Later that night I decide to spend time with my brother in hopes to cheer him up. I take him over to the local video rental store and he picks out some movies. We decide to order a pizza and bake Halloween sugar cookies. He seems a lot happier than he was before, and he's telling me some crazy story that he read in class today.

We finally sit down with cookies and popcorn spread out on the small wooden coffee table. I just hope that the power doesn't go out because there's a nasty storm brewing out there, I can hear the rain pounding down on the roof. I put the movies out on the floor in front of the TV and Liam sits down with me. Liam is really into horror flicks, so of course half the movies he picked out are that. I always make sure that they are kid friendly though, but there are some he's snuck by me that definitely are a little too mature. He points to one of my favorites, The Gremlins. He hasn't seen it yet, and I don't think it's too scary, hell I saw a movie called The Gate when I was only five.

I put the DVD in and it starts up, and I make sure to throw on the captions. Liam gets my attention when the father brings home Gizmo. I look over and he's telling me how cute Gizmo is and that he wants one. I laugh and tell him he may want to re-think that, mogwai are very difficult to take care of.

We've already watched a decent chunk of the movie when I hear the screen door open. I look up and Daryl walks in all soaking wet from the rain. His hair hangs in his face and he pushes it aside to see what we're watching. In his hand he holds a can of something and he's eating it with a plastic fork. He takes off his wet jacket, and sits down in the beat up old recliner next to the front door and joins us like he belongs here. I look over giving him a "what the fuck" look and he just grunts and mumbles something.

"What the hell are you eating? There's a whole pizza in the kitchen."

He looks over at me and shoves another bite in his mouth. I can't see the can too well because of how dark the living room is.

"It's Spam, what you've never eaten spam before?" he questions.

"Oh my god ew, your gross," I say.

Liam taps my shoulders and asks me what I'm talking about. I sign to him that Daryl is eating canned spam, and I make a face like I'm puking. Liam looks over at Daryl and rubs his stomach to say he likes it. Daryl holds out the can to Liam and he shakes his head and points to the cookies and popcorn on the table. Daryl nods as Liam goes back to watching the movie and shoveling his mouth with cookies.

Daryl sits back pulling the handle so the foot rest comes up. I guess he's staying for the movie. I don't really mind and he's not doing any harm.

"Okay that stuff smells awful," I say.

"Shush woman, its good stuff."

"Gross," I tell him.

"Try it."

He holds the fork with a small piece of meat in my direction waving it around. Laughing I lean over and bite it off the fork. I hold it in my mouth a second too long and when our eyes meet my heart and stomach do those weird things again. I wish my body would stop reacting like this. For one thing I barely know the guy, secondly he doesn't plan on hanging around long, and third he and his brother are assholes. I quickly pull away and chew on the soft salty meat from a can.

"Good right?"

He's digging around the can looking for another bite for himself. I take a sip of my soda sitting on the table, and nearly down the whole cup.

"Where did you even find that crap?"

"Its mine bought it before I left..." he starts, but doesn't finish his thought.

Daryl stays quiet and I turn my attention back to the movie. The mom is holding a knife in her hand attempting to kill the gremlins in her kitchen. Daryl chuckles as the tiny creature throws plates at her.

"This bitch thinks she's all bad ass with her knife."

He laughs to himself, and I can't help but smile. Is it weird that his laugh is actually nice? He hasn't laughed a lot since we've met, but I like it. I watch him with just my eyes as he sits there finishing his spam and enjoying the movie.

"It's like an apocalypse with little creatures," he jokes.

I roll my eyes and laugh, because he's kind of right. These guys are little terrors taking over a small town. He and Liam start hysterically laughing while an old woman in a stair lift gets ejected out a second story window by a gremlin. I swear he wipes tears from his eyes he's laughing so hard. Liam signs that the scene was awesome and I shake my head.

"What's he say'n?" Daryl asks.

"He signed awesome," I show him the sign as I speak.

"Yeah buddy that was awesome," Daryl says and signs while looking right at Liam.

I see Liam smile and that makes my heart full. After the day he had he needs to feel good. We continue through the rest of the movie. Daryl is commenting on random scenes, and laughing with Liam when they find something amusing. When it's finished Liam begs for another one and I unfortunately have to send him to bed. Although I'd love to keep him home tomorrow he has school and I have work.

I make sure that Liam gets to bed okay, then head back to the living room to clean up the mess, and pack up the dinner. It's late almost midnight so if they haven't eaten it by now it's going to spoil. I hear dishes clanking in the kitchen and notice the coffee table is clear. I walk in and see Daryl standing at the sink washing dishes. He stands at the sink dish towel draped over his bare shoulder cleaning up my mess. I don't say anything I just sit back and watch him. I watch how his muscles move every time he places a dish on the drying rack. He's wearing a tight black t-shirt with the sleeves cut off so I can see the muscles in his arms. I feel my heart skip a beat or two as he turns his head and finds me staring.

"You gonna just stand there all day, or help me out?"

He stares for another second and I laugh. I come up behind him and swipe the towel from his shoulder then walk to the other side to dry some of the dishes. We work like this in silence until the dishes are done. It somehow doesn't feel awkward being here with him, I feel at ease. I feel like on the outside he has this hard shell and is quite scary at times, but I'm starting to see that underneath that shell is a whole different guy. Maybe even damaged.

"I get paid on Friday," I say.

"You paying me for doing dishes?"

He looks over at me as I set the dish cloth down, and if I wasn't looking at him I wouldn't have noticed the small smile on his lips. Without thinking I take my hand and hit his arm playfully. Thankfully he doesn't respond to my touch I don't even know why I did that.

"I mean for the car battery," I roll my eyes.

"Honestly, don't worry about it," he tells me.

"No, I can't just not pay you."

He shuts the water off and turns his full body towards me.

"It's on me."

"Are you sure? If you're living here with us you must not..."

I stop myself, I was going to mention he probably doesn't have a lot of money if he's working for my stepfather. Most of the guys who end up staying don't and need a cheap place to stay. I'm not even sure he charges rent. Daryl bites his lip and for a second I see anger in his eyes and it looks like he wants to say something. Instead he says nothing and on his way out of the room he knocks the chair at the kitchen table over with a slam. I jump, but don't say anything.