Thirteen years ago

"Why don't you go play with Alex, Amelia?" Mommy whispers into my ear.

The boy sitting on the fluffy floor is playing with a toy car. It looks like it can fly. Cool. Mommy gives me an encouraging look, and I walk over to him.

"Hello," I say to the unusual boy with the brown hair.

He looks up at me and stares. "Do you want to play?"

I nod and plop down on the fluffy floor beside him. "I have a car like that. It's pink," I tell him. "Pink is my favourite. Is red your favourite?"

"Sí."

"The sea? You mean your favourite colour is the sea colour?"

He watches me, confused. "No entiendo."

Oh yes, Mummy said they are from Spain. I don't know Spain language. "No entiendo," I copy what he said. The boy smiles. His tooth at the front is missing – he looks funny. I smile too.

We play with his toy cars and race but he wins every time. We don't talk much but the swoosh and zrooom noises we make are enough for us. The boy wins another race and puts his hands up in victory, and I feel my eyes start to sting. Tears fall from my eyes and I cry out. It's not fair. I never win.

Someone pulls my hands away from my face. It was the boy. He's looking at me with a sad face. "No llores."

I don't know what it means, but the way he says it makes me feel better and I stop crying. The boy is still holding my hands but I don't pull them away. If Dana from school saw this she would say it's yucky and everyone would laugh at us. But Dana from school isn't here so I think it's okay.

The boy gives me his car and takes the one I was using. He tells me it's special, and he's right because when we race again I win. We play some more while our Mommies talk and I tell him about Dana from school, but i'm not sure if he can understand me but he listens anyway as if it's the most exciting story he's ever been told.

I never saw the unusual boy from Spain ever again after that day.

+++

Today

Moving day. Again. It's the second time this year we have moved state. Just as I settle in and start enjoying where we are, we always move. It's like my Dad has an alarm that goes off whenever I become happy in our new home and he gets another business offer.

After putting my last box in the trunk of my car, I hop into my silver Volkswagen, or as I call her – Meredith.

"You ready?" Dad shouts out the window of his Jeep.

No. No i'm not ready to move again and be the new girl in school for the 100th time. You just never get used to being put in a foreign place, not knowing anyone and not knowing where to go.

I don't say anything like this to my parents though. "Yeah!" I yell back. He starts to drive and I follow, and we begin our journey to Colorado.

For most of the twelve our journey, I blast music in Meredith and sing along to Blackbear, Machine Gun Kelly, Ariana Grande, and even some old One Direction songs. By the time 'I want', has finished playing, I'm exhausted and my voice is half gone.

We stop at a small cafe and order coffee and sandwiches. There is only a couple more people inside but we pretty much have the place to ourselves. Mom takes a sip of her coffee then look at me with a serious expression. Uh-oh. This, my people, is the face of someone who's about to tell me something I don't want to hear. As if things can get any worse than this.

"Amelia, there's something we need to tell you."

My chewing slows as I watch them, my eyes narrowed to splits. "Spit it out," I say, still not completely done chewing. I ignore Mom's disgusted response at how unladylike i'm being.

"So you know that we had to move immediately, without having time to even sell the house-"

"Yeah so we need to stay in a hotel until we can buy a house in Denver. I know this." I go back to scoffing down my sandwich.

"Yes- well, no. You remember my friend Isabella don't you?"

My eyes narrow again. "Yes..."

"She offered us her guest rooms. Isn't that so kind?"

"Are you talking about Isabella with the nine sons? That Isabella?"

"Yes, Amelia. But I think it will be great for you. You will know people in school that way and you can become friends with her daughter Yasmin-"

"I CANNOT LIVE WITH THAT MANY BOYS! ARE YOU CRAZY? I can barely even stand living with Dad! No offence," I say to him. Mom sighs and closes her eyes. "I can't do it Mom! Let me stay in a hotel and you guys can live there. Please-"

"No. It won't be that bad Amelia. Give them a chance – they are really nice boys. And their Dad just got arrested last month so they could really use your support."

"What did he get arrested for?" I ask, curious now.

"It's not my place to tell. But I think you will like them. And surely Yasmin will enjoy having another girl around. And you already know Alex-"

"No I don't, Mom. We met when we were five and he couldn't even understand what I was saying. I wouldn't call that knowing him."

"Well, you will know him," she says louder, getting impatient with me. I should stop being such a brat – I feel bad causing her this stress when she's already probably stressed out about moving. Maybe not though because we're moving to the same state as her best friend, whereas all of my best friends are scattered around the fucking globe.

I take a deep breath and smile. "Fine."

It's 9pm by the time we stop outside a massive house. So these guys are rich. Great. The last thing I need is for them to be cocky and stuck up along with being male.

A stunning woman with tan skin opens the front door. She has wavy dark hair that falls on her shoulders. Her features are dark, which is beautiful, and there are light freckles on her cheeks.

"Kate!" She hugs my Mom excitedly. "You look amazing!"

"So do you! All those kids and you still look like you haven't aged a day," Mom says and they laugh.

"Nice to see you again, Dylan," Isabella says to Dad and they hug. She looks at me and covers her mouth with her hands for a moment. "Wow," she whispers. "I can't believe how gorgeous you grew up to be." Isabella opens the door wider and steps out of the way. "Come in, we need to catch up." We step inside the house and my jaw almost falls to the floor at how big and awesome it looks inside. A chandelier hangs from the ceiling and in the centre of the room there is a big expensive looking table. Behind it is a seating area with brown leather couches and a white fluffy carpet covers the floor.

"You were only five years old when I last saw you. This is just so unbelievable," Isabella continues, admiring me. "I'm sorry. I hope i'm not making you uncomfortable."

"No, it's fine," I assure her. "You're so nice," I laugh. "And it's like really cool that you're letting us stay here."

She smiles. "Why don't you go sit in the seating area, and I will make you all some coffee."

"I can help carry them through," I add and Isabella thanks me. She leads me through a door on the right into the large kitchen. The first thing I see is a boy poking a girl with two different cooking utensils while the girl throws frozen peas at him. Another thing I notice is that they are both drop-dead gorgeous.

Isabella yells something at them in spanish and they both stop and start laughing. They look at me and the boys eyebrows shoot up.

He extends his arm for me to shake his hand. "Hola, hermosa. Soy Valentino."

I shake his hand but stay silent. I really wish I took spanish class now.

The girl comes up behind him and pushes him away. "Shut up, Val." She looks at me. "That's just something he does when he meets hot girls. He thinks talking in español will make it easier to get in their pants."

I laugh and look at the boy. "Well before you start trying, Im just gonna let you know that you are never getting in my pants."

"We will see about that," he winks.

"Valentino!" Isabella yells. "Stop annoying her and clean this up." He groans and gets on his knees to pick up the peas one by one.

"I'm Yasmin," the girl says. "That's Val."

"Amelia," I smile.

"Yasmin why don't you show Amelia around and introduce her to your brothers?" Isabella offers.

Yasmin nods and holds the door open for me. I walk out and she leads me up the staircase. "You might wanna write all these names down," she jokes.

"So how do you like having nine brothers?"

She shrugs. "It's okay, I guess. Some of us are pretty close and Val and Santiago are like mis mejores amigos. But they can be annoying too." I nod, assuming she said they are her best friends. I think. Or maybe she said worst friends. Something friends.

She leads me down one of the halls and opens a door. Inside is two beds and a desk covered in paper and clothes. One of the beds is a mess containing all sorts of items, and on the other there is a boy with black messy hair. He's looking at us, his phone in his hand. I notice his eyes are a greyish-blue colour, and he's an all around really attractive guy.

"This is Amelia," Yasmin tells him.

He gets up and walks to us. "Hi, I'm Santiago," he gives me a warm smile and I start to think my Mom was right about them being nice guys. Maybe this won't be so bad.

"Are you gonna say something seducing in spanish too?"

He laughs. "So you've met Val."

"Mmm-hmm."

"I'm showing her around. You think Alex would mind if I took her into his room?" Yasmin asks him.

"Oh, he'd love that," Santiago rolls his eyes.

"Alex?" I question.

"He's a year older than us. And he can be pretty mean."

"He's fine once you get to know him," Santiago assures me.

"Yeah but he's just not really up for socialising right now because of..." she trails off. Santiago looks down and I assume she's talking about their Dad. "I'll take you to Max and Marco's room." She plasters on a smile. I say bye to Santiago and follow her back the way we came until she opens a door with another two beds.

There is a young kid on one bed with a ps4 controller in his hand, playing some sort of game. His hair is blonde, his eyes blue. The guy on the other bed is much older and has brown eyes and brown hair with blonde streaks in it. He's has earphones in but takes them out when he sees us.

"You must be Amelia, or another one of Yasmin's hot friends. Either way, I'm Max," he grins and surprises me by pulling me into a hug.

"You must be used to guys hitting on you, right?" Yasmin asks. "Because you're gonna get a lot of that here."

"Uh, not really." Okay, guys do usually take an attraction to me, but do you ever get used to it? Plus, its mostly the ugly guys that like me, not guys like Max and Val who look like they could be on the cover of magazines.

"Marco, come say hi to Amelia," Yasmin tells the younger blonde boy.

"Hi," he says without moving and keeping his eyes on his TV.

She rolls her eyes. "He also got the moody trait."

"You're eighteen, right?" Max asks me and I nod. "We're seventeen. And twins. But we don't look much alike, do we? We came out of the womb together though, ain't that cool?"

"Yeah..." I laugh and look at Yasmin. "You do look more like Santiago though. Are you sure you guys aren't triplets?"

She laughs. "Nah, 'Tiago was born ten months before us. Oh, and Marco is eleven by the way." I nod. I can remember everything so far.

"That's Carlos and Ray's room, but they're both out right now. They always are because Carlos has a girlfriend and God knows where Ray goes," Yasmin informs me as we walk down the hall. "Diego's room is there but he's not here either. And this is Alex's room." We stop outside it and for some reason I feel nervous just being near it.

"He's in there probably watching porn or some shit, I dunno. But, we shall not disturb." She smiles and I can't figure out if she's joking or not. "And here's your room," she opens the door to the one next to Alex's room, then points across the hall. "And that's mine. Your parents and my Mom's room is down the hall away from us. Our bathroom is right there. It's just me, you and Alex who need to share it because we have our own rooms. The other guys have their own bathrooms. And Diego's room has a bathroom because he's the oldest and that somehow qualifies him to have a bigger room to himself. And there you go. Thank you for choosing Yasmin tours, I hope you had a fantastic time."

"It was magnificent, thanks." I say, still trying to take that all in. I reach into my hoodie pocket and pull out five cents. "For your troubles," I smile and she takes it from me like it's gold.

"Wow, thank you!"

"Don't spend it all in one place!" I say as she walks away.

"I'd never do such thing!"

I walk into what will be my room for the next month or however long, and fall onto the queen sized bed, feeling exhausted from travelling. The room is decorated in simple white and silver, with a large dresser and desk. The place is amazing and way better than a cheap hotel would be, but it's still gonna be hard to get used to this many people, since I don't have any siblings.

The last thoughts I have before falling into a deep sleep are of the mysterious boy in the room beside me.

+++

ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh first chapter i'm excited are you excited? i'm excited.

what do you think of the fuentes siblings you have been introduced to so far? who's your fave?

teaser: amelia meets alex in the most awkward way possible.

ly

-e