[Mitch's POV]

After another few hours of frustration with words, a huge alarm went off, making me jump. "Dude, chill," Ty said. "It's just the bell for the end of the day."

I sat back down and took a deep breath. "Right. What does that mean?"

"It means it's time to go home," he said, walking out of the classroom with me and Jason trailing behind him. They both opened their lockers and put their stuff in a backpack, while I just stood there awkwardly with my homework. I planned on burning it the first chance I get.

The three of us walked out of the school and around the front, where I guess we go our separate ways. "Well, thanks for covering for me guys. And for giving me food. I guess I better get going."

I started to walk away, but Ty called after me, "Wait! You're have to come back tomorrow!"

"Why?" I asked him. "I'm not planning on staying here for long. I just came to New York for some food."

Ty shook his head. "Not anymore. Exchange students usually stay for about a month. If you don't stay, the adults will make us give your secret away. Well, that and we'll probably get in trouble."

"A month?!" I almost screamed. "I'm not staying here for a month!"

"Hey, we gave you food and didn't give you away, even after the whole aquarium thing," Jason said, folding his arms. "You owe us."

I groaned. "Fine. I'll see you tomorrow then."

I started to walk away, but again, Ty stopped me. "Where are you gonna go?"

I shrugged. "I don't know. Somewhere by a restaurant, I guess. I'll snag some food and sleep under a doorway or something. I'll live."

Jason scrunched his nose up in disgust. "No, no, no. I'm not gonna let you steal things. You can come with me to my house. Besides, you need help with your homework and some new, not ripped dirty clothes. And a shower. Definitely a shower. No offence, you smell like you haven't bathed in years." I tried to say no to Jason, but he wouldn't have any of it. I was going to his house whether I liked it or not. I guess it can't be that bad. It'll be nice to have a real bed and someone else make a meal for me. Hopefully Jerome won't mind.

We said goodbye to Ty, then walked to Jason's house. It was only four blocks away, but it was the longest four blocks I've ever walked in my life. Despite the fact that Jason had volunteered to let me crash at his house, I can tell that he still couldn't stand me. We walked in awkward silence the entire way, making it seem three times longer.

When Jason finally turned onto another street, I felt I had suddenly came to a place where a builder had made one house, then pressed copy and paste down the entire road. All the houses were two stories, white, had a black roof, and a glass door. "How can you tell the difference between your house and the others? Have you ever just walked into your neighbor's house and been like 'oh. This isn't my house. Maybe if there had been some variety between all these houses, I would've picked the right one'?"

Jason glared at me like I had personally offended him. "There are little details. If you would bother to look closely, maybe you would see that every house is really different."

I looked at the other houses while we walked, this time looking for subtle details. "Nope. Still don't see it."

He sighed. "Never mind. My home is right up here," he pointed to one of the houses at the end of the street. "And whatever I say to my parents, just go along with it, okay?"

"Yeah. Whatever." We walked up the driveway and then into the house. I have to admit, I felt tears swell up in my eyes a bit. The last time I was in a real house was with my mom before the crash. I forgot how nice they were. When you walked into Jason's house, you walked right into the living room that had grey furniture with colorful pillows on them. There was also a TV on top of a black table with a Wii next to it. Right next to the living room was the kitchen and dining room. In the kitchen were two people talking to each other. Probably Jason's parents.

"Kelly, Dan, I'm home!" he called then ran into the woman's arms. They both smiled and hugged him and asked him how his day went. Jason started to ramble on and on about school, while I stood in the background, perfectly fine with not being noticed

Of course it didn't last long. The man, Dan I guess, looked over his son's shoulder and made eye contact with me. I waved sheepishly. "Hi."

"And who might this be Jason?" He asked in a tone that I couldn't figure out. It sounded like a mixture of curiosity, friendliness, and a bit of irritation.

Jason looked back at me like he had forgotten I was even there. "Oh yeah. This is my friend Mitch. He's an exchange student from Toronto. He came to our class awhile ago, and every student is taking a week with him. I'm really sorry I forgot to tell you about it. I meant to, but I kept getting distracted when I was going to tell you." Wow. I need to give this guy a bit more credit. His lying skills are on point.

Kelly and Dan both gave me warm smiles. "Well, nice to meet you Mitch," Kelly said. "And if you need anything, feel free to ask me or Dan." I nodded. "Do you like pizza Mitch?"

"Yeah! What kind of person doesn't?!" I responded a bit too enthusiastically.

They both chuckled. "Good thing you like it," Dan said. "Because that's what we're having for dinner. Is pepperoni okay?" I nodded again. "Okay then. I'll call right now. Jason, why don't you take Mitch to the guest room?"

Jason led me upstairs to his room first. He opened his door and I saw what could've been outer space. His walls were dark blue with stars and planets covering everything. He had a bookshelf filled with different space books, and a couple of telescopes. His bed was white with bed sheets that looked like the moon. Next to his bed was a black desk with a map of the sky and several pictures of smart looking people. Probably rocket scientists or something. "You like space?" I asked.

He nodded and looked at his star map. "I just think that it's so interesting, you know? The fact that our world is just one small part of something so big and mysterious. There's infinite things to learn about space." He turned and smiled at me. "And when I get older, I'm gonna be the first one to go to a different planet."

"Wow. I've never thought about space much. Or what I'm going to do when I'm an adult. I've mainly been worried about what I'm gonna eat the next day." I said, glancing at one of his telescopes.

"Well, I guess that's just one more difference between you and me." He started rummaging through his closet, then tossed me some clean clothes. "Here. Bathroom's down the hall. Please do the world a favor and go take a shower. Then come back here."

I looked at him skeptically. "Why?"

Jason just rolled his eyes. "I'm gonna teach you how to read and write. Duh. You're not going to get anywhere in life if you don't know how, and if you get a job somehow, you don't have to break the law anymore. And I'm all for getting people to follow rules."

I smiled at him. "Thanks Jason. I guess you don't hate me as much as I thought."

"No, I still hate you. Don't get your hopes up. Just go take a shower

I walked down to the bathroom and turned on the shower, then looked in the mirror. I haven't seen my reflection in years, and I was shocked by what I saw. For one thing, my hoodie hung very loosely on me like I was a mannequin. When I lifted it up, I could see a bit of my ribs. It could've been a lot worse, but I could still just barely see them. My face was really thin and dirty. My caramel eyes looked tired and had bags under them. My hair was matted in some places and definitely really dirty. My entire body was covered in bruises and scrapes. And overall, I just looked way older than nine.

Once I got over my look, I took my shower then changed into the clothes Jason gave me. It was simply a plain white t-shirt and black sweatpants, but since I had been wearing the same used clothes for about five months now (I know, disgusting. But clothes aren't exactly the highest thing on my priority list), it felt kinda weird to put on clean ones. I ran my fingers through my hair, trying to get some of the knots out. I went to put on my hoodie, then realized it was gone. I sprinted down to Jason's room and slammed open the door. "Where's my hoodie?" I demanded.

He glanced up from his book and gave me a confused look. "What?"

"My hoodie Jason. Where. Is. It?"

He shrugged then went right back to reading his book. "Kelly might have it. Ask her."

I ran down the stairs into the living room, where Kelly and Dan were sitting watching TV while Kelly worked on something with some fabric and a sewing needle... my hoodie? I walked over and tapped her on the shoulder. "Uh... excuse me, Kelly? What are you doing with my hoodie?"

Kelly looked up from her work and smiled. "Oh, hi Mitch. Well, I noticed that you seemed to really liked it, but it wasn't really in the best shape, was it?" I shook my head. All of my clothes had several rips and holes from over the years, and my hoodie since I wore it everywhere, got the worst of it. Besides just rips and holes, it also had many stains, loose strings, and part of one sleeve was halfway torn off. "I threw away all you other clothes," Kelly continued, "but I thought that you might like to keep this. So I washed it, and now I'm going to patch it up for you." She showed me her progress so far. It looked almost exactly like it did when I first got it. "I'm also going to make it a bit bigger, since it seems a bit small on you. Is that alright?"

I had a huge smile on my face. "Yeah. Thanks." I gave her a big hug, which seemed to surprise her as well as me, then headed back upstairs to Jason's room for my reading and writing lesson.


So my first little lesson from Jason didn't go very well. He tried to teach me to read one of those picture books, but I couldn't figure out any the words. They all just looked like random squiggles on the paper. I also found out that Jason got frustrated easily. Sure, he was fairly good about not showing it too much, but I could still tell. He would tell me a word when I couldn't figure it out (so every word) in a tense tone, and would make a fist. When he didn't think I was looking, he would shoot me a little glare. Yeah, he still doesn't like me.

Thankfully, our lesson ended when Kelly called us down to dinner. While we ate our pizza, Dan and Kelly asked me about myself. Half of my answers were lies. But they didn't ask much about my family, which I found kinda weird. Not that I'm complaining.

Soon they sent me and Jason off to bed so we could wake up early for school tomorrow (seriously, we have to wake up early too? I'm starting to like school less and less). We both brushed our teeth then went off to our rooms. I tried to sleep, but it didn't work very well. I wasn't used to sleeping in this setting, so I had trouble getting comfortable.

During my struggle to fall asleep, I heard a door quietly creak open. I got up from my bed and saw Jason, sneaking down the hallway. And since I had nothing better to do, I followed. I stayed back quite a ways though, just incase he didn't want me to hear him.

We headed down the stairs towards the living room, where I could hear Kelly and Dan's voices. Once Jason got to the bottom, he peaked his head around the corner so he could see them. I stayed a couple of steps up where I could still hear what they were saying. "Jason has never lied to us Kelly," Dan was saying. "Maybe Mitch really is just an exchange student in a weird situation. Maybe his family is dealing with some hard times or something."

"Really Dan? Who are you trying to fool?" Kelly asked. "Jason comes back from school with a boy who is skinnier than a stick, in small and ripped clothes that have obviously never been washed, and looking like he's never slept a day in his life, and you are saying that his family is poor? And they sent him to New York to a private school because that would help? And even if for some reason that was the case, why would he not have clean clothes? Or look like a skeleton?" Silence for a good thirty seconds. "We should help him Dan. He obviously needs it desperately."

"No, no, no." Dan said in an exasperated tone. "I don't know how you convinced me the first time Kelly, but I most certainly am not cracking again. One kid is enough! Our house is not an orphanage!"

"So we do what Dan? Send him back from where he came from? He'll probably die, considering the shape he's in now! Maybe he came here for a reason. Maybe we're supposed to take him in." Another few seconds of silence. "We have enough money Dan," Kelly continued. "What are you so afraid of?"

"I'm afraid for Jason," he admitted. "When my parents adopted my baby sister, I felt neglected for months. I don't want to do the same thing to Jason."

"This is different Dan. The boys are both the same age, and we're always so busy. It'll be nice for Jason to have a brother to talk to while we're working. We'll be helping Jason as well as Mitch. And we'll make sure to give both boys the same amount of attention, so no one will feel left out."

"...Alright. Let's do it."

"WHAT?!" Jason and I both screamed from around the corner at the same time.

Dan sighed and Kelly chuckled. "I should've guessed that you two would be down here. Come over here you guys."

Jason and I came out of hiding, then sat down on the couch by Kelly and Dan. "You're adopting me?" I asked them.

They both nodded. "You heard our reasons," Kelly said. "But do you want us to adopt you? That's really what matters here. If you choose not to stay, that's completely fine. But we would love to have you here."

Do I want to be adopted by Kelly and Dan? Sure, they've been nothing but kind to me, giving me a place to sleep, Kelly fixing my hoodie, cleaning me up, and giving me the best meal I've had since the crash. And Jason had offered to let me stay here, along with helping me learn to read and write, even if it was a complete failure at this point. He also didn't rat me out at the aquarium a couple months ago or at the school, which I'm incredibly thankful for. But there was still Jerome back in Canada. He was my only friend for the longest time, even if he was a bit weirded out by me at times. How could I just leave him without notice? Jason still seems to hate me and shows no sign of dropping his grudge. Dan and Kelly, no matter how nice, are still practically strangers. After all, I had only met them a couple hours ago. It took a while, but I made up my mind. "I'd like to stay," I told them finally. Hopefully Jerome would understand.

Kelly hugged me and Dan smiled. "Welcome to the family Mitch. Now seriously, it's almost midnight. Both of you better go to bed, right now." Jason and I both said goodnight then headed upstairs.

"I'm sorry," I mumbled as Jason walked into his room.

"For what?" He asked.

"Well, it's pretty obvious you hate me. And now you have to live with me."

He shrugged. "Meh. I'll live. Besides, I don't hate you. I hate what you were doing. This could be like a clean slate. Just don't go back to stealing and we should get along just fine."

I smiled at him, then walked down the hall to my room. "No promises. Good night Jason."

"G'night Mitch."