Saturday mornings.

While Mom does the groceries, Minho recovers from whatever he did the night before, Finn is training, and Dad gardening, I stay in my bed.

Until Mom gets back from doing the groceries and we have the best breakfast of the week, with fresh bread and croissants and all.

STEPHANIUSIBUSIUSYPUSSY

Did Minho arrive alive

Yeah
Not sure if he's alive right now tho
Definitely got a hangover
I heard him come in at a crazy time

Surprising
I don't have a hangover

Neither do I

Ask ur mom if she can get me a croissant as well

Ask yourself
You have hands
And fingers
And a phone

Hahahaha so funny Sage
You're like my mom
Talking abt moms
Did Minho survive YOUR MOM

I think I'll hear at breakfast
She was waiting for us but must've been asleep on the couch when he arrived

Praying for him

But ur eating with us today?

Yes

His parents do the groceries on Sunday, which means that if he eats at ours on Saturday and at home on Sunday, he gets twice the amount of new food.

Open up

What

The door

I'm still in my bed, in nothing but a shirt I stole from Dad.

Right now?

When else

I rush out of my bed, trip after my first step, groan, slip the first pants I find on, and then run down the stairs, trip again—Finn left his boxing gloves on the stairs—hit my head, then finally open the door.

Out of breath, I greet, "Hi."

Thomas's hair is messy but done, and he's well-dressed. He looks up and down at me, eyebrows raised. "Morning."

There was no reason for me to hurry up like that because Thomas can easily wait a few minutes and neither did I have to try fixing my hair on my way to the door because I have never worried about by hair in front of Thomas before.

And I want to hit him for the way he said 'morning' and is currently grinning.

"New pants?" His eyebrows go even higher up as his eyes gain a twinkle, which means that the pants I chose are definitely not nice ones.

I look down.

Oh my god, an unfinished pair I was making. The white material still has cuts at both sides of my legs, and I don't even want to know what this looks like from the back.

"I had to hurry to open the door," I say fast.

A smile touches his lips while he follows me inside. "Right."

"I swear," I add.

"Mhm."

"So I'm gonna put on something else. You go... I don't know." Quickly, I make my way to the stairs again.

"Watch out. There's—" crash "...boxing gloves."

I end up sprawled over the stairs. Pain shoots through my knee, and I'm wincing as I push the stupid gloves away.

With my cheeks burning from embarrassment, I turn my head. Thomas has his lips pressed together, obviously holding back a laugh. Yet he seems a tad concerned as well.

"You alright?"

"Yeah."

I want to get away from him even faster now. My knee throbs as I hurry to my room. I cast a quick look at Thomas, who's been following me with his eyes, and force a strained smile before I disappear into my room, knee in agony.

"What was that?" A sleepy voice comes out of Minho's room.

"Willow," I lie.

Minho will never stop reminding me of this moment if he finds out.

Shaking my head, I put on a pair of, this time, normal sweatpants and a long-sleeved top I made a while ago. Brush through my hair and look in the mirror just in case... someone drew on my face while I was asleep or something.

Then finally, I'm less embarrassed to go down the stairs, which I now make sure to do calmly, even with my painful knee.

The sight of Thomas petting Willow and Mom putting groceries in the fridge greets me. She must've got home while I changed.

"You're eating with us, Thomas?"

He looks up. "If I may, yes."

"Sure. If you help set the table."

"Got it." Thomas gets up to do the job, flashing me another smile that's mixed with a grin.

I smile back, but it fades once I take a step toward the kitchen to help.

Something is definitely wrong with that knee.

After a lot of winces, I'm sitting on one of the chairs. "Hand me an ice pack?"

Thomas turns his head, eyebrows scrunched.

Funny how those two lines of hairs can express so much about his feelings.

"Think I hit my knee pretty hard when I fell," I explain.

As he grabs the pack from the freezer, I hold up my hands, ready for it to get thrown at me and ready to miss it and— oh, he doesn't throw it.

Thomas crouches down beside me. "Which leg?"

"Eh, left."

He rolls the pipe of my sweatpants up and presses the cold pack against my knee. "There?"

I swallow deeply, "Yeah."

"Wait. I'll wrap it in a towel so it's less cold." He gets up to do that, then returns, holding the pack  on my skin again.

The hazel eyes look up at me. Due to sunlight shining on top of them, they get a greenish shade, too.

I have never found his eyes not beautiful.

"I, er, I got it," I say, and I swallow another time. Words I won't ever tell him claw at my insides. Unshed cries. Unspoken words that I'll keep swallowing away from him. Swallowing away so the feelings will hopefully become less real. Or rather just nonexistent.

"Alright." Thomas continues setting the table.

Simply, he continues setting the table. Because helping me with some pain is nothing more but casual to him.

Scraped knees he put band-aids on, tears and nosebleeds he dabbed away, hands he squeezed to ease my nerves.

"Minho!" Mom starts yelling his name from below the stairs. "Breakfast!" Then she moves to the back door and starts yelling for Dad, "Oliver!"

When I think about it, Mom is actually not that sweet and forgiving. Sometimes I wonder how she's even a psychologist.

I mean, as I mentioned before, she cares about us equally, but tends to show that in... certain ways that don't always work, and she's always ready to ground us.

But I love her, so it's okay. Better than no mother or an abusive one.

"Smells good here." Finn appears in the room. His hair is matted to his forehead from sweat and I can still see it making his clothes sticky.

Disgusted, I turn away from him.

"I told you to get here earlier so you could take a shower before breakfast!" Mom says, her words coming out fast. "Because you don't make the smell any better. Go wash yourself. Hurry."

He holds up his hands in defense. "Alright, alright. Hi, Thomas, by the way."

Before Thomas can reply, Finn is already upstairs.

I cup my hands around my mouth to yell at him. "And pick your gloves up!"

"Will do!" He screams back.

A few minutes later, everyone is sitting at the table. Finn looks and smells a bit cleaner, Minho's eyes are so puffed that it looks like they're closed, Dad's face full of dirt from outside, and I, of course, look fabulous compared to them all.

"I know it was not half twelve when you got home." Mom's shooting daggers with her glares at Minho. "How late was it?"

He mutters something. Or maybe it was just a groan. Either way, it's impenetrable.

"You really want to be grounded, don't you?"

"Mom," Finn says. "Let him live. I guarantee he didn't do anything wrong. He was just having fun at a party."

My eyes go from Finn to Mom to Minho and back to Finn for a good minute.

Mom ends up sighing and shaking her head. "For now, fine. But next time, no later than two AM. Got it?"

"Uh-huh," he mutters, rubbing his eyelids with a big yawn.

"Also," Dad interferes, just as Thomas was about to pass me the bowl of croissants, "we made a decision on your mother's patient. He will be staying here."

Before Minho can throw hands, Mom continues.

"He'll be sleeping in one of your rooms. It's your choice whether you stay with him or don't. If you choose not to, the three of you will be rotating between two rooms, so all of you have equal privacy."

"Can I stay at Thomas's?" Minho's head twists towards Thomas. "I can stay at yours, right?"

"Don't be childish, Minho," Dad warns.

"I think this conclusion is fine," Mom adds. "The question is, whose room will be given up?"

"I have a thousand clothes and all my stuff to sew with," I say fast.

Minho and Finn can't overtop that and they know it, because they remain silent.

"He can take mine," Finn offers.

Wow, I don't think I've seen Minho more thankful in my life before.

"Okay. Then that's settled," Dad says. He gives Finn a nod of appreciation and approval.

"I'll make some sort of schedule to keep track of who sleeps where."

Thomas looks around in a way that makes him seem like a little kid who's scared to raise his hand. "Eh, if that doesn't work, we have a spare room at home, so any of you could move there for a while."

"Ohh, can I go there?" I blurt out.

Dad shoots me a glance. "I thought you had your thousands of clothes and stuff to sew with," he quotes.

My face goes bright red. At a loss of words, I lean back in my chair. Beside me, I hear Thomas chuckle below his breath.

"When will we meet him?" Minho asks.

"As soon as possible."

Mom nods. "Which is tonight."

"Tonight?"

"Tonight. So Finn, you better tidy your room and place the stuff you don't want Aris to be around away."

Aris. So that's his name. About time that she mentioned it.

"And please, also get rid of as much sharp objects as possible."

The table goes silent at that. I keep my eyes on my food. I don't dare to look at Thomas. I don't know what would even happen if I did, but I just force my eyes averted.

"Will do," Finn says, tone quieter.

It takes a few minutes for everything to loosen back up. I shift in my seat, nervous. I don't know what to expect.

Will he be quiet? Will he act tough? Will he like us? Will he be nice? Won't he get pissed Mom already told us about most of his issues? How will he like the school? Is he even ready for all of that?

Minho reads my mind. "What's he like again?"

"Taken aback, quiet, really nice. Quite shy. So please just try to involve him but don't make it seem forced and don't annoy him."

"Do I need a list to note everything down I from now on can and can't do?" Minho asks.

Mom stares at him until he mumbles an apology.

"We believe this will work out just fine," Dad says. "And indeed, we also expect you three to respect Aris. We will be picking him up in a few hours."

Thomas's knee pokes against mine, so I raise an eyebrow at him.

Carpet, he mouths. I visibly roll my eyes.

Please, he adds.

I now squint my eyes. AKA: what do I get?

Nerds? He adds an extra smile.

I shake my head.

And material.

I tilt my head.

And chocolate, he says, begging with his eyes. For a second, he also makes that sign with his hands.

Fine, I mouth, and Thomas starts grinning.

He has been begging me to make him another carpet—or floor mat, whatever—like the one in his bathroom, but now for in his bedroom. Of course, a blue one. I'm just not very experienced with carpets and I don't enjoy making them, so that's why I need to negotiate.

Thank you, he mouths.