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Rich drops of rain fell on my hair, soon soaking it. I realized I needed to go somewhere. Anywhere by now. So I got up, and without thinking, treaded straight back to Garrett's house.

I had no idea what to say, or how he was going to react.

"Hey Garrett, can I stay at your house until we turn 18?"

Yeah right.

I pulled out my gum, popping the pieces in my mouth one by one. I watch nothing but my feet now, focusing on nothing else but the safest route to Garrett's house.

-

Garrett frantically picked up each red solo cup, throwing it into the black trash bag he treaded with him. His parents were supposed to come home the next day, and it was already 1 in the morning. You can take a lucky guess what he was doing to procrastinate. Shoveling people out of his house of course! He almost got into it with Scott, but thankfully his ginger girlfriend stopped the heated argument.

He moved onto the bathrooms now. One was completely filled with vomit, all over the mirror, toilet- everything.

"How the fuck..." He muttered, gagging.

There was a knock at the door.

Holy shit they're home already.

"Shit!"

His feet shuffled down the stairs, him pulling the door open quickly without thinking. He expected to see his lanky bald dad, and short grey headed mom, arms piled high with luggage. But instead it was... Rhiannon?

Breath hitching in throat, beads of sweat falling off of his face. The boy was a damn nervous wreck.

"Rhiannon? What are you doing here??" He laughed. His laughing died down when he saw how sad she looked inside. She kept her head down.

"I need a place to go... my dad kicked me out."

Without thought he answered.

"Come on in!"

He opened the door, letting her step into his house, letting regret step into his brain. Garrett had no honest idea whether she was allowed to stay or not, but he knew what it was leaning towards. Hell no!

Rhiannon was surprised that he let her in. She thought he would be completely weirded out by the question, and she was already prepared to cry again. It immediately lifted her mood.

"Thank you so much." She smiled, tucking a piece of hair behind her ear.

Garrett noticed she had mascara and tear stains down her cheeks.

"I can uh, get my moms makeup wipes for you?"

She was embarrassed now.

"That'd be nice." She giggled.

He ran upstairs to get some, leaving her swimming in awkwardness. Could she make herself at home?

She eased onto the nice couch.

"Here you go," he tossed the packet of sea salt remover wipes at her, accidentally hitting her boob. Rhiannon's face turned beet red.

"Dammit, sorry..."

"Feel free to avoid talking about that, please."

"Oh-oh ok. Well my parents can't know you're here. So tonight you sleep in the guest room, and at school you sneak out the window to meet me outside. I'll just say I'm having you over as a friend when school ends. You'll "leave" the house," He made quotation marks with his fingers.

She nodded, overwhelmed by the idea of having to hide.

"Then we will just keep this up until you can go somewhere else."

She couldn't go somewhere else. So apparently this means, she can stay for a bit, then she's homeless. She clenched the pillow between her arms.

"Okay. Thank you, again."

He smiled.

"Do you need to have alone time?" He motioned upstairs with his thumb.

"Yeah, thanks."

She headed upstairs with her bag.

Garrett's head spun. Rhiannon was staying at his house. Hot Rhiannon. Hot. Rhiannon.

He went back to cleaning.

Austin won't believe this.

Sketch (Austin Abrams)Where stories live. Discover now