Welcome to the Family

The music that was blasting on the TV in the living room covered up the noise of the 5 guys screaming about their RockBand game. Behind the closed door of the twins’ bedroom the music and screaming was nothing but a dull roar in the background as the two girls fought out their problems.

“You ratted me out!” Danii yelled, exasperated.

“You ratted me out first! Don’t you dare go acting high and mighty when you ruined my moment first!” Emily retorted, crossing her arms over her chest and staring her sister down.

“But you and Brian have moments all the fucking time! Sometimes more than once a day! Why couldn’t you let me enjoy myself, huh? You always have to ruin everything!” Danii shouted, her eyes starting to water. She really did feel that way; she wasn’t just screaming shit at her sister. She always felt that when it came to relationships her sister had the better luck. Hell, Emily and Brian had been together since her freshmen year of high school, and they had just recently graduated.

“That’s ridiculous, Danielle. You know that that’s not true,” Emily replied, not quite sure where her twin was going with this.

“Yes it is!” she replied, her voice cracking as she started to cry. Emily sighed, getting up to hug her sister.

“I didn’t know you felt that way,” she said, hugging her. It was kind of hard to stay mad at someone you need to stare at every freaking day of your entire life. Danii just sniffled, feeling like an idiot for getting this worked up over what should have been nothing.

“I’m sorry I killed your moment,” Danii said, attempting to make peace in her own way.

“It’s okay,” Emily said with a smile, sitting back down on the bed, patting the space next to her. “So, irresponsible, secretive little sister, tell me more about this guy who is not fraternizing with our brother and his friends in our living room.”

“I’m not little!” Danii whined, but laid down next to her and kicked off her shoes.

“Yes you are!” Emily said with a grin, and laid back as well. “By a whole two minutes. And those two minutes without you were the best one hundred and twenty seconds of our parents’ lives.”

“Hey, that’s not nice!” Danii said with a smile. It was a line she had been hearing since forever.

“But really, tell me, before I whip out the baby pictures!”

Danii stuck out her tongue, “Fuh-ine. Well,” Danii said, smiling a bit. “We met at the tattoo shop, since he came in multiple days in a row, ‘cause he was getting a sleeve done.”

“How long ago?”

“What?”

“How long ago?” Emily demanded.

Danii hid her face in a pillow before answering.

“Danielle! I can’t hear you. So pick your head up and answer me.”

“Two months,” she finally said, giving in to her sister’s demands. Now that she was being honest about, she felt like a complete bitch for having hid this from her sister. No, not just her sister—her twin, who was supposed to be her other (often times better) half.

“Well,” Emily sighed, trying her hardest not to get mad, “At least you’re telling me now. Why didn’t you tell me sooner?”

“I was afraid you were gunna tell Matt…” she said, hiding her face again.

“I wouldn’t have told if you just told me in the first place!”

“Yeah, well, it’s too late for that now,” Danii spoke into the pillow.

“Obviously. But look at the bright side; Matt didn’t kill him; he made a deal with him instead,” Emily said, trying to prevent her sister from being mad at her again.

“True, true. And if all goes well, it’ll be great to have a band again.”

“Yeah, really. Maybe it will get Matt off of our backs, since he’ll have something else to devote all of his time to,” Emily joked. As much as they both loved Matt, his over protectiveness got to be a bit much sometimes.

Danii opened her mouth to speak, but she was interrupted by the sound of their bedroom door flying open, and someone incoherently begging.

“Slow down,” she demanded, looking up to see who was standing there. It was Johnny.

“Can I please hide in your closet?” he asked, practically shaking in his boots—correction, sneakers.

“Uh, why?” Emily asked, cocking an eyebrow.

“Just please!” he pleaded.

“Fuh-ine,” the girls replied in unison, and then looked at each other and giggled a little. It was good to be doing the twin thing again.

Not even two seconds after Johnny had gotten the closet door closed, Jimmy came flying into the room.

“Jimmy!” the girls shrieked, getting up to hug him. Of all of their brother’s friends, Jimmy had to be their favorite. He was so… Jimmy.

“Baby Sanders!” he shrieked back, mocking them playfully as he opened his arms, waiting for their hugs. The girls hugged him enthusiastically and then sat back down. “Have you seen piss face?”

“Nope,” they giggled in unison, and watching Jimmy walked back out of their room, scratching his head.

~*~

The boys were sitting in the living room, still completely enthralled in their RockBand game. Currently, Matt was trying to play the drums on easy, but he had just failed out for the third time and they were only half way through the song. Shortly after Matt failed out, Jimmy failed out as well from singing—he sang just about as well as Danii did, which was pretty fucking awful.

Matt and Jimmy looked and each other and nodded, signaling that they were switching places, yet again. The only problems that Brian and Johnny had when they switched was that Brian was bored out of his mind attempting to focus on the bland bass line, while Johnny was sweating trying to move his fingers fast enough to play the lead guitar line. Zacky was feeling very awkward sitting on the couch looking at his feet with a pout on his face. This was his first official time hanging out with the guys, and since Emily had stolen Danii away, he didn’t have a buffer between him and the four intimidating guys he was sitting on the couch with.

“Do you always stare at your feet, or is this a new thing for you?” Jimmy asked barley focusing on the difficult drum line that was on the screen in front of him.

“Uh-well-um-” Zacky started stuttering not really sure how to respond to the sudden question that was obviously directed at him.

“Ease up, man, we’re not going to eat you,” Brian said glancing up at him, but trying not to lose his focus on the game, “Sweet tats by the way.” He said smirking.

“Uh, thanks?” Zacky responded, although it came out as more of a question because he still wasn’t really sure how to act around the guys.

“So, how did you and Danii meet?” Jimmy asked, trying to get more information on the potential new guitarist for the band. Jimmy was also very overprotective of the Sanders twins, he had always seen the two girls like his own little sisters ever since they had moved out to California.

“Uh, well I was going to the tattoo shop for a couple days in a row to get my sleeve done, and she seemed like a really nice girl and that she would be easy to talk to. So finally, after the second day of me going to the shop, I got up the nerve to start up a conversation with her.” Zacky replied shrugging, almost hoping he gave them the “correct” answer. Jimmy just nodded in response.

“Danii? A nice girl, yeah right, once she warms up a little more around you, you’ll see the true Danielle Sanders.” Matt said when there was a break in the lyrics for the song that they were currently playing.

Johnny was still overly focused on his guitar line in the game, obviously struggling when his section of the screen started flashing red for the third time in that particular song. “GOD DAMN IT!” Johnny screamed, getting frustrated with the song, then he looked over and noticed how easily Jimmy was playing the drums on expert like it was no big deal. “YOU SUCK!” He yelled once again, getting so aggravated with everything that he “accidentally” tipped over Jimmy’s drum set.

“YOU LITTLE SHIT!” Jimmy yelled jumping up, Johnny’s eyes grew large at the realization of what he just did, and turned to run for the kitchen of the small apartment. When there was nowhere else to run, Johnny headed towards the girls bedroom and barged in hoping to hide in their closet.

A little while later, the girls walked into the living room, laughing about something, with Johnny walking behind them, almost hiding from the others.

“You little shit, don’t think I can’t see you,” Jimmy said from his space on the couch. They had given up on their game of RockBand and were beginning to discuss the details of their first potential practice with Zacky as their new guitarist.

“Damn,” Johnny said, coming out from behind the girls. “Well, whatever. What’s going on?”

Matt filled him in on the details, and then the seven of them spent the rest of the evening laughing and goofing off as if they had known each other for a lifetime.