Chapter 3
On Monday, me and my sibs all went back to school. Leni, Luan, and I went to the high school, while Lynn and Lincoln went to the middle school, Lucy, the twins, and Lisa to the elementary school, and Lily to the preschool/daycare.
Me and the members of my band, Sully and Mazzy, had volunteered to clean the cafeteria after lunch for some extra credit, and it was my solemn duty to take care of the overflowing trash bins. Guess who I found rummaging through the school's Dumpster?
"Come on, come on...there has to be something worth eating in here..." I heard Jay before I saw him, one arm elbow-deep in discarded items from all over the school while the other held the Dumpster's lid open over his head.
"Jay? What are you doing here?" I asked, startling him so much that the Dumpster's lid fell on his head and knocked the wind out of him. "Oh, gosh, I'm so sorry! Are you okay?"
"Luna? What are you doing here?" he unintentionally echoed while rubbing his bruised scalp. I let out a small chuckle.
"That's what I just asked, dude. I go to school here. You?" His feet shuffled a little and his face turned red.
"Food is hard to come by with my living arrangements. This is one of the best places to find it this time of day," he answered.
"Well, if it's food you're after, I'm sure the lunch lady would be willing to part with some leftovers. Follow me!" I said and led him inside. "Hey, dudes, this is the dude I was telling you guys about. Jay, these are my band mates Sully and Mazzy," I introduced Jay to my friends when they met us at the door.
"Wassup? Don't worry, we don't bite," Sully said in response to the apprehensive look on Jay's face. Together, the three of us talked the lunch lady out of some leftover Chicken a la King and baked potatoes, and we brought it over to the table Jay had taken a seat at. We had some friendly conversations, until Sully asked, "Do you sing or play instruments, Jay?"
"I, uh, I used to. Why?" Jay asked.
"We have this band, see, but we can't seem to find the right sound. I think we'd sound better with someone on bass guitar," Sully said. "Luna here is our main guitarist and vocalist, Mazzy is on the drums, and I have my keyboard. What do you say?"
"We do gigs and stuff around town and get paid for them. You'd get a cut of the check," Mazzy added. Before Jay could answer, the bell to signal our next class rang.
"Look, you don't have to decide right now. Just think about it," I said and practically shooed Jay back outside so that he wouldn't get mistaken for a trespasser.
...
It was over a week before I saw Jay again, and Dad had instructed me (upon being told about him) to invite him for dinner. When he arrived, I was the one to answer the door. He had at least tried to make himself look more presentable by donning a fresh(er) set of clothes. Lola, being the prissy brat that she was, refused to eat until Jay had taken a shower, so Dad let him borrow some of his old clothes and his shaving razor. Make no mistake, Jay cleaned up nice. Without his facial hair to cover it, there was one major scar on his face that stretched from his left nostril to just below his left ear. He wore a gray wife-beater undershirt with his dog tags proudly displayed, and dark gray sweatpants. Having met Lola's standards of cleanliness, he sat down between me and Lincoln at the table. Having heard about his situation, Dad had made an extra Lynn-sagna and gave Jay a double portion.
"Might I ask what has happened to your family that has you living in such atrocious conditions, Sam?" Lisa asked.
"It's not something that I like to talk about...wait, what did you call me?" Jay asked, looking fearful.
"Yes, I know who you really are. Samuel Jason Sharp, born August thirty-first of the year two thousand in Redfeather Lakes, Colorado," Lisa said, smugly pushing her glasses up the bridge of her nose. "The question is, why have you been lying to us?"
While our guest struggled to find a suitable answer, my mind was reeling. "Jay" had a name after all. If Lisa was right (and she usually was), that made Sam a year older than me and two months younger than Leni. He was born WAY outside of Michigan, and who knows how long he'd been on his own, likely never staying in one place for long.
"Because bad things happen to the people that get close to me. Not close as in physical distance, but close as in emotionally," Sam finally said.
"What kinds of things?" Lana asked innocently.
"My parents and younger sister are all dead. I've been wandering on my own for the last two years." There were very few things that could kill the mood of a meal in The Loud House, and announcing something like that was one of them. "Everyone that I've tried to form an emotional bond with seems to share the same fate. Wherever I go, carnage follows." Sam looked extremely heartbroken, like he sincerely believed that he was responsible for his family's deaths.
"Oh, you poor thing!" Leni exclaimed. "Mom, Dad, can he stay with us so we can convince him that none of those things were his fault?"
Sweet, sweet, naïve Leni. Always trying to bring out the best in people. She had a point, though. Mom and Dad were hesitant at first, but finally relented when the twins presented their infamous "Bambi eyes" (one set of those eyes was bad enough, but two of them majorly overloaded the cuteness meter). Apparently, all it took was a good sob story to get Lola to change her opinion of someone. It helped that the 'rents were charitable folks, contributing to the local food bank whenever they could.
"Alright, alright. But he can only stay with us if he pulls his own weight around here," Mom said. "And don't think you're getting a new brother out of this! We're not adopting him!" Sam did his best to try and back out of it, but escape was impossible. This was only the beginning of our adventures with him.
Fun fact about me: my grandparents own a cabin in Redfeather Lakes. It's a small tourist town in the Rocky Mountains, and one of my favorite places to go during summer vacation.
