Faced with those eyes, I could only freeze in disbelief. There was no way Oliver was in my house right now.
"Dan? Are you alright?"
Hearing my mother's confused voice shook me out of my confused state, and I furrowed my eyebrows to ask him.
"What are you doing here?"
Raising his eyebrows at my obviously hostile words, Oliver subtly shifted his gaze to the air beside him, before focusing his attention back at me and giving me a fake shallow smile.
He opened his mouth, however before he could speak, my mother walked out of the kitchen with my father.
"Oh Dan, you're home. Oliver chose our house to be adopted into."
Shifting her view to Oliver, my mother smiled gently.
"If there's any questions, you can ask Dan. I hope the two of you get along."
Then, before I could interject, my father whispered something into her ears and the two of them excused themselves into their bedroom.
The moment the door closed behind them, I flicked my gaze towards the boy in front of me and glared at him.
"Why our house?"
Not smiling anymore, Oliver blatantly scanned our house as he answered.
"The kidnapping incident 2 years ago. If I wanted to join any household, it would obviously be one that is clearly Anti-MDVA act. Plus, your mother was very brave back then. And I heard that she had a son. I thought it would be good if I could make friends with someone who was closer to my age and knew Middle street better than I did."
Oliver's eyes then met mine, his gaze straight and unwavering.
"Although it seems that you do not welcome me here."
Breaking the line of sight first, I tightened my fists and glanced at him from the corner of my eyes wearily.
Seeing his gaze wander again, I was in the middle of trying to come up with a good comeback, when I saw him head straight for Leo's door. Before his hands could even touch the doorknob, I had already ran forward and threw myself between him and the door.
With a surprised look on his face, Oliver raised one eyebrow at my actions, but soon reverted back to a mild expression and backed off from the door.
"Sorry."
Lightly apologizing, he seemed a little more restrained and didn't look around anymore, instead opting to safely sit down on a dining chair.
Moving away from the door, I followed him and sat opposite him.
"My Mom was not the only one involved in the kidnapping incident 2 years ago. There was at least one more."
Resting my hands on the table in front of me, I interrogated Oliver. But he didn't seem intimidated or bothered by my words.
"Camellia's family right. But I have a little issue with Daniel, and ..."
Oliver trailed off his words, immediately realizing that what he was about to say next was probably best left unsaid.
And they do not have a son anymore.
Brushing off the unsaid sentence in the air, I continued with the topic.
"But that doesn't mean that it has to be our family. There are many other Anti-MDVA act families out there. After all, it isn't as if our faction is small."
Scoffing at what I thought was a flimsy excuse, I looked at his face to gauge his expression and was met with another fake smile.
"I have my reasons."
With that cryptic sentence, I raised my eyebrows as Oliver silently took over the conversation.
"Or is it that you don't want me to be adopted into this household."
The atmosphere was tense, and I wanted to reply with a 'yes' and a roll of my eyes. However, even when I opened my mouth, I couldn't say anything. I wouldn't be lying if I said I didn't particularly enjoy his presence in the house, but I wasn't necessarily against him being adopted here. Just, not welcoming.
"...No."
Gritting my teeth, I spat out that word. Lifting my head, I expected to see a smug expression, but I was surprised. On Oliver's face was a genuine, gentle, pleased smile.
"Then it's decided."
In no time at all, that genuine smile was hidden underneath his fake one as he stood up from the chair.
"I guess that I'll be sleeping in your room?"
Standing up after him, I pushed in the chair and followed him as he stood in front of my room.
Feeling slightly reluctant, I nevertheless took out my room key from my pocket and unlocked the door. As the two of us went in, I never once let my eyes wander away from his face. Maybe I could catch him off guard and tear off that darn mask of his.
Stepping into the room, Oliver first took a cursory look around. The room was only so big, so it wasn't long before he had spotted the board of newspaper clippings that I had stuck to the wall.
Walking over to them, he seemed to briefly read one before moving on to the next one. When he saw my small collection of articles related to him, I saw one brow rise and a spark of surprise flash across his eyes. However, that surprise quickly disappeared and was placed with a heavy and deep sorrowful look.
Flicking my gaze over to see which article he was looking at, I paused as I laid eyes on it. It was the article mentioning Alex's death and the circumstances around it.
Feeling a little uncomfortable, I returned my gaze back to Oliver to see him reach out a hand to touch the article. Taking out the sharp object holding it to the board, I saw him rub his thumb over Alex's face, his mask forgotten as raw sadness and fury shone in his eyes. He then closed those eyes and flipped over the article so he wouldn't see it.
Looking at that expression, those actions, I couldn't help but sneak my hand over and tug the article away from his hands. The moment he felt me touch it, I saw those eyes snap open and flicker to me and I thought I could see a trace of guilt before it was covered up by his mask again.
"...Sorry."
Mumbling an apology, I tugged at the article gently again, and Oliver let it go. Facing it down, I reached out to my board and took down all the other articles that mentioned Alex and hid them away from his eyes.
Temporarily abandoning my plan of searching for his flaws, I walked over to the bookshelf and took out a file, slotting the article in there before returning back to him.
"Thank you."
With a soft and gentle voice, Oliver thanked me as he returned his gaze back to the board.
Once he finished reading all the articles there, he tore his eyes away and took another glance at the bedroom.
"Where will I sleep? I don't think your single bed can hold the two of us."
Looking towards my bed, I also frowned as I considered that question.
"Maybe my parents will buy you another bed. Then you can place it next to mine, or we can shift mine horizontally and you can put the bed nearer to the bookshelf."
Picturing the room space in my head, I silently calculated the layout of the room. Splitting the whole room into 9 sections, the bookshelf was on the 'top' of the room, spanning from top right to top middle. My bed was at the bottom right, filling up both the bottom right and half of the middle right portion. The middle middle was blank, and my desk and chair were at the bottom left. The board was on the wall spanning from bottom left to the bottom middle. Perhaps Olver's bed would occupy the bottom middle to middle middle portion. However I would prefer to be nearer to the board than him, so hopefully we just move my bed to a horizontal position and I take the bottom right and bottom middle position, while Oliver got the middle right and middle middle position.
Nodding my head at the new room layout plan in my head, I was satisfied with what I imagined to be the new room layout. All I had to do was to convince my parents. Oh, and Oliver too.
Breaking out of my thoughts, I turned to Oliver and was about to try to convince him when I saw the small smile on his face.
"It looks like you have a solution. Since it's your room, whatever position you want me to sleep in, I'll accept it."'
That calm acceptance, instead of making me happy, just irritated me.
Frowning, I placed my hands on my hips and huffed.
"If you're joining our family, then this is your room as well! Don't just accept everything willy-nilly!"
Half shouting at him, I immediately felt silly after saying those words. I was supposed to be irritated and hateful of him! Why was I nagging him?!
Hearing my words, Oliver initially showed a shocked expression. However, as time went on, his lips started curving up and I could see his eyes slowly turn into crescents. He even seemed to be holding back some laughter.
"Thank you."
Giving me a genuine smile, Oliver looked at the direction of the bed once more before turning back to me.
"I feel that we're going to get along just great."
As if!