear all the details, but I can tell that she really doesn't want to unload it all in front of me. Judging from what I've hear already, it would be something awful that I probably would wish I hadn't been told anyhow. 

Octavius placed a scoop of Lasagna onto my empty plate, before putting food on his own plate. Before he eats, he gets Vale a glass of water from the cabinet and sets it in front of her plate before placing a kiss on her temple. 

I can see plain as day that they love each other. I never doubted that Octavius loved Vale. He's too much of an asshole to pretend to feel something he doesn't, and while I never doubted that Vale loved him back, though I never really understood why or how she could care so deeply for the asshole.

Now, I see it. Or maybe I always saw it, but just refused to acknowledge it, because the truth is that they are both broken people. They are not perfect people. They have felt pain and hardship.

Just like me.

I'm not leaving. And I'm not going away, no matter how long it takes for you to believe it.

My brother's words from earlier floated around in my mind and for the second time since I'd entered the system, I believed the person who said it. I believed my brother. I believed in my brother.

"Thank you." I say quietly.

"You're welcome." He responds. I don't even need to look up to see that Vale is smiling. It's probably the first time that I've ever thanked my brother for anything since I came here a year ago.

"So, I was thinking that maybe that family therapist you go too, wouldn't be so bad to go to." Comes out of my mouth before I even knew the words were in my brain. I take a bite of my food and am careful not to look at either one of them. For about six months, they've been going to a family therapist once a week. Each week they extend an invite, and each week I turn them down flat, and spend the night in my room, listening to my music.

"Ye-yes!" Vale says, overly excited and as if she realizes this, her voice goes Zen. "I mean, sure, if you want too."

Emilia laughs. Octavius and I both snort and the same time and our eyes meet in a bit of surprise, but then both of us content ourselves with pretending it didn't happen. Baby steps.

"It's Thursday, right?"

"Yep. At 5pm."

Great. I take another bite of my food.

"Can I get like $30?" I ask no one in particular.

When I first came here, they gave me an allowance each month. It was more money than I'd ever had before. But when I spent it on drugs and alcohol, the allowance stopped, which I didn't actually mind. I didn't drink or use drugs but I did leave them out everywhere for them to find. I'm surprised I didn't end up in rehab.

"For what?" My brother asks me.

"Pair of shoes." I say evenly.

"Something wrong with the ones you got on?" He asks me.

I fight the urge to flip him off, and not because he pissed me off for once. But because he damn well knew what was wrong with my shoe.

Vale hisses at him. "Tavi, stop it. He should have more than one pair anyways."

"Oh no," he tells her with a wicked grin. "You're going to want to hear this."
Vale and Emilia turns towards me with wide eyes, begging to be let in on whatever secret Octavius knows and they don't. 

I stuff another bite into my mouth, pointedly and ignore both of them.

"I'll start back up your allowance again." My brother bates me.

I raise my brow at him.

"No drugs or alcohol, obviously. You could buy two new pairs of shoes. You know, just in case something happens to the other one." He says as he takes a drink of Vale's water.

This asshole.

I sigh. Vale leans in closer across the table, her hair narrowly avoiding her lasagna. Octavius smirks into his glass.

"I was walking in the gravel area beside the road that I was dropped off on." I start, rather pointedly. Emilia has the decency to blush, while Vale's mouth widened into a grin. "I was kicking some rocks and my shoe fell off and landed in the road." I was throwing a fit and accidentally flung my shoe in the road. "And Octavius pulled me back before I could get my shoe." Octavius saved my life by not letting me try to get my shoe. "So I had to watch a truck run it over and it cracked the sole of it."

"I see." Is how Vale responds, in her Zen voice which tells me she is completely not Zen. Still, she doesn't comment.

"It was quite a walk." My brother tells her and kisses the crown of her head.

It was an awful walk, aside from the fact that I maybe don't hate my brother anymore. I have blisters on my feet, my shoe is broken, my shirt is in that awful, cold sweat state, I've got bug bites that itch, I almost died, and I learned that both my brother and Vale had terrible childhoods.

"Are you not glad you did what I said this time?" Vale says teasingly.

I get the sense that it's some kind of ongoing joke between them, but for the first time, it doesn't bother me, not knowing. It doesn't fill me with bitterness at the reminder that I wasn't apart of their life before. 

For the first time in a long time, I feel...content. I am content to be here talking to them and eating supper with them. And instead of thinking about all the awful things I'm going to do to get them to kick me out, I'm thinking about how much I'd like to stay here with them, and how much fun it'd be to have my own inside jokes with them.

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Tell me what you think about the beginning of this story! Noah and Julian are both very close to my heart, as well as Darius and Emilia, Vale and Octavius. Eventually, if requested, I will be working on writing their stories as well. 

Remember to like, comment, and VOTE if you enjoyed this chapter.

Take care and stay safe!~ CANGEL <3