Blast: The Teenage Hero

9. The Girl Next Door

Alex opens his eyes, rising from his bed with a loud yawn as he stretches his arms. He looks over at the calendar, and smiles. Few things make him smile more than seeing that today is Saturday. No school to worry about, no fear of missing the bus or having to explain to his teachers why he's late again, no worrying about whether or not he did all his homework last night.

He smiles, and floats out of his bed, flying slowly over to the closet, to change out of his pajamas and into his regular day clothes, and then goes over to the kitchen. By now it's 9:00 am, so of course his mom is already at work by now. But that's ok, he grabs the cereal box and serves himself some cereal in it, then grabs some milk from the fridge and pours it onto the cereal, and then goes to the living room to watch some TV as he eats his cereal.

"I love Saturdays." Alex says with a happy smile as he sits on the couch, eating his cereal as he starts watching some TV. However, as he eats his cereal, he hears a truck stop nearby. He looks out the window, seeing the truck having stopped right outside the house across the street, which catches his attention. The neighbors that used to live there moved out quite a while ago, and no one has been living there since then. Does this mean there's new neighbors?

It seems to be the case, as the truck opens to reveal a lot of boxes of varying sizes. Alex seems kind of curious as to who the new neighbors might be. He finishes his cereal, and decides to go meet the new neighbors. Who knows what they might be like!

He accelerates with his super speed as he runs across the street to go meet the new neighbors, but a single misstep causes him to trip and fall, though far from falling flat, the inertia causes him to keep on moving forward, rolling ahead almost as fast as he was running before tripping.

Meanwhile, a young man that's a bit taller than Blast, and seems not too much older as well, possibly early twenties, is carrying boxes into the house. He has short black hair, and is wearing a T-shirt and some pants. The man doesn't even realize Alex is coming his way, until rolling Alex crashes straight into him, knocking him over and making him drop the boxes he was carrying.

Both Alex and the young man lie flat on the ground, as the young man realizes what just happened. He then gets up at the same time as Alex, and grits his teeth, with an angry glare at him. "Hey! What's the big idea!?" he yells at Alex, who steps back, with an embarrassed smile.

"Sorry for crashing into you, it was an accident." Alex tells him, wishing he hadn't just messed up his first impression with the new neighbors.

The man narrows his eyes, not really seeming to appreciate the apology all that much. "Well be careful, you klutz," the man tells him in an angry tone. "What do you want anyway?"

Alex looks at him, and tries to defuse the situation. "I saw the truck arrive here, so I guessed you were moving in," Alex tells him. "I just wanted to come over and meet the new neighbors. I'm Alex, I live right across the street." he adds, with a nervous smile and offering a handshake.

The man still seems upset, and ignores his offer of a handshake, just turning to pick up the boxes he dropped. "You're lucky these boxes didn't have anything fragile in them, or you'd have to pay for anything that broke." he tells Alex, definitely still not seeing him in a good light. "I'm Harris, and if you want to be a good neighbor, you'd do good by leaving me alone. I don't want to deal with any troublemakers this early in the morning." Harris adds, picking up the boxes and walking away.

Alex just sighs, realizing that far from leaving a good first impression, he just messed up. "Man... that was a terrible first impression..." he tells himself. However, he decides to not let it get to him. He follows Harris and decides to try and make it up to him. "Hey, I can make it up to you! Why don't you let me help you out with the-"