There'll be an author's note everytime I need to explain something. Okay, so there is an OC in this (Laura), but the other two entering are technically real, but I'm posing them as OCs as to not break the rules. If you want to see them, I left their names as they were. Thank you, and enjoy!
It was an early morning when the door-bell of Elmtree House was buzzed timidly for the fourth time. The dew was resting on the door and the milky sunrise's light danced on the mini-van, showing the world its delight to finally be spring again. Tracy, on her overnight shift, hurriedly put on her fluffy dressing gown as she rushed downstairs. Carmen and Jody followed in pink and brown hoodies, stretching and lazily following Tracy. "Alright, I'm coming, keep your hair on!" Tracy told whoever was at the door as she rushed towards it.
Just as the doorbell rang again, Tracy got to the door and thrust it open, fluffing down her bed hair. There stood three tired teens and a balding man. Tracy stood confused at the door. "Can I help you?" Her voice, mildly helpful, held an undertone of annoyance.
The balding man nodded shyly. "Yes, actually, you can. I am Jon Berry, their social worker. These are Laura Byrnes, Andy Biersack and Johnny Seward, and they're from the recently closed Rosewood House. They were to be moved here. I believe I set up this arrangement with Mike Milligan? Is he here, I would like to speak to him."
Tracy looked suspiciously at the four and welcomed them in warily. "You three can go into the kitchen and get a bit of breakfast, there should be cereal in the press. Mr. Berry, if you could come with me? Mike is in bed but you can wait in the office while I wake him up." Tracy directed. She smiled contentedly to herself at the way she had maturely handled the situation. Now, all she had to do was wake Mike and tell him of the newcomers…And ask why he hadn't told her.
An awkward silence greeted Johnny and Tee as they arrived into the kitchen at breakfast time in the Dumping Ground. All the kids sat, and while every once in a while there was a crunch, a click of metal against a bowl and quiet slurps, it was mostly quiet. Tee took her place next to a new boy. She glanced sleepily at him, not registering that he was new, before doing a double take. Her eyes widened and she looked around the table, this time noticing two other new faces.
She smiled and held out her hand to the boy beside her. "Hello, I'm Tee."
The boy had long-ish black hair, startled blue eyes and almost translucent skin. He blinked before shaking her hand. The only new girl out of the three piped up. "His name is Andy. He's mute, and knows sign language and normally carries a white board with him, but we've yet to find it."
Andy tilted his head to acknowledge what the girl said was true. Tee's smile faded a bit, but then was up full force again. "Oh, that's cool."
The girl didn't notice that the conversation was drooping, and carried on. "I'm Laura, by the way, and that shot stack over there would be Johnny. We've just been moved because Rosewood closed down for some stupid reason. I dunno; I wasn't there when they told us why." She had a lilting accent, Irish but not quite.
Finally, conversation started to open up, and within 10 minutes, everyone was talking to someone else. Toby and Laura seemed to be getting on well, but Johnny and Andy were arguing about something jokingly. It was kind of strange to Tee, seeing only hand movements from Andy and actual words from Johnny. She took note of the new kids, curious.
Andy was tall, maybe 5"7 and was rail thin. He wore a band t-shirt with white skinny jeans. His jet black hair was rather long and his complexion was extremely pale and spotless. His bright blue eyes always seemed to be alert and startled. He seemed very quiet but his expression held something between curiosity and amusement.
Johnny was the opposite; short (5"4 on a good day she presumed) and wore a dark t-shirt as well (was it a trend in their care home, Tee wondered). His jeans were dark and tight but not skinny jeans. His blond-brown hair was in a Mohawk fashion and he was tanned. His chocolate brown eyes were kind. He carried a bag with a Green Day logo on it.
Laura was the only girl and was in between the two boys' height. She had a kink in her dark brown hair but it was mostly straight, and she wore a white spotted black skirt and a tank top with a band slogan on it - which one, Tee couldn't tell. Her brown hazel eyes were unfazed, but she looked drifty.
Gus spoke, but not before making everyone be quiet first. He needed his information. "What are your last names?"
"Andy B-I-E-R-S-A-C-K, but call Johnny's last name Christ and mine is Byrnes. So…Who's everyone here?" Laura supplied.
"Everyone in the Dumping Ground is here now besides Tracy and Mike and Gina but they are talking in the office. So that's Toby, Carmen, Lily, Liam, Frank, Elektra, Johnny and Tee." He pointed at each of the children in turn. "Why are you here?"
"We're in here because Rosewood shut down." Johnny informed him, fiddling with the strap on his bag, not making eye contact anymore and turned to Tracy, just walking in the door. "Can we know which rooms are ours? I'd like to go to sleep for a while." Taken aback, Tracy led them out the door, shooting the other kids a questioning look, and got five bemused ones back. She rolled her eyes at them and showed Johnny a fairly big, empty looking room with no posters or wardrobes or anything.
"There you are. If there's any trouble whatsoever, find Mike, Gina or me and we can try and fix it. Have a good sleep; someone will wake you for lunch. Oh, and you're sharing with Andy; we only have two spare rooms." She kind of awkwardly excused herself. Outside the door, she stopped for a minute to see if there was any noise, or was he actually going to sleep. She heard the rustling of bags and a low hum of something she couldn't recognise. Tracy crept away quietly.
She went to the office, to look at their files. Gina would be coming in and cooking lunch and the house was mostly quiet as all the kids were outside in a rare warm, sunny day. It was noon before Tracy got up and stretched, clicking her back and head whirring on what she had found.
"Tracy?" She snapped out of it to see Carmen staring impatiently at her. She hadn't even heard her come into the office. "Are you coming to play football or what?"
Tracy nodded. "Yeah sure, give me a minute."
She put away the files, stretched again briefly and went off with Carmen to play a game of football with all the children, leaving the two new people who were awake to explore the house. But something was bothering Tracy about the new kids.
The looks in their eyes were not relaxed, no matter how well they tried to hide it. Tracy knew the look well. Her mother's boyfriends had it all the time, no matter what expression they fruitlessly tried to hide it behind. Something was wrong; she had seen a small glimpse of it in their files, but not enough to know the full picture.