Laundry Day

doing the laundry and feeding the dog

Cassie didn't mean to break in his house, honest. It was pure accident. It was extremely dark out and the numbers on the houses could hardly be seen - (and the fact that she didn't have her glasses on either didn't exactly help). But truly, Cassie didn't mean to break into the house of Niall Horan.

Let's just start from the beginning, to get her side - the true side - out there.

---

"Casper, are you done, for Christ's sake?"

Cassie wrinkled her nose at her full name, thinking the same thought she always did when she heard it: 'Why did I have to be named after my father?' Not that she didn't mind keeping the name in the family, but couldn't her parents have put Capser as her middle name at least? Cassie shook her head and continued what she was doing. "Yeah, give me a minute."

"We don't have a minute, Cas! The fuzz is here!"

Cassie's eyes went comically wide as she whipped her body around. True enough, red and blue lights were flashing angrily in the night air like fire from a dragon's mouth. Cassie cursed loudly and turned back around, hurriedly finishing up her section. Beau pleaded for her to just bail, but Cassie refused, saying to just leave her and that she'll catch up in a few seconds. Beau left after hesitating. Cassie was glad he had hesitated; it meant that he didn't want to leave her because he would be worried about her. But they both knew it would be better to have one person in jail than both.

"Done," Cassie mumbled, the dragon's red and blue fire growing closer as the seconds ticked by. She dropped the spray can on the ground, knowing the cops wouldn't bother doing fingerprint checks on it, and made a run for it.

"Hold it right there!"

"Crap," Cassie muttered, a spark jolting through her veins. This is what she loved the most: The adrenaline rush. The cops were chasing her, knowing she was one of the culprits for all the graffiti that had made its way around the city of London. And they had brought out their fastest runners tonight.

Cassie cut through a few alleyways to lose the lone cop that was chasing her now, coming upon a subdivision. She came here purposely; she didn't have allies for nothing. And these allies were definitely loyal to Beau and her.

But tonight, Cassie couldn't see much because she didn't have her glasses on, and the numbers on the houses were hard to read because it was dark out. However, the house she came upon looked to be the right house; it had the same structure and style, and Cassie could have sworn the numbers said 221.

She climbed up the side like she normally did, despite her heaving chest and wobbling knees. Saying she went to the gym every week was completely different than actually going to the gym. The window was open like usual, so she slid it wide and jumped inside, tugging it closed and pausing to take a few huge deep breaths.

"Who tha hell are ya?"

Cassie inhaled sharply as she whipped around. Her switchblade was at the neck of a boy around her age, his blond hair (obviously bleached) everywhere, in two seconds flat. She hadn't missed a beat. Great. This was the absolute wrong house, and now she was holding some kid (who had an Irish accent, she heard) up by a knife. Great, just great. Exactly what she needed when running from the cops after spraypainting a giant lion on two train cars.

She thanked God she still had her hat on, hood up, and bandana over her mouth. Or this would have been even worse, though it didn't seem like it could get that way. Cassie couldn't back down now, though. She was in too deep. "You utter a single syllable, and you're going to have a live Anatomy class right here in this-" She looked around to see what kind of room she was in. It was always better to know your surroundings. She learned that from Zombieland. "Laundry room." She rolled her eyes. Whatever. Who the hell did their laundry at eleven at night? "You're doing laundry? At eleven?"

"I was," the kid snapped, and Cassie frowned at him, telling him he didn't need to be snippy. His blue - wow, they were really blue - eyes widened in shock. "Don' need ta be snippy? Ya've got a knife at me neck!"

"You're also doing your laundry wrong," Cassie said, completely ignoring him. She looked at the piles and piles of clothes in front of them. It looked like he had just thrown his whole closet in the room.

"Huh?" He sounded utterly confused, but Cassie didn't care. Her OCD was kicking in, and she really wanted to go correct what he was doing wrong. Besides, she had time to kill before the cop gave up looking for her and went back to his post. Helping out a lost laundry soul wouldn't hurt.

"Your laundry, you're doing it wrong. You can't just throw random clothes in the washer and think it's okay," she explained, quoting her mother from many years ago when Cassie was a child and learning how to work around the house. "You separate your whites and darks."

"Uh, okay." He was talking slowly, and Cassie knew he was beyond confused as to why this intruder was telling how to do his laundry. He didn't want to talk too quick anyways, the knife was still at his throat, ready to press down. "Thanks?"

"Go do it," Cassie said, hating that she was obsessing over this. But she couldn't help it. Things like that always bothered her to no end.

"What?!"

"Go do your laundry! It's bothering me!" Cassie stressed, biting at her lip. Her thumb was pressing hard on the switchblade handle, though she made sure to not cut the boy's throat. She didn't want to hurt him; just to hang out in his house until she was cleared to go home herself. Besides, this kid was cute; she could spend a little extra time with him. "Go on," she said, nodding her head at the piles. "I'm going to lower the blade, and you're going to do what I said. No fucking around, alright? I've got the blade. Deal?"

The boy clenched his jaw, sighing sharply through his nose. Well, this wasn't exactly what he had in mind when he was going to do his laundry tonight. "Deal."

Cassie smiled, though he couldn't see it, and she lowered the blade, twirling it around her fingers. She watched him go separate his clothes, and could hear him mumbling angry curses - some she hadn't even heard before - under his breath. She couldn't help but laugh. What an insane night this was. "No! That's not right! You put that dark purple one with your darks!"

The boy turned around and full on glared, his jaw clenched hard as he said between his teeth, "Then why don' ya do it, yeah?"

Cassie stared at him, an eyebrow raised. Hm, well, it would get everything done faster, and by the time she would be the done, the cops would be gone. So she shrugged. "Fine. Go sit on the washer over there where I can see you."

The boy groaned loudly, walking over there and doing as she told without a fight, more curses muttered under his breath.

And Cassie started sorting out his laundry.

She lowered her purple bandana from her mouth, letting it fall around her neck, and she lowered her hood, fixing up her ponytail, a few minutes later. This kid wasn't going to call the cops on her; he didn't seem the type, so she wasn't afraid to show her face.

She picked up an Ireland FIFA jersey, and smiled. She loved soccer with all her heart, though she was a huge Italy fan. "You think Italy's going to win FIFA this year?"

The boy stared at her for a few minutes before slowly shaking his head. "I think Germany's got it. I wan' Ireland ta win, but Germany is looking good this year."

Cassie nodded in agreement, accepting his opinion as perfectly reasonable. "That's what I was thinking. Spain obviously is going to be in the finals. But it's going to be extremely close with Germany and Italy this year. Poor Ireland can't seem to win a match." She was sorting clothes quickly into their appropriate piles as she spoke, keeping an eye on the boy in the corner of her eye, though she wasn't worried. He didn't look stupid enough to test her.

"I know. As much as I love me country's team, they're awful this year," the boy chuckled, and Cassie joined in.

"I'm excited this year for the final, though. It's going to be a great game. But no one wants to watch it with me," she said sadly. Beau hated soccer, so he was out, and Cassie didn't really have many close friends after that. They were all just 'Hey, I'll invite you to this party and say hello to you, but that's it,' types of friends.

"Maybe you can just break into someone's house and force them to watch it," the boy shrugged, smirking, and Cassie let out an honest laugh. She grabbed an armful of whites and walked over to the boy, who scooted over to sit on the dryer instead. After putting in the appropriate amounts of detergent and fabric softener, she shut the hatch and hit the start button.

She looked at the boy then, and found that he was staring at her, too. To be honest, this guy was fairly attractive. Though Cassie was really into blondes, this one was very pleasing to the eye; his blue eyes reminded her of the ocean. Cassie loved the ocean.

Cassie bit her lip, looking at her watch. "Well, I should get going. Fuzz is probably done looking for me now."

"Why were you even running from them, anyways?" he asked, hopping down. He was standing close to her, and Cassie could see he was a good few inches taller than her. He was Irish, he loved soccer, and he was attractive. God, this kid was perfect.

Cassie smirked then. Might as well let him in a little secret. She did hold a knife to his throat. "There's a lion on the trains now, roaring 'Bangarang.'"

Cassie loved when he smiled, and boy did he smile then. "Ya're one o' tha Shockers, aren' ya?"

"Aye," she nodded, smiling proudly. She and Beau were famously known around Europe for their amazing graffiti, always having 'bangarang' somewhere on there and signing it Shockers. "It'd be brilliant if you didn't tell anyone, though, yeah?"

"Mum's the word," he smiled back, and Cassie laughed softly. She asked if she could go out the front door, to which the boy nodded and told her he'd walk her there.

Cassie was excited when a dog walked slowly up to her feet, wagging its tail happily. She loved dogs a lot. After a few minutes of playing with the pup, and the boy introducing the dog as Lancelot, Cassie noticed the dog's empty food bowl in the corner. She scowled at the blonde, scolding him for starving his poor dog, and asked where he kept the food. The Irishman sheepishly showed her where the food was, and Cassie filled the bowl and even gave Lancelot some fresh water.

Finally, Cassie was at the door. She couldn't believe this. Two hours ago, she never thought this would have happened. Two hours ago, she was spray painting her art on the side of a train. Two hours ago, she had planned to go home straight afterwards.

And now, she had been chased by the police, and broken into the wrong house. She met a boy from Ireland, and discovered he liked soccer just as much as she did. And, he was even fairly attractive, and had the cutest dog. Having successfully broken into his house, she fed his dog and did a load of his laundry, too.

Now, she was a bit sad to be going home. This guy was extremely interesting, and she honestly wanted to get to know him more. He probably didn't, though; people got a bit angry and hateful when someone holds a knife to their neck and forced them to do their laundry.

"So, uh," Cassie bit her lip. "No hard feelings about tonight?" She offered a hopeful smile. She wanted to be friends with this guy, but she knew it would never happen. He probably thought she was insane.

The boy laughed and shook his head. "Ya know, if it was anyone but ya, I'd probably still be angry." He shrugged then, and Cassie could feel the smile slowly growing on her lips. "But, for some reason, I can't seem to stay angry at ya."

Cassie laughed then, a good, honest laugh that was out of disbelief and astonishment. He wasn't the least bit angry or resentful. He said he couldn't even stay mad at her. That had to mean something, right? "What's your name?"

"Niall Horan, pleasure to meet ya." He held out his hand for her to shake, and Cassie quickly gripped it. "And you are?"

"Casper Carmichael. But you can call me Cassie," she replied, her stomach fluttering wildly. He had to be feeling this also. She just knew it, or he wouldn't be looking at her like this, right?

"Well Cassie, why don' ya come and break in again on Friday? We can watch the FIFA semi-finals," he suggested, and Cassie nodded quickly, grinning from ear to ear. A date! He asked her out on a date!

"I'll wear my jersey," Cassie smiled.

"And I'll wear mine, since it's being washed now, thanks to you."

Cassie laughed, and the two stared at each other for a few seconds more before Cassie said she had to go (her phone had been vibrating nonstop because Beau had been texting her, asking where she was) because she had to get home, and Niall saw her out the door, waving goodbye until she was out of sight.

Cassie couldn't wait until Friday.