Echoes of The Cliff

Chapter 1

"Minnie, I'm home!" Frank, closing the door of the white three-bedroom house behind him. He dropped his black leather bag on the pale blue sofa in front of him and made his way to the kitchen, where a five foot seven brunette was already racing towards him.

He spread his arms open and engulfed her in a hug as she slammed into him, not moving him in the slightest.

He kissed her on the top of her head. "You should stop running like that, Minnie. You'll hurt yourself."

He said, smirking down at her. Minnie giggled and he joined her, letting out a throaty laugh at their inside joke.

"Not when I have my sergeant in dashing armor to save me." She replied with a cheeky grin, her light brown eyes twinkling with life and humor.

"Oh?" Frank raised an elegantly arched dark eyebrow, trying, and failing, to mask the pride swirling in his cloud grey eyes. "That's very confident of you, Mrs Maxfield. How sure are you I'll be able to save you? I'm more known for solving murders than saving falling damsels."

"Because if you don't..." Minnie traced a finger down his bicep slowly, and craned her neck to look back up at him an alarming energy of mischief, "...then you won't get to eat dinner tonight." She smirked triumphantly.

Frank's eyes widened and he sped past her to the kitchen that was heavily permeated with the sweet aroma of mashed potatoes and steak. "Not my dinner!!"

"Hey!!" Minnie raced after him, half yelling and half laughing, and planted herself in front of him. "You will not step into my kitchen without taking a shower, young man. Get your sweaty, handsome ass out of here!!" Her tiny voice carried more authority than it was entitled as she pointed her hand towards the stairs by her left and Frank's right.

Frank groaned as he went to grab his bag on the sofa. "Nurses are such a pain." He grumbled, turning around to trudge up the stairs.

"I heard that!!" Minnie thundered from the kitchen.

"Nothing, ma'am." Frank denied, increasing his speed up the stairs.

He heaved a sigh of relief once he entered their bedroom. It had been a tiring day. The room was dominated by white with splotches pale blues and grays highlighting it in form of the walls, curtains, beddings and wall decor. The blue was Minnie's favourite colour and the gray was his.

He rid himself of his black leather jacket and grey shirt that hugged his toned, slender yet muscular frame and ripped off his shoes and jeans as well, traveling to the bathroom to take a shower. As the cool water trickled from the shower head down Frank's alabaster skin, he allowed his mind to wander.

Frank, Minnie, Magnum and Andrew had hailed from different parts of the country and met at the orphanage through one travail or the other.

Both Minnie's parents had died in a house fire when she was just five years old, she had always been very wary of flames afterwards. Andrew's parents had died in a car crash, throwing him out of the car at the last minute to save his life. He had watched the car go up in flames with his parents still inside and the toll it took on the five year old was obvious and permanent. He developed a huge aversion towards cars of all kinds and never stepped in one again, driving a motorcycle to every destination when he was old enough to drive.

Magnum's father had impregnated his mother, a young Catholic, and skipped the city after discovering her pregnancy. She was taken care of by the elderly nuns at the church afterwards, who raised Magnum after she died during his birth. He was sent to the orphanage six years later when none of Cassia's relatives came to claim him.

As for Frank, he had lived a peaceful, he could even say Elysian life with his parents. That was till they got robbed one night. His mother had quickly hidden him in a secret spot only they knew of behind the stairs that led down to the basement, and he had watched from there as the thieves marauded the house and and pushed his parents around. He wanted more than nothing else to run out of his hiding place and stop them, but he was powerless and he knew it. And his mother had made him promise to stay there and never come out no matter what. So he remained hidden with a hand clamped over his mouth, praying to God as dad taught him to for the police to come. They didn't.

Taking all their money and valuables wasn't enough, the robbers decided to violate his mother as well. But Mr Maxfield would rather die than let it happen...which was what he did. They made sure she followed suit. The police never came.

From the moment the robbers left and the police eventually showed up and found him mute with tearstained cheeks behind the stairs, to his parents' funeral, till he was sent to the orphanage because his relatives had no idea what to do with the boy who seemed to have lost his tongue. Frank never spoke a word after he got to the orphanage either, which made him the cynosure of all malevolent attention.

Till he met the three. Magnum had been alone for two years prior. Alone not because there were no other kids at the orphanage, but because was not one to frolick with them. His quiet aura of maturity and superiority subjected him to bullying from the bad eggs whom he eventually taught to stay away from him, the brats who scorned him from afar, and the actually nice kids who were too scared to make friends with him, lest the bullies set their sights on them.

That was until Minnie came in two years later, big brown eyes darting around in a perplexing mix of wariness and curiosity, both wanting to play with the oodles of kids her age and put off by their numbers. Till her eyes fell on Magnum sitting alone at a corner in the dining hall and not minding the solitude at all.

Magnum found himself attacked by a little ball of sunshine who clung to him like a leech, one he couldn't bring himself to get rid of.

Frank was brought in not long after, muted by the memories that plagued his cognition. Until Minnie's hawk eyes found him as well and Magnum once again taught the bullies to steer clear of him. Andrew was brought to the orphanage a year after, and you would expect that he would be, like Frank, silenced by the shock of watching his parents die so violently at such a tender age.

Alas, the boy was different. He was one little yet giant ball of angst, with a fiery temper and little fists ready to pummel anyone who crossed him. Till the trio came in and adopted him as well. Well, to be specific, Minnie commanded he join their posse, Magnum wordlessly huffed his insouciant approval, and Frank nervously pushed his glasses up his nose as Minnie gave her manifesto about the benefits of being a member of their squad.

And so their little group was born with Magnum unknowingly taking on the role of the big brother, Minnie fussing over the foolish boys constantly like a mother hen, Frank making sure his glasses remained perched atop his nose, and Andrew making sure there was never too much peace in the building.