I was turning eighteen on that day. I swear, everyone was more excited about it then I ever was. My dad made me leave the house as he ran around like maniac who was never sick in the first place with Anastasia running behind him.

Laura was at my place, bright and early, at a good six in the morning. God forbid.

And like I said, I was kicked out of my own house. Everything was just dandy.

Do note the sarcasm. There's always a little someone who wants to just ruin my day or maybe, just maybe, they thought they were making it better.

(6th of November 2011, Sunday).

I woke up to the vibration of my nightstand which started to vibrate though my bed because of the silent mode my phone was ringing at.

I needed to remember to switch the vibration off.

Picking up the phone, I quickly slide my thumb through the screen and put it to my ear.

"Hello?" I groan out, mad at the caller for trying to have me pick up my phone at this ungodly hour. I stayed up late catching up on all the notes the school had been moving on without me. I started to think that I missed it. All the annoying little voices in the hallway, gossiping on and on about how terrible that girl's skirt is and why is her hair colored green? And all the guys snickering when the girls pass by them, rolling their eyes at their childish thoughts but refuse to cover themselves up. Freedom of will they call it.

"Hey, cutie. What're you up to this morning?" A voice, that I recognized to be Phil's, said. He has got to be kidding me.

"Are you out of your mind?" I yelled. I could here footsteps from my dad's room coming close to my door, I hear a knock on the door.

"Wha-" I cut him off. "Come in!" I call out to the door, Anastasia peeps in with only her head inside my room and her right palm holding onto the door frame. She had dark circles under her eyes and her hair was making its way out of the tight bun that she once had.

"Is everything okay? Why are you yelling at five in the morning?" She asked, a look of worry flashing through her eyes.

"Yeah, I'm fine. I'm really sorry if you were sleeping." I apologized, genuinely feeling sorry for not thinking about my dad and her who were right next door and probably just experienced the same thing I did. Being woken up at this darn ungodly hour. I was furious.

"What do you want?" I hissed, slowly pushing myself out of bed and rubbing my eye with the back of my left hand. I slipped my slippers on and walked towards the bathroom, groaning at the dark circles under my eyes. Why can't things be normal? Like a bad hair day or something. Why does it have to be this?

"What happened?" Phil asked at the other end of the line, his voice all cooey and annoying.

"Nothing." I dead panned. I was not in the mood for anything at this time of the morning. Why did everyone need something from me today?

After a while of silence and listening to him breathe, I asked, curiosity getting the best of me, "What did you want?"

"Get dressed. We're going out."

"What?"

  ▼▲▼    

"We're going to meet my mom." Phil announced as I sat in the passenger seat of his car.

"What? Why?" I turned to look at him, my eyes widening. No. I was not going to do this. I don't do parent meets. What the hell was this all even about?

"Why not? This is the best idea I've ever had." He proudly looked at me, his eyes shining and happy. He was glowing.

I suspiciously narrowed my eyes at him. First mission for today; find out what's the glowy thing in Phil's eyes all about.

"That's the best idea you've ever had?" I asked, raising a brow. " That's just sad."

He just turned for a second to glare at me and focused up front, both hands on the wheel, his posture stiff.

"Are you nervous?" I asked him, this was weird. It was supposed to be the other way around. This is not the way it's supposed to be.

"I'm more nervous about the fact of what you're going to think of my parents rather than what they are going to think of you." he mumbled, letting out a deep laugh that didn't seem humorous at all. 

Letting my eyes slip away from his growing mop of dirty blonde hair down to his eyes that were still very focused up front, I asked, "What do you mean?"

  ▼▲▼    

Phil tried to warn me that his family was weird. I told him that I was okay with weird; that I was used to weird. Weird was normal. 

He kept fiddling with his fingers when he opened the door and made sure he gave me house slippers when I took of my shoes and helped me with my jacket after I told him three times that I wanted to keep it on but it didn't really look like he was hearing me. 

"Phil, is that you?" I hear a voice call out for him and his eyes widened, making me giggle loudly. "Who's with you?"

"Just give me a second mom." he yelled back, running a hand through his mop of hair and smiling nervously at me. "All right, you ready, right?" he asked. I just laughed at how hilarious this all was. It's not like I dragged myself to this scene.

I walked quietly behind him as he lead the way to wherever he was taking me and tried to master my nice-girl-smile which wasn't my best because I wasn't the smiliest person there is to be, but at least I try. 

He lead me to a kitchen and stood aside revealing a very pretty woman in her late forties with dark brown hair that was left open, bringing out her high cheek bones and perfectly contoured face. Her dark eyes skimmed over me before a smile graced her perfectly cupid shaped lips.

"Habibi, who's your friend here?" she asked. I wasn't sure what the first word meant or what it referred to, but as I was about to introduce myself, Phil butted in for me instead. What was his deal today?

"That's Alaska. I hope it's okay if she stays over for lunch, mama?" he quickly said before walking to her and leaving a peck on her hand, followed by one at the top of her head and I swear I have never seen anything cuter than this.

"Of course. Are you in the same grade as Phil, Alaska?" she turned back towards the stove after throwing a smile in my direction. "Yeah, I am." I could see Phil rolling his eyes at the corner before he whispered. "Typical Arab moms. I'm gonna change my shirt, be right back."

Arab?

"You look surprised, darling." I let out a laugh and then said, " I didn't know that you were Arab?"

"Oh forgive my manners," she dropped the dish towel in her hands and walked up to me. Her hands on my shoulder and kissing both my cheeks, three sides. I tried to smile, which made her laugh.

"It's how we greet people in Lebanon. I'm Clara, by the way." 

Never would it have crossed my mind that Phil was Lebanese. I suddenly realized why Phil was acting so different on our drive here, but I couldn't think of anything that was weird about this. I made a mental note of asking him about it later.

"It's nice to meet you, Clara. Would you like me to help you out?" I tied my hair up into a half up do with the band that was wrapped around my wrist and washed my hands at the sink, quickly grabbing the knife from Clara's hand. "How would you like me to work with this?" I asked.

Clara showed me how to dice the tomato into small squares for some Lebanese salad  called Tabouleh and I carefully followed her instructions, quite interested how cooking like that everyday might get tiring. It was some sort of formal food art. "Have you ever tried Arabic food before?"

"No, I believe I haven't. I'm quite excited to, though." I told her, continuing to cut some leafy vegetable whose name I'd never remember or now. Is this much green in a salad even necessary? They're usually a lot more colorful.

"I'm back." Phil announced as he stumbled into the kitchen, dressed a little lighter. His white shirt nicely forming around his torso slightly rising as he scratched the back of his head. 

"Eh, Alaska?" he called out.

"Hmm?"

"You're bleeding."

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Author's Note :

This chapter is short but definitely a lot more is coming and I got excited writing the last scene, I don't know why. I love how it turned out and I hope you enjoy this too. 

Major shout out to all the people waiting for an update. It's 4:19 am right now and I managed to pull something off for you, haha. New chapter coming sometime this week so do stay tuned! Exams are over and I will start updating as often as I can.

Shout outs to: SmallHero6, Rainbow_Pixie1234, PeachyInsomaniac, Elle_mazing, doughnut4life, JessicaMaristle, Kaorulover, Chynaalee and xxSarah17xx thank you so much for reading and I hope you like this chapter.