Julian- 16, Shelby-6

((thanks to bandcrazy01 for telling me about that coding error, i had no idea that happened; also thank you for the review!))

Yellow was his favorite color so it made sense that his nails were usually yellow.

Julian had gotten in the habit of coloring his nails. It started off as a joke, something that kept the ankle-biters happy when it was his turn as babysitter. But then he found he quite liked the look of the random colors on his hands. Today, unfortunately, his nails were blue. He'd woken up feeling a little sad and he couldn't pinpoint exactly why.

"Can I paint your nails again?"

Julian looked up from his laptop to see Shelby looking at him from across the room. She was holding a few nail polishes in her hands–ones he suspected she'd either made come to life from her drawings or "borrowed" from one of the older girls.

"Of course, I'm always down to have my favorite girl paint my nails." Julian stood up and walked over to her. Shelby clapped her hands as he sat down to face her.

"What color do you want?" Shelby took one of his hands and looked at the already existing deep blue. "This is very pretty."

"Thank you," said Julian. "And I want whatever you think would look nice on me."

Shelby gave him a toothy grin at that. She'd started losing her baby teeth a while back and there was a gap in her mouth where one of her front teeth should be.

Julian watched as Shelby looked at each color one by one, mumbling to herself and seemingly eliminating choices in her mind. He thought about how she reminded him of his own sister back home. She was around Shelby's age but their mother had decided that she would make the choice when she was of age, just like he did. He couldn't wait for her to learn her own path.

"This one."

Julian focused on Shelby again and he saw she was holding up a polish of gold glitter paint.

"Looks good," Julian complimented her. "You have great taste."

"Thank you," Shelby beamed at him. "Give me your hands."

He obeyed and sat as still as he could while she painted his nails.

There were times where Julian felt homesick. Nearly everyone here did at some point. But with moments like these around every corner, those feelings were soothed. He'd found another home here. He hummed to himself, watching as his nails went from blue to gold.