Chapter 13: Crazy Lady and cousins

Little Rosie was the cutest baby that Tia had ever seen in her whole life time. She had her mother's looks with her father's pretty green eyes and red hair; Rosie was defiantly going to be a looker when she grew up. Tia watched, as D'jok fed Rosie another spoon of baby food making a kind of airplane noise; it was quite funny. Mei, sat close to her husband and also laughed at D'jok attempts to feed their daughter. Mary and Sonny had gone to collect the food at the counter, leaving Tia to sit by herself. Stella would have joined them but her husband's children needed her to look after their children. Tia was happy that Stella had found herself a man that loved her and a family that she adored, giving Tia more hope that she could start over. They had spent all morning trying to find new clothes for Tia, since she only had the ones that Mei could lend her and they were too long. They had done well so far, Tia had managed to buy three new jeans and a few t-shirts. Mary and Mei tried to encourage her to try on a dress or a skirt but Tia refused, she would feel like a complete idiot when she had been forced to wear a dress when she had to go to parties with Jonathan, then getting beaten up for looking ugly in it. She suppressed the shiver that was about to roll down her back. No, she couldn't think like that anymore, she was supposed to be moving on with her life. Tia had been nervous when she downloaded a few applications this morning for a few of the local collages but Stella and Sonny encouraged her to at least give it a try. Sighing to herself, she saw Sonny and Mary return with the food and moved along the chair to give Mary and Sonny a seat. They had come to a place called Planet Akillian. The place was packed, many people came here, Mei said you had to be lucky to find a seat in this place, which luckily they had. The whole family engaged in conversation, while Tia just watched and ate her burger. She couldn't help but feel jealous with the way Mei and D'jok looked at each other; their looks were filled with so much love. Why couldn't I find someone like that? Tia mumbled to herself, as she took another bite of her cheese burger. She knew that she wasn't actually girlfriend material but Stella had always said there was someone out there for everyone; yeah, everyone accepted her. She snapped out of her unhappy day dreams as baby Rosie made a cute little giggle at one of the funny faces that D'jok had just made. Tia couldn't help but giggled herself at D'jok foolishness. Her phone suddenly started buzzing; looking at her watch she saw she had a text from Rocket. A big smile spread across her lips and let out a little laugh. Poor Rocket, Tia sighed to herself and quickly sent a reply back. A few minutes later, after finishing their lunches they were walking back to the shopping district. Mei was making another attempt for her to try on a dress but Tia continued to refuse. Besides even if she did buy a dress when was she ever going to wear it, she had no idea but she was sure some time near in the future Mei was going to find a good excuse to force her to try it on. If she had been paying attention she would of notice the two little animals run past her ankle. However, she did notice two blond flashes run past her and before she could take in the situation completely something heavy collide with her and knocked Tia down.

Rocket groan when he heard the sound of his phone ringing, he tried ignoring it at first and hoped it was his imagination but finally picked up the phone when it didn't seem to stop.

"Hello." He grumbled into the phone, pulling the cover back over his head when the piercing light burn in his eyes. He was still trying to wear off the effects of the hangover he had got from too many drinks last night with the guys yesterday and hoped to sleep it off. However, Rocket suspected that his plans had been foiled.

"Hey Rocket, is it possible that you could pick up the girls from gymnastic today?" His uncle asked. Rocket let out a loud groan. His uncle knew he didn't like picking up the girls from their club. Not because he hated them or anything like that, in fact he loved to watch his young cousin show off the new tricks they had learnt. It was just, that woman... Shivers went down Rockets back at the very thought of her. He wanted to deny his uncle's request but he knew his uncle wouldn't ask him unless it was complete emergency. So, like the good nephew that he was he replied,

"Sure, I'll do it." Rocket muttered, hoping that he would wake up any moment from his nightmare. Sadly, his prayers were not answered.

"Thanks Rocket I appreciate it." He could hear his uncle beaming down the phone, Rocket was sure he had swiped a whole load of problems off his uncle's chest. After a while of small conversation they both said goodbye and hang up. He looked at his clock to see he had enough time to clean up before he went out. Taking a quick shower and pulling on some trousers and a t-shirt, he quickly grabbed an apple and some coffee before walking out of the house; off to what Rocket called his doom. He needed to come up with some kind of plan to survive and he needed to think fast since he only had twenty minutes tops. When he was just a few steps away from the building he quickly sent Tia a text that said 'wish me luck, I'm about to face crazy lady' he had told Tia about the women that always tried to flirt with him, especially one called Lori who wouldn't take the hint that he wasn't interested. The plan he had come up with was simple. Get in; get out, that way nobody got hurt. His plan started off well, as he managed to duck past some young women coming out of the gym, however, his plan soon turned wrong. Rocket had just spotted his two cousins on the other side of the room when slim hands wrapped themselves around them.

"Hey Baby, you miss me." Lori whispered seductively into Rockets ear. Great! Just when he thought he might actually dodge her for once.

"Hey Lori, it's nice seeing you but I have a busy day so if you don't mind." He tried to say politely, while he attempted to wriggle out of her arms. Nonetheless, no matter how much he tried, Lori had the claws of a tiger.

"Oh come on, I know you've missed me, you know we should get together sometime..." At the last moment Rocket was finally able to duck out of her grasp and quickly walk over to his cousins. When was Lori ever going to get it, he wasn't interested. Out of all the people in the world why did she pick him? She was a very beautiful girl, she could have anyone. Besides, he wanted to stay far away from her even more now that his heart was only for Tia.

"Hey Hayley. Hey Samantha." Rocket smiled at his cousins, trying to look his normal self. Miserably, he was a rubbish liar and his cousin read him instantly.

"Lori's been trying to get her hands on her again." Hayley joked with Samantha giggling agreement. Rocket could only nod at his young cousins in the company of a silly grin on his face. His phone buzz, as he looked down and saw he got a reply from Tia. Poor you, I hope you make it out without the need for any therapy sessions. Rocket laughed at Tia's response and was just about to text back another one before his cousin interrupted him.

"Come; let's make a run for it, before Lori's tries to get you to have a making out session with you." Samantha laughed at her poor older cousin, who winced at the very thought of the idea. Quickly gathering the rest of their stuff together they rushed out of the room just as Lori decided to try another attempt to get Rocket to take her out for a date. Rocket let out a loud sigh of relief, as they were about ten minutes away from the club. Rocket was in such a good mood now that he had gotten away from that woman that when the girls asked if they could got to the park he agreed. He sat down on one of the benches that over looked the whole place while his cousins went to go and meet one of their friends of the swings. He relaxed as he looked around the park. It hadn't change much from when Rocket and the guys had been kids, except that some of the equipment desperately needed a paint over but that didn't seem to bother the children at all.

"Rocket, look what we found." Hayley cried out joyfully, as Rocket broke out of his thoughts and turn too his two cousins that were sprinting all the way up the hill to him. He couldn't see what she was holding at first until she slid into a halt in front of him.

"Oh no, don't even think about it." Rocket replied firmly before they could even ask the question. In Hayley's arms lay a chocolate brown puppy that must be around seven months odd. Both of the girls' faces dropped.

"Please Rocket, he's just so cute." Samantha tried to persuade him with one of her puppy looks she would usually give him when she really badly wanted something.

"Yeah, we can't just leave him in that bag in the river." Her sister added to their defence.

"Huh what?" Rocket asked, not sure he had heard the last part correctly. Before he process the situation in further in his head a cat suddenly appeared out of nowhere behind him. The puppy went absolutely mental and jumped out of the Hayley's arms and ran after it.

"Wait!" The twins yelled and ran after the small puppy. Rocket was on his feet in half a second and ran after them. It was at a bit of a disadvantage because the girls had followed the dog into the woods, it was easy for the girls to slip under the bushes but not for him. He was grateful when he ended up on the street and saw the girls running down the road. Following them he was just about to catch up with them when he rounded a corner and bumped into someone by mistake and fell down. Horror rippled through his body when he realise who he had fall onto.

"Tia!" He cried out and instantly got off her, allowing her to breathe when his crushing weight had been remove. "Tia, I'm so sorry I didn't mean..." He paused shocked by his actions. It was only when Sonny crouched down beside her that he notice everyone else. Sonny and D'jok helped her to her feet. She seemed a bit dazed, until she looked at Rocket and seemed to finally understand what happen. "Tia are you alright, I swear I didn't mean to..." He stopped half through his sentence again when he couldn't think about anything else to say.

"Rocket calm down." Tia smiled, leaning her hand gently on his wrist, sending electric waves up his arm and made him stare at her. "It was an accident, no harm done right." She smiled again, making Rocket feel happy again.

"Rocket we got him." His young cousins sang as they came skipping back happily with that evil puppy in Hayley's arms. He shook his head disappointedly at the girls but he couldn't help but smile a little bit when he saw how dirty they were.

"My uncles going to kill me when sees the state of you." Rocket stated, rubbing his hand over his forehead. This was going to take a lot of explaining. As he rubbed his head he also notice that he was also messy and felt embarrass to meet Tia in this state.

"When did you guys get a puppy?" Mei inquired, bending down near the push chair and tried to ssh an upset Rosie, she must of sensed Rockets embarrassment and had tried to change the subject (it was one of the abilities that allowed her to rise to the title of spy master). The dirty girls looked at her with big smiles.

"We found him near the river by the park." Samantha stated, showing the puppy off to Mei. Rocket had to admit the puppy was rather cute looking. "Please let us keep him." Hayley begged to Rocket with her puppy dog look on her face. Samantha saw what her sister was up to and also out on the same expression; hell even the dog was giving him some kind of puppy pout. Why couldn't I be born blind? Rocket whined secretly, there was no way in hell that he could resist those little faces.

"We'll see what your dad says." He finally answered, earning a small cheer from the girls. If their hearts were going to be broken, then he'll let his uncle do it, who will probably pass the responsibility on to Aduim. He blushed when he heard Tia giggle behind him, making the girls notice her for the first time.

"Do you like our puppy?" Samantha asked Tia, as she walked up to Tia and place the puppy out in front of her. Slowly, Tia bent down and held her hand out for the puppy to sniff; the brown fluff took his time sniffing Tia's hand before licking it, allowing Tia to scratch the top of his head.

"He's lovely." She smiled back at the young girls and the puppy. Tia had always had a love for animals, even scary ones. The girls beamed back at her; whoever this person was they liked her.

"I'm Samantha and this is Hayley." The girl smiled at the nice person. So these must be the Rocket twin cousins, Tia thought to herself, she had heard many stories of them and the rest of his family.

"It's nice to meet you too; Rockets told me so much about you. I'm Tia." Tia grinned back. She noticed for a second that the girls' faces had turned to a shock expression but quickly turned back into innocent smiling ones. Unlike everyone else who had known the girls for a long time she would of realise the sly smirks at the corner of their dimples.