"So, what was that about shredding adoption papers?" Michael asked me as we continued walking out and away from the orphanage. I shrugged my shoulders before realizing that he probably wanted an actual answer. 

  "She probably just wanted to save herself from having to do it when you guys return me," I told him as I looked at the children playing in the park that we were passing by. 

  "What do you mean return you? You're not an action figure?" he asked. I chuckled at his logic. 

  "Why would you return a perfectly good action figure?" I asked him, still chuckling lightly at his choice of words.

  "Why would you return a perfectly good human being?" he countered. I rolled my eyes at him and decided to answer him instead of simply shrugging.

  "The same reason that you would return a faulty action figure," I answered. He "hm"d in response, seemingly thinking about my answer and I simply laughed at his puzzled face. 

  "So, where are you taking me?" I asked him, being bored of the subject and wanting a change. 

  "To our house," he answered vaguely. 

  "Is it around here?" I asked, surprised as not many people seem to live around the part of town that we were currently in. 

  "Not really at all, no," he chuckled. I turned to look at him, the confusion evident on my face. 

  "Where is it then?" I asked, truly not seeing anything funny about this situation yet. 

  "About three-quarters of the way around the world," he full on laughed his way through this answer. I stopped walking and waited until he realized that I had done so to make a scene of laying my suitcase down and sitting down on it. 

  "What are you doing?" he asked as he stopped and turned around after he realized that I was no longer beside him. 

  "I do not know where you are taking me, but I am going to sit here until I don't have to walk there," I replied stubbornly. He laughed at me, shaking his head and walking back to where I was. He pulled his phone out of his back pocket as he sat down on my suitcase next to me. 

  "What are you doing?" I asked him, looking at the screen of his phone in question. 

  "I'm going to call Cal and ask him to pick us up," he answered, clicking on a contact and holding the phone up to his ear. 

  "Hey, Cal," 

  "No, I didn't call to order a pizza," 

  "I told you I was out picking up Arca-" he paused mid-word, glancing over at me.

"-Nova," he finished. 

  "Yes, and yes the Luke thing," he said, in almost a hiss. 

  "Why do you have to be stupid, she's sitting right next to me you idiot," he said in a slightly less venomous tone. I think it's safe to say that I am confused. Why is just now calling someone to pick us up? Why were we walking in the first place? Where are we going? What is the "Luke thing" as Michael called it? Who the hell is "Cal" even? Just as I'm about to voice these questions, Michael hangs up the phone even though I can still hear "Cal" talking from the speaker.

  "Why did you hang up? Weren't they still talking?" this question decided to make its way out of my mouth before any of the others had a chance to. 

  "He was being an idiot," he sighed, seeming a little frustrated or nervous. I couldn't tell you which one. 

  "Well, if he's an idiot why did you call him?" another unimportant question finds its way out of my mouth. 

  "He's my friend," he shrugged, slipping the phone back into his pocket. 

 "Weird," I rolled my eyes. 

  "So, where are we going?" I asked him. Pleased that a question that would actually help me finally found its way out of my mind.

  "I already told you, we're going home," he said, looking at me out of the corner of his eye and chuckling lightly. 

  "Three-quarters of the way around the world, right?" I scoffed, putting my legs up onto the suitcase in front of me and pulling them up close to my chest.

  "Just about that, yeah," he answered, chuckling again and I rolled my eyes at him. Chuckling is weird. Why does he keep chuckling?

  "Then why the hell were we walking in the first place?" I asked, my tone almost icy. Almost. I saw his eyes snap my way, holding what seemed to be amusement. 

  "I didn't want to have to wait for a ride in the same building as those bitches," he answered. I felt my jaw go slack but quickly gritted my teeth slightly and wiped any emotion off my face. I saw him look at me out of the corner of his mouth and raised an eyebrow at him. 

  "Why do you do that?" he asked. 

  "Do what?" I asked him, rolling my eyes and looking away from him. 

  "That thing you do with your face, I've seen you do it all the time," he said, looking at me with a strange expression on his face. I pulled a weird face in response. 

  "Is this the thing you've seen me do all the time since yesterday when you met me?" I asked, pointing to my face and he laughed, leaning over to nudge my shoulder with his again. 

  "Haha, you're very funny," he said sarcastically, rolling his eyes playfully. I nudged his shoulder back with my own and rolled my eyes yet again. They better return me soon or my eyes might get sore. 

  "But really, why do you do that?" he said after I had let my face go back to normal. 

  "I honestly don't know what you're talking about," I said, looking down at my hands and pulling my phone out of my pocket. I pretended to text someone by texting myself. I made a contact a while ago with my own number and no one has been the wiser yet. 

  "What are you doing now, then?" he asked and I felt him looking over my shoulder. 

  "Texting my friend," I replied, silently hoping that he wouldn't actually read them as it really just says the same thing because obviously, it's just me. 

  "Which one," he asked, resting his chin on my shoulder, being careful not to put too much pressure. Weirdo. 

  "Adelaide," I answered, using the name that I had made up for the contact. 

  "Adelaide, huh?" 

  "Yep," I said, popping the p. I close my texting thingie and open my music, pulling my earphones out of my pocket and plugging them in. I saw Michael raise his eyebrows at me out of the corner of my eye and shrugged, putting them in my ears, closing my eyes and leaning back on my hands. I opened one eye when I felt one earphone being pulled out. I raised my eyebrow at him when I saw him place it in his ear. He raised his eyebrow back at me when he heard what was playing. 

  "You like Linkin Park?" he asked me, I rolled my eyes a little. 

  "No, I'm just listening to them to torture myself," I deadpanned. 

  "You know, you just keep getting better and better,"  he said,  shaking his head at me in amusement. 

  "You're dumb," I replied, not really caring how rude it sounded. 

  "Why's that?" he asked, a look of confusion gracing his face for a moment. 

  "Because you just came and picked me up from the orphanage and I have no idea where I am going. Are you sure that you aren't the one that adopted me? 'Cause I don't see anyone else around?" I answered him. 

  "How does that make me dumb?" he asked, still seeming confused. 

  "You didn't answer my question," I said, sending him a sideways glare. 

  "And you didn't answer mine," 

  
"Then I guess we're even, huh?" I said, picking at a string coming out of one of the holes in my jeans. 

  "I guess so, but I would rather you just answer my question," he answered me. 

  "Then I guess we're even again because I'd rather if you just answered mine," I said, continuing to pull at the string. 

  "Then why don't we just answer each others' questions then?" 

  "Okay, but you go first," I answered. He sighed. 

  "Okay, fine. I already told you that we are going home which is three-quarters of the way around the world, which is why Cal is picking us up," he began. I could tell that he was going to keep talking, but I cut him off anyway,

  "Is he going to take us to the airport?" 

  "Yes," 

  "Where are we going to fly when we get there?" 

  "Home," he said. I rolled my eyes. 

  "Whatever, continue," I encouraged him. 

"Alright, so I am sure that I am not the one that adopted you, and he's not here because we were supposed to leave yesterday but you wanted to wait until today, so he left and me and Cal stayed here to bring you back," he answered, looking around for something. 

  "Oh, well. Cool," I said, shrugging. 

  "What do you mean, cool? Now it's your turn," he said. 

  "Well, it makes you dumb because I said so," I said, taking the easy way out. 

  "That's just not fair," he said, chuckling and shaking his head a bit. 

  "Yeah, well, life's not fair so suck it," I said, only half-teasing. 

  "Hey, that's-" he started, but a car pulled up and cut him off. 

  "Well, that's Cal, let's go," he said, standing up and pulling me up with him. He grabbed my suitcase that we had been sitting on and popped the trunk of the car, shoving it in and closing it again. He walked around to the front seat and got in, closing his door. I rolled my eyes before opening up a back door and getting in.