When the Sky Comes Down

Chapter 2

[Keith’s P.O.V.]

Finding a buyer is not very hard. The house is relatively large, three floors, eight bedrooms, three bathrooms and a royal living room and kitchen. Besides, it has a large piece of land. Given, the state of it all could have been better, but it is easily fixed with a couple of hands. I actually managed to make more off of it than I had expected. It is that Lexi and I have already bought all she needs days ago, otherwise I would have spoiled her rotten.

The doorbell rings. ‘Lexi?’ I ask. It’s all I need to say for her to know that she needs to get the door. She has been packing the light things, everything we want to keep. I myself have been moving furniture. The pieces I can carry by myself, that is. That is why I have called for help.

‘Jackle!’ I hear Lexi exclaim. I smile. If Jackle is here, then surely Liath is too. I hear them talking, though it is too soft for me to follow. Surely, soon after, I hear Lexi again. ‘Liath!’ Approaching footsteps announcing my brother coming my way. ‘Need help with that?’ he asks me, pointing to the small desk I am carrying, of which the legs are slightly dragging on the ground.

‘It is why you came all this way, is it not?’ I grin. He gives me a humble smile, slightly revealing the pointy corner teeth. He knows better than to hide them from family, yet he always attempts to do so. I put down the table and move, so that we can both take one side. Though it isn’t big in size, it is heavy. It has many cabins and drawers built in, making it hard to carry alone. ‘I assume you’ve brought the van?’ I ask. He just nods in response.

Liath comes in, followed by Lexi. The two couldn’t be more different. Liath is small, has her hair short, even shaved at one side. She has painted it purple this time, which makes her elvish green ears pop out even more. Because she’s only half fay, it’s only the tips of her ears that are bright green, poisonous green. After that it slowly turns towards the light pale colour the rest of her body has. Her small eyes are just as green as her ears. She is small. The top of her head barely reaches Lexi’s shoulder, that while Lexi probably isn’t even fully grown yet. If you look at Liath, you definitely wouldn’t see a 30 year old. But then again, you wouldn’t see it when looking at Lexi either. She might be tall, but in some ways, she still has the body of a child.

‘Let’s get to work,’ Liath yells, rolling up her sleeves, as if she’s about to do some heavy lifting.

‘You help Lexi with the boxes,’ I tell her. She grins widely. She might not be a full Fay, but even I know better than to get into a fight with her. Her sharp teeth could rip anybody apart. She salutes me, takes Lexi’s hand and pulls her into another room.

Suddenly, Jackle chuckles. ‘Man, if I didn’t know better, I definitely would’ve thought Lexi to be in her early twenties.’ My surprise must’ve been visible. ‘You don’t see it anymore,’ he adds. ‘You actually spend a lot of time with her. You come back every weekend from school, every break. You don’t see how she has grown.’ We manoeuvre the desk through the front door. ‘But I’m telling you, you need to keep an eye out on that one. I’m sure there are plenty who’ll think she’s just delicious.’ We put the desk down in front of the van. ‘And we don’t want her to end up like mom, do we?’

‘We don’t,’ I can’t help but growl a little. I can’t believe he would even think of her like that. She is nothing like our mom. ‘I am already looking out for her, so it’s only going to be getting easier once we live at the campus together.’

He shrugs and opens the van door, so we can start loading in.

[Alexia’s P.O.V.]

‘You simply have to come to my place for the Winter holiday,’ Liath rattles. So far, she has already told me about her five years at school, how they were the best of her life and how I should stay clear of Mr. Baric, the concierge. Apparently he has the tendency to grind up to girls. She wondered aloud whether he was even still working there and said she would need to ask Keith. Then she jumped to the topic of holidays. She wasn’t able to have me and Keith for any of the other holidays, not that we had expect her to. I am already surprise she will have us for the winter. ‘We will do one of those silly human celebrations. Chrismas. I read all about it. According to Gill, it is the celebration of this guy named Chris, who generously gave gifts to the poor. Then the humans turned it into gift-giving to their family and friends. They put it underneath some kind of tree. So Gill and I, we’re going to the Middle to get ourselves one of their trees.’ I nod in response. Liath is always like a waterfall of words. Sometimes she asks questions, but then doesn’t wait for a response. She’s a bad listener, but she is a great sister. ‘Maybe we can get you a permit by then too? So you can come with Gill and me to the Middle. See some humans.’ She grins widely, exposing the most terrifying teeth one could ever expect. I remember being terrified of them when I was a little kid. She was nothing to be afraid about, as it turned out. She is pretty much as innocent as a three headed dog.

As we walk up to the van with the next load of boxes, we run into Keith and Jackle. We tried staying clear of them, because they carry the heavy stuff and we don’t want to get in their way, but now they are empty handed.

‘Are you ladies done on the third floor?’ Jackle asks. I nod in response. ‘Then we’re going up there to get the last things.’ He elbows Keith’s side.

‘Have you guys already cleared out everything else?’ I ask in surprise. Three floors almost at the same speed as Liath and me, that’s impressive, even for them.

‘Almost,’ Keith says, before Jackle can even open up his mouth. ‘We’re leaving some things.’

‘Why?’ I frown.

‘I asked the new owners if they would be interested in some of the furniture. They said to leave them for now. We will make a deal on them when they come by to get the keys. Those they want, they will pay for, the other things we’ll get out and either put in the garbage or in storage at Liath’s place,’ he explains. ‘We won’t need everything anyways. I doubt that we’ll need a three store house for just the two of us, especially because you’ll eventually move out on your own.’ Despite me being on my own for the larger part of the last few years, I am not really looking forward to living by myself. Maybe that’s because I have been living alone for so long.

It doesn’t take the guys long to bring out the rest of the stuff. That said, we have taken all day to do so. It is already starting to get dark. ‘We’ll have to wait with loading everything out till tomorrow,’ Liath says. ‘It’s too dangerous to get it all out once it’s dark.’

‘That’s alright,’ Keith says. ‘I’ve arranged for us to get into the campus a little earlier.’ He points to his car, which was already filled before Liath and Jackle had arrived. We had put everything we need for our dorms in there. ‘Seeing how we can already move in, I’m sure they won’t kind us staying the night either.’

Jackle closes the van door and looks at us. ‘So you guys will go to the campus and we’ll meet up again tomorrow?’ Keith nods.

‘Perfect. I’ll make sure to get some snacks, you guys had nothing good to eat,’ Liath says.

Keith grunts. ‘I told you, that’s because we had to finish everything before moving out.’

As they continue their bickering, I take one last look at our family home. The home we all grew up in. We all might be completely different, from all different fathers, and we might not have had much, but at least we had each other.

After that, we split ways. Jackle and Liath take the van. Liath’s place is near that of Jackle, just three streets apart. Keith and I go towards the campus. I have never seen it before.

‘Make sure to keep close once we get there,’ Keith tells me. ‘It’s huge, so you might easily get lost if you don’t.’ He glances over at me. I am sure he would stare had he not been driving. ‘I mean it,’ he says. ‘First few days, you stay close to me.’ I wasn’t planning it any other way. We ride up to this ginormous building. That doesn’t even cover it. I mean eight floors high, and as least as big as twenty football fields. I didn’t even realise that I had my mouth open until I feel it getting dry. I hear Keith chuckle and lean back in my seat. He stops the car and turns to me. ‘Welcome to Hellgate, Lexi.’