Cold air blows into the house as I click the front door shut behind me with my foot. Groceries strung over my arms, my fingers turning a shade of red thanks to the lack of circulation. The living room is dark, a scented candle sitting on the TV stand being the only source of light. Slowly but surely I slip the sneakers off my feet, dragging myself down the hall through the open doorway. Laying the variety of drinks and snack on the tiled floor of the kitchen, sighing out loud, shaking my hands to gain the feeling back.
The brunette woman I call my mom is sitting at the creaky table covered in a pink, stained cloth. An uncovered ceiling light hanging over her head, barely lighting up the room but doing its job nonetheless. A variety of tubs filled with either orange or black icing are sitting on the table in front of her. As well as a rack of cookies, half of them bare and the other half slathered in the icing. She is humming a tune that I don't recognize, glancing up for a moment at me.
I stand there watching her for a second before she speaks up, "Got the candy?".
"I didn't know what you wanted, so I just picked randomly", I sit down In the chair across from her slowly tilting back, balancing on the back legs with a creak.
"Its fine, kids will eat anything with sugar", she says placing the orange iced cookie in her hand with the others and picking up a bare one.
"What's with the cookies? Got plans?", she snickers looking up at me.
"Can't a mother make cookies for her children?"
I laugh, "Not my mother, remember last time you did Max ate most of them and you swore to never make any again."
My little brother, yet just a year younger than me at sixteen years old can sometimes act like a toddler. Binging anything sweet like its the last time he'll ever get a chance to have it.
"Yeah, you're brother is nothing but trouble.", she says with a smirk. "We have new neighbor's, I want to give them a present, and what better than a treat on the week of Halloween".
"Wouldn't a plant be easier?", I ask.
"It might be easier, but not as fun", she says in unison of her butter knife being dunked in the black icing and going to work on the cookie in her hand.
Silence lingers in the air for a bit as I think. Ive been holding off on asking to go to Riley's party tomorrow night. Ed has been bugging me to just ask already but Max is staying over at a friends and Id hate to leave mom alone.
Dad used to love halloween with a passion. He'd take me and Max to the haunted house Nate's dad would do every year. Then the haunted house stopped happening and dad died, so halloween isn't as fun anymore.
Leaving mom at this time of year has been a fear of mine since the first halloween without him, mom had a break down when the first trick or treaters came to our house.
"Mom?", I squeak out a bit louder than I meant.
Slowly my mother makes eye contact with me as a response.
"There's a Halloween party tomorrow night...", I let the words linger in the air for a bit. "I'd really like to go"
Yet another awkward silence settles as I wait for an answer.
"I promise to not drink or anything", I say backing up my question.
The last think I expected was for her to laugh. Rubbing her hands on the apron around her waste, she gets up from the seat she's in, the chair screeching as its scooched back on the hardwood floor.
"Of course I don't mind, I want you to get out and have fun", she says standing on her tip toes, putting her hand through my hair, the curls bouncing back down on my forehead in response. Mom always says she doesn't know where I got my curls from and scolded me that one time in middle school I wanted to straighten them down.
"But...", she says spinning around on her heel to sit back in her chair "If you really want my 100 percent approval, you can do something for me".
I smirk, "Yeah yeah, watcha need from me"
"Take a plate of cookies to our new neighbors", she gets back to work not making eye contact with me.
"Now?", I ask.
"Yes now", still no eye contact.
I let out a deep sigh.
____
Never in the short life I have lived have I enjoyed making conversation. People might think otherwise due to my social status, but my brain and constant stammering proves anything but.
I've been staring at the light blue plate for a couple minutes now, about a dozen iced cookies laying on it and a thin piece of plastic wrap covering them. I'm standing on my front porch, staring at cookies like a total weirdo and the sun is going down and if everyone in this neighborhood didn't already know me they'd probably think I'm some predator or something.
God, just stop being a coward and get it over with Korey.
The beige house across the street has a moving truck backed up in its driveway. I'm guessing they got all the moving done this morning, since the truck is closed up. There's a purple bike with dangling silver streamers on the handles leaning up against the house already, a kid probably.
I breathe in and out, gripping the plate in my hand and start over across the street to there house. Now, standing in front of the dark brown door to the house I wonder whether I should knock on the door or ring the doorbell.
Doorbells are so annoying but they might not hear if I knock on the door and I'll be that douchebag that knocks to much.
I ring the doorbell.
It takes a sec before I can hear a muffled commotion and footsteps across the room. The door swings open with a click and creak, a tall black lady with her hair in braids and up in a heavy looking bun is standing in front of me. At first she has a frown on her face as she looks me up and down but after a sec she has a big grin across her face.
"Are you one of our neighbors? Oh my god, its so nice to meet you!", she grips my free hand tightly and shakes it.
I stand a bit awkward for a bit before finally getting to the reason I was there, "My mom made these for you", I say lifting up the plate higher in front of her.
"These are so cute, my sons will be hogs for these", she says taking the plate laughing. "Ty, Hunter! come meet our neighbor!"
I internally freak out at being an inconvenience for a couple of kids, but its to late to be against it now as a couple of boys hurry down the stairs and down the hall to the front door. The taller one of the two has dark, straight hair that is currently being covered by a grey beanie, he is built and does not look happy at the moment. While the shorter one is obviously younger and has light brown hair that's sticking up all over the place, a lanky frame and a big grin on his face just like his mom that reveals the gap where his two front teeth should be.
"Cookies! Momma can I have one?", the younger boy pulls on his moms sleeve while he asks.
"Go get changed into you're jammies Hunter and you can have two", she says as the boys eyes get big and he starts off down the hall again.
"Hey! you better thank this young man first.", her hand goes to her hip and Hunter looks back for a split second.
"Thanks a lot!", and he's gone. Not the first time I met a hyper kid, Ed's little sister is the exact same way.
"You wanna come in for a bit, I'd love to get you a drink or something?", the woman exclaims.
"I wouldn't want to intrude this late miss", the manners my mom taught me kick in as well as the don't do anything with strangers rule that everyone knows about.
"Its no biggie, I wont keep you long", she backs up insisting I come in. Of course I except, internally slapping myself and inch in walking past her as she closes the door behind me with a click. Slowly I slip my sneakers off by the door next to the various other pairs of shoes scattered by the door as well. The boy who looks a bit my age, who I'm guessing is Ty glares at me and walks away from us through the open doorframe into the living room that just has the couch set up at the moment.
"Oh, and call me Morgan", she says walking up to me. "Okay, so we've only been here a couple days but my husband went shopping last night, we've got tea, coffee or water", Morgan states confidently. Coffee sounds amazing but everything in me wants to say water so she isn't in a hassle, but I'm feeling a bit more confident now.
"Coffee would be fine"
"Creamer, sugar?", she asks.
"Sugar would be nice, thank you", I say
"You can go ahead and sit on the couch if you'd like", she walks away soon after that. I turn towards the open doorway, walking through and immediately loving the feeling of the tan carpet on my feet. The room is bare white except for a huge light grey couch up against the left wall, the window behind it and a red brick fireplace on the wall straight ahead of me. The strong smell of sweet mint that I smelled when Morgan opened the door is coming from a light blue candle sitting atop the fireplace, a picture of a ocean on the front of it.
Ty is sitting at the far end of the couch leaning far back, his phone out in front of him and a catchy toon coming from it as he taps frantically. The clanging of dish against dish can be heard down the hall from the kitchen.
Slowly I walk to the couch and sit at the opposite end of Ty.
Awkward, awkward, so very very awkward.
Besides the music coming from Ty's phone, the room is deathly silent lacking any conversation that my dignity needs. I sigh immediately regretting it not wanting to sound obnoxious. Looking over with a side eye to make sure I didn't annoy him and his calm stature maybe means everything is fine. Before looking away I catch sight of his eyes, a bright blue that I've never seen before. If anyone turned out the lights in the room they mine as well glow.
How didn't I notice them before? Was I not paying attention?
Then he looks over at me making eye contact and my heart jumps and I look away frantically. My face goes hot and I can only imagine how red I am.
"You a creep or something?", Ty says laughing.
I stammer like a fool "U-uh, no, definitely not", I look down at my lap because eye contact would literally make things worse right now.
The room is silent again but not for long.
"How's this town and everything", he asks sort of out of the blue.
"Honestly", I stall for a sec looking up at him again "very boring".
He laughs and I laugh to, my face still feels a bit hot but the normal question helped a bit.
"Only a coffee shop to hang out at and that's literally it.", I say.
He smiles, "With the amount of woods we went through on the way here I'm not surprised".
"You'll get used to it don't worry"
It doesn't take long for the frown to be back on Ty's face and he looks away.
"I hate being new", he murmurs.
"Tell me about it, I went to church again for the first time since I was a kid and didn't know a soul. Not close to you're situation but you know....", I look at him mid sentence and immediately shut up.
He smiles and sets his phone down on the arm of the couch, sitting up.
"You're weird", he states.
"Yeah....I know", I say looking down again.
"A bit refreshing coming from California"
"Oh my god, you lived in Cali?", I say a bit to loud.
"Yep, its hot", he bluntly says.
"Why in all hell would you come here from there?", I ask.
"Mom went through some stuff and wanted to work somewhere more secluded. She took a job as a police officer here, one of the few I'm guessing", he smiles.
"With her that would be three", we both laugh at that.
"What does you're dad do?", I ask.
"Oh he did construction"
"Ah, I don't think there are any jobs for that here" I say.
"Yeah, he's looking"
Me and Ty go on and on about our lives and the town. I tell him about my mom and brother and how we've lived here awhile, deciding to leave out my dead dad so the mood doesn't go down.
Then an idea comes to mind.
"Hey, do you want to go to a party tomorrow night?", I ask slowly and of course awkwardly.
He's quiet for a sec. "Sure, where is it?"
"Oh, in the local cemetery, thanks to Halloween and everything."