Curtis Donovan woke up that day as he usually did to the sound of his highly irritating alarm, he never changed it because without it he wouldn't have ever felt the will to leave his bed. He lived alone but he was fine with that preferring his own company to others who would only create unnecessary noise. It was how he lived separating himself from other people.

It would have been a normal day, he took his coffee black as he read a trashy gossip magazine, it was delivered to his door by an unknown source and had become somewhat of a guilty pleasure for him, reading about the unnecessary and stupid things that celebrities did which made no real impact in the world. He checked his wristwatch, he was expecting an important call from Beijing at eleven. Curtis was an investment banker, those two words usually commanded a lot of respect and awe which he revelled in, in fact he made it a goal to enquire about people's occupation when he met them only to see their jaws go slightly slack when he brought up with an air of indifference that he was in fact an investment banker.

Many who met him thought he was a narcissist, someone completely wrapped up in his own life with little care for anyone else, he agreed with a sense of pride. He had looked around at the foolish people in the world who had their hearts broken and lived for others and decided at an early age that he was going to be quite different.

His phone buzzed on the marble worktop and he viewed it quizzically it was half ten, he wasn't expecting a call.  Curtis was the type of person you had to inform in advance to have your call answered. He picked it up and felt a sense of foreboding as he saw who was calling.

Curtis had a half-sister, though he had long ago cut off any ties with his Mother, Keegan was still nonetheless unfortunately related to him. He considered briefly ignoring her call. She should have been in school but then he sighed as he remembered he owed her a favour, he hated owing people anything so accepted the call hoping that today might be the day where that debt was fulfilled.

"Curtis?" She asked.

He noted that she didn't sound how she usually did. On the rare occasions the two of them had met she had been somewhat of a shrinking violet, one of those people who preferred to blend onto the background rather than stand out. Today she had an unmistakable note of authority in her voice.

"You did save my number correctly." He replied drily.

"Remember how you owe me that favour... I kinda need to call you out on that now. But first you have to promise not to tell my parents and you definitely can't call the police."

He raised his eyebrows, clearly her life wasn't quite as dull as he had always assumed, anyone who lived with Margaret and Greg, with his checked jumpers and sensible brown shoes couldn't help but be dull.

"Given that the current communication between your Mother and I is a polite Christmas card on a good year, I don't think you need to worry about me telling her Keegan, go ahead."

He was mildly interested against his better judgement.

"So... someone I know is kinda out of place right now and needs somewhere to stay for a bit until he finds his feet."

He laughed.

"Absolutely not, you might owe me a favour but I don't really do roommates."

Her voice dropped lower as if she was trying not to be overheard.

"Curtis I wouldn't ask you unless it was something really important he'll be there maybe two days at most. I have forty pounds on me, I think that more than covers any food he might eat here or whatever it is you're worried about."

He felt a slight feeling of shame at the fact that his sixteen year old half-sister was offering him money because she didn't think he would help her otherwise.

Curtis probably wouldn't have helped her but something about her pleading tone resonated with him. She wasn't usually much of a bother to him.

"Fine, he can stay here." He said regretting the words as soon as they had left his mouth.

She let out a sigh of relief that sounded almost painful.

"Thank you."

Half an hour later he heard the knocker on his front door be lifted up persistently. He walked to the door with the air of a man being lead to his death.

It had been six months since he had last seen Keegan, she'd shot up and almost reached his shoulder now. They both hesitated at the door, usually her parents were there to act as a kind of buffer between them stopping things from getting too awkward.  He hated this feeling of being out of place, one of the main reasons why he stayed away from his Mother and her new family,  he just didn't fit.

He hadn't been paying much attention to the figure behind her and it was only as he stepped aside to let Keegan in that the boys face came into sharp focus.

Curtis wasn't easily surprised, the things that shocked most people barely made him bat an eyelid but something about this boys face made him have to restrain himself from gasping. He was extremely pale, though Curtis wasn't sure if that was his usual pallor, he looked sickly and the whiteness of his face was in sharp contrast to a sharp scarlet line that looked deliberate stretching from his mouth to his eyebrow.

"Curtis... this is Noah, a friend. Noah... this is Curtis, my half-brother."

Curtis widened his eyes at her, this boy looked like he was on something, of all the people in the world to show up at his door with a train wreck of a boy it would not have been goody Keegan who would have come to mind.

He closed the door wondering what exactly he had gotten himself into.