(Disc.: As always, I don't own LoDt. I only own the original characters featured. They are based partially on friends and people I've known. I hope you are able to see yourself at least a little in one or more of the characters.)
Gypsies, Tramps and Thieves
Chapter 1: Sunset in Venice
The sun was setting. Five kids shuffled out of the van and up toward a dingy gray house. Not a care in the world, except for their own lives. Options left were limited. Five more kids the foster system had failed. They were all on the verge of being sent to a detention center, this was their last resort. The lowest of the low. This was the floor they could not fall below. This was the eerie calm just before the storm hit, the storm of juvenile delinquency. It would tear them apart and glue them back together, all in the same summer. The summer the five Apuro children (if you could call them that) arrived at the home (if you could call it that) of Skip Engblom, in Venice, California. Local-proclaimed 'Ghetto by the sea'. The peace shattered, scraping of wheels on cement, chattering of teens, joking, pushing, banter. All in the distance, fading away once more.
The siblings were greeted (sort of) by a skinny, tallish, average man of about 30. Shoulder length dirty blond hair, green eyes, cigarette dangling from lips, bottle of liquor clutched in left hand. The van drove off, rather quickly.
"What?" Came the half-drunken, half-stoned slur.
"What do you think?" The eldest Apuro spoke.
Arrow's black eyes pierced the other man's challengingly. The shoulder length black hair swayed in the breeze. Rather tall, not quite the tallest of the clan. His fierce hatred for the world in general slid casually from his words. The four others surrounded him. All ranging in various ages and heights, they backed him strongly.
"Oh. Right. Fosters or something. Well." He spoke in broken fragments.
"Well, are you just gonna stand there like an idiot and stare or what?" The youngest, Azure, a boy of only thirteen, spoke softly.
Short in stature, gentle in nature, with peaceful pale blue eyes and ordinary mouse-brown hair to about the ears. Barely a word escaped his lips as a general statement.
"I… no."
"Oh for heaven's sake, where the hell are we supposed to stay you drunken, stoned hippie?" The outspoken voice of 15 year old Lily cut through the air anxiously.
She brushed a strand of her angle-cut platinum hair out of her face, the piece dyed lime green. The dark brown orbs bored into the green eyes harshly, tired of funny business. Short, no taller than 4 feet, 10 inches, and scrawny all over, but packed full of energy, anger, and persuasion. Self proclaimed 'chica bonita'.
Well, that certainly broke the awkwardness of the moment. The man, proclaimed Skip, stepped aside and pointed toward a small room wordlessly, a single room at the back of the house.
"Oh I know we ain't all about to sleep in one room!" Kass shouted indignantly.
Sixteen years old, eyes the colour of fresh honey in the early summer months, about 6 feet tall, the tallest of the children, and very curvy. Waist length curly brunette hair with red highlights tumbled down her back in tangles, just the way she preferred it. The surrogate mother of the clan was about as girly as they came. Never one to get dirty without justifiable reason, she was as hot-tempered as her younger sister.
"Yup." Was the slurred answer.
The last child spoke not a word of the conditions. This was Carmen, the other of the free spirits, the two hippies; twin to Lily, she was athletic and lanky, preferring to run around with the boys of the neighborhood. Chin length black hair, vibrant blue highlights frightened most old people. Just the way she preferred them. 5'7 in frame, she was to become quickly swept into the skating craze. The caramel eyes were full of determinedness and fire. Known to avoid most social situations involving unknown strangers, she held her close-knit group of writing pals together, the everlasting glue.
"Let's just make the best of it, then. The lot of you, let's get moving. Go! Into the house! I want to establish sleeping arrangements. You did remember to put out mattresses, you insufferable git?" Kass turned to Skip sharply after pacing across the front porch. And with the final word from the mother of the pack, they all entered, single file, clutching their single stuffed suitcases.
And so begins the trek, the trek of five foster siblings into uncertainty of a new 'father', new living conditions, a new neighborhood, and a new batch of mischief.
