Chapter 2|Are you bipolar?

The adorable child is Archie. I don't even like little kids, but I really want to squeeze this one's cheeks.

~*~*~*~

"Sketchbook, sketchbook, sketchbook," I muttered to myself.

Where the hell did I put it?

I grabbed my backpack and proceeded to tip it upside down, spilling the contents all over the floor.

I stood back to survey the mess I had made. I nodded my head. Nice.

"Stop procrastinating, Hazel," I scolded myself, getting back to the task at hand.

Then my butt started vibrating.

I straightened up and blew a few strands of hair off my face.

"What?" I said, pressing my phone to my ear, not even bothering to check the caller ID.

"Well hello to you too, H," said a cheeky voice.

"You have impeccable timing, you know that?" I replied, flopping onto my bed.

"I know," he said. "So what's wrong?"

"Nothing's wrong," I frowned.

"Something is definitely wrong, I can feel it in my bones."

"Well your bones are stupid."

"Don't you sass me, little sister."

"Don't you sass me, big brother with stupid bones."

"I will sass you to hell and back because I'm older and wiser and I smell better."

"Wow great logic."

"I know."

"Modest too."

"Aren't I always."

"Nope."

"Thanks."

"What?"

"You're so confusing," I muttered to myself, but he must have heard me because I could hear his faint chuckles.

"You still didn't answer my question," Caleb said.

"What question?"

"I swear to God, talking to you is like talking to a brick wall."

"Hey!"

"Straw is cheaper, grass is free, own a farm and you get all three," he said in a singsong voice.

"I'm sure you're adopted."

"Wouldn't surprise me. Now answer the damn question!"

"I can't find my sketchbook," I muttered.

"Hmm," he hummed. "Did you take it to school?"

"Yup."

"Did you look in your bag?"

"Uh huh."

"Did you by any chance, leave it at school?"

I froze. I took it out in art class but then decided not to do any work and started playing temple run. Damn you temple run. I blame the rabid monkeys.

I groaned in realisation.

"I'm going to guess that was a bad groan, I mean it would be a little odd if it was a good groan..." he trailed off when he realised he was talking to his little sister.

"I left it at school."

"That sucks."

"Yeah. So when are you coming home?" I asked.

"Whenever the assholes in charge decide we need a break from this shitty desert," he said bitterly.

"What are you actually doing over there?" I asked curiously.

"C'mon H, you know I can't tell you that."

"It was worth a shot right?"

"If you say so," he chuckled.

"Yo lover boy, hurry up with the phone would ya?" A muffled voice said in the background.

"I'm talking to my sister, asshole," Caleb growled.

"Oh...is she hot?"

"Fuck off Peterson," Caleb snapped.

You could say Caleb was a tad overprotective.

"Sorry H, that guy is a butthead," he said, returning to the conversation.

"Clearly," I chuckled.

He sighed. "I should go."

"Yeah.."

"Look after mom for me, yeah?"

"Okay."

"I love you, H," he said softly.

"Love you too," I replied.

"Don't worry about me, I'll be home before you know it," he said, before disconnecting the call.

"How can I not worry?" I wondered aloud.

That was depressing and I still didn't have my sketchbook.

I sighed and peered out the window. True to what Tara had said, there was a window directly across from mine. The room looked like any typical teenage boys bedroom; unmade bed, cluttered shelves, clothes scattered all over the place. I frowned, how had I not noticed that before?

I looked at my own room and wondered if my previous statement had been sexist because my room was in a very similar state.

I shrugged, giving my backpack a kick for good measure, before heading downstairs.

I strolled into the living room where the remaining three members of my family were chatting animatedly about the health benefits of eating vegetables daily.

None if you ask me.

I threw myself into an armchair and waited for them to acknowledge my presence.

"Hey kiddo," dad said.

"Hey dad," I replied with a lazy smile.

"How was school?" He asked, turning away from my mom and sister who had now moved on to the subject of civil rights.

Of all things, why civil rights?

"Just the usual," I replied, shrugging my shoulders.

"C'mon Hazel, give me something interesting."

"Well, I recently realised that the Smiths don't live next door anymore."

"What?" He asked, surprised at my discovery. "They don't?"

"Nope apparently they moved out two years ago," I clarified.

"Huh, I never noticed."

Well that explains a lot

It's funny how life works. I was only biologically related to two of the people living in that house, yet the one I wasn't related to paid me more attention than the other two combined.

My mom had major mood swings. One minute she treated me like I was I was the magical fairy queen and she was a peasant, and the next she could barely look at me. I had a fair idea why she was like this, but she could at least learn to control herself.

And Jasmine was everything that I wasn't. I was still coming to terms with the fact that she would always be smarter than me. She was blonde, I wasn't. She could sing, I definitely couldn't. She was demanding and bossy, I wasn't. She was the spoilt youngest child, I was the middle child and the list goes on. I was always jealous of Jasmine, she lived with both of her biological parents and she was happy, she didn't have a care in the world.

I felt like an outcast, especially after Caleb left. He understood the way that I felt because he had a different dad too.

You could say that our family was a little mismatched. All of us kids had the same mom, but we all had different dads. Jasmine's dad was obviously the one my mom was married to, the one that I called dad even though he wasn't really. Caleb didn't even know who his dad was and my dad, well lets just say he wasn't the nicest cupcake in the box.

My mom sees in me what she saw in him because I look exactly like him. The only feature I inherited from her was the small smattering of freckles over the bridge of my nose, other than that we were polar opposites. My mom was a beautiful woman, wavy blonde hair falling just past her shoulders, ice blue eyes, sharp cheekbones, ivory skin and a petite figure. I was slightly taller with a few more curves to work with, thick dark hair flowed down my back, wide chocolate brown eyes and naturally olive skin. I'd been given the chance on many occasions to meet my sperm donor, as I affectionately called him, all of those times I not so politely turned down the offer. I refused to see him after all the horrible things he'd done.

~*~*~*~

The rest of the week passed fairly quickly, with still no sign of my sketchbook. I'd even been to Ms Whistler, the art teacher, and asked her if she'd seen anyone take it from her classroom. It's not like she'd know anyway because five times out of six she was in the staff lounge during class, downing coffee. But it was worth a shot.

Ryan also kept smirking at me, like he knew something that I didn't, which to be honest was a little disturbing. It's not like he actually made an effort to talk to me, but when you see four guys talking and then they all look in your direction at the same time, I'm pretty sure that means you're the topic of conversation.

When I arrived home after school on Friday the house was eerily quiet. Usually dad would be home by now, but the house was empty.

I dropped my bag on the kitchen floor and skirted around the counter. Taped to the granite surface was rough note with moms messy scrawl scribbled across it. It read:

Hazel

Your dad and I are going away, we'll be back on Sunday. Please pick up Jasmine from cheerleading practice at 4:00.

Wow, that was vague but at least she used please that time, what an improvement. They could've taken Jasmine with them or at least told me where they were going.

It wasn't an unusual occurrence, my parents just spontaneously taking a vacation and leaving us behind. I knew that these 'breaks' were always my moms idea, the purpose of them was probably to get away from me but I couldn't be sure because she never actually told me.

I sighed in irritation. Why did I have to be the older sibling?

I looked up at the clock fixed to the wall.

"Shit," I shouted, my eyes almost bugging out of my head when I saw the time.

It was ten past four.

I raced out to my jeep, backing out onto the street like a madwoman, before putting my foot down hard on the gas pedal.

I made it to Jasmine's elementary school just on quarter past four, I'd made pretty good time.

I speed walked out to the field where the cheerleaders and football players had their practice. They always had practice together which I guess made sense.

Walking onto the field I saw two little kids sitting side by side on the grass. Obviously they were the only ones left that hadn't been picked up. Even from a distance a could tell the one on the right was Jasmine. Her long blonde hair was tied in pigtails, each adorned with a bright red bow, she was wearing her tiny red and white cheerleading uniform. She was chattering animatedly to a little blonde boy beside her, who was clearly more interested in the pile of grass he was constructing. I didn't blame him, Jasmine's new favourite thing was algebra.

Algebra.  Does that word make anyone else shudder?

As I approached the two, it became even more obvious that it was indeed Jasmine. She shot to her feet upon spotting me and pointed a finger at me accusingly.

"You're late!" She hissed, planting her hands on her nonexistent hips.

"Sorry your highness," I said sarcastically, bowing like the court jester after making a grave mistake in front of the Queen, "but I didn't realise that I was your taxi service."

"Well you are," she replied angrily, stomping a foot.

I rolled my eyes. Spoilt brat.

"Let's go," she said, snapping her fingers. "I want a piggyback ride."

"No can do," I replied, imitating her stance.

"But my legs are sore," she whined.

"Then maybe I should make you walk home. You should have thought about that before you insulted the person giving you a ride."

She let out a groan, storming past me, her hair swinging back and forth as she walked.

I turned around to see the little boy still sitting there, although now he had his thumb plugged into his mouth. He appeared to be quite a lot younger than Jasmine, five or six maybe. The school had to combine all the different age groups to even get a football team together which explained the age difference.

I crouched next to him and his eyes widened.

"Hey bud, is your mom coming to pick you up?" I asked.

He shook his head.

"Your dad?"

He shook his head again.

I scratched the back of my neck. Who else would be picking up a five year old from kiddie football?

"A sister?"

He gave me an 'are you serious' look. Okay maybe he didn't have a sister.

"What about a brother?" I asked out of desperation.

He nodded and smiled, his thumb dropping from his mouth.

"Alright," I said, glad we had established who was supposed to pick him up. "Do you know his phone number?" I asked doubtfully.

His smile shrunk and he shook his head again.

"That's okay, I guess we just have to wait right?"

He nodded and I offered him my hand. He took it hesitantly and I pulled him off the ground.

As we walked towards the parking lot instead of dropping my hand he clutched it tighter causing a soft smile to form on my face.

"What's your name?" He said in a small voice, so quiet I barely caught it.

"I'm Hazel."

"Hazel," he said testing it out on his tongue.

"What's your name?" I asked, peering down at him.

"Archie," he said proudly.

I chuckled and he smiled up at me.

We approached my jeep and I spotted Jasmine sitting on a nearby bench.

"There you are," she exclaimed. "Ive been waiting for like, an hour."

"Right," I replied.  "And I have a pet dragon named Frederick."

She glared at me, clearly understanding my sarcasm.  That's just sad that a nine year old knows what sarcasm is, yet Annie didn't.

"Why'd you bring the kid?" She asked harshly.

"Don't be so mean. Nobody came to pick him up," I scolded, sitting down on the bench. Archie scrambled to sit next to me.

"What's your brother's name Archie?" I asked him.

He shrugged.

Right, so he either didn't know his brothers name, or he just wasn't in a sharing mood.  Either way, I still didn't know what I was supposed to do with him.

"Do you know where he might be?"

"At Lee's house," he said, sticking his thumb back in his mouth.

So he knows the name of his brothers friend, but not his brother. Okay...

"Do you know how to get there?"

He nodded his head happily.

And there I had a dilemma. Did I trust a five year old with directions or wait for a brother that probably wouldn't show up? Trust the five year old with directions of course.

"This is kidnapping," I muttered to myself as I herded Archie and a very stroppy Jasmine over to my jeep. From there I actually had to lift Archie into the vehicle because he was too short. That's how small he was.

After a few doubtful directions, given by Archie, we ended up at an average looking house not too far from the school.

I unbuckled my seatbelt and told Jasmine to get out. She unhappily complied.

I had to walk around to the passenger seat to lift Archie out, I didn't want him to break a leg or something, that would cause some major legal issues.

Archie grabbed my hand again as we walked down the path, but he seemed more relaxed than before which was probably a good indication that he'd been here before. To my surprise Jasmine clutched tightly onto my other hand, unsure of this new environment.

I knocked on the door three times, but nobody answered.

I turned the door handle and it was unlocked so I pushed it open to reveal an average looking family home.

I looked at Archie. "You sure this is the right place?"

He nodded eagerly.

God, this is so illegal.

I stepped into the house. It was weird, walking into a strangers house without them being there to meet you at the door.

All three of us stood just inside the door. The house looked pretty empty to me, like nobody was home, but Archie had other ideas.

So when I tried to turn and leave Archie yanked my arm, pulling me towards a staircase which lead to the basement, this in turn pulled Jasmine who was clutching my hand with both of her small ones. She let out a startled yelp, almost tripping on her own feet. In any other situation I probably would have laughed but she looked so terrified that I actually felt sorry for her.

I studied the staircase. There was a wooden door at the bottom and the actual stairs themselves were carpeted. There was a sliver of light beaming out from a gap under the door and several voices could be heard on the other side.

What if this was a drug house?

I made a spontaneous decision to just do it.

Nike.

"Alright kid, if this goes wrong it's on you," I informed Archie.

He nodded his head, but I'm pretty sure he didn't understand what I meant.

We started walking down the short staircase. By 'we' I mean Archie and I were walking and I was dragging Jasmine. Apparently I wasn't the only one apprehensive about walking down a set of stairs to a creepy basement. I never liked basements.

Does anybody though?

Once we reached the bottom of the stairs I hesitantly reached for the door handle and twisted it gently.

The door swung open, revealing a large room with a leather couch, a large flat screen TV with various gaming consoles scattered across the floor, a fridge and a foosball table.

Gathered around the foosball table were four guys, who looked around the same age as me. Two of them had their backs turned to me, and the other two seemed far too focused on their game to notice us standing there.

They were making quite a lot of noise, whooping and hollering, so when I cleared my throat to get their attention they didn't hear me. I thought that Archie would at least give me an indication that they were the right people, but he seemed quite content examining the chipping blue nail polish on my fingernails instead.

Way to help out Archie.

I cleared my throat again, louder this time, but still no luck.

And then Jasmine screamed. Initially I think it was to get their attention, which it obviously did, but she just didn't stop.

So I slapped a hand over her mouth and she bit me.

"Shit-ake mushrooms," I yelped, quickly covering my mistake realising the younger audience. I glared at Jasmine.

"Dad should have listened to me when I told him to abandon you on the church steps," I muttered.

She harshly pulled away from me.

"Well are you going to talk to those idiots or not?" She huffed, pointing in front of me.

I looked up, only to be greeted by the familiar smirk of Ryan Martinez.

I looked at Archie, and then back to Ryan. I saw the similarities.

"That's your brother?" I hissed, gesturing to Ryan.

"Uh huh," Archie grinned.

I sighed. What horrible thing did I do to deserve this? Maybe it was for the time I put flour in Tara's hair dryer or, the time I put blue dye in Caleb's shampoo. That was pretty funny though.  He walked around looking like Marge Simpson for three weeks.

"You left your brother at football practice," I said, directing my comment at Ryan.

"Don't worry she was late too," Jasmine piped in.

I rolled eyes. "You know what? I don't remember asking for your input. At least I showed up," I said, narrowing my eyes at Ryan.

The other three guys had stopped their foosball game and were watching us with interest.

"I was busy," he said vaguely.

"Yeah looks like it," I replied, placing my spare hand on my hip.

"I don't think it has anything to do with you," he said.

"Doesn't it? I just picked up your brother from football, followed his directions to a strangers house, walked down that creepy staircase into a basement. My own basement is damn scary enough, but someone else's basement, that is scary shi-stuff. There could have been aliens or drugs or bombs down here. My mom is freaking scary when she's angry and I'm pretty sure she would be angry if I was exploded into tiny bite sized pieces. And then what if this was the wrong house? That would've been embarrassing and someone probably would have called the police because a strange teenage girl was spotted with a kid that doesn't belong to her. Then I would've been arrested and sent to jail and it would've have been all your fault because you were too busy to pick your little brother from his school, which is ten minutes from here," I ranted, taking a gulp of air.

Two of the guys were snickering and the other was smiling softly.

"You're cute when you ramble," Ryan grinned.

My mouth dropped open. "Are you bipolar?" I asked, but my cheeks reddened.

"No. Not that I'm aware of anyway," he replied, continuing to grin.

"Okay I'm just going to go before this gets any weirder," I announced as Archie dropped my hand.

I ruffled his hair.

"Bye kid," I said, edging towards the stairs.

"Bye Hazel," he waved, he voice barely audible.

Jasmine scampered up the stairs in front of me, clearly keen to get out of there, but I walked more slowly, thinking.

One question was fresh in my mind as I started my jeep.

What the hell just happened?

~*~*~*~

Chapter 2 complete!

Again, please vote, comment, follow, whatever floats your boat.

Wattpad kindly decided to delete my whole chapter just as I was about to publish it, so sorry if some parts are kind of strange.

Grammar nazis are appreciated here! Please correct my butchering of the english language.

Until next time.