When I Met You

Diary entry 1154 We are moving again. Cree is done with his internship and he got a new job 10 hours from where we lived before in Mayor Heights and now we are moving to Hill-view in California... "Welcome to our new home" Cree Pickett, a tall 24-year-old, with rangy blonde hair and the most charming blue eyes exclaimed, looking up at the tall, white-colored building in front of him. It was a duplex, with a wooden porch up front, the driveway was well cleaned and the grass cut, surprising for a house that had not been lived in for a long time. Cree was talking to his little sister, Natalie Pickett, an average height strawberry blonde, with pale skin, freckles around her face and cheeks, round black spectacles covering her blue eyes. She wanted to be somewhere but in front of the house she was standing at that very moment. It wasn't like she didn't like the house, it was smaller than where they were coming from but too big for just the two of them. She just didn't appreciate the fact that they had to move. Again. Cree didn't understand the problem with moving. Every time they moved, she'd have to get used to a new environment, meet new people, go to a new school and, for someone like Natalie who had no friends, it was a very hard task. It was better when she knew everyone even though they didn't know her. Cree looked at Natalie, who was giving the house deep scrutiny with her eyes. "You don't like it" he said, more of a statement than a question. Natalie turned to him with a blank look on her face. She just shrugged. She knew that explaining to Cree wasn't going to get them anywhere, it would just leave them standing in the cold for a few more minutes and after that, they'd eventually enter the house. "It's a nice house and the good news is that it's ours, no rent, no mortgage". Natalie looked at him with a raised eyebrow. They'd been struggling some time ago, so she wondered how Cree was able to buy a house of their own. Cree came to stand beside her, placing his arm around her shoulder. "Let's just get in first, see if you like the town and if you don't, we can leave", Cree muttered. Natalie knew how hard it was for that statement to leave her brother's mouth and she also knew that no matter what, even if she didn't like the town, Cree would somehow convince her to stay a little longer like he did in Miami, Orlando, Florida. Yeah. They moved a lot. Cree walked up to the front door, pulling Natalie along with him. He took out the keys from his pocket, inserted it into the keyhole and opened the door. Natalie shivered as they stepped in. The house was cold. They walked into a small hallway filled with boxes. On the right was the kitchen and on the left, the living room. There were marble stairs that led to the second floor. Cree let out a satisfied sigh as he looked around while Natalie was trying to generate as much heat as possible by rubbing her arms. "Go pick a room, I'll set up the heaters" Natalie turned and headed for the stairs, her sneakers squeaked as she climbed each step at a time. She finally came to the landing and looked into the hallway. It was long both ways. She wondered what they were going to do with all the rooms, but she had to pick one that would at least make her life bearable. She opened the doors one by one, checking their features until she came by the very last one, 4 doors to the right of the landing. She pushed open the door and stepped in. It was a large room, it had a bathroom and closet, but the best thing was the big balcony and glass doors that led out. "Why did you pick one that we have to travel to get to?" Cree asked, walking into the room. He looked around like a supervisor examining the day's work. He looked at his sister and shrugged. "If it makes you happy for a month or two, then its okay "Cree said, "I'm ordering pizza for dinner, a couple friends from work are coming over to help me set up, you don't mind, right?" Natalie shook her head no. Cree walked out of the room, leaving Natalie alone. She sighed, looking around the room one more time before walking out. She followed Cree down the stairs and into the kitchen. Most parts of the house had been set up already, it was basically the rooms left. Natalie took a seat on the island and placed her bag on the table. Other teenagers would have pulled out their phones to text their friends but for Natalie it wasn't so. She pulled out a copy of the Great Gatsby and began to read it for the tenth time. She could hear Cree walking around the house, whistling as he went. It was only a few moments later that she heard a knock on the door, assuming it was the pizza guy. Natalie walked to the door, grabbing Cree's wallet as she went. She pulled open the door and paused. There were guys standing there but they were not holding any pizza, so she knew they were Cree's friends. Cree had friends everywhere, so she wasn't surprised. Awkward silence descended on them as Natalie looked at them and they looked back at her. She hadn't said anything and neither did she open the door for them to come in. "Hey, you must be Natalie" the guy at the front finally spoke. Natalie looked at him, pushing her glasses up her nose. He was huge, all of them were. She could see the tattoos that peeked from under his shirt and onto his neck. His eyes were a dark brown, sexy brown. "Natalie?" Cree's voice came from inside the house. It was then she noticed that she'd been staring at the guy who probably thought she was checking him out. Her face turned a bloody crimson, she turned slowly and walked back into the house. If she had a bedroom, she would have gone up immediately, but what was she supposed to do? Seat on the floor?. She could hear Cree's laughter from the door echoing in the house, joined by the laughter of the other boys. They were probably laughing at her. She was weird, wasn't she? She always got laughed at. "Natalie doesn't talk much; she was probably confused" Cree said, leading the troupe into the kitchen. Natalie gripped her book tighter at Cree's words and didn't look up even when all of them had settled down in the kitchen. The pizza had come so they were dishing it out on plastic plates. Natalie was suddenly no longer hungry. Her appetite had waned from the various eyes that were staring at her. "Natalie, these are my friends, we all work in the same company, this is Nicholas", Cree pointed to the guy at the edge of the table. He was tall but not as tall as the rest, he had black hair, brown skin and brown eyes, "Finn and Erin are twins". They did look alike, with their brown hair and green eyes "and Darius". He was sitting opposite her. She didn't look at him directly, she looked above his head because there was no way she was going to stare into those brown eyes of his without turning bloody red. "take them as your brothers because they'll be around a lot". Natalie shrugged even though the new piece of information didn't sit well with her. Cree put a pizza slice in front of her but Natalie made no move to take it. She didn't want to risk throwing up due to anxiety. Cree noticed because he headed the boys out of the room and began assigning tasks. Once they were gone, Natalie picked up the slice and ate it. She didn't see Darius standing by the door watching and chuckling to himself. Natalie was half asleep by the time her room was all set, when Cree told her she could go up, she picked up herself and her things and began to drag herself up the stairs. She pushed open her room door and stepped in. It was different, very different. There was a bed now, cabinets, shelves, bed stands, a desk and chair and even a television. Cree had even installed the night sky lights she asked for. Darius was putting finishing touches to the room when she walked in. She paused at the door watching him pick up a few materials. He looked really good. He was handsome. What was she thinking? He was probably older than her and, even if he wasn't, she wasn't going to go out with anybody, much less her brother's friend. Darius stood straight and looked at her. He picked up one of her stuffed animals as he came to where she was standing. He handed the stuffed panda to her, and Natalie could feel her face go red at his gesture. "Welcome to Hill-view Nat, hope you like your room". She felt butterflies in her stomach at the nickname Nat. She shifted for Darius to pass before walking into the room. She put her bag on the floor and immediately flopped on the bed. Pulling out her diary from her bag, she flipped the full pages until she came to the one she'd started earlier. Her diary was her life. It was the last thing she received from her parents before they disappeared. The picture at the back was the only picture she had of all of them, the one she'd salvaged from the fire that had gulped their house up. She didn't have anything to say, her hand hovered over the book but nothing came to mind, so she closed it, placed it on her nightstand and went to sleep.