K A D E N

"Where do you want us to put this?" One of the removal men called over to me, holding onto one of the legs of my dad's desk. That old thing had been in our family for generations and I was surprised that it hadn't rotted by now.

"Right this way." My dad said gesturing to the two men to follow him.

The removal vans were still full, waiting to be unloaded. It was hard work, hefting about the heavy furniture and the wet pavements from the rainfall earlier today didn't help the situation. I would've helped out had my right arm not been covered in a cast.

It was covered in crude messages from when I'd left my old school in Australia. A few of my classmates decided it would be funny to scribble badly constructed genitalia and other perverted drawings in rainbow coloured pens as a practical joke. Once we were at the airport I was in the waiting area with my suitcase when a little kid came up to me. He kept staring at me from a few rows down and had eventually come and sat in the seat next to me.

Our conversation went something like this:

He stared at my cast a few minute and then grinned at me showing a row of wonky teeth and a gap in one of them. "Hello."

"Can I help you?" I couldn't see his parents anywhere near. If the little boy was lost then that wasn't good, obviously, and he didn't seem to know that he shouldn't talk to strangers. I could be a kidnapper for all the child knew but he seemed oblivious to the idea.

"Why do you have a penis on your arm?" He blurted out.

I choked on air.

How the kid even knew what a one was amazed me since he looked like he was around five or six years old.

"It's a banana." I said the first thing that came to my head.

Just then a woman appeared and took the kid by the hand. "There you are, don't ever run off like that." She clutched a hand to her chest along with the boy's hand and breathed a sigh of relief.

"But mommy this man says a penis is a banana." I cursed under my breath as multiple heads turned to look our way. The kid had a loud voice and I could feel my ears start to go red.

His mom gave me a shameful look and I shrugged saying what could I do? Was it really my fault if her son came up to me first and asked the question?

"Come on honey. Don't listen to this silly man." She ushered her son away, giving me one more dirty look as she turned her back.

After that unfortunate event I frantically tried to rub the images off my cast but to my despise I found that they'd used permanent markers. Throughout the whole car ride, I'd sat in the back trying to use white-out to cover everything up but we went over a bump and the whole bottle toppled over and covered the seat next to me. I had thrown a blanket over it because if my dad ever found out that I'd done it then god knows what he'd so. Luckily he didn't notice anything which gave me time to sneak back later and somehow fix the damage I'd caused.

"Kaden, come inside!" My mom called and I found her in the kitchen talking to an older woman.

"I was just talking to Ms Johnson here. She's our new neighbour." Turning back to her she said, "Thank you so much for the casserole, that'll be our dinner sorted for tonight."

"It's my pleasure, folks like you should have a warm welcoming into the neighbourhood." Ms Johnson turned her attention to me whilst still addressing my mother. "I have a grandson who also goes to Stonecrest High. He can show your boy around when he starts tomorrow."

"That's very kind of you, but we're no strangers in this town." Then my mother started to struggle with her words. "Certain circumstances made us leave and well, it was a bad time for us all."

"I'm so sorry to hear that." Ms Johnson said in a sympathetic voice and then frowned. "Mordecai? Did you say that was your last name?"

At that moment there was a loud bang. Both of their heads turned towards me. "Sorry." I apologised and bent down to pick up the box that I had knocked over.

With a sigh, my mother came over to inspect the damage. The box had held plates which were now smashed into tiny little pieces. "Sorry." I said again.

"It's fine. Go and help your father."

I took the hint and left the two to talk together. The removal men were still moving boxes up the stairs, following my dad's voice as he shouted orders here and there.

My room was at the end of the corridor and when I turned the handle to open it, I wasn't expecting to see someone sitting on my bed.

"Shit." My head hit the door frame as I stepped back, startled. I stared at the person in front of me for a few seconds, rubbing the back of my head. "Who the hell are you?"

The kid was tall with a mop of wild brown hair and looked to be a couple of years younger than me. He stood up and held his palms up facing towards me. "I come in peace!" He said, squeezing his eyes shut.

"You didn't answer my question." I said, ignoring the fact that he seemed to think that I was some sort of alien from another planet.

"Oh, right." He cleared his throat and dropped his hands to his side before carrying on. "I'm Sam, your neighbour. I came with my gran. She was going to introduce me to you but I kind of wandered off." He trailed on.

I didn't like how this kid was poking his nose in my bedroom but I decided to have some fun for the time being. "So, Sam?" With a coy smile, I pulled out a chair and sat facing him. "Is snooping around a hobby of yours or am I the only special one?"

He stared at me then shrugged. "It comes in handy every once in a while." All the while he'd gotten up to rummage in one of the boxes that were littered around the room.

Boxes with my things in them.

The nerve of this boy. Normally it wouldn't bother me if he was elbow deep in my boxer drawer but even with only one good working arm, I had managed to bring up one box that contained stuff. Personal belongings.

"Is this a diary?" He asked holding up a book that had bits of paper sticking out. He flicked through the pages before I snatched it from his hands. "You're an artist? I thought only girls drew stuff."

"That's such a stereotype."

"Then I'm guessing you didn't do that." He gestured to my colourful artwork of a cast.

I looked down at it then back at him. "Why are you here again?"

"My name's Sam. I came with my grandma but--"

"But you ran off. I got that." I waved my hand dismissively. "She appointed you to show me around town, am I right?"

I didn't need anyone to show me around Stonecrest since I knew it like the back of my hand but I didn't want Sam to find out about that small detail right now. And I had to get him out of my room somehow, in case he decided to unravel my other belongings.

"My grandma told me not to talk to strangers." He stuck up his nose and looked down at me. "I don't even know your name."

Yet he can still come into my room and snoop around? I rolled my eyes at the audacity of this kid. "I'm Kaden. Now we're not strangers anymore."

He paused as if thinking for a minute. "Alright, there's this really cool place, the Blitz. We can go there now if you want."

It'd been a long time since I'd heard that name. "Lead the way." I stood up and reached for my jacket when something caught the corner of my eye.

It was tucked away in a corner, probably having fallen out of the box. A picture of two people, both smiling at the camera. One of them had his arm slung over the shoulders of a girl. I barely recognised myself from so far back.

"Are you coming or what?" Sam called from the bottom of the stairs.

"I'll be down in a minute." I replied before I grabbed the frame and opened the back.

As I held the worn down photo in my hands, I saw how happy we both looked and hesitated. My fingers were poised to tear it up but instead I folded it and put it in my pocket.

"I'm getting old here." Sam shouted from the landing this time. "You know if you wanted to take a crap before we left then you should've just said. I wouldn't have held it against you." I rolled my eyes at his lack of patience.

It was time to forget about my old life and start my new one.

Somehow.

-

We had reached The Blitz in ten minutes and as soon as the door opened with a jingle, I was immediately engulfed in warmth and a smell so strong that it made something deep inside of me twinge.

"You have got to try the cheesecake. Dude, it's like heaven on earth. You won't regret it, I promise." Sam hadn't stopped babbling once since we'd left the house, listing off his favourite foods and drinks and what the staff were like.

I already knew these things but it was nice to remember the rare places where I could find my piece of mind from before. I had missed this little coffeehouse more than I thought.

The place wasn't too packed and there were only a few people here and there. Sam and I settled into a booth and a few seconds later a waitress appeared beside us.

"Good afternoon. Welcome to the Blitz, my name's Jenna and I'll be serving you today." With a notebook in her hand, along with her petite frame and hair pinned up with two chopsticks, she looked like those expensive dolls that you saw in antique stores. She looked down at Sam and smiled. "Hey Sam, the usual?"

"You know it." He responded with a cheeky wink at the end.

"And what can I get you?" She turned her attention to me, ignoring Sam's shameless flirting.

Sam was mouthing 'get the cheesecake' at me so to humour the kid I did, along with an espresso.

"Coming right up," Jenna smiled and went to get our orders.

"You won't regret it." Grinned Sam. "The cheesecake here is legendary."

"So you've said a couple hundred times already." I rested my arm on the table. "Do you come here often?"

"After school most days with my mates. And speaking of school, gran says that I have to babysit you tomorrow as it'll be your first day." He took out a black marker from his pocket and started to doodle on my cast.

I narrowed my eyes at him. I was pretty sure that was my marker and I had no idea how he'd managed to get his thieving mitts on it without me seeing. "And you'll do exactly as your grandmother tells you to do because you're a good boy and wouldn't want to upset her." I stretched my lips into a grin.

"No." He huffed, still focused on my cast. "She doesn't control me. I'm a big boy."

I raised my eyebrows at this. For a big boy, he sounded like a very little boy. "Where are your parents then?"

"Now who's being nosy?" He shot back.

"You went into my room and through my stuff without my permission. I think getting to know you hardly counts as being nosy."

"Fair enough." He shrugged and said, "My parents work abroad so I don't see them that often. They get a week off every month and come see me, but to be honest, I've lived with my grandma for a long time, I hardly notice that my parents aren't there."

"Any siblings?"

"Yeah, I have an older brother but he lives with his girlfriend. He's a cop too. So cool." I could hear the pride in his voice as he said this. On an afterthought, he asked, "Do you have any brothers or sisters?"

I felt myself stiffen at the question. "No." I replied. "I'm an only child."

"That must suck. Being alone all the time."

I struggled to come up with a response to that but I didn't have to because Jenna came back. "Two cheesecakes and one black coffee. Enjoy boys." She smiled once more and sashayed away with Sam staring at her ass.

"Isn't she a little too old for you?" I said picking up my fork and sinking into the cake. Jesus, I'd forgotten how good this was.

"Pffft, not too old for the Sammeister."

"Keep dreaming kid." I muttered and looked down at my cast and said, "You do know horses don't have six legs, right?"

He looked up at me and grinned. "It's a unicorn!"

There we go ladies and gentlemen: big boys draw unicorns.

"Those are the legs and that's the tail." He said pointing to the various areas. "And that's the horn." I can tell you it looked like anything but a horn.

"Do you want to know how unicorns were born?"

"No, but I bet you're going to tell me anyway."

"Basically one day, a narwhale was swimming in the sea - you know what a narwhale is right? It's those whales that have horns - and it saw a horse and said, 'I am going to fuck that' and bam!" He clapped his hands together and imitated an explosion happening. "Come hither the birth of the unicorn."

"So the narwhale thought of screwing a horse and through the thought of sheer willpower a unicorn was born?" I questioned.

He just gave me a weird look. "I don't know. It was just something I saw on Tumblr."

I took a sip of my coffee and winced. "I'll be right back." I said to Sam as I got out of the booth and to the counter where there was a wooden box of sugar pouches.

Grabbing a couple I turned back around only to bump into someone. I looked down to see a girl. "Sorry." She said apologetically.

"It's alright." I breezed past her and back to the booth where Sam was staring at her. As were a lot more other people around us.

"Who is that?" I motioned to the girl as she sat in the booth with another guy. The stares followed her. I'd been there before. It wasn't a nice feeling, having your every move watched and judged.

"Phoenix Astere." Sam said, casually resuming where he'd left off with his strange narwhale/horse/unicorn creation.

"Astere." I murmured to myself trying to pin down a memory of the name.

"Her brother, Matt, died in an accident a month ago. It hit their family pretty hard."

I leaned back in my seat and glanced in her direction. She didn't seem to notice the eyes of those around or much of anything. Her eyes were cast downwards instead of the guy talking to her.

Just as I was thinking that, they flickered up to mine briefly before quickly moving past.

I wondered if she remembered me.