A/N: Thanks for reading so far y'all! This chapter is absolutely awful and I know it, so I'm super sorry. I'll try to update more frequently and all that. Plus, my sister has been helping me out a bunch with this fanfiction, so go follow her: VolleyballGoddess. Her stories are awesome, and you should read them! Thank you soooo much for all the reviews, please keep sending in more. Tell me what you think of this new one!
My mom woke me up at eight a.m. sharp the next day, even though the smell of her burning waffles would have done the trick eventually. "Mom," I shouted sleepily, burrowing deeper into my blankets. "It's a Sunday!"
From downstairs I heard Mom's muffled response, which I didn't understand so I turned over in my makeshift bed (a couple of blankets and a pillow, until all our furniture came down from New York) and pretended she had given me five extra minutes. I was what you could call not a morning person. Like, at all. Especially on the weekend, when sleeping in was basically the purpose. I tried staying in bed as long as possible, but then my mom shouted loud and clear, "Cameron Ann Morgan the movers come at eight thirty and if you aren't up so help me God…" and I shot out of bed quicker than light. The sound of my full name always had the tendency to do that.
"I'm up!" I grumbled, wadding into the bathroom. I flicked on the light, took one glance in the mirror, and immediately turned it back off again. I should probably wake up completely before I even tried to deal with the monster I called my reflection. My best bet was to go downstairs, eat something and then try to comb all the tangles out of my knotted hair. So I went downstairs and joined my mother in the smoking kitchen.
"Morning kiddo!" She chirped, fanning at the frying pan that was at the moment in flames. "Your waffles are on the counter." I turned away from the burning stove (because really, this was a normal thing in the Morgan household), and found my food on the smooth surface of the kitchen counter. My first initial thought was 'is that really a waffle?' because the awkwardly shaped lump on my plate was almost completely black and burned. But then I saw, that it was indeed at least something of the waffle category and that it was coated in maple syrup, so I took a bite.
"Yum," I lied, giving Mom thumbs up. She turned her attention from the bacon frying in the pan and studied me. Maybe it was her mom-instincts or the fact that I'm an awful liar, but she rolled her eyes and said, "You can eat some cereal."
I shot her a grateful smile, and dropped my waffle and hurried to the pantry. We were still low on food since we'd barely just moved in, but there, sitting on the very top shelf were my Frosted Flakes. I snatched them up, grabbed myself the tiny carton of milk we'd bought on the way over here, and hopped back onto the counter with a clean bowl in my lap. "Thanks Mom."
Mom reached over (to ruffle my hair probably), but before she could the piercing sound of the smoke alarm ringing upstairs stopped her. She muttered a bad word and made her way up the stairs claiming something about how cooking is harder is way than Paula Deen makes it look. I couldn't help but smile.
Sitting there, on the gleaming surface of our new kitchen counter, with the early morning sunlight streaming in through the windows, I was absolutely sure for the first time since we moved that I would be happy here. Roseville was such a nice, cute town and things were looking up. I dug into my cereal, silently thanking Mom for taking the job here. She was right; I really liked it.
"Seriously, Kate? I don't want to!" I suddenly heard a muffled voice shouting from outside, breaking me from my thoughts. I looked up from my bowl of food and towards my front yard where the voice seemed to be coming from. There was a barely audible response on the other side, and the same voice groaned, "I don't care about 'making connections'. Neighborly kindness my butt!" Except they used another word for butt. I slid off the counter with every intention to tell whoever was screaming in my front yard to go away but before I could the doorbell rang.
"Yes?" I snapped, once my front door was open. I wasn't exactly a fan of rude people who screamed in their neighbor's yard, but the moment my eyes met my visitor's, I froze. Zach? The boy at the door must have thought the same thing, because for a moment surprise registered across his face, but then a mask of amusement quickly covered it.
"So we meet again." Zach extended a plate of cookies protected by clear plastic wrap (the good looking kind; crispy on the edges, gooey in the middle. Much unlike what Mom's cookies look like). I took the plate out of Zach's hands and balanced it in between my arm and my hip.
"What are you following me now?" I raised an eyebrow in what I hoped was a playful way, although with my bed hair in a ponytail and my pajamas I probably looked more like a zombie with a tic. I suddenly felt self conscious and really wished I'd attempted to at least brush my teeth before I went downstairs. Zach grinned, stuffing his hands into the pockets of his very well-fitting jeans (they did fit him well, it's just an observation), and leaning against the doorframe.
"You wish."
I did. Sort of. I ignored the comment and unwrapped the plate of cookies, picked one from the plate, and bit into it. "Wow, these are good!" I told him genuinely shocked, as the taste of chocolate and sugar exploded on my tongue. Zach didn't even hesitate to say, with a sly smirk, "So am I."
I rolled my eyes. Were all boys this provocative and cocky or was it just Zach? And why did he keep smiling like that? Was there chocolate on my face? "Now you're the one wishing," I taunted. As an afterthought I opened my mouth, about to tell him that he may be Goode, but he would never be good but before I could, Mom kept bounding down the stairs. She had her apron on, (stained, and charcoaled from all the things she sets on fire), and an oven-mitt on her left hand. She paused at the stairs, glancing between me and the boy standing in the doorway.
"Uh, Cam?" She said, in her trying-hard-not-to-sound-uncool-but-I'm-super-excited-right-now voice. "Who's this?"
"This is—"
"Zach. Zach Goode. I'm you're next door neighbor." Zach interrupted, extending his hand. Mom raised her eyebrows at me and shot me a way indiscrete, and a waaaay embarrassing thumbs up before reaching to shake his hand.
She looked down at the cookies in my hands and her face brightened. "Did you make these?" Zach didn't break eye contact with my mom for a second. It was like he forgot I was even still there.
"Actually my sister did. She would've come but she was headed out for work. She said she would love to meet you." He explained. The thought of that brought a smile to Mom's face.
"How sweet!" She took the plate out of my hands and headed for the kitchen. "Tell her I said thanks a lot, and that she should send me the recipe. They look delicious!"
I cringed at the thought of Mom attempting to bake cookies, and then turned my attention back to Zach. He was staring at the spot Mom had just vacated. I could feel my face flush. Mom was pretty, gorgeous even, I was used to guys acting like this when they saw her. But the look on Zach's face when his eyes met mine told me his expression had nothing to do with my mom's hotness but with something way different.
"Your mom's cool," he told me. He sounded like he meant it, and he wanted me to really know how cool my mom was.
"Um thanks, she's kind of crazy but…" my voiced trailed off at the sight of a giant moving van rumbling up our driveway. A cloud of dark black smoke puffed out of the exhaust pipe, and the whole van seemed to teeter to the side as if it was about to fall. I thought about how much stuff we had packed in it, and realized it probably was.
"Oh those must be the movers!" Mom shouted suddenly, running in from the kitchen. She dropped the cookie that was halfway in her mouth and hurried to my side, giving the two men in the front seat of the van over-exaggerated waves.
"Do you guys need any help?" Zach asked Mom. I don't think she heard however because she was already pushing past him and trying to pry open the back of the moving van. I sighed at her, and stepped around Zach as well, and into the fresh, sunny fall air.
"Actually, I think we've got it. Thanks though." I said, rolling up the sleeves of my Gallagher sweatshirt, which also doubled as pajamas (okay, so maybe I was a little homesick). I started walking to help Mom but Zach grabbed my arm to stop me.
"Come on, Gallagher Girl," he snorted, directing a nod towards Mom and the two burly men who were watching her bend down instead of emptying the van of it's boxes. "It looks like you need all the help you can get. Besides, we both know I can lift at least three times more than you." He said it casually, but I didn't take it like that. If there was one thing Cammie Morgan was not, was boy-dependent. And weak. Okay, so maybe that was two things. Who cares? I still was neither one.
"You can not." I said hotly.
Zach scoffed. "Uh, actually I can."
"No, you can't."
"Of course I can. Guys are stronger than girls."
"You're sexist." I snapped. "And wrong."
"It's well-known." Zach claimed, raising his arms in surrender. "I'm just stating the facts." I glared at him and pushed him out of my way. All I could think as I grabbed on of the bigger boxes, was maybe Zach wasn't as great as I thought he was. Everyone had flaws. His just happened to be that he was an over-confident, sexist teenage boy.
I shot a pointed glance at Zach as I carried a box almost twice the size as me up the walkway and dropped it on the foyer floor. The movers had broken out of their staring-trance after Mom yelled at them and now were huffing and puffing our furniture into the house. Zach shook his head at me and grinned before picking a box and following me in.
"All I'm saying," he continued. "Is that you're like what, five foot five?"
"Five six." I corrected setting down the box in the empty living room. He set his down and followed me out, ignoring me like I didn't say anything.
"—so you're like half a foot shorter than me, and weight like fifty pounds less. And I play football. So logically speaking—"
"Playing football does not make you stronger than me."
"—I should be able to carry more." He finished and lifted up two boxes from the back of the van, walking inside.
I grabbed a box and followed, growling under my breath.
Pros and Cons of Being Neighbors With Zach Goode.
A list by Cameron Morgan:
He helps you move into your new home and offers you a plate of cookies like a gentleman. PRO
You have to listen to him talk about how strong and helpful he is the whole time. CON
He actually can carry the really heavy things up and down the stairs, which means you won't have to do it. PRO
He digs through all your boxes even though you labeled one of them private and you practically tackled him to keep him from looking at it. CON
He is big enough to push you off of him and look through the box anyway. CON
He helps you unpack your room. PRO
He makes fun of every single decoration you've ever owned. CON
"What is this?" Zach snickered, lifting up a spelling bee trophy from my seventh grade. We had finished emptying the moving van downstairs, and while my mother and the movers finished setting up the living room, Mom told me to go and unpack my room. Zach unfortunately took that as an invitation to join me.
"What do you think it is?" I snapped, snatching it from his grasp. I ran my index finger along the engraved print. "Cammie Morgan: Spelling Bee Champion 2010-GALLAGHER ACADEMY." Zach's raised an eyebrow and turned back to the box he was emptying. I had given him the one I thought he would make fun of less. It was full of photo albums and old certificates, but he still managed to tease me about something.
My room was shaping up nicely. Zach and the movers had carried my bed upstairs, and even though I tried to help, one of the movers had said, "Don't hurt yourself, sweet cheeks. Let the men get it." and when I looked at Zach he was trying hard to not laugh. I had dragged my bedside table and drawer all by myself and now they were pressed up against the wall of my new spacious room too. At this point we were just decorating but we still had a long way to go.
"You know," Zach said, inspecting a framed photo of my Aunt Abby and me that we took in Rome. I snatched it away from him and put it on a shelf. "It's a good thing Kate sent me over here with those cookies. I would've hated it if you had to unpack this whole room all by yourself." He swept his arms out dramatically as if it was Madison Square Garden instead of a bedroom and smirked at me.
"I could have done it myself, you know." I countered.
He shrugged. "Sure. But let's think of it as a bonding experience."
"I thought you didn't care about making 'neighborly connections' with us?" I joked, remembering the shouting I'd heard earlier that morning. He cringed and leaned against the wall. "Oh…you heard that, huh?" I just grinned back at him.
Zach ran a hand through his hair. "In my defense, I didn't know it was you," he explained. What did that mean? Would he have wanted to 'connect' with me if he'd actually known it was me? Wait no, that came out way wrong.
I started to panic internally. Boys were confusing.
To cover up my inner alarm, I said, "You meet a new girl yesterday, your sister sends you to meet a new neighbor today, and it doesn't occur to you it might've been the same girl? I'm pretty sure Roseville isn't that big, Zach."
Zach opened his mouth to retort, but then closed it after a moment with a grunt. Ha. Cameron Morgan wins yet again.
All around the floor were half empty boxes, and bubble wrap. I kicked a couple of them aside and collapsed face first on my bed. I was exhausted. "How long have we been working?" I asked Zach, my face pressed up against the pillow so I sounded muffled. I heard shuffling around my room and then the weight of someone else sitting on the bed.
"Two hours give or take," Zach told me, and I groaned. It felt like we had been unpacking all day.
I shifted the pillow away from my face and peeked up at him. "Why are you still here?" Zach looked up at my question, alarmed. He narrowed his eyes and tossed one of my pillows in my direction.
"Seriously Gallagher Girl, I just spent the last one hundred twenty minutes of my life setting up your furniture and that's what you say to me?" Zach argued "Ungrateful little…"
I propped myself up on my elbow and cut him off. "Well, seeing as no one really forced you to do any of this there's no one to blame but yourself." I expected Zach to argue back and say something about how he was trying to be a gentleman but he folded his arms behind his head and leaned against my bedpost.
"Touché."
I smiled at my second victory (I was getting good at this), and laid my head back down onto the fluffy surface of my comforter. "Really," I told him, "You don't have to stay anymore. You've done more than enough. Thanks."
"Nah, I want to stay." Zach claimed. I looked up a little, staring through the curtain of hair that was covering my face. Zach's eyes were shut, as if he was resting, and he was drumming his hands on the wood of my headboard. Then both his eyes opened, settled on me, and he added, "To help you guys move in."
I rolled over on my back and covered my face with the pillow he had thrown at me. "Of course."
