After a long, less than stellar day at school, I had finally gone home. I stepped through the door, immediately slamming it behind me and without taking my shoes off, I started to walk to my bedroom.

I took one step before my pace faltered as I heard someone shout, "Hey!" from right outside the door. I turned my head to the door and watched the handle turn before opening to reveal my twin's annoyed face. "I still exist you know. You should really know when someone is walking behind you." he then began rubbing his nose. "You literally slammed the door right in my face!" he whined.

Oops, kinda forgot he existed for a minute there. Definitely not going to be telling him that though.

"Sorry, I wasn't paying attention. I'm gonna go to my room now, see ya later." I waved and went to turn around again but Hunter stopped me.

"Wait." I faced him again, raising an eyebrow in question, annoyed. "Riley was talking about you inviting him over. Is, uh, is Natalie gonna be coming too?"

I rolled my eyes. "Yes Hunter, yes she is gonna be here," I replied.

He nodded. "So why wasn't I told this was happening? I wanna hang out with you guys."

"You just wanna be around Natalie."

"Well, yeah, but I wanna talk to the rest of the gang too," he defended.

"You probably would've heard everyone and come out anyway."

"You know how I am Skylar. I would've gotten into my zone painting and I'd block out everything. I wouldn't have even known anyone even visited at all."

"Oh, quit your whining. You know now, don't you? Now if you don't mind, I'd like to get to my room now. Call me out when they get here."

Hunter pursed his lips and nodded then I finally turned around and walked to my room up the stairs. Opening my bedroom door, I went straight to my bed and face planted on it with a groan.

"God I hate school. Can summer just start already?" I complained.
Of course, summer vacation wouldn't start for another nine months since it's only now coming up to October. Letting out a frustrated sigh, I relaxed into my bed. I spent a good couple minutes just staring up at the dark grey ceiling. Eventually, I started to get drowsy just staring into space and my eyes began to push themselves closed. My heavy lids closed and I was just about to slip under the effects of sleep when I heard four loud knocks on the door.

I growled lowly and sat up, rubbing my eyes with the palms of my hands. Of course, I wouldn't be able to just fall asleep that easily, who was I kidding?

I already knew it was Damien banging on my door before I even opened it; no one else would have knocked that aggressively. Dragging my tired body out of bed, I trudged over to open my bedroom door.

"Hey, bestie!" Damien shouted, engulfing me in a bone-crushing hug.

"Mmm," I groaned out with what breath I could muster.

He let me go and I heaved in a breath then continued breathing exaggeratedly heavy as if I had just run a marathon.

"Oh, stop being so dramatic!" the darker boy said, placing his hands on his hips. "That's my job."

"I'm sorry your Highness, I just thought it would be nice to regain my breath that you so rudely took away from me with that death hug!"

Damien rolled his eyes and grabbed me by the wrist, pulling me out of my messy room and down the stairs to the living room.

"You know, you really need to clean your room. It looks like your closet threw up everywhere."

"Alright, dad. Will do," I retorted sarcastically, rolling my eyes.

Damien just shook his head at my actions and sat on the couch, putting his feet on the table with one ankle crossing over the other.

A small yawn came from my lips and I walked into the open kitchen to turn on the coffee maker. Grabbing a big orange mug from the cupboard, I placed it on the counter for when the brew was done. Turning to the rainbow-haired boy sat next to my brother, I walked to the counter separating the two rooms and just looked at them.

"You want anything to eat while I'm over here?" I asked in general.

Damien turned his head from the episode of Steven Universe he and my brother were watching and pursed his lips in a thinking expression.

"Depends, is Riley bringing his dip?" I nodded at the question. "Then no thanks, I'll wait till he gets here."

"Alright, suit yourself," I said before grabbing a jar full of homemade cookies given to me by Damien from his mom.

I needed to go back there soon, I hadn't hung around the DeMarkus household at all recently and I was starting to miss the home-cooked meals. Not to mention Damien's mom and dad are really good company.

Quite the odd looking couple, Damien's mom was a tall pale woman with red hair and a radiant personality. She was always so full of life and happiness yet she was poised enough that her excitement was never overwhelming or obnoxious. His father was more of a laid back character however, a short black man with a good heart and a knack for cooking. The two both loved the kitchen more than I loved my bed and there would never be a day where you wouldn't find them making something together.

As I reminisced about my time getting to know Damien's family I hadn't noticed the coffee maker had turned off, having finished boiling. I turned to it and poured the hot brown liquid into my mug before walking over to the fridge for the milk. Opening the door to it, I grabbed the carton and poured only a little in my coffee before putting the milk away again. I don't know why but I've always enjoyed my coffee more or less black.

Taking a whiff of the strong scented coffee, I grabbed the cookies again and joined the other two people on the couch. Steven Universe continued to play and I watched the TV with disinterest. I didn't understand how anyone ever liked that show; a cartoon about some naive kid with magical powers and a "love conquers all" mindset? I just didn't get it.

After maybe five more minutes of boredom-watching the show, there was a knock on the door. I got up from my spot on the couch and walked to the door. Turning the knob, I was met with Riley's grinning face.

"Hey, I brought the dip," was the first thing he said as he entered my house.

"Good old Riles. Just put it on the coffee table while I get the nachos."

"Yes!" Damien shouted as he saw the layer dip being placed on the table.

I saw him move his feet from off the table so he was sitting like a respectful human as I walked to the kitchen. Damien eyed the large bowl of dip with an almost feral looking hunger and I finally turned my view so I could get the chips from a cabinet. Walking back over to the couch, I placed the bag beside the dip and sat down.

Grabbing a chip and dipping it in the layer dip, I spoke up. "Now Damien, I'm gonna tell you the same thing I told Nat for when she got here. Don't eat all the food."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah," he got out quickly before digging his hands in the bag for a chip to dunk in the dip. Letting the food hit his tongue, Damien moaned in satisfaction. "You know, even with my parents being amazing cooks, I still can never get enough of this dip. What do you put in it to make it taste so go anyway?"

Riley shrugged. "I add in a few spices to give it my own flavour."

After that, we spent a little bit of time just eating in silence until there was another knock on the door. Hunter then shot up from the couch.

"I'll get it!" he shouted even though everyone was right there and he went to the door.

Opening it up, he happily greeted Natalie, of course. Hunter moved out of her way so she could enter and she came over to the rest of us huddled around the dip.

"Ooh, is that Riley's layer dip?" Nat mused, her eyes lighting up.

Riley proudly nodded and Natalie sat down, digging into the dish. I chuckled a bit and got up from my spot. While Natalie was profusely praising Riley's dip as she shovelled it into her mouth, I set up the Xbox one so we could all play on it. By the time I had gotten done with setting everything up and waiting for it all to load, I could hear Natalie start to complain as someone cut her off from the food.

"Come on! You can't do this, that dip is too great for you to keep away from me! This should be considered a hate crime!" she wailed.

I rolled my eyes and grabbed my two Xbox controllers. The black one I gave to Natalie who was usually my gaming partner in crime for these hangouts and kept my awesomely designed purple one. Call of Duty was already set up and I opened it up to play. It only took a minute or so to load up before the menu screen flashed on the TV.

Starting a one-on-one match first to warm up, I waited intently for the first round to begin so I could slaughter Natalie. The count down finally ending I began controlling my character, trying to find Natalie's position.

It wasn't too long before the two of our characters met up and I swiftly moved my hands over the controls to shoot at Natalie while still avoiding her gunshots.

"You're not winning this time Natalie. I'm taking you down if it's the last thing I do."

"In your dreams Lockheart. There's no way you're beating me," Natalie responded, determination in her voice.

These CoD battles we would have has been an ongoing thing between us since I got my Xbox 360 and still goes on today now that I have the newer console. It didn't even matter that Nat and I were gonna hog the game all to ourselves for the next couple hours, everyone already knew that. No one really cared that we never shared the controllers around, everyone always gets excited to see our games go on and the others were pretty trash at videogames anyway.

Hunter has always been a man of the arts and doesn't really stray far from the piano or painting and Riley just never really got into videogames. He said he'd rather do the actual thing then simulate it in a game and so instead of participating in the fun, he would watch and then go on to practice it himself in real life. Riley always was a skill builder. As for Damien? That man won't even get near a controller. We've established that he's more of an observer than a player and has never shown too much interest in the world of virtual combat. He did however like "helping" me when I played Sims. Damien was more of a fashionista than a fashion designer so he took great joy in picking out outfits in the character creator.

Bringing my full focus to the game now, I was running away from Natalie in an attempt to delay the inevitable. I was low on health, but it was no use. As I limped away, still shooting at my opponent she fired a few more times and I was gone.

I let out a frustrated shout as I waited for my character to revive itself.

"You won't get away with this Neval. I'll win this game, you'll see."

"Whatever you need to tell yourself." she let out a cocky chuckle.

- - -

After an intense twenty minutes, the game ended with my screen lighting up the words "YOU LOSE" in big letters.

"Fuck!!" I growled as I stood up.

"Good job Natalie! On fire, as always I see," Hunter congratulated her.

"What can I say, even without Skylar's little," she snickered. "Distraction, I was still able to win." The girl still sitting on the couch smirked at her victory as I fumed.

"I will win at some point. Your winning streak won't last forever."

"You wanna have another round and see if you can live up to this little expectation you have? Huh, Sky?" she taunted.

"Let's go," I said and began setting up the next game.

The round started up and as usual, Hunter was cheering for Natalie while Damien cheered for me. Riley, being in the middle ground just cheering for the person with the most kills.

This game was a little more in my favour than they usually were. Already at the halfway mark and I was leading by six; her 18 to my 24 kills. I was concentrating so hard on the game that I had blocked out the loud noise from the spectators beside and behind me.

"Are you kidding me right now!" I screeched as my screen once again read those two words I couldn't stand; YOU LOSE.

Somehow, even though I put up a good fight and was winning for most of the game, Natalie still beat me, 39 to 38. How she managed to beat me every time was beyond me but I hated it.

"Aw, sucks man. Guess you just weren't trying hard enough," Natalie jeered, laughing at the end.

If there was one thing I disliked, it was losing and I wouldn't take it laying down.

"One more round!" I called.

"If you think you can handle it." A teasing smile played on Natalie's lips and she playfully elbowed me in the ribs.

"Oh I'm so gonna crush you this time!"

- - -

"Gah!" I groaned.

It had been well over two hours and rematch after rematch had only ended in one thing, me losing. I was just about ready to throw my controller out the window and start stomping my feet, throwing a tantrum like a little child. My grip was tight on my controller as I grit my teeth and I requested another round. Natalie had a cocky grin on her face knowing that the continuous wins were fueling her ego, I didn't want to lose again. This was my last shot at beating her and if I lost I had no choice but to allow her bragging rights for the week. That's always what I hated most about these sessions, the prize. Nat got so full of herself and with winning bragging rights, came the humiliation of having it rubbed in my face every time she got the chance.

I started the game up for the last time before I hung up the towel and waited for the count down again. I was ready to beat her and I planned to do so.

The game started up and I was off searching for Natalie's character once again. It didn't take long for us to find each other and the battle began. I was the first one to get a kill so I was feeling better but the game wasn't over yet. Seconds turned to minutes and finally, the game was over. I was so focused on playing that I didn't even have time to check the score before the game ended. Waiting for the game to say the stats, my face contorted into the most frustrated face I had ever made in... Well, a couple months. I had lost again against this freaking gamer god apparently.

"You have got to be kidding me!"

"The only thing that's been kidding you is your brain about the fact that you can beat me. Face it Sky, I'm just better at this game than you!"

"Ah, whatever! Let's just order a pizza!"

Natalie snickered and I just ignored her, dialling the number to Pizza Nova. They'd all be staying the night, but lucky for me I'd be leaving early in the morning before they even got up. Damien had a spare key so I wasn't worried about that, but I knew Natalie would definitely be flaunting her victory come Monday.