Chapter 21- Never Ending Chaos

Disclaimer: As usual, I don't own MSA Ghost or its characters, all of this belongs to MysteryBen27 and company. I merely own my ideas and a laptop to type them on. NOW GO ENJOY THE CHAPTER!

Note: Keep in mind that a lot of the English you see in this chapter is actually Italian being spoken by the characters. I just found it too weird to put everything in Italian and have to explain translations. Just keep in mind that there is a lot more Italian speaking than shown.

"That," my mom sighed angrily, pointing to the purple handkerchief I wore around my neck, "Is not a formal tie! Didn't I tell you to change that before we left? Oh gosh, and I never even noticed this until we were almost there!"

"I'm sorry I forgot, Mom! I was busy helping you make cannolis, remember?" I replied, nervously dusting off the black pants I wore with my formal vest. To be honest, I wasn't that sorry at all. The satin handkerchief fit much better with my plaid, purple vest than any other tie could. I was glad I went with the handkerchief and didn't regret it at all.

"I'm just trying to make you look presentable for the family." My mom stated, taking in a deep breath.

Every Thanksgiving, we would all gather at my cousin Alfonso's house, since they lived in an area filled with houses that were the equivalent sizes of baby mansions. They were enormous! On both the insides and outsides of the houses there, they were all extremely fancy. I was fairly stressed out, but excited because I was meeting up with my eccentric relatives again.

Both my mom's and dad's sides of the family would come for Thanksgiving because my parents' great grandparents were best friends, and after my parents got wed, the friendship turned into a family relationship, and we all got along incredibly well. There were barely ever serious fights in our family, and if there were, someone was always there to break it up quickly and peacefully.

"It doesn't matter now, Lucinda, we're already at my sister's house, so you might as well deal with it. Besides, he looks just fine!" My dad reassured her, pulling into the sectioned area of houses.

Just then, my phone buzzed in my pocket and I quickly whipped it out, thinking it was a message from my cousin. But I knew I was wrong since Vivi's face was on the screen. Wouldn't she know not to text me on Thanksgiving? I sighed and began skimming through the message she sent me. "Hey Lew, I know that Thanksgiving isn't the right time 2 be texting u, but Arthur got grounded and he wanted 2 tell u that things r getting worse at his house."

I quickly scoured for the right keys on my phone, replying, "I'm sorry Vivi, I'll be back later but I have to go, at relative's house."

Before my parents could comment about my not getting out of the car, I shoved my phone in my pants pocket and unbuckled myself from the tight seatbelt.

We got out of the car and took out all of the food we prepared, along with birthday gifts for my favorite cousins, since their birthdays were yesterday. We walked through the brisk, chilly winds to get to the door, a tall fancy wooden door that I was barely taller than. The second my mom reached out to ring the doorbell, the door immediately swung open and we were greeted by a giddy dark haired woman with a few gray streaks in her hair.

My aunt Emilia beamed at us and exclaimed in surprise, "Hi! Oh my gosh, Lewis! You grew so much! Holy cow!"

Forcing a quick smile, I quickly entered the house and closed the door after everyone made it inside. We began taking off all of our coats and winter wear, handing it all off to my aunt Emilia. Before I could even kick my shoes off, a stampede of kids ran at me and nearly tackled me with hugs, screaming, "Lewis, you're finally here!" in fluent Italian.

I had tons of younger cousins, but in my intermediate family, there were five children under the age of ten. They all loved me because I would always play with them more than any of the other relatives my age did. They would follow me around for a while, then migrate to some other place in the house for a little while.

"Lewis, look! I finally learned how to do a cartwheel!" My eight year old cousin, Monica, screamed at the top of her lungs, trying her best to catch my attention. She then proceeded to perform a poorly coordinated cartwheel on the wooden floor, her thin purple locks becoming completely tangled.

I crossed my arms, teasing, "Oh yeah? I could totally do better!"

"I don't think so!" My uncle Roger, Emilia's husband, interrupted me in English, bringing me in closer for one of his classic bear hugs. "You'll break something, considering how dang tall you are! How tall are you now, son? Like six feet tall?"

"Six foot three," I corrected him, grinning sheepishly.

He pulled away, exclaiming, "Holy cow! You can't be serious! My, my! I'm surprised all the girls aren't after you! They just looooooove tall guys like you and I!"

Blushing madly, I replied, "Not really.. Girls at school don't really talk to me much."

"Heh, I beg to differ, especially with your face that red! But I'll drop that for now, bud, I gotta catch up with your parents." Uncle Roger said, leaving me to go find my mom and dad, who both wandered into the kitchen, where all of the adults usually gathered.

I barely even had another second to sigh before I felt someone grab at my neck from behind me. I whipped around, my face still beet red, knowing exactly who was behind me. I cursed, "Madre di dio, Alfonso!"

My sneaky older cousin popped out from behind the stair case, with a notably shit eating grin adorning his face. He snickered, running a hand through his dark fohawk. He sneered in Italian, "Man, I would've really had you if you weren't so damn tall! What did you do, put yourself through the taffy puller or something?"

"I don't know, puberty?" I shrugged, resting my elbow on Alfonso's shoulder. He used to do that to me all the time, back when he was taller, so I knew it would bother him for sure.

"Stop it!" He practically shrieked, turning away from me. "Dude…. Oh well. You want to go catch up with each other's lives and play video games?"

My youngest cousin, Sarah, tugged on my pant leg and asked, "Can I play too, Lew?"

Before I could reply, I heard a, "Not before giving a hug to us! Gee, you kids and your games! C'mon over here, all of you!"

We made our way to the living room, which was looking just as fancy as ever. My grandparents were all gathered on the brown leather couches, chatting by the giant fireplace. I quickly glanced up at the ceiling, where an enormous chandelier hung high, lighting up the whole room. My grandma Trinity welcomed me with open arms, a big smile on her wrinkly face.

"Oh, you're so much bigger! I thought you were just going to go play your games and forget to say hello to your grannie!" Trinity exclaimed in her usual raspy voice, planting a wet kiss on my cheek. She was practically squeezing me to death with the hug she was giving me. "You too, Alfonso! Get in here!"

Alfonso reluctantly embraced Grandma Trinity while my grandfather shouted, "Honey, you're hogging all of the boys to yourself! I need some love too, you know!"

I wriggled free from Trinity's iron grip and gave my grandfather Gio a light hug. My grandparents Gio and Trinity were on my dad's side of family, and by far, the most lively people in the whole house. The house was even livelier back when my other grandmother was still alive, but nonetheless, it was still exciting now, too. Rather than argue about politics or social media like the rest of the adults at gatherings, they would always have little conversations about the most ridiculous things. One constantly reoccurring topic was…

"Lewis, hai una fidanzata?" Do you have a girlfriend now? Trinity asked impatiently. "I need more grandchildren, and let's face it, it's not like Alfonso's going to do anything with that girl of his own anytime soon!"

"Hey!" Alfonso hollered, laughing at Grandma Trinity's words.

My face quickly regained its blood red color. Twiddling my thumbs, I answered nervously, "N-n-no…? I'm not dating anyone, sorry."

I flinched as she practically yelled, "Relax, child! It's fine! I'm not going to hit you like your Nonna! Oi! Now go play with the kids! And don't forget to give your grandfather Matthew a kiss!" Trinity ordered, shooing me away from her as she began combing through her graying dark hair with her wrinkly fingers.

I quietly walked over to my grandfather Matthew, who was collapsed on the couch, snoring lightly. He looked older than ever. I thought back to the picture and tried not to frown, thinking about how much happier he was back then. I hugged him as light as possible, trying not to wake him up, and rushed over to Alfonso, following him up the stairs. We managed to sneak by without any of the younger kids knowing us and crept up the stairs.

I leaned over the high balcony by the edge of the hall and glanced down at my grandparents again before getting back on course and taking a left into Alfonso's bedroom. For being an untidy person, it was somewhat surprising that Alfonso's bedroom was always clean. It still showed his personality though, with a television and several video game cases in the corner and a whole shelf of manga and books on film next to it. Alfonso's twelve year old sister, Natalia, sat lounging on his bed, playing Mario Kart against my seventeen year old cousin, Dominic, and Alfonso's girlfriend Larissa.

"Ey, Lewis!" Larissa tucked a wavy strand of bleached blonde hair behind her ear, pausing the game to come give me a hug. "Long time, no see man!"

"It's only been since last Christmas," I informed her shyly, quickly setting my phone on Alfonso's nightstand before reaching in to give her a welcome hug.

"Who cares? I miss my adorable little cousin!" Larissa beamed, reaching up to tousle my hair and examining me gleefully with her muddy brown eyes.

"Uh, I hate to ruin the moment, but technically he's my cousin…" Alfonso pointed out, pulling his girlfriend off of me.

Natalia laughed, commenting in Italian, "If I hadn't known better, I would've assumed she was Lewis's girlfriend!"

"Watch it, Nat!" Alfonso shouted back, an expression of mocked anger on his face. I chuckled, taking a seat on the floor so I could grab a controller.

Larissa shook her head, saying, "You know, it would be nice if you all spoke a little English every now and then! Not everyone here is bilingual!"

Alfonso rolled his eyes and plopped down next to me, cracking a small smile. "So, who's up for a Mario Kart tournament?"

• • •

"É merda testa!" Dominic exclaimed furiously, throwing down his Wii controller. He pointed to Alfonse accusingly, growling, "I swear to god, you're hacking the game somehow!"

"Nope," he said, grinning, "You just suck at playing video games! And you're a sore loser, too!"

"That's so not true!" Dominic exclaimed, his reaction getting giggles out of Natalia and I. Larissa just sighed exasperatedly and rolled her eyes.

Alfonso's sneer grew even wider, teasing, "Waah! I'm Dominic and I blame other people for my horrible gaming skills!"

"Stop taunting him, jeez! Honestly, you're already twenty yet you never seem to change!" Larissa exclaimed, whacking her boyfriend lightly on the arm with her Wii controller.

Alfonso looked at her with a confused expression for a moment. "I'm twenty? I thought I was nineteen- OH that's right, our birthday was yesterday.."

"Oh that's right, you're two decades old now!" I exclaimed in realization. "Man, I even got you and Antonio presents and I forgot you were going on twenty!"

Alfonso gave me a mock expression of astonishment and betrayal. "Lewis… You forgot my twentieth birthday? After all we've been through? How could you!? Oh, I feel so unloved!"

"You forgot it too, you jackass! God, you're such a moron.." Larissa muttered angrily, rubbing her temples.

Wrapping an arm around her, my cousin flirted, "But I'm YOUR moron!"

Shaking her head, the two leaned in for a kiss but were interrupted by Natalia shouting obnoxiously, "Get a room, you two! Blergh, I'm out of here!"

Natalia nudged past us and stormed out of the room, her straightened plum purple hair flowing behind her. It was a bit of a common trait to have purple hair in our family, although not everyone had it. My relatives either had dark hair or the strange plum hue to their hair. Although now it was starting to become more of a dominant trait, especially with myself and a lot of the younger kids within the family.

But rarely anyone in the family tree had violet eyes like mine.

Dominic followed wordlessly, leaving his controller behind. He was probably going to check to see if dinner was ready yet.

"Well that was a bit new…" Larissa muttered, scratching her blonde head. "But typical for twelve year old behavior, I guess. Man, I was a terrible twelve year old…"

"How so?" I asked curiously.

"I went through a hilariously embarrassing goth phase. Like, I dyed my hair neon pink, wore all black, had raccoon eye eyeliner, all the classic stuff. I also acted like my dad was the cruelest person on the earth, which was totally not true at all. He was really cool then. I was just a complete brat. So there you have it, the most embarrassing years of my life." Larissa sighed exhaustedly.

"Wow. That must have been rough.. I guess I was okay when I was twelve." I told her in response, only for Alfonso to nudge in and interrupt me.

"You don't even know, dude. Lewis was a miserable kid at that age," Alfonso added. "He was about twelve when Nonna died, and he LOVED Nonna so he took it really hard. I mean, he wasn't that bad for too long, but he would even cry at the mention of her after it first happened. She used to be really hard on him, but he was still depressed over her anyway. I was sad too, I guess, but I knew it was her time. Then Lew eventually simmered down after a while, but he was still really sad."

Larissa reached over and squeezed my cheek, cooing, "Aww, my poor little baby! Always so sad! Man, sometimes I forget you were even a little boy once…. When did I first meet the family, four years ago?"

"Yep, four years. Wow… It's been that long." Alfonso cleared his throat. "Anyway, how's life Lewis? Anything interesting?"

I answered sheepishly, "Not really. I made a few friends and we're all into reading and the horror genre, but other than that everything's been normal."

After chatting with Alfonso and his girlfriend for a while, I told them to continue playing Mario Kart while I went to the bathroom. I took a right down the hallway and ended up in a large bathroom with marble tile floors, a fountain-esqe sink, a giant jet equipped bath tub, and a fancy looking toilet.

I hummed and glanced around the sophisticated bathroom, my eyes falling on the clock hanging from the wall. I had already been here for an hour. The younger kids were bound to come drag me off with them any time soon, not that I minded. The girls, Monica, Sarah, and ten year old Gabi were all rambunctious, but were a bit more well behaved and sweet. My other two immediate cousins, Matt and Daniel, however, were way more troublesome and hyperactive than the girls were. They made everything interesting, but they were a thousand times more difficult to keep track of.

I heard a sudden bang from down the hall, followed by laughing, which indicated the kids were in fact, looking for me. With a long sigh, I got up to wash my hands under the warm, relaxing water, and left the bathroom. I began to walk steadily back to Alfonso's room when the phone rang. But not just any phone.

My phone.

I took off in a sprint and busted into Alfonso's room, accidentally bumping into Larissa as she headed to the bathroom, and tumbled on the bedroom floor. But I was already too late. Alfonso held my cell phone up to his ear, with a shit eating grin on his face. "Hello? Who's there?" He asked in Italian.

I could hear Vivi's confused voice over the device as clear as day. "Who is this? I'm looking for Lewis?"

I ran at Alfonso, trying to snatch my phone out of his hands, but he held me back, replying with a devilish smile, "Lewis? I don't know a Lewis! Who could you be, by chance? His girlfriend?"

"I'm sorry, what are you even saying? I only speak English you know!" Vivi informed him.

"Give me the phone, Al!" I shouted, managing to pin him down once more. He was great at keeping his hands out of my reach though, even with the huge height difference between him and I. I pinned his right arm down to the floor, the one holding my cell phone, and pried the device out of his hand.

Finally having my phone back in possession, I responded to Vivi, "I'm sorry, my cousin picked up the phone and he wouldn't give it back. What did you need really quickly?"

"It's Arthur! He was researching that Claude Wolfsfeld guy and his mom caught on and grounded him for 'being silly and making up lies.' But he managed to email me really quickly before his parents unplugged his computer. This Claude guy was apparently associated with a lot of gangs and spent some time in jail for causing violence and vandalism and stuff."

"Interesting…" I muttered. "Did you find anything else?"

"That's what I was about to say. He was in this really wacky occult gang that called themselves, 'The Hands of God.' They assumed they were being vigilantes and doing the Lord's work and stuff, but really all they did was cause trouble and dabble in human sacrifice. There's very little information on these people, but Arthur told me they would kill people and hack off their arms and gory things like that, but their preferred mode of sacrifice was suicide preaching." Vivi informed me, sighing over the phone.

"Suicide preaching…? Maybe it has something to do with that Julia person's death?"

"That's exactly what Arthur thought. He quickly went to research her too, but then his parents busted in and declared house arrest for three weeks. House arrest along with confiscating all of his paranormal equipment. Honestly, Arthur's parents act like they have sticks up their behinds! Don't tell him I said that." She spoke hesitantly.

I replied, "I feel bad for Arthur. His parents don't seem to agree with anything he enjoys, other than mechanics, maybe. Maybe I can look into it tomorrow, when we don't have anything to do. But for now, I have to go. Sorry…"

"It's fine, I understand you have family to spend time with! My brother's only been here for an hour and I already want to kick his pretentious butt right out of my house. He's so annoying! But yeah.. I'll let you be for tonight. Happy Thanksgiving!"

"You too, Vivi!" Silence. She has already hung up. Sighing, I turned off my phone and shoved it in my pocket. But I still had Alfonso's suspicion to deal with.

My cousin watched me with a questionable expression on his face. "What the hell was that all about?" he asked, his voice full of concern. "Suicide preachers?"

I could feel my face flare up from the embarrassment. I usually tried keeping friends, especially female friends, hidden from my family because they were all huge teasers. They were always curious to find out if I had a social life, since I had always been quite a distant person. And then there was Grandma Trinity with all of her girlfriend nonsense. She just desperately wanted more grandchildren. So it was best to keep my previously nonexistent social life and my family life separated.

"My friends are ghost fanatics," I explained sheepishly to my cousin. "And they were doing research on one of their houses because we're all 100% convinced it's haunted. So yeah, don't worry, we're not occultists or anything like that."

"That's exactly what an occultist would say! Nah, I'm kidding Lewis." Alfonso chuckled, reaching up to pat me on the shoulder. "Your friends sound fairly interesting though. Mind letting me in on this whole ghost thing? I promise I won't tell Grandma Trinity."

"Fine, but I'm not getting too much into detail." My cousin cheered quietly to himself and glanced back up at me with curious black eyes. With an exasperated sigh, I began, "My friends' names are Arthur and Vivi, in case you wanted to know, and we're all into the same stuff. Arthur's been telling us stories and stuff about his house… Well, Nonna's house…."

Alfonso's eyes lit up with surprise. "No way! He lives in Nonna's old house!? Damn… You're kidding!"

"No, you think I would kid about Nonna?"

"Good point… But wow, that's such a crazy coincidence! Man, and it's haunted too? By her?" He asked eagerly, tugging on my sleeve slightly.

"Maybe, we're not sure. There could be other ghosts living there too. Turns out, Nonna's old home has a bit of a past. One that includes some pretty dark stuff. But anyway, we're trying to figure all of this out because we're thinking about starting a paranormal investigation group someday. It's Vivi's biggest dream and we figured, why not tag along? So yeah…. That's that…" I continued, my voice trailing off.

I expected a sarcastic reply from Alfonso, but was slightly surprised when one never came. He was thinking about something, but I couldn't tell what was on his mind. It was hard to tell what was running through my cousin's head at times. But suddenly, I had a feeling it was something devious as a mischievous grin spread over his face.

"Madre di dio, what now?" I asked, a pit forming in my stomach thanks to the smug look on his face.

"You guys should investigate the ancient house of horrors nearby my place." Alfonso suggested, grinning evilly.

"No way! Wouldn't we get arrested for breaking in? There's no way we could go there! Plus Arthur's currently grounded, so we can't exactly go as a full trio."

Laughing, Alfonso replied nonchalantly, "Dude, the place has been abandoned for at least seventy years, the law wouldn't care anymore! I bet you that people break in the place to see if they can witness the hauntings for themselves all the time! Remember when some of my friends searched the place?"

"Of course I remember that story, where your friends used a Ouija board in that place and almost got squished by that giant armoire. But still, we'd get in trouble with our parents! I'm pretty sure they don't want us running around in an abandoned house, especially a haunted one!"

"Well, I don't know about your parents, or your friends' parents, but I'm pretty sure mine won't care!" My cousin exclaimed, chuckling. "It could work! Me, you, the girl, and Arthur can go to the house and hold an investigation there. We can just tell the guy's parents that we're going black Friday shopping!"

Staring at my large feet, I muttered hesitantly, "I don't know… I could get in huge trouble. I mean, lying to Arthur's parents would be a really bad move, especially if we got caught. They would probably ban him from hanging out with me, if he could even go in the first place."

"Oh come on, stop being so worried! We're not going to get caught and we're sure as hell not going to get arrested! Just loosen up a bit! Don't you wanna do this? Go ghost hunting like you and your dorky friends fantasize about?"

I shook my head. I did want to go ghost hunting, but not with so many risks on the table. The whole thing could flop so easily if we weren't careful enough.

"Yeah, but my parents will say no and-"

"DINNER'S READY!" My aunt Emilia hollered in English from downstairs. "Come and get it!"

"I guess we'll just have to find out what your parents think about this…!" Alfonso exclaimed devilishly before taking off and bolting down the stairs.

(A/N: Eyy! I just got back from vacation... Although it didn't exactly feel like much of a vacation, besides going to the pool at the hotel, but I still had time to relax anyway. But now I'm back, so here's chapter 20! It's kind of short compared to what I had in mind, but there's a lot more so yeah... *shrugs* I wrote most of this chapter on the highway, so yeah, that was fun. We got pulled over by this lady cop at one point though, and almost got a speeding ticket. I was VERY confused. And I thought the lady cop was hot xD ANYWAY, just to officially let y'all know, there will be a sequel to this story, still thinking of a title, but yep! Sequel confirmed! I don't exactly believe the events of the sequel could actually happen after the events in the video, but it's more of a 'what if,' kind of thing. I'm not saying the story's almost over though, if anything, it just begun. Even though I'm alrady 20 chapters in... My god, this is going to be a gigantic story, isn't it? Oh well. So, if you liked this chapter, please review and tell me what you think! And I'll see YOU in the next chapter. Bye bye!)