My First Glance: An On My Own Prequel

still hadn’t met—and I hadn’t chosen which rooms we were getting yet. An oversight for sure.
In fact, the only box I had brought in was the one Violet had carried, and it was for the living room—not that I was sure I would put anything in there. I was a little worried about how this was going to end up and look once we were all living there.
I looked across the living room, seeing four guys around my age that I had never seen before. I figured they were my roommates.
And it seemed none of them had come with their families. I had only come with Cameron, Violet, and Aiden, but still, it was three more people than they had. They each gave me a look, the blond one raising a brow, the three dark-haired others giving me odd looks.
I cleared my throat. “Can you guys go back out to the car for a second?” I asked softly.
Violet squeezed my shoulder and nodded, while Aiden and Cameron gave each other a look, shook their heads, and then left, taking the box with them.
That wasn’t awkward at all.
“Hey, sorry. My family is kind of big,” I said dorkily. That phrase wasn’t something I was used to saying. At least it hadn’t been before two years ago. And here I was, moving into a home with people I didn’t know, leaving the only family I ever really loved behind.
Dear God, I was part of my own made-for-TV movie, and I was already failing.
The blond cleared his throat and moved forward.
“Hello there. I’m Pacey,” he said, a posh British accent sliding from his mouth. That made me pause. From the texts we had shared when deciding what day to move in and get the keys, I hadn’t realized that he was British. But it wasn’t like I could really tell. The guy hadn’t talked about biscuits across the pond or anything—or any other stereotypical British things that came to mind.
“Hi, I’m Dillon. And that was some of my family.”
“Only some?” one of the guys asked, scoffing.
I held back another wince. Not off to the greatest of starts.
“That’s Sanders. Well, his name is Paul, but he goes by his surname,” Pacey explained.
Sanders just snorted, giving me a once-over that left me feeling judged. Or maybe I was just reading into things since I felt as if I had no idea what I was doing.
“Tanner,” the brooding one in the corner said as if his name were all that was needed. And maybe it was.
“And I’m Miles,” the slightly shorter guy said, giving me a slight wave. “We probably should have decided who got which room before this so it wouldn’t be so awkward, but here we are. Oh, and sorry about the couch. My mom wanted to help with the new house since it’s my first time living on my own outside of a dorm and went garage sale diving. It’s a lot comfier than it looks. At least, that’s what she says.”
I looked at the very large brown monstrosity that I thought was a sectional, not a couch, and grinned. “Looks great to me. I mean, I don’t have a couch.”
“I’ve got a TV,” Tanner said, shrugging. “Actually, I have two thanks to my dad wanting to get a larger one for his man-cave or whatever. We can put one down here, at least the bigger one. I don’t think the smaller one’s going to work in any of the rooms but the master, and I never have good luck with that.”
There was something there, but I wasn’t going to ask.
“Well, I have a bunch of kitchen supplies thanks to my sisters-in-law.” I looked at them and shrugged. “When they moved in with my brothers after the weddings, they ended up with a lot of doubles. We can probably fill that entire kitchen—or we will if my sisters have any say in it.”
Pacey smiled. “That sounds like a plan. I have a few other things we can make work, too. As long as you guys aren’t the labeling sort,” he said with a sigh. “I mean, I’m sure we can all remember what’s what. Or make a list, I don’t really care. But I refuse to live with another person who has a label maker they use on everything they’ve ever owned, including their pillows.”
I blinked at him and then laughed. “Well, I think my sister Violet out there may have a label maker, but I can ask her not to bring it in. Though she might want to use it with the fridge or something.”
“That’s good,” Miles said before leaning back on his heels. “Anyway, we’re all parked in the back near the large garage. We probably need to start unloading things. My family was going to help, but work sort of got in the way.”
“Yeah, same thing with half of my siblings,” I said.
“My parents actually hired a moving company, so my belongings should be here within the hour,” Sanders explained.
“Makes sense,” Pacey said. “Well, I guess we can draw straws or something, but I don’t have straws. I do have Twizzlers,” he said and then reached into his messenger bag for an open bag of candy. He pulled out five red ropes and broke them into various sizes. He popped a spare one into his mouth and gave us a look before tossing the other ends towards everyone else. “I guess I could have cut into two, but I really just wanted a Twizzler for myself,” he said as he swallowed the plastic-y candy.
I chewed, the strawberry flavor bursting on my tongue. Well, this was a good way to begin living together, I guessed.
“Okay, there are five sizes of rooms. Mostly because I think this was a custom home down this row, much like the rest of them. No two rooms are exactly the same, so we’ll go by sizes.”
Sanders stared at me. “Here, you go first, new guy.”
“You guys got here, what? Five minutes ahead of me? But I