A/N- Hello there, one and all. I know that Neighbors (or, where I'm from, Bad Neighbours) has an absolutely teeny-tiny category, but this fic is an idea that I've had bubbling around my head for a while, so I'm saying 'fuck it' and posting it up! I'm trying a new angle here: little to no romance. Will there be hints? You'll just have to wait and see. By the way, I'm English, not American. If I fuck up any words, or put in something typically English, just let me know!

Chapter One- Best Friends For Never

"Britney Applegate?"

"Here."

"Carson Ashwell?"

"Yeah."

"Lena Bailey?"

"Yup."

"Pete Carter?"

"Yeah."

"Dana Fargate?"

"Here, sir."

"Andrew Jameson?"

"I'm here."

"Michael King?"

"Yo."

"Tommy Palmer?"

"Present."

"NERD!"

"Michael, for God's sake, boy, grow up! You're twenty-one! Korbyn Radner? ...Korbyn? ...Korbie!"

I started, looking blearily up from engraving a star on my desk with my compass. "Hm? What? Oh! Er, sorry, Professor Bright. Here."

"Thank you so much for returning to us, Korbie," Professor Bright said dryly, rolling his eyes. "You won't be building too many stable houses in the future if you can't even pay attention to Attendance."

"Sorry sir," I apologized again, stifling a yawn. "My brother's baby girl is teething; she kept me up most of the night with her crying."

I had to give it to her: Stella had a serious set of lungs. I'd gone to bed just after 10. Stella had woken up at 12 and started screaming, waking up Mac and Kelly, and subsequently me. It was now coming up for half 2, and she really was showing no signs of letting up.

I was bundled up under my duvet, hugging my plushie Spider-Man with my Beats clamped over my ears in an attempt to muffle the noise. But apparently, those headphones weren't as soundproof as I thought because I could still. Hear. Fucking. Crying.

"Oh my God!" I grumbled exasperatedly, pushing away the duvet and pulling off the headphones, throwing them down on the carpet in irritation. "I am never having kids." I grabbed my robe and shrugged it on over my pajamas. Not bothering to do it up, I stumbled out of my room and across the hallway into Stella's.

Mac and Kelly were already in there - they had been since Stella had first started crying. Kelly looked completely harassed. She had a still-screaming Stella in her arms, jiggling her daughter up and down in an attempt to calm her. It really was not working.

Mac, meanwhile, was just being a total man: sitting in the chair by the window, looking panicked at Stella, then running his hands through his hair, looking at Kelly, then looking freaked out. Specifically in that order.

"Man, what the fuck did you give that kid before you put her to bed?" I yawned, stretching my arms above my head and trying not to flash my brother the tattoo of a dream-catcher on my hip that he'd disapproved of for the last three years. Mac was pretty chill with nearly everything - I mean, the man smoked weed in the house, for fuck sake - but he hated my tattoos. I think it was because it reminded him that I was now twenty-one, an adult, and not just his baby sister anymore. He especially hated the skull I had on my left shoulder.

"Milk!" he retorted, folding his arms. "We gave her fucking breast milk!"

"I think she's ill!" Kelly cried in her Australian accent. "She never...she never cries like this! What if it's meningitis, or septicemia...or chicken pox!"

"Okay, first, there is a serious difference between meningitis and septicemia and the chicken pox," I reminded her. "And second, girl, wouldn't she have a rash?"

"Well what the fuck else could be wrong with her?!" she demanded; clearly the lack of sleep was making Kelly tetchy.

"Dude, I have had just as little sleep as you, do not start getting snippy with me," I warned her. "She hasn't got fucking meningitis, calm your shit. Look, give her to me. I'll see if I can work some magic."

"No, Korbyn, I really don't-" Kelly began, but Mac cut across her.

"Come on, babe, just let her try. Korbie babysat for fucking years before college."

"And you know how much Stel loves me," I said, pouting. "How many times have I calmed her down in the last six months? Exactly. Hand her over." I held out my arms and wiggled my fingers at her, and Kelly relented, passing the now-sobbing-rather-than-screaming Stella to me.

"Hey, baby girl," I cooed at her red, tear-streaked face as she cried at me. "Come on, Stella, don't cry for Auntie Korbie." Cue Stella crying even harder. "Fuck. Okay, um...oh! I think I know what the problem is!" At that point, Stella had attempted to bite my bare shoulder, and a little light bulb went off in my head.

I sat down in the chair by the window after evicting Mack from it, being careful not to startle Stella even more. I gently placed a finger on one of her lips and softly lifted it up. There, in the middle of her top gum, the little white cap of a tooth was poking through. "I knew it. She's teething, you idiots."

The looks of relief that fell over Mac and Kelly's faces were priceless; they both looked like they were about to pass out from sheer release. Kelly let out a breathy laugh and placed her hand over her heart, while Mac just stuck his middle finger up at me.

"Fucking hell, Korbie, like you couldn't have just said that to start with!" he said.

"Er, Mac, I'm not trying to be funny but to start with I didn't know that," I pointed out. "Kel, have you got any of that soothing gel you can put in your mouth?"

"There's some in the bathroom cabinet," she replied, having passed relief and now sounding completely drained.

"Right," I said, standing up, keeping Stella in my arms. "You two go to bed, I'll wrap up here."

"Korbie, you don't have to do that," Kelly insisted.

"No, seriously, it's fine," I replied, already heading out of the room with Stella. "You guys were actually like, up-up way earlier than me. Get some sleep, it's fine. Please."

"Thanks Korb, you rock," Mac said appreciatively, punching me on the shoulder.

"Yeah, yeah," I said, brushing him off. "Just go, for fuck sake, before I change my mind."

So as my brother and sister-in-law snuggled back into bed and quickly fell straight back to sleep, the bastards, I was sitting back in Stella's room with my niece in my arms, rubbing soothing gel into her mouth and holding her until 3am, which is when she finally fell asleep.

I placed her back in her crib, pressed a kiss to her forehead and said, "Night, baby girl. I'll always be here for you," before heading back into my own room, crawling under the covers and shutting myself down until my alarm went off at 5.45.

"Well next time, may I suggest a pair of earplugs?" Professor Bright now offered, causing me to scowl at him.

"Now why didn't I think of that?" I said sarcastically. "Oh wait, I did. It didn't work."

"Attitude, Korbyn, we've had this conversation before," Bright said sharply. I didn't say anything, so he continued with Attendance. "Amira-Jane Riley?"

AJ, my best friend since I started college, smirked at me as she waved her hand in the air. "Yeah, sir. You got me."

That left one name on the Attendance sheet.

"Teddy Sanders?" No answer. "Teddy?" Still nothing. "Teddy Sanders, are you here?" I rolled my eyes. Surprise, surprise, Teddy cut class. Again. We had a grand total of four months left of our senior year at Braxton University, and Teddy had skipped pretty much every other class we'd had since the beginning of the year. Hell, since the beginning of college. Not that I was shocked, the guy was a fucking moron.

Bright removed his reading glasses and placed them back on his desk, sighing. He never bothered commenting on Teddy's absences anymore. After three and a half years, he was used to it. I could see him muttering something as he consulted another bit of paper, crossing something off of it, then writing something else.

"Okay," he said, standing up and looking over the ten of us that were in the class. Architecture wasn't exactly a popular major. "You've been back from spring break for what, a week? You've had time to get back in the groove of working, so I'm setting you all a kind of prep project." A groan rose up from the class. "Calm down, guys, you're not doing it by yourselves. I'm putting you into groups of two-"

"So pairs?" piped up AJ.

"Yes, AJ, pairs," said Bright. "I'm putting you into pairs, and over the next month you are going to be designing a eco-friendly waste system for a bungalow that leads to a drain system outside."

Sounds like a really charming topic, I thought, flicking my black hair over my shoulder and pulling a face at AJ, who crossed her eyes back at me and giggled.

"Is there a problem, Korbyn?" Shit, he'd seen me.

"No," I said quickly. "Nope. Absolutely zero problem over here."

"Oh good," he said, consulting his piece of paper again. "Right. Lena and Britney, you're together. Carson and Andrew, you two. Michael and Tommy, you. AJ and Dana. Korbyn, you were going to be a three with AJ and Dana, but since Teddy isn't here, Korbyn and Pete."

"Oh, fan-fucking-tastic," I muttered under my breath, and as the class stood up I saw AJ mouth, "Shit," at me.

Pete Carter and I had known each other since the first grade. We'd grown up in Ardendale together. While the other boys at school had run around kicking soccer balls about or playing basketball, and the girls sat with their Barbies and their Bratz dolls, Pete and I would be sitting in the sandbox building castles and houses out of the sand and Duplo blocks. We slept round each others' houses, went out on our bikes after school, and if we came back splattered in mud - until we were like nine - one of our moms would put us in the same bath.

Pete and I were joined at the hip. Even through high school, we'd stayed together, even though he was your typical hot high school guy while I was leaning more towards being the alternative, Goth-like girl. But the summer before we started college, things changed.

Both of us had been accepted at Braxton University to do Architecture, and we were psyched. Then Pete's parents got divorced, and something in him snapped. I tried to be there for him, but suddenly, he stopped calling me. Stopped texting me. Stopped seeing me. The few times I did get through to him, he just cried, got angry and shouted at me.

So I stopped trying. We only saw each other when we would meet up once a week to go through the official stuff for Braxton. He'd decided he was going to try and join a fraternity; Delta Psi Beta, the biggest frat on campus. So, in an attempt to show him that I was still his friend and would always be there for him, I pledged for Zeta Tau Phi. Both of us were accepted to our chosen houses.

That's when Pete met Teddy, and I met AJ. AJ, with her blonde hair and brown eyes and petite figure. We looked like chalk and cheese, but personality-wise, we were almost identical. Same love of crappy comedy movies, superheros and all things WWE. The only thing we disagreed on was who we thought should be Divas Champion. She said her namesake, AJ Lee, whilst I insisted Brie Bella deserved the title again.

Pete, meanwhile, rapidly changed into another version - albeit, a smarter version - of Teddy. For almost four years, the two of them had worked their way up through Delta Psi until Teddy became President at the start of senior year, with Pete as his VP.

Me? I'd hated every second of my time as a sorority sister. Everyone but AJ was bitchy, vapid, high-pitched and just plain fucking annoying. I hated most of them, and I'm pretty sure the feeling was mutual. So when my older-by-fourteen-years brother Mac had announced that he and his wife, Kelly, were moving into a three-bedroomed house that was a twenty minute drive from the university, I backed out of Zeta Tau Phi as quickly as I could and moved in with them, on Mac's condition that I help look after their, at the time, newborn daughter Stella.

So that's where I've been the last borderline-seven months, away from the bitchiness and the stupid girls, able to just be me.

"Oh my God, Jesus is trying to make me kill myself this week," I hissed to AJ as I passed her, and she patted me comfortingly on the arm. I stood by the computer Pete had sat down by and slammed by bag down on the table next to it, dragging up a chair and sitting down on it, crossing one leg over the other and folding my arms. "Carter. Long time, no speak." No exaggeration, we had classes together every other day but Pete and I hadn't directly spoken in about four weeks.

"Radner," he greeted me, looking up from the computer and raking his eyes over me. "Looking understated as ever."

"Oh, bite me," I growled. It was no secret that I liked to dress a little differently to girls my age. Today, the outfit of choice was a tank top that read 'My body, my tattoo, my choice, fuck you,' black Doc Martens boots and turquoise jeans that were the exact same shade as the highlights in my hair.

"Already have," he quipped. "You didn't taste that great. Like dirt and spite, even when we were ten."

"Look, Pete," I said, trying to keep my cool. "We are not gonna get through the next month of this project without killing each other if we can't just be civil."

"Hey man, I tried to be civil, you're the one who jumped down my fucking throat."

"No, you were ripping the shit out of my clothes!"

"I was just saying-"

"No, you were just being an asshole!"

"Korbyn!" Oh God, Bright had intervened. "Pete, is there a problem?"

"No, Professor, just some creative differences," Pete said smoothly as I sat there fuming.

"After five minutes?" Bright questioned.

"Korbie's very opinionated," Pete replied, and I scowled at him.

"Just try to keep the shouting at a minimum, okay?" Bright said, walking over to check out...I mean, check on AJ and Dana.

I plastered a very obviously fake smile on my face. "So how's life over at Delta Psi? Still torturing those pledges of yours?" You always knew who the Delta pledges were on-site; they were the ones in bright pink crop tops that sported highly derogatory nicknames on them.

"It's initiation," Pete was quick to defend. "We all had to go through it too."

I snorted. "Yeah, and you looked like a fucking idiot, Dogfuck." I reminded him of the nickname he'd been given for freshman year.

"But," he said, ignoring my dig. "We're moving houses. Too many brothers, not enough space."

"Oh yeah? Where you moving to?"

"Some place like a half hour away," he replied. "Sick house, we beat out this gay couple for it. We're moving in on Saturday."

"Nice," I said dryly. "Beating out a gay couple for a house. I bet you and Teddy are super proud of yourselves."

"Hey man, we didn't make them not raise their offer," Pete pointed out, dragging up a big sheet of paper from a cubbyhole under the desk and chucking out some markers too.

"Well, I'm sure you and your boyfriend will be very happy in your new house," I said, taking a red marker and printing ECO-FRIENDLY WASTE SYSTEM at the top of the paper. "And I seriously pity your new neighbors." Delta Psi parties were famous around campus; famous for being loud, bright and last all night. Those poor neighbors didn't know what was going to hit them.

Class dragged on so, so slowly. I had classes on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, two classes a day for an hour and a half at a time. Today was Wednesday, and I was so tired already. Even without Stella's rough night, I would still have been tired. My run-in with my ex-best friend had drained me.

As soon as two o'clock hit, I was out of class, pushing past Pete, AJ, everyone, just to get out of school and into the parking lot. I located my red Fiat 500 - a 21st birthday present from Mom and Dad - and clambered into the driver's seat, chucking my bag in the passenger seat and peeling out of the lot.

I was home by half past. Kelly's car was in the garage and Mac was still at work, so there was plenty of space for me to park in the driveway for a change.

"Kelly? Stella? Are you here?" I called as I opened the door, just in case they'd gone to the park down the road or something.

"Hey Korbie!" Kelly called from the kitchen. "How was your day?"

"Shitty," I replied, kicking off my boots and mooching through to the living room, where Stella was sitting in her jumper-seat, giggling away to herself. "Hey Stella! How's my favourite little niece, huh?" She laughed at me and clapped before turning her attention back to the toys on her jumper. Clearly Kelly had been dosing her up on soothing gel all day.

"What happened today, then?" Kelly asked, coming through to the living room with two mugs of cappuccino. She handed one to me and we both sat down on the sofa, curling our legs up.

I sighed. "We've got this project in Architecture and Professor Bright divvied us all up into pairs."

"So I guess you weren't put with AJ?" Kelly said sympathetically.

"You would be correct," I said grimly. "Instead, he's put me with...um...did I ever tell you about Pete Carter?"

"Is he the boy you used to be close to when Mac and I started dating?"

I nodded. "And way after, too. Pete and I were besties until like, three years ago."

"He's the one who turned into an arsehole?"

I nodded again, smiling at Kelly's pronunciation of 'ass.' "Yeah, that one. His normal partner wasn't in class - not that that's a surprise, Teddy never is - so Bright glued me to him instead of putting me with AJ and Dana like he was going to, the bastard."

"Is he still a total dick?" Kelly sipped her coffee almost intelligently.

"We spent half of the lesson arguing, let's use that as an answer. We've gotta to this project for the next fucking month and I swear to God, I'll end up killing him by the end of next week. It's like I never even knew him, and it sucks."

Kelly placed her mug down on the coffee table and took my free hand in both of hers. "Fuck him," was all she said, grinning at me. "Obviously he's an idiot if he dumped you for some frat boy."

"Oh Jesus, don't say dumped," I said, grimacing. "It makes it sound like we dated and we so did not." Okay, yes, there had been a few months in our sophomore year of high school where it looked like things might have developed that way, but that was quashed almost as quickly as it was started.

So for the next three hours Kelly and I sat around drinking coffee, gossiping and playing with Stella. As evening drew in, the little girl started to get a bit grizzly. Her soothing medicine was wearing off and she was starting to get pissy with anything and everything.

I held her in my arms as she made irritated whining noises, and Kelly was attempting to cheer her up with a rattle, a teddy bear, my iPhone. I'd protested quite loudly about that last one, especially after Stella had started gumming on it before deciding she didn't like it any more and dropped it.

"Oh my God, where is that fucking gel?!" I demanded.

"I'm not giving her anymore, I'll end up OD'ing her!" said Kelly.

"You can't OD on soothing gel! You can practically eat the whole fucking tube!" I snapped. I handed Stella over to her and ran a hand through my hair. "Stel, as much as I love you, you are causing me some serious stress right now."

It was at that point Kelly and I both heard the front door open, and Mac appeared in the hallway, closing the door behind him. "There are the girls!" he said with a smile.

"What's up, bro," I said. "It feels like I haven't seen you for like two days." Wednesdays were my early days; I was out of the house at 7am to get to Braxton for my 8am class, and Mac didn't leave the house until 8, so I hadn't seen him since last night's totally fun (not) all-nighter.

"Hey sis," he said, dumping his bag by the living room door and joining us. "How's it going, sweetie?" he asked Kelly.

"Good," she said, smiling back at him.

"What's happening?" he questioned, holding out his arms for Stella, who Kelly gratefully handed over.

"She's excited to see you," Kelly told him, even though Stella was still making her 'I'm pissed off with you all' noises.

"Wait, wait. Hey," Mac cooed at Stella, making her look at him. He started waggling his tongue about, making 'blurh' noises at her until she stopped whinging and started to giggle. He looked between me and Kelly triumphantly. "Man, parenting is easy! Look at that!"

"Yeah, for two hours a day," said Kelly, and I detected a hint of resentment in her tone.

"Yeah, Mac," I said, folding my arms. "I parent your kid more than you do."

A/N- So that's chapter one. I'm using this one to establish characters, relationships, set the scene and whatnot. Sorry not much movie stuff happened, but I do have my own storyline to add in as well. So let me know what you think! I know the Neighbors category is so small, so if you're reading this, gimme a follow, a favourite, a review, just something to let me know how you're liking it, and I hope to update soon! Happy New Year, one and all! Xx Gee xX

PS- I'm developing a Polyvore page for Korbie's outfits. You'll find that link on my profile, along with links to the actresses I'd have play Korbie and AJ, and also a picture of Korbie's car. Check 'em out!

PPS- I'm in the process of making a kind of trailer for the fic, but I'll have more details on that as and when it happens :D