I honestly don't remember how or when I wrote this but I found it when I (finally) cleaned my room and decided to edit the first part for all to see.

Amy Cooper leaned forward in the window seat and pressed her hands against the glass pane of her second story bedroom window. She was looking so intently through the rain she imagined her father turning into the driveway and seeing two blue lights from his daughter's window.

"I can't believe it." she muttered to herself.

Her twin brother, Alexander, appeared at her side. "What?" he peered over Amy's shoulder and out the window.

"That girl that moved in next door is dancing in the rain."

"Her name's Gwen." Amy rolled her eyes without taking her gaze away from the twirling girl in the middle of the cul-de-sac.

"And you don't think that it's just a little weird that she's out there in the rain?"

Alexander shrugged. He didn't like how his sister judged people like that. If this new girl wanted to dance in the rain, so be it. It was none of his business.

The girl outside, Gwen, spun around with her arms spread out to form a 'T' shape. Amy raked her eyes over this girls wet clothes, noticing how her flowy skirt stuck to her legs in places, and guessed that this new girl wasn't much of a fashion expert. Most of the things Amy wore were up-to-the-minute styles from the latest designers. The twins' mother owned a fashion magazine and Amy took that to her advantage. Gwen's clothes looked like stuff she made herself. Amy touched a lock of her own blonde hair, cut to her shoulders and wondered how this girl could survive with dark hair that flowed down her back.

"I can tell what your thinking." Alexander said quietly.

"If you're hearing 'She's a total freak.' than your right, you can tell what I'm thinking."

Alexander glared at his twin and was about to respond when their mother stopped in front of the door and announced, "We have guests tonight so set three more places at the table."

"Now?" Amy turned to face her. Their mother shared the twins' blonde hair but had almond-shaped green eyes instead of blue.

"Yes. Now." she disappeared down the stairs.

Amy put her hands on her hips, glad when she realized she didn't have to think about it. She never did it until it became 'in' for girls to hold their arms that way and she was really getting the hang of it.

"Who do you think is coming over?" Alexander was silent, "Alex?"

"Beats me. C’mon we have to set the table." Alexander walked past Amy with a small smile on his lips, for he just saw Gwen's parent join her in her dance in the middle of the street.

* * *

Amy clicked her tongue in impatience. She fidgeted in the living room chair. Alexander shook his head at her agitated body language and stared at the small, dying flames in the fireplace. As he traced a pattern in the glowing embers with his eyes, the front door opened.

Both Amy and Alexander snapped their heads up to see who the three mystery visitors were. They their mother usher three dark-haired people cheerfully into the house. Amy saw her mother point in the twins' general direction. The shortest figure detached from the group and walked toward the fireplace.

Amy's mouth fell open in astonishment. It was Gwen, the rain dancing girl, Amy did a quick assessment and found her clothes to be twice as weird as before. Now she wore jeans that, on the left leg, were relatively normal, but on the right leg was cut to the middle of her thigh, a white shirt that could have come from any generic school uniform, and a pink and black checked tie, loosely worn around her neck. A pink fingerless glove that came halfway past her elbow was worn on her left hand and a black hat straight out of the sixties sat on her head. Amy closed her mouth and scrunched her nose with distaste.

Gwen took in Amy's stare and turned to Alexander with a smile on her full lips. "May I sit there?" she gestured with her ungloved hand toward the spot next to him on the couch.

Unlike Amy, Alexander wasn't staring at the new girl's unusual clothing, he was watching her face. He was stunned at how pretty she was. Alexander noted in the few seconds that Gwen talked that her eyes were wide with dreamy grey irises and her small nose wrinkled a little when she smiled.

It took him a few seconds to frame a coherent answer, "S-sure."

Amy started at the sound of her brother's tone of voice and shifted her disbelieving stare from Gwen to Alexander.

"My name's Alex."

"Mine's Gwen."

Alexander glanced swiftly at his sister. Realizing she wasn't going to say anything, he introduced her, "This is my sister, Amy."

Gwen's body language changed abruptly as she made eye contact with Amy. Her shoulders came into a defencive position by her ears, "Hi." she said shyly.

"Is Gwen short for something?" Alexander saved Gwen from sister's stare.

"Gwendolyn." Amy rolled her eyes. She knew that Gwen would stand out from the second she laid eyes on her, but to even have her name be different? That was a little over the top.

"How old are you?" Gwen took her hat off and shook her hair out as she spoke. Alexander found himself marveling at the reddish tint the light gave the strands.

A buzzing from his pocket distracted him. He pulled out his cell phone and read a text message from his sister. Most of the message was dominated by a picture of a green eyes girl with carmel-colored hair. Underneath the picture were the words "U HAVE A GF" in capital printing.

"Amy," he sighed, "No offence, but if you have to constantly remind me of my problems...well, you must have some of your own." Alexander felt the force of his sister's glare on his face but he didn't even glance at her as he answered Gwen's question.

"I'm fourteen."

"So am I," Gwen's brow was puckered in confusion, "How bad is the high school here?"

Alexander, who had been a freshman for all of three weeks thought he had a pretty good handle on the school, "The classes aren't bad, the homework is light, and gym is...well, gym bu--"

"No," She interrupted, "I mean the people."

Amy answered before Alexander could even open his mouth, "If you're good at sports, you'll be fine," she paused dramatically, watching the crease between Gwen's eyebrows deepen, "Otherwise you're in for social suicide."

Gwen grimaced.

* * *

Alexander rang the doorbell of the house Gwen had moved into and pretended he was unaware of his sister shadowing him. He held Gwen's black hat in his hands and Amy stared at it like her gaze would burn it.

Gwen appeared at the door. To Amy's surprise Gwen had on a normal jeans-and-a-tee-shirt outfit and her hair was pulled up into a ponytail. What halted Amy's surprise was that the strange girl was balancing two heavy paint cans, several bags of water balloons, and about twenty cheap water guns.

"Hey." she panted, "That's where I left my hat!" she smiled at Alexander. He paused, unsure of what to do.

He unfroze, "Let me get those." He took the paint cans and walked into the house, Amy still followed him, "Where to?"

Gwen sighed in exhaustion, "Up two flights of stairs and down an enormous hallway." She shut the door with a push of her foot and turned to a flight of stairs parallel to the wall where the front door was.

Once they were up to the second floor they rounded a slice of wall that separated the top of the first staircase to the bottom of the second. Halfway up the third floor Alexander's curiosity got the best of him.

"What's all this stuff for anyway?"

"I'm painting my soon-to-be art studio." she was quiet for a moment, "Do you want to help?"

"First, tell me how water balloons and squirt guns are going to help you paint your studio."

She grinned over her shoulder at him, "You'll see," her grin faded, "Where's Amy?"

Alexander checked over his shoulder, down the steps. His sister had a knack for being either too loud to tune out or so quiet she was a ghost, so he found nothing startling about her disappearance.

"She went back to her cheer-cave most likely." he used his name for Amy's overly-pink bedroom by accident.

"She's a cheerleader?" Gwen's was facing forward but Alexander could hear the worry in her voice.

"Yes," he scrambled for something funny to say, "She's crossed to the dark side." He hung his head in mock sorrow.

It worked; Gwen laughed.

* * *

Amy detached herself from her brother and explored the first floor of the house.

She passed the staircase and peered into a bathroom at the wall opposite of it. It was a pretty big bathroom and was wall-to-wall blue. Blue tiles on the wall and floor reflected Amy in their shiny surfaces hundreds of times over and the ceiling was painted the same shade of blue. Paintings of seashore and beaches hung next to fluffy white towels on the walls. Statues of fish, dolphin, and another strange creatures with tails. Amy stared more intently at the unidentifiable figurines.

Mermaids. Amy couldn't help thinking how funny it was that she didn't see that coming. Last night's dinner had proved that Gwen's parents were just as strange as she was. Shells, smooth round rocks, and bottles of sand with labels on them adorned any surface. Amy leaned forward and read a few of the labels. Hawaii 6/18, Mexico 7/24, and California 6/2.

So they were well traveled. Amy stored that in her mind for later use.

She walked into an enormous living room covered with modern furniture. The entire room was warm reds, oranges, and yellows. The carpet had a overlapping square pattern and pictures of sunsets and sunrises sat on the mantle of a colossal brick fireplace. Yellow curtains covered the windows and cast a funny golden glow on the entire room.

Amy quickly croosed the room and walked into a huge room that was divided almost in half by a wall that came up to her chest. The half she walked into was a kitchen in earth tones; the counters' surface was dark green marble, the cabnets were made of dark wood, the tile on the floor was light brown, and the walls were a grassy green.

* * *