A Twist in my Story

I stood alone in Rose’s lounge room, staring blanking out the window, watching as the rain pelted against the clear, unmarked glass. No smudge was visible from where I stood, and this house all together seemed to be completely spotless even though their parents were supposably on holidays. It was unknown to me how they could keep this house tidy without a housekeeper or adult, but apparently it was possible.
The sound of the rain soothed me, as I watched the trees sway in the night breeze. A smile made its way to my face as I heard footsteps move down the hall and into the lounge room. Glancing behind me I spotted a blonde girl that looked not even a year or so younger than me, her hair done up in a loose ponytail. The girl glanced over me with her bored eyes before shrugging and collapsing onto the pink couch.
I looked at her curiously, my eye brows furrowing as she turned on the television without a word towards me. Letting out a shaky breath, I turned my attention back to outside.
“Hello, I’m Lily,” the same girl spoke from beside me, making me jump and spin around to look over at her with wide eyes, my hand over my heart. Lily giggled, amused as she held out her hand towards me, her amused expression changing to a kind, sweet expression.
“H-hi, I’m C-Caleb,” I stuttered, a blush warming up on my cheeks.
“Aw! That’s so cute!” Lily squealed, her hands near her chin as a grin started to spread across her pale face.
“Leave the poor boy alone, Lily,” I heard Rose speak, making me look up at Rose who now wore her silky blue pyjamas.
“But why?” Lily complained, dragging out the ‘why’.
“Because, your girlfriend is over, yet you choose to be with my new friend,” Rose said, shaking her head in disapproval.
“Shit! I forgot,” Lily muttered as she slapped her forehead and bolted up the set of stairs.
When Lily was out of earshot Rose collapsed on the couch, just like Lily had done before muttering ‘she has the memory of a goldfish’ under her breath.
“Caleb, take a seat on the couch and let us watch a movie!” Rose exclaimed happily, making me wander away from the window sill, over to where Rose sat.
I stood not too far away from her, my hands pulling at a loose strand of fabric that dangled off of the front of my plain grey t-shirt. Rose beamed up at me as she jumped to her feet, bolting over to the wooden cabinet with a grin as she flicked through the DVD’s.
“Why don’t you ask dear Caleb what he wants to watch? He is the guest after all,” Xander spoke from the kitchen, entering through the doorway with two bowls in hand.
“Good idea, what do you want to watch, Caleb?” Rose asked, her gaze moving from Xander to me in an instant.
“I-I don’t know, any movie is fine,” Caleb said, nodding with a kind smile.
“I thought you were going to say that, but really, we want to watch whatever movie you want to watch.”
“And, I-I want to watch whatever you guys want to watch, really, y-you guys should choose,” I murmured, bowing my head to stare at the bright white carpet.
“Caleb, come on, just choose,” Xander said as his eyes focused on me.
“I-I don’t know,” I mumbled, hoping that they would just forget about how ‘my choice mattered’.
“Caleb,” I heard Rose say warningly, glancing up, he noticed that Rose had her hand placed on her hips.
“I can’t, okay? I can’t choose a movie!” I exploding before sinking to the floor, not looking up at their faces, knowing they would be filled with surprise.
“Why not?” Xander asked as he rounded the couch to move closer towards me, just as I could hear Rose doing the same.
“I-I’ve never watched a movie, ever,” I sobbed, the tears flowing out of my green eyes before I could stop them.
I swore under my breath at my father, as I curled up into a tight ball, my head buried in my knees as I felt two hands rubbing my back sympathetically. I didn’t want it. I wanted to pull away from the touch, scream at them for assuming that everyone had the perfect life, but, I couldn’t. I couldn’t yell at a girl that had helped me far too many times throughout one day, and for some odd reason, I just couldn’t yell at Xander either.
A shudder ran down my spine as I swallowed back more tears, knowing that my eyes would already be red and puffy. Raising my head I looked at the two worried teenagers, them staring back at me with sad smiles.
“I can’t believe you’ve never seen a movie before, that’s, wow, just, shocking,” Xander murmured, staring at the floor.
“Don’t worry Caleb, Xander and I will take it in our care to show you the good actors and the bad and just let you enjoy what comes. Personally, I think we should start off with childish movies and then work our way up until we reach horror, deal?” Rose asked, moving her attention away from me towards Xander, grinning when he nodded.
“Let’s watch Finding Nemo first,” Xander said, moving out of his kneeling position to grab the movie.
Rose helped me off of the floor and onto the couch before she grabbed the two bowls, one being filled with lollies, the other full of popcorn.

The rest of the night went flawlessly. I sat in the middle of both Xander and Rose the whole night, staring at the television screen as it played all sort of cartoon movies. I had felt my heart skip a beat when Xander had fallen asleep and started using my shoulder as a pillow. A blush rose to my cheeks as the movie came to an end, but there wasn’t much I could do since I was sandwiched between two sleeping figures. So instead of waking them up, I drifted off to sleep myself, ignoring the fact that my head now rested on top of Xander’s.