"Taylor sweetie, what are you doing up?"
"I couldn't sleep" she answered crawling into the Bolton's bed and laid down next to Lucille who hugged her tight and rubbed her back.
"Feel better now?" Taylor nodded into her neck and let her tears fall. She hadn't known the Bolton's for very long but she felt closer to them than she felt towards her own mom and brother. Her mom being a 45 year old single mom in New York felt that life was hard and turned to drugs. Her older brother James was 30, he was the outcome of their mom's relationship with her high school sweetheart, Jonathan. He died when James was only 3 years old, he was on his way to work when he was in a car accident that's all Taylor ever got to know. Her mom didn't want to bring up any bad memories. Taylor's own dad Matthew was apparently a successful lawyer in Los Angeles, she had never met him since he apparently wasn't ready to have a family and didn't want anything to do with them. Life hadn't been easy for either of the Mc.Kessies.
"Shh, its okay sweetie just let it all out" Lucille rubbed her back until her crying stopped and she was asleep.
-----
The next morning Taylor was the first one to wake up, she carefully got out of bed and tip toed out of the room so that she wouldn't wake the Bolton's up and made her way downstairs. As she reached the bottom of the stairs she heard someone walking around in the kitchen. Her breathing hitched and she looked around for a good weapon, she needed to defend herself with something. Spotting an umbrella over by the door she sneaked her way over there and grabbed the umbrella, making her way to the kitchen she considered going back upstairs and pretend like this wasn't happening that a stranger wasn't in the kitchen looking through their cabinets for something. Sneaking up behind the man in the kitchen she failed to see the second man by the toaster as she only had her eyes set on the man looking through the refrigerator.
"Troy?" the second one said carefully trying to warn the young man with his head in the refrigerator, Taylor spun around and saw the second one, she didn't know what to do anymore it was now two against one there was no way that she was gonna get out of this alive. She took a defensive stand and looked cautiously at the two men looking at her with bewildered expressions.
"Jack!" she cried after several failed attempts at yelling for help. She was relieved when she heard footsteps running down the stairs.
"What is going on in here?!" Jack yelled as he saw Taylor stand with an umbrella ready to swing at his son and friend.
"Dad, who's that?" Troy asked pointing at Taylor who still hadn't let go of the umbrella.
"Taylor sweetie, you can let go of the umbrella, that's our son Troy and his friend Chad, they're not gonna hurt you" Taylor nodded and put the umbrella down but she still looked unsure of having, to her, two complete strangers in the house. She hadn't left the house since she got to Albuquerque three weeks ago and wasn't planning on going outside anytime soon. The outside world was a scary place.
"Not to be rude but what is she doing here?"
"She lives here, now here's a better question, what are you doing here?" Jack asked his son and friend.
"Summer vacation, remember how I told you I would be coming back for that?"
"Yeah"
"Well summers here and so am I and Chad's just here for the free food" Troy said pointing over to his friend who was busy eating a doughnut while staring at Taylor. Taylor shifted uncomfortable and looked anywhere but the two young men.
"You two stop staring and fix your bags I don't want them in my kitchen" Troy nodded and pumped fists with Chad before grabbing his two bags and headed up the stairs while Chad left through the backdoor to go home.
"I'm sorry we didn't tell you about Troy coming home for the summer it completely slipped my mind" Lucille said stroking Taylor's hair out of her eyes.
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"A little help here!" Chad said a he tried to climb in to Troy's room, it looked easy enough from the ground but climbing that tree and then swinging to the window wasn't that easy at all.
"You could have used the front door" Troy grunted as he tried to pull Chad in through the window. He finally fell in to the room and slowly stood up looking around the room.
"Where's the fun in that besides now I can surprise that Taylor girl, man she was fine!"
"Dude stay away from her!"
"Alright you don't have to yell at me, I was just joking, but she is pretty fine" Chad said sitting down on Troy's bed and putting his feet up so that they were hanging over the footboard. Troy sat down on his desk chair with a sigh.
"She is pretty cute but mom said she's had a rough time so she doesn't need us drooling over her"
"Fine with me I had my eyes set on Gabi anyway"
"You mean that brunette freshman right?"
"That's the one" Chad smiled tossing Troy's stuffed basketball to Troy who threw it back and so a game of horse was started.
-----
"Come on let's ask Taylor if she wants to play some basketball cause this shit is boring as hell!" Chad exclaimed as he threw the stuffed basketball into Troy's desk drawer before he made his way out of Troy's room and down to the kitchen where Taylor was sitting reading a book as the Bolton's were out in the backyard attending to Lucille's garden. It wasn't a very big garden considering a basketball court was only a few feet away.
"Hey Taylor?" she looked up and found Chad or in her case the 'bushy haired one' followed by Troy "wanna play some basketball, Troy's great and all but I need some entertainment, so wanna play" Taylor looked out in the garden and saw the Bolton's laughing and she started to think that the backyard wasn't like the park, the only people here were the Bolton's and a bushy haired guy.
"Sure" she marked the page in her book and slowly got up and followed the two out the backdoor. The fresh air felt cold against her skin and she felt a sense of freedom at the same time she felt scared, she couldn't get passed the feeling of someone watching her. She smiled uneasily over at Lucille and Jack as they looked at her with surprise clearly written on their faces but they still smiled over at her, glad that she was starting to get over her fears.