**FANG'S POV**

From my bedroom on our third floor balcony I watch as the beautiful girl disappears back into her new house with her little black dog trotting ahead of her. Iggy and Ratchet had been talking to her down the street when I just so happened to pass by on my way home from the basketball court down the street. This girl had silky blonde hair, those intense electric blue eyes, a perfect sun tan, and a body covered by loose clothes to hide her perfect curves. My bedroom door burst open behind me and Iggy entered with Ratchet trailing behind him but I only stared after the girl even though she had already disappeared inside of the house next-door. This family had just moved all of their stuff in a few weeks ago and they just arrived today with four kids and a woman but there wasn't a husband following them.

"Fang!" Iggy exclaims and claps me on the shoulder; I look over at him and shrug off his hand before walking into my bedroom with him trailing behind. "Did you see your new neighbors? Man those three girls were smokin'!" Iggy exclaims dramatically and collapses on the couch in my bedroom in front of my TV. Ratchet was already going through my video games next to the TV; this was always our routine with Iggy being an idiot and Ratchet going straight to the video games.

Iggy's and Ratchet's mom was strict and wouldn't let her kids own a TV or any video games anywhere in the house, so this is where they came to hang out. Our other friends: Star, Nudge, Kate, Holden, JJ, Sam, Dylan, Angel, and Gazzy were all down at the beach today together to get away from their parents. I was grounded because of my little fist fight with an idiot named Brad in the mall after he almost hit Nudge, my younger adopted sister. Of course I wasn't just going to sit by so instead I broke his nose, bruised his ribs, and maybe dislocated his arm for a while and now I was sulking in my bedroom. I have no idea how Iggy and Ratchet got in here in the first place let alone how they snuck past my mom downstairs and snuck up two flights upstairs to get up here. Usually I would just hang out with them and let them dish out what they knew about the new family, and I did the same thing now.

We settled down on my black couch with Modern Warfare 3, "Alright, spill," I say and Iggy grins as he starts to explain exactly what happened on the street. He loves to explain what happened during some of his terrible moments when he feels embarrassed and makes a fool out of himself in the simplest ways.

He explained how his throw had been completely off and almost went into the girls' head if she hadn't have dropped like he said she did almost immediately. Then he explained about her name and how strange it was for a girl to have 'Max' as a name, but I wasn't really listening after the whole football incident. The thing with Iggy is he can fall for a girl so easily and he apparently just fell for, not Max, but Max's younger sister by maybe a few months or so. He saw her walking into the house earlier today and he said it was like love at first sight even though she didn't actually see him standing there, watching them. It was times like these Ratchet and I thought Iggy really was a stalker so we scooted farther away from him on my couch just like always. Our first match started and we fell silent as we blasted through our enemies with me concluding the game by shooting Iggy in the head.

"So, what's this girls' name?" Ratchet asked Iggy while shifting through other video games that included something to do with some zombies.

Iggy sighed dramatically and breathed, "I have no idea," and Ratchet gave him an incredulous look; I rolled my eyes and got to my feet to check out in the hallway. Mom was still downstairs probably working on finding some new couple their first house just liek she always was during hot days like these. Tomorrow school started again meaning we'll all hopefully see the new girls around; Iggy will probably find his little crush first and invite her to sit with us.

My mom was the complete opposite of me where she has dark brown hair I have raven black hair, and she has green eyes but I have almost black eyes. Some people told me I look exactly like my dad even though barely anyone has ever met him; he's always in his office writing one of his books. Part of my black hair falls across my forehead and covers part of my right eye and my obsidian eyes have little gold specks or so I've been told. I have my mom's natural olive-toned skin and, not that I'm bragging or anything, I have a good 8-pack of abs to show when we go down to the beach or something. Of course I'm taller than most people just like my dad was back when he was in high-school; Iggy and I only share or looks in height but other than that we're complete opposites, but we've been best friends since pre-school.

For the next four hours we played video games and pretty much emptied my mini-fridge until it was midnight and the guys left by sneaking downstairs to Nudge's room and going through her window. I settled down for bed under my black comforter and dark, dark green sheets after I heard Nudge's excited chatter quiet down in the room beneath mine. For another minute or two I listened to her banging around for her pajamas and then listened to her bed creak slightly as she got under the blankets for the night. Two barely audible claps sounded and I knew she was giving herself good luck for the night and for tomorrow; I rolled over onto my side to stare out my glass balcony doors. It wasn't long before I started to fall asleep thinking about that girl... Max... such a strange name but just for the right girl in some strange way.

**MAX'S POV**

"Mom I'm back!" I called after I shut the front door behind me and I finally realized it was seven o'clock already and I just now got back from my walk. Total followed me into the kitchen and he immediately started slurping up water from his bowl with his long, pink tongue; I unleashed him and walked out to our living room. There was Maya with Pudding in her lap and she was mindlessly watching TV and flipping through the channels like we usually did when we were bored. "Maya," I call and she looks over at me with a questioning look, "Where's Mom?" and she silently pointed towards the door leading into the basement.

I open the door to the basement and follow the lit stairs down to a long hallway supporting four plain white doors; the second one was cracked open. Mindlessly, I pushed into the room and saw four rows of two three-people couches and two lazy-boy recliners to seat twenty people in the room. On the very front wall was a large screen that looked oddly like a movie-theater screen and in the back was a counter filled with candy, popcorn, and soda machines. I leave that room after not finding my mom and went to the first, in that one was what looked like an art room with easels and paints and everything else. It was filled with neon colors that looked as if they were just splattered onto the walls; I leave when I saw Mom wasn't in there either. Then I go to the third room to find it filled with musical instruments and to see a dance-floor in the very middle of it all but Mom wasn't there either.

The last room was obviously a gym with every exercise equipment piece that you could think of spread around the room and a door to a locker room on the opposite wall. Here, Mom was on one of the treadmills running and sweating; I smirk and enter the room completely where I surprise her to the point she jumped and stumbled on the treadmill. "Hey honey, we were waiting for you so I could finish dinner," she smiles and hops off the treadmill to dab the sweat off her forehead with a throw towel.

Ella and my mom look exactly alike with deep brown eyes, flowing black hair, tanned skin, and a sweetheart personality that just comes naturally. Ari has Jeb's wavy brown hair and dark blue eyes, but they're completely different in so many ways that I don't even want to go on about to make a list. None of us look really, really alike except for Maya and I, but we are TWINS so that makes a lot of sense... unless you're fraternal then it wouldn't make any sense but you know what I mean! Sometimes Maya and I would get mixed up with each other, so when we were in middle school I started to spend most of my time outside. Of course nobody really thought to check our eyes, and I thought it was pretty pointless when Maya got a haircut that brushed her shoulders just slightly to make a cute sort of bob, but she liked it in the end.

Dinner went by slowly and I scarfed down seven homemade tacos before I was 'dismissed' from the table and I jogged up two flights of stairs to my bedroom. It was always quiet at dinner unless there's something to talk about like school and such but we really weren't in the mood to bond or anything. Mom and Ella seemed to be the only ones of the five of us to love this place while it was okay in my eyes, but I really wanted to go home. My nerves were going to burst soon if I don't find something to do to let out all my anger; back in Arizona I would get into street-fights but I doubt there are any of those in perfect little California. Why California out of every other state in the U.S.? It's right next to Arizona! The move was pointless in every way! Yes, Jeb is in the prison closest to our town but I didn't really care because I could fight him off now since he and Mom got divorced!

Ella follows behind and she rushes into my bedroom before I can shut and lock my bedroom door, "Wait for me Max! I have a proposition for you!" she exclaims.

"And what is that?" I ask her and pull off my t-shirt so I was in my tank-top and then I looked over at her to see her hesitating and running her hands through her hair over and over again. "Spit it out!" I snap and she yanked her phone from her back pocket before showing me a video she took earlier about three days ago. I gasped when I saw it was me in the middle of a street-fight against a twenty-seven-year-old man named Bone Crusher down in the ring. How the heck did she get her hands on this? "Ella! Where did you find this?" I exclaim and shut the door to my room hurriedly, but now she was grinning evilly.

She says, "I have my sources. Now, you have to do what I say or I will show this to Mom," and I groan but slowly nod my head in agreement and Ella squeals. "Great! You have to let me pick out your outfit for the whole school year! You don't have to let me do your makeup but you have to at least wear mascara and eyeliner!" I closed my mouth because I knew she wasn't kidding about showing Mom that footage of me and that stupid man that thought he could take me down. If she showed Mom, I would be watched every moment of the rest of my life by my sisters and I would never get to leave the house by myself ever again if it was under her command.

"Fine," I mutter under my breath and she squeals again before giving me a long hug, a warning, and then she left my bedroom with the door shutting behind her. I changed into my pajama bottoms and pull Total up onto my bed with me to tuck him under my arm and stroke his soft fur quietly as I think. Then I fall asleep while dreading what tomorrow would bring for me...

*The Next Morning*

"Ohhh Maxie," a voice taunts me in my subconscious; I reach up and smack whoever in the face before rolling over only to hear a little yip of pain. I mutter an apology after Total hops from my bed and dashes out of the room when he hears my mom opening the bag of dog food downstairs. "Ouch!" that stupid voice squeaks and starts shaking my shoulder until I grab a heavy pillow and smack the person in the face with it. I'm so not a morning person if you haven't noticed already and this person was actually stupid enough to try and get me up at what has to be six-something in the morning by the temperature. Yes, I can tell what time it supposedly is by the temperature hanging in the air; yeah, I'm a little weird and I'm happy to admit that. "Just get up or I'm going to go show Mom the footage right now!" the voice I finally recognize as Ella shouts and she stomps her foot like a child.

I groan loudly and smack her once more before throwing my blankets off of my legs and throw my legs over the side of the bed, "Fine, I'm up." Ella glares daggers at me but starts ordering me to shower while she fixes an outfit for me and so on before I shut the bathroom door in her face. My shower was short but refreshing and I scrubbed my face and hair of any dirt or grease or whatever gets on your face and hair when you're sleeping. Then I stepped back into my bedroom wrapped in a dark blue towel to see an outfit folded on my bed with shoes and jewelry included.

For a second I consider showing my mom the video myself so it doesn't make it seem like I was never going to tell her, but I suck it up and change anyways. I end up in dark wash jean short-shorts with small fashionable rips in them and a black t-shirt with 'COME AT ME BRO' on the front in blue and white. Then the jewelry consisted of black hand-grenade earrings and a matching black hand-grenade necklace, a dark blue flower ring, and a black rubber bracelet that says 'YOU MAD BRO?' on it in white. She left me some blue sunglasses and my dark blue sling bag that goes over my head and crosses my front body diagonally just like I like the only purses I'll wear. This was an okay outfit and I only put on a brush or two of eyeliner on my eyelid and some mascara along my eyelashes; I was okay with makeup that was barely noticeable until you got close enough to see it.

Finally, I leave my bedroom and jog downstairs with my sling bag hitting my side and I scoop up my few books and such on my way out of my bedroom. Everything was in this one big awesome binder since I don't have textbooks yet meaning I didn't need a bag to carry my stuff around all day. The rest of my family was already gathered around the table eating by the time I had finished my nine pieces of bacon, two eggs, and three pieces of toast. Mom left for work with a kiss to our heads and I brushed out my finally dry wavy blonde hair right before I grabbed my stuff again walked everyone out to the bus-stop. My car was on its way here by some random dude since Mom didn't want me driving it all the way here by myself even though I am almost eighteen. I was an awesome driver, by the way, but I was restricted from my car last week for my fourteenth speeding ticket in two months.

For other kids were waiting at the bus-stop when we got there but they were all younger than Maya, Ella, and me; we soon figured out they were going to Ari's school. A younger boy Ari's age told Ari they would be best friends and I watched the two of them climb onto the bus together; I rolled my eyes at this, though. "Max!" Maya suddenly exclaimed and pointed up the street where our house was and I saw that a man had suddenly pulled up in my dark blue mustang.

"Forget the bus!" Ella cheered as we rushed towards the car and I went through showing the man my license and explaining that the mustang is my car until he handed over the keys. He left in a taxi a moment later and I hopped into my preciously clean car to put down the roof and start it up to back right back out of the driveway after sliding on my awesome blue sunglasses. Maybe today was my lucky day; I mean my car just happened to pull up when I needed it to and I didn't get stuck at any red-lights on my way to the high school.

Of course Maya took over the radio to turn on 'Playing God' by Paramore and I cranked up the music to full notch even when we pulled into the parking lot of Ridgefield High. Everyone in the parking lot turned to look at the newbie's that just decided to roll right in with their music on pull blast; I turned off my car and the music went silent. Maya and I got out first and then Ella jumped over the side of the car from the backseat; I shoved my car keys into my bag and slowly take off my sunglasses just to show off, but I was seriously uneasy about all of the attention we were getting. I'm hoping my tan was covering up the very faint scars running up my legs and arms from dear-old-Jeb; I started towards the front doors of the school. We tuned in all of the conversations about us going around the parking lot only to smirk to ourselves from everything we heard.

"Dude the one in the front is hot!" and "But her twin is hot, too!" and then, "ONE FOR BOTH OF US!", "The younger one is also pretty hot", "You have a girlfriend! Besides that one is MINE!" I tuned them out after that and continued to the front doors without even giving any of them a second glance; I put my sunglasses in my bag on the way inside. Immediately boys inside also started to talk and stare and talk in whispers; Maya and I shot them warning looks but Ella reveled in it happily.