Wheels rolled against gravel, invisible voices chattering. A clutter of children were huddled around the bright red door, stepping over each other's toes and climbing around windows in an attempt to get a sneaky look at the new girl. However, incase of being caught, they could barely see a thing. They couldn't hear a voice that wasn't familiar. Just the rolling of one lone suitcase.
"I wonder why she didn't bring more stuff," a girl dressed entirely in pink and with shining jewelry pondered, spotting a black suitcase through the keyhole.
"Maybe she doesn't have many things to bring," a slightly smaller girl suggested softly, her golden blonde hair pulled back in a tidy high ponytail.
Any footsteps stopped and the rolling ceased. One voice spoke as the door began to open. "Come on, I'm sure Tracy'll introduce you to the others," it was a man's kind voice, but the friendly tone wasn't enough to stop the children from stumbling about in an attempt to fill a different room.
"Yeah, I'm sure they'll love to meet you!" Tracy grinned, leading the new kid into the house, where she peered around thoughtfully and shrugged. "Hey, everyone, come and meet-!"
Moments after Tracy shouted, everyone tumbled out of the nearby door and grinned, pushing into a messy line.
"This is Lorna," Tracy announced, slightly taken aback but not entirely surprised by the young people's actions.
Once there, they seemed unsure, nobody speaking until the girl with her pink clothes and slightly darker skin stepped forward. She extended a hand, smiling reassuringly to the new girl, who looked somewhat around her age.
"Hi! I'm Carmen," she began, as the girl shook her hand but did not smile. When there was a dragged silence, Carmen's eyes drifted towards the suitcase, where Lorna's hand clutched the handle, and decided to prompt her. "Do you want me to help you unpack?"
All she got in response was a slight shake of Lorna's head.
"Well... okay," Carmen contunued after a subtle warning look from Mike, who was passing through to his office. Best not to insist, or go on about it. Instead, she turned the subject to something that didn't require any communication from Lorna's end. "This is Tee."
The small girl with her hair tied back neatly stepped forward and outstretched her hand. "Hi, welcome to the du-Elmtree. It's nice to meet you." Once again, there was a slightly awkward silence and a boy, who looked much like Tee, also stepped towards Lorna and held out his hand.
"Johnny," he said simply, a look of almost smiling appearing on his face. It was apparent to Lorna that there was something about Johnny, something bubbling inside him that he was forcing not to pour out. "Tee's my sister."
"I'm Rick," another boy, this time with scruffy dark hair and kind brown eyes, reached out to shake her hand. He smiled reassuringly, understanding in his eyes. "This is Tyler-" he pulled a laughing boy with curly hair to her, nudging him. "-beware of him."
"Elektra," an older girl with dark hair and bright blue highlights said grumpily, after being thrown to the front of the crowd.
"Frank Matthews," a boy with a chain necklace nodded and grinned at Lorna. She noticed clearly that he had something she recognised as cerebral palsy.
"My name is Gus," the most articulate young person of all took Lorna's hand and shook it firmly. He had curly hair, like Tyler's, but it was neatly cut and his shirt was tucked into his smart pants - much unlike Tyler's scruffily half-tucked orange t-shirt and his baggy jeans. Gus also held a notepad and a pen, and continued to furiously scribble words down as other young people introduced themselves. "I'll be giving you a tour in exactly thirty-one minutes and forty-three seconds. So you'd better be ready."
"All right," Tracy appeared unfazed by this odd, overly organised decision. "Perhaps you should go and-"
"Don't forget Jeff!" a small boy squeezed through the tight line and held his giraffe teddy up high. His little smile was sweet and his light blonde hair hung over his face. Dramatically, he held the giraffe to his ear and shook its head about at its neck. "Jeff says hello to Lorna and wants to know if she has any teddies."
Again, Lorna did not speak. This time, however, she could not surpress the grin etching itself upon her face.
"Oh, this is Harry," Tracy explained, not failing to notice Lorna's reaction. "He likes giraffes a lot, but his favourite giraffe is Jeff. Isn't that right, Harry?" She leaned down and ruffled his hair when he nodded, chuckling fondly.
Everyone stood in an awkward silence, Carmen rocking back and forth on her heels. Lorna bit her lip nervously and looked to Tracy for approval, who nodded. "You should probably go and get your stuff unpacked and... decide what sort of design you want in your room. If you let Mike know, we'll get it done this weekend. Your room is the-"
Lorna nodded and took a last look at her new housemates before wandering eagerly off up the stairs. At the top, however, low voices caught her attention from the huddle of people she'd just been stood with. Pausing on the top step, she listened intently.
"Listen, guys, I think it's best if we don't disrupt her. She's clearly had a hard time getting used to the fact that she's in care now, and if she doesn't want to be disturbed then we'll let her deal with it that way," Tracy spoke quietly to the young people, an informative tone in her voice. "We all have different ways of dealing with this."
Nods could almost be felt from where Lorna sat. She heard a 'yeah, guys' from Carmen and a 'maybe she just needs-' from Tee before rushing off the step and along the corridor. Most of the rooms she passed were full, messy or freakishly tidy alike, with personal items and photos and clothes. One room, however, held only a bed and a bedside table. This was it, then. Her new room.
Tugging the suitcase behind her, Lorna sighed and blew a stray strand of hair from her face. Closing the door tight shut behind her, she threw the suitcase to the floor and threw the lid open. She began to empty the contents onto the floor, starting with the scrapbook of memories yet to be glued onto the old, rusty pages. A pile of clothes was quickly stuffed into the drawers of the bedside table and jewellry and hair grips were left piled on the table top. She lay out the DVDs, scrapbook, notebooks, teddy and the books from the zip up compartment in a neat assortment on the floor before wrapping them carefully inside the warm pink blanket. Opening the bottom drawer of the bedside table, Lorna placed the bundle carefully inside and shut it, then jumping up to lay on the bed. She didn't do anything for the next two hours, just watched the plain ceiling and listened to the cautious footsteps and whispers outside her door. Tears threatened to penetrate past the brim of her eyes, but she always pulled them back in. Crying was for night time, at the least, when there was no risk of being seen.
A herd of feet and voices brought her back to reality as a deep woman's voice called up the stairs. "Tea time!" she heard, over and over, not wanting to move. To disturb her blissful peace with an agonizing hour of people trying to get through to her. Hopefully, they'd listen to what Tracy said. If this plan was going to work out, then Lorna could not get distracted. But, if she did not get up soon, someone was bound to come and get her.
They did.
"Uh... tea's ready, Lorna," Carmen's head peeked around the door hesitantly and she shot a feeble grin at the girl sprawled across the bed inside. "We're having Gina's Friday pasta. It's a sort of special. You... won't want to miss it."
Lorna only nodded, stayed down for a moment, and hopped off her bed. Carmen was still there, waiting at the door, and walked with her all the way down to the kitchen. In case she didn't get lost, Lorna supposed. That said, what happened to her tour? Hadn't Gus been set on showing her around the place? What happened to that? Perhaps it was what Tracy had said, and he'd been convinced to make other arrangements.
Everyone was already sat at the table when Lorna arrived. Each head flew up at the sound of her arrival, momentarily distracting them from the bowl of pasta in front of them. Carmen gestured to a seat between her and Tee, pouring some of the food into her bowl before filling her own. Still, everyone was silent and attentive. It was eerie, with the looks that Mike and Tracy were giving the rest of the kids.
Tracy coughed, taking her own seat opposite Lorna. "Well, what are you waiting for? Eat up, you lot." At that, everyone caught the warning and tucked into their meal. Nobody really spoke for the first few minutes, too intent on filling their angry stomaches. All that went through Lorna's mind was how kind Carmen was being, and how much she hated it.