HELLO MY PEOPLES! I have arrived! Sorry, I know it's been a while but school, work, homework, other responsibilities... you guys probably don't want to hear my excuses but do you know what I think is fucking stupid!? The amount of homework given to senior students. The workload literally doubles and we're expected to keep up while having a job and do teachers forget that we get homework from other classes too or? I don't even know anymore, man. School's been going on for about a week and I'm already wanting to storm out of there with my middle finger up. Anyway, that's my life right now, please enjoy the chapter :)

The next day was a Friday, and Will would have looked forward to a weekend without worrying about school deadlines if it not were for Alda's previous threat. As Will walked into the house that evening he heard laughter come from the kitchen. It was a deep laugh, too masculine to belong to Pauline and Halt didn't laugh (Will briefly wondered if that was due to medical reasons), so Will wondered who the stranger could be. He walked into the kitchen and at the dining table sitting with Halt and Pauline was a tall, lanky fellow that looked to be in his early twenties.

"Will, there you are," Pauline said and motioned to the stranger. "This is Gilan, he used to live here with us."

They had fostered more kids? Will thought and wondered why he hadn't heard of them before. Gilan smiled at Will and said, "Hello, Will, Halt was just telling me a bit about you."

"Careful, Gilan, or he's going to get a big head," Halt said before taking a sip of his coffee.

"Not with you being around him. At least I'm here, so maybe I can boost his self esteem that you've probably lowered." The left corner of Gilan's mouth twitched up into a smirk.

"As if, he gets plenty of praise. Just yesterday I complimented him on how well he cleaned the living room rug."

"Actually, all you said was 'You missed a spot to the left!' and 'Put some energy into it!'" Will imitated Halt's voice.

"Now that sounds more like Halt," Gilan said and laughed.

Halt rolled his eyes and muttered something in his coffee mug about "insolent you people" and "no respect for elders".

"Since you don't seem to be enjoying our company, how about I take Will for a drive?" Gilan suggested.

"What about supper?" Pauline asked.

"We'll grab take-out."

"Don't need my permission," Halt said.

"Alright, come on, Will." Gilan twirled his keys on his finger.

"Ok," Will shrugged and followed Gilan outside.

"I parked just a block down," Gilan said and before long he clicked the unlock button on his key and a blue car beeped.

"Wait, is this yours?" Will gaped at the corvette sitting meters from him.

Gilan grinned goofily and got into the driver's side. "Hop in," he said.

Will raced forwards and jumped into the car. The interior was made of soft leather and had a complete digital console. Will sank into his seat comfortably and put on his seat belt, glancing around him as he did so, barely believing that he was in a sports car.

"Pretty nifty, huh?" Gilan asked as he started up the car and began driving.

"No kidding," Will breathed.

"So, where to first?"

"I don't know, I haven't been in Redmont long so I don't know any of the cool places yet."

Gilan's smile widened. "Then I'm more than happy to give you a tour, I lived here a couple years ago with Halt and Pauline. Where did you live before you moved in with them?"

"Up by Meric, lived there for a couple of years."

"Meric, eh? That's where I live now. Know that coffee shop on the corner of Maple and Salthurst? Run by a cute red head who barks orders at everyone? Think her name is Allie."

Will's eyes lit up. "Yeah I know it! I used to go there every Friday and Saturday night, hung out with Allie while she was on her shift. The Deep Cup was about the only good thing about living in Meric."

"Aw Meric's not that bad."

"Depends on who you're living with and spending time with." Will's thoughts attempted to bring back suppressed memories of his previous foster home and times with the gang but he managed to keep them at bay. At the time he had made a deep connection with Allie, who was a couple years older than he was. She had sensed that Will had been in a bad place, the fresh bruises he'd come in with every weekend proved that. So she had worked hard at becoming his friend, talking with Will as he sat alone at a table, staring at his coffee cup with a bleak look in his eyes. Will never told her much about his personal life, but having someone he could have a relaxed conversation with had been relieving to Will at the time.

"Fair enough. Hey how does burgers sound for supper? Larry's has the best."

"I've been to Larry's once, sounds good to me."

"Sweet, and after that I'm taking you to the best ice cream place, then the second best coffee place in the whole world."

(Page Break)

"Okay okay, so you're telling me that you made sex noises in the back of the classroom, then told the teacher that it was a guy who was picking on you?" Gilan was near laughing, but was still looking unbelievably at Will as they ate their ice cream down at the park where Will had played volleyball earlier that week. They leaned comfortably and easily side by side against the hood of the car.

Will chuckled. "Yeah, that was back in Grade Eight."

Gilan could not contain his laughter anymore, and doubled over. When he straightened up there were tears leaking from his eyes. "That's great. One of the pranks I pulled on my English teacher, in Grade Nine I think, was while he was giving a presentation. I had stolen the TV remote before he had walked into class that day and while he was ranting on about similes I switched the TV with the volume at max. When he turned to look at it I switched it off, and as soon as he turned back to us I'd switch it on again. He got so confused and ended up getting the janitor to come and try to 'fix it'."

"What did they do when they found out you had the remote?"

"Nothing, they never saw that remote again because I put it in my locker, then at the end of the year I tossed it in the garbage." Gilan laughed shortly. "I played a lot of pranks on my teachers back in the day."

Will smiled. "Do you play pranks on your boss?"

"Every time I see him. I work at the same business Halt does, I just do it in Meric."

"Insurance pays well enough that you could buy a corvette?" Will asked, his eyebrows rising in disbelief.

Gilan smirked. "You could say that."

"Maybe I should consider a job in insurance."

"Maybe you should. Anyway, how's school going? Got any friends?"

Will shrugged and took a big spoonful of his cookie dough ice cream. "Sort of. I hang out with a pretty weird group. There's Jenny, who's fricking bubbly and likes cooking so much that sometimes she brings us all a lunch. Then there's George who's constantly taking notes for some reason. Maybe it's thoughts for school, I don't know. There's Horace, which I got into a fight with on my second day of school."

"Oh yeah, Halt told me about that. You landed a punch on him though, right?"

Will smirked, perhaps a little smugly. "Yeah, got him on the jaw. We still don't get along but we tolerate each other. And then there's Alyss." A small sigh escaped Will's lips and Gilan held back a smile as he scooped at his ice cream.

"She cute?" he asked.

"She's gorgeous," Will said, momentarily getting lost in thought as he stared at his ice cream. He shook the thoughts out of his head. "But you know, she's completely not my type. She studies all the time and is such a goody two shoes."

"Oh yeah, I understand." Gilan rolled his eyes at Will's denial that he had a crush. "So you've been living with Halt and Pauline for about a week now?"

Will nodded. "Yeah, about that. How long did you live with them?"

"It was roughly five years, moved in when I was fifteen, moved out when I was twenty."

"Wait, you only moved in at fifteen as well?"

Gilan nodded as he scraped the last of his ice cream from the bottom of the styrofoam cup. "Yup, not much different than you. Although my situation was, shall we say, different."

"How so?" Will was beginning to get more curious about this Gilan. Was he a foster kid like him? Why did he stay with Halt and Pauline until he was twenty?

"They weren't necessarily fostering me, my dad was always off on business ventures so I was stuck at home all the time. I eventually asked him if I could stay with Halt, since he was a friend of my dad's whom I had known my whole life. He allowed me and I ended up kind of just sticking with them until I was twenty." Will stared at the trees that were clustered in the park and wondered what that would feel like. It'd almost be like having two families, meanwhile Will was struggling to have one. After a little while Gilan's shoulder bumped Will's and Gilan said, almost as if sensing his thoughts, "Hey, don't worry so much. Halt and Pauline enjoy having you around, even if Halt pretends he doesn't. Chances are you're going to live there a long time. Now, how about we go to this second best coffee shop? It doesn't have a cute red head running it but the coffee tastes amazing!"

(Page Break)

Will and Gilan entered the coffee shop which had a foreign title that Will didn't bother attempting to pronounce.

"This is an Arrida coffee shop," Gilan explained. "They invented coffee, although they call it Kafay. The Deep Cup uses coffee shipped from Arrida as well, the only reason it's better is Allie and the fact that they have more flavours. But this place is a real close second."

Will and Gilan grabbed their coffees and sat at a table close to the back. There was a painting of men leading camels across a desert that hung on the left wall. The rest of the coffee shop was painted red, with light brown wooden chairs and tables.

Will took a cautious sip of his hot coffee, his eyes lighting up at the taste of it. "Wow this is good," he said. "Definitely reminds me of The Deep Cup."

Gilan smiled. "Told you." He glanced at the clock hanging on the wall and noticed it was nearly ten thirty. "It's getting late, maybe we should take our coffees to go and head back home."

Will did not think that it was late at all (ten thirty on a weekend?) but agreed with Gilan, knowing that soon he'd have to sneak out to see Alda.

So there's a bit of bro fluff for you guys ;) By the way, I am absolutely in love with the idea of a coffee shop called The Deep Cup so if you ever read it on any other fics or books I post on other sites, it's probably me :D Please leave me a review, and tell me, do you think this fic should be rated M or T due to the swearing? Let me know and I may change the ratings. Anyway, I love you all, have a fantastic rest of the weekend! **throws confetti and disappears**