A/N: Hey everyone! Here’s the fourth chapter! This one’s written by me. Hope you like it! Nate’s pick up lines were found online, and Juliet helped me write for Dawson and Kordelia because they are her creations and I suck at writing about them, haha.

Side note: in case you hadn’t figured it out from the last chapter, Piper, Mandy, and Aly are all siblings. They are the Inmans and live next door to the Watsons.

Side note #2: if any of you are artists, we would SOOO love it if you drew the Watsons for us. (: Visit my profile for more information, if you have a gaia account. Haha. Or even if you don't. JUST DO IT. :O please? xD

--x-xxx---

About one week after moving in…

YOU’RE INVITED!

What: housewarming party

Where: the Watson’s house

Who: the whole neighborhood and friends

When: Saturday from 8:00PM-11:00PM

Why: to welcome the Watson’s to the neighborhood!

Please dress semi-formal and bring snacks if possible. People of all ages can attend, but you are responsible for your own family. This party is being hosted by the Inmans and the Watsons. RSVP by Friday 555-236-8794 or 555-247-6291.

“A housewarming party?” Kaelyn asked after skimming the invitation Casey had handed her.

“Yep, that’s right! Our families are hosting it together because we’re next door neighbors. It was Piper’s idea, actually,” Mandy replied as she distributed more invitations to Michi and Kordelia.

“Oh, Kordelia…can you give this one to Dawson?” Korynne asked slyly, holding one of the pieces of paper out to her friend. Kordelia immediately reddened and her lips turned to a pout.

“What makes you think I want to talk to him?” she huffed, arms crossed.

“Uh, you guys are best friends,” Michi pointed out.

Kordelia pouted some more while she tried to think of a comeback to the too true statement, but could think of nothing. Instead she resorted to just grabbing the invitation hastily from Korynne’s hands and stomping off to find Dawson.

The other five girls smirked in satisfaction and watched her go.

--x-xxx---

It was Tuesday afternoon. Not that this piece of information is particularly vital, but oh well. The point is that the Watson’s housewarming party was a mere four days away, and none of the siblings had something to wear yet. The invitation had said “semi-formal”, after all. And it was this realization that brought the eight Watsons to the local mall, where they were trying on things to wear to their party.

“Let’s match, Korynne!” Kory squealed as soon as they entered the mall. “Eee! Look, BCBG! Let’s go there!” The crazed teenage girl began speed walking towards the expensive designer store, but didn’t make it far before her older brother grabbed her arm.

“Noooo way. We can’t afford designer labels,” Justin said. “You guys each have a fifty dollar limit. And that includes shoes and all accessories, too. Okay?”

Kory pouted and was dragged by her twin towards the JC Penney. The rest of them followed.

The family spent a good three hours searching for the best outfits their budget would allow. Casey, being the weirdo that she is, decided to make a list of what everyone was wearing and how they were doing their hair. She had taken over as “party beautifier” with Kory.

Now, on Saturday afternoon, the two sisters went over their chart to make sure everything was perfect before they guests started arriving.

OUTFITS FOR THE PARTAAY.

Ayprille: black mini dress with electric blue leggings. silver peace sign necklace and assorted blue and silver bangles. classic black ballet flats. hair down and wavy.

Katie: adorable white dress with golden waist ribbon that reaches just above the knees. white-gold necklace. white flats. gold hoop earrings. hair down and straight.

John: black dress pants and shoes. white collared long-sleeve dress shirt with black tie. leave hair as is (do whatever you want with it, john).

Kory and Korynne: short indigo-blue mini-dresses that sparkle. black bead necklaces and silver bangle bracelets. black jimmy choos (korynne borrow from kory). hair in cutely-messy updo (done by kory). silver studded earrings.

Casey: cute off-white dress with moss green waist ribbon and pink and green flowers near hem. moss green flats. hair down and curly.

Liz: white low-cut silk dress with black waist ribbon. black heels. black chain necklace. hair down and wavy.

Justin: grey long-sleeve dress shirt and black dress pants (and matching shoes). black tie. leave hair as is.

“Looks perfect, eh, Casey?” Kory smiled satisfactorily at her sister and the list.

“Definitely!” she replied, looking at the clock on the wall. “Seven fifty. People should be here soon.”

The siblings started filing downstairs, all wearing the outfits that the list designated. Needless to say, they all looked amazing. Moments later the doorbell rang. Kory answered it, and in skipped Piper, followed by her sisters Mandy and Aly.

Now let us remind you that John Watson is a teenage boy. And here a very attractive teenage girl has just waltzed into his home, wearing a purple dress and heels. It is only natural that little John couldn’t help but stare at Piper incredulously as she said her hellos to her friends, giving each of them a hug.

“Heeey, Johnny boy! Looking snazzy!” Piper stepped up to John and hugged him, causing him to blush and mumble awkwardly. This exchange was not lost on John’s older siblings or his twin sister, they stood on the sidelines snickering, but Ayprille and Piper herself didn’t seem to notice a thing.

Ten minutes later other neighbors and friends began to arrive. First came Candi and her parents, then Kaelyn’s family, then other random neighbors, and finally – Michi, Kordelia, and Dawson.

Korynne grabbed Kory’s arm when she saw the three enter and pulled her twin to a side hall. “Kory, this is our chance to figure out what’s up with Kordelia and Dawson,” she whispered. “All we have to do is talk to both of them and get them together.”

Kory nodded enthusiastically. “Okay! I’ll go talk to Dawson, you can handle Kordelia,” she said. Korynne agreed to the plan and the two sisters set off in opposite directions.

“Dawsonnnnn~!” Kory greeted eccentrically as she walked up to the boy, interrupting his conversation with one of the neighbor kids she had yet to be acquainted with. They were near the entrance to the kitchen; right next to a table with many treats piled high on its surface. “What’s up?” Kory smiled at Dawson, causing the boy he had been speaking with to pretty much melt. Dawson seemed unphased, however.

“Uh, hey Kory. Have you seen Kordelia?” he asked as he looked around for his best friend. Kory had to strain herself so she wouldn’t roll her eyes. Is she all this boy thinks about? Sheesh.

“Um, no, but I was actually going to ask you something,” she said.

“Oh yeah? Shoot,” he said, turning his attention to the red-headed girl before him.

“Well, it’s actually about Kordelia. I was just wondering…what’s up with you guys?” Kory asked.

“What do you mean? Kor is my best friend, I’ve known her since the day she was born. We’ve been together our entire lives.”

“You know what I mean. She’s always avoiding you, and Korynne heard you guys arguing once at lunch. What’s the deal?” Kory knew she was being nosy, but she didn’t care.

“Umm…” Dawson began, obviously trying to find a way out of explaining. “I honestly don’t know,” he answered.

“How can you not know? You guys are fighting about something and I know it’s none of my business, but you’re my friends and I want to know what’s wrong,” Kory persisted.

“That’s something you should ask Kor about.”

“Does that mean she’s the one who started the fight?”

“Wow, these cookies are really good.”

Kory rolled her eyes. She knew that this was going nowhere so she decided to leave Dawson alone for the time being and went to rendezvous with Korynne.

Meanwhile, Ayprille and Casey were sitting in the linen closet plotting mischievously. What were they plotting, you ask? Well, a prank, of course. The two sisters were notorious for pulling tricks for laughs and the big party was the perfect opportunity.

“Okay, so part one commences at 10:04 PM. Make sure you are in your station and ready to go at least a minute before show time. Got it?” the older of the two said.

“Roger that. What time is it now?” Ayprille asked.

Casey pulled out her crappy cell phone to check the time. “8:30. Let’s go mingle for a while so that nobody suspects anything,” she said.

Ayprille nodded and the two crept out into the main hallway. They pretended to be talking about how awesome the party was as they made their way to the living room so that nobody would think they were planning anything.

Of course this plan didn’t work. Any sibling of Ayprille and Casey’s knew that when you saw them come into a room together talking loudly about something they normally would have no interest in, they were up to something.

Katie eyed her younger and older sisters curiously as they walked into the room. She was about to go find out what they were up to when someone tapped her on the shoulder. She turned around and found herself face to face with a very attractive boy she had never seen before. He looked slightly older than her, somewhere between herself and Casey age wise, and he was ruggedly handsome with messy blonde hair and green eyes. Katie found herself very intimidated while in his presence. She could only imagine why someone like this would want to talk to someone like her.

“Excuse me, but do you have a map?” he asked.

“Er…huh?” she replied, confused by his question.

“I just keep getting lost in your eyes,” he finished with a smirk.

Katie’s jaw dropped. Was he hitting on her? And what kind of line was that?

“Umm…” she began to tell him to please stop when he spoke again.

“You must be tired, because you’ve been running through my mind all day!” he said.

Katie tried to think of what to say to that but she couldn’t get words to come out of her mouth. She was too busy staring at this boy, whose beautiful face had a smirk permanently plastered on it. She knew she should be disgusted by these lines (they were horribly cheesy) but for some reason she found herself smiling at him as he delivered his next pathetic attempt at a pick up.

“Do you believe in love at first sight? Or should I walk by again?”

This sent Katie’s laughter over the top. The boy smiled at the fact that he was making her laugh, and when she finally stopped, she found her voice.

“What’s your name? And where’d you find those pick up lines?” she asked him.

He laughed. “I have an older brother,” he shrugged. “And the name’s Nathan. Nathan Kendall. But you can call me Nate.”

“Katherine Watson, but you can call me Katie,” Katie said, smiling.

“Cool,” Nathan Kendall smiled back.

“Hey, want to go meet my brother? He’s over there somewhere,” Katie suggested. Nathan nodded and the two made their way over to John, laughing and talking the whole way there.

“Hey John, this is my new friend Nate,” Katie said.

John didn’t say anything at first because all he could think about was the fact that this tall, blonde, and cocky-looking guy had his arm around his twin sister’s shoulder. He felt the rage starting to build up inside of him as this ‘Nate’ tilted his head upwards in greeting and said, “Hey.”

“Hi,” he mumbled, narrowing his eyes at this guy whom, frankly, he thought was quite sketchy. And he hadn’t even heard the pick-up lines.

Katie sensed his apprehension. “What’s wrong?” she asked. She followed her brother’s gaze to the other side of the room where Piper stood laughing with that same guy who threw the gumdrop on the day she had first met the younger Watsons. Katie grinned. “Ooh, is someone jealous?” she asked slyly.

“What? No way. I was mad because you just met this guy and yet you’re letting him fondle you like you’ve been together for years,” he half-lied. That was one of the reasons that John was mad, but he was already in a foul mood because of the very reason that Katie had accused him of. But there was no way he would admit that, not even to himself. This whole Nate situation didn’t help his mood at all.

Katie rolled her eyes. “Whatever. You’re not the boss of me,” she said.

“Yeah,” Nate said, frowning at what John had said about him. And then, just to spite him, he pulled Katie closer to him and moved his arm to around her waist, which made the thirteen year old girl blush profusely.

John scoffed and stomped off angrily. Katie shrugged, and Nate let go of her, even though she didn’t really want him to.

--x-xxx---

Justin was having a good time talking to various neighbors when he heard something that was unmistakably Liz’s laughter. Normally this would not be problem, but Liz’s laugh was normally not this loud. There were only three instances in which she was this obnoxious: 1) when they were in the presence of roller coasters, 2) when she drank coffee, and 3) when she was drunk. Justin only knew the last was true because once when they were younger (around 13 and 11) Justin and Liz found some of their mom’s beer in the fridge and drank it because they both were going through a particularly rebellious stage then.

Since there definitely were no roller coasters around and Justin banned coffee from the house, he feared what was going on in the kitchen. Although he owned no beer (no one in the family could actually legally drink yet), he saw that some of the adults who had attended brought their own to drink and so he knew Liz could’ve gotten a hold of it somehow.

Sure enough, when he entered the kitchen, the first thing he saw was Liz dancing around like a maniac and singing to Phil Collins while holding a Budweiser bottle that was nearly empty, the last remaining drops of alcohol sloshing around while she danced. Several people were laughing, but a few of the older and more responsible adults were looking worried. This was definitely not how Justin wanted people to think of his family, so naturally, he was very angry.

“LIZ!” he shouted. Liz stopped jumping around but staggered a little as she tried to get steady. She saw her older brother glaring her down but failed to realize exactly how furious he was.

She dance-walked over to Justin and took another swig of beer. “Heeeey, Jusssstinnnn,” she slurred. Justin grabbed her arm and harshly began to drag her out of the kitchen and up the stairs. She was giggling the whole way, and mumbling random things that Justin couldn’t understand. He was too angry with her to try and decipher what she might be saying, anyway.

They finally got to her room and he closed the door behind him.

“I can’t believe you, Liz! You’re eighteen years old. You aren’t old enough to be drinking and you sure as hell shouldn’t be doing it in the presence of your younger siblings and several other teenage kids! Who knows what people think of you now? Do you want the whole neighborhood to know you as the drunk minor?!” he screamed.

Liz was sitting on her bed now and clutching her head. “Stop yelling, Justinnnn,” she whined. “I’m right here.”

“I don’t care!” he shouted. “You disappointed me and so now you are staying up here until morning. And I hope your hangover really sucks because that’ll teach you not to drink in my house again.”

He walked out of the room and slammed the door behind him, not locking it because you could only do that from the inside. He didn’t think Liz would try and sneak out or anything anyway, she looked about ready to pass out.

Sighing, he made his way back downstairs and tried to cool off a little bit; muttering apologies to several neighborhood adults as he passed through the kitchen.

Korynne saw Justin storming through the house while she was looking for Kordelia and wondered what had his panties up in bunch. She shrugged and continued looking for her friend. It seemed as though Kordelia had caught onto the fact that Korynne and Kory knew something about the whole Dawson issue, and so the set of twins were now being avoided as well. It was proving very difficult for Korynne to corner Kordelia. She’d seen her several times now, but every time she went to go talk to her, the slim girl would disappear into another room and Korynne would lose her.

She ran into Kory soon afterwards and was given a full report on what Dawson had said. It wasn’t much, but it was something. They now knew that Dawson was just as confused as they were, and so the best plan of action would be to badger Kordelia until she spilled.

In the "almost but now quite" week they'd spent at their new high school, Kory, Korynne, and Casey had learned quite a few things about Kordelia. Besides her current "avoid best friend at all costs" operation, at the top of the list was her peculiar way of dressing. For one, Kordelia didn't immediately strike them as the kind of girl who would . . . expose almost her entire leg. On Friday, Michi had explained to them that Kordelia did not own a single pair of pants, and that the skirt she was wearing that day (it barely reached the middle of her thigh) was actually the longest in her closet. She should know, she and Dawson would actually take a ruler to Kordelia's skirts and shorts when she tried them on. They had also learned that Kordelia liked heels, and that no matter how high they were, she could do everything a person wearing sneakers did. And yes, this included running.

And that is one reason why finally, after chasing her down for a grueling twenty more minutes, they finally got Kordelia where she couldn’t avoid them any longer: the bathroom.

Kordelia's white sweater was the same shade as freshly washed linen, and through the thin, loosely knit cables, there was the faintest outline of a black camisole. The sweater was abnormally long, and practically covered her brown plaid shorts completely. But of course, that wasn't saying much, seeing as her shorts probably didn't even cover five inches of her leg. The thick, dark brown elastic belt around her hips went well with the over all color scheme of her outfit. In fact, the only thing that strayed from a shade of brown were her magenta knee high socks. And to finish off the entire outfit she was wearing brown leather boots. Upon seeing Kordelia's shoes, Kory had made a mental note to ask her shoe size, but that would have to wait until after the interrogation.

“Would you guys quit following me around? It’s kind of creepy,” she said.

“I know,” Kory answered. “It really is. But sorry, we can’t do that until you tell us what’s going on with Dawson.”

When Kordelia didn’t say anything, Korynne spoke. “If you tell us what’s going on we might be able to help you, Kordelia.”

A moment of silence passed and then Kordelia sighed. “Fine. I’m not going to tell you the whole story, but I’ll tell you this: Dawson’s mad at me because I’m avoiding him for no apparent reason. But there is a reason, he just doesn’t know it.”

“Duh, that much we figured out. But why are you avoiding him?”

“Well…uh, that would be because-“

Kordelia’s explanation was cut short by the sudden and random power outage. It had turned instantly black inside the house and there were shouts everywhere; signs that it wasn’t just in the bathroom that it’d turned pitch black.

“Casey,” Kory muttered.

“Ayprille,” Korynne added.

Soon thereafter they heard Justin’s over powering voice. “Everyone stay calm, it’s just a power outage. And I can assure you that it probably has nothing to do with weather or anything like that. I want Casey and Ayprille down here NOW, I know you did this, guys. And turn on the power, please, all the food in the fridge will go bad if the electricity stays off for too long.”

People were murmuring now and you could hear footsteps and laughter that inevitably belonged to the pranksters. Even though they had been ordered to turn the electricity back on, they didn’t want this prank to be over just yet. And so they decided it would be fun to run around the dark house scaring people, just to see how they all reacted.

By the time Justin had threatened to ground them for life and the power was turned back on, the two had a tally of 7 screams, 4 violent self defense attempts, and 1 very odd squeak that sounded like the noise a bunny makes.

Pretty soon it was nearing eleven o’clock, the time the party was scheduled to end. Many families had left already and the only people that remained now were the Watsons, the Inmans, and Nate and his brother and father.

“Your stupid prank ruined our chance to get Kordelia’s confession,” Korynne whined to Casey, who merely shrugged.

“And you know I’m afraid of the dark, you guys,” Katie scolded.

Nate put his arm around her shoulder again and said, “Don’t worry, you’re safe with me.” Insert cheesy grin here.

After glaring at his twin sister’s newest “friend”, John spared a glance at Piper, who was praising Ayprille animatedly for the prank. Apparently, she thought it was quiet funny. John would never admit this, but he was grateful for the timing of the prank, because he was standing right next to Piper when the power went out, and that gumdrop throwing guy friend of hers was nowhere to be seen.

Eventually it got to the hour where it was officially time for everyone to leave. The friends said goodbye after helping clean up a bit and it was finally peace and quiet in the household.

The remaining Watson kids (Liz was still up in her bedroom, conked out) besides Justin began to file up the stairs for bed. Justin decided to stay back for a while and clean up the rest of the house before going to sleep.

He was about to retreat to his room himself when a loud knock sounded at the door.

Did somebody forget something? he thought. No one else could possibly be visiting at this hour.

He opened the door cautiously and there stood a middle aged man who looked vaguely familiar. He couldn’t place where he knew this man from, but something about his dark hair and dark skin rang a bell in the oldest Watson’s memory. He observed the man and saw that he was wearing casual clothes, which were very unlike a door to door salesman and that he was also fairly short.

“Can I help you?” Justin asked as politely as possible when a stranger comes to your doorstep at midnight.

“Yes. Is this the residence of Ayprille Watson?”

--x-xxx---

A/N: there you have it! Ten pages on word! Ooh boy. Lots of stuff happening in this chapter. First of all, we’ve got John’s newfound infatuation with Piper Inman. By the way, Juliet and I planned this without telling Neems or Lisa, who are the people John and Piper are based off of. Hahaa, looks like you guys are paired together now. If you don’t like that, too bad so sad. We’ve also been introduced to Katie’s new cocky-and-confident friend Nate. You get to see more on Dawson and Kordelia as well.

And you may not think this ending is a horrible cliffhanger, but trust me, it is. This is very vital to the plot…we’re getting into the main storyline now! Hooraaah~

Well, hope you enjoyed it, please reviewwww.

Love,

Kyllex and Juliet