Chapter Text
It was another day, and another cloudy one at that. But that was pretty normal in the city of Brighton, which was a dull, gray town. And that would be because of the ghosts that usually tried to make the town full of misery. However, as of late, things seemed to be getting brighter and better, and it was all in part thanks to a certain, bright young girl of thirteen by the name of Molly McGee, who had moved in with her family to help make the town a brighter place. Sure, she had her roadblocks, but thanks to making some new friends AND with the help of a grumpy ghost named Scratch, the town was starting to get a bit friendlier, though it was a big road.
But there was more to the story than just the friendship of a girl and a ghost who happened to be cursed to living with the family by accident. There were also Molly’s family members… the father, Pete McGee, the optimistic family man who often tries to help his family out… the mother, Sharon McGee, a caring woman who helps with the family with the finances AND making sure things are in tip-top shape… and then of course, there was Molly’s brother… a nice kid, but also a troublemaker who always finds an easy way to scam or make a quick buck, or could easily play things for laughs until things go too far… and yet, not having a care in the world as he seemed to be having the time of his life.
Then again, that was ALWAYS to be expected for Darryl McGee, a young eleven year old who seemed pretty proud of what he had done today, humming to himself as he was walking home and shuffling his hands in delight, before walking in and settling down on the couch, getting himself comfortable. He hummed to himself as he picked up the remote and turned on the TV, in hopes of watching some cartoons. However, before he could, he heard the familiar sound of his phone ringing.
Darryl groaned as he picked up his phone and frowned as he noticed the name on his number being that of his teacher’s, before ignoring the call and putting it to the side. However, not even an ignored call was going to last very long.
“DARRYL!”
The young boy winced as he turned to see his sister giving a rather disappointed frown as she was shaking her head, followed shortly by his mother and father, who also looked very disappointed as Sharon gave a groan. “We just got a call from your teacher, who says you sold him a fake ticket to a show?”
“What? It’s not my fault he wanted to see that movie.” Darryl rolled his eyes. “I just said I had a ticket, and that I wasn’t going to see it. I only left out the part where I said it was yesterday’s ticket.” Darryl said with a smirk. “And hey, I made five bucks, that’s a steal!”
“Yeah, and that’s five bucks you’re going to be giving back to him…” Pete shook his head. “Look, Darryl, we love you, and we know you’re better than this. Why do you always try to find trouble?”
“What?” Darryl frowned as he looked around in confusion. “Come on, can’t a guy just make an honest buck around here?”
Molly paused as she gave a sigh. “No offense Darryl, but the only times the words ‘Darryl’ and ‘honest’ are in the same sentence is if the word ‘NOT’ is between them. I get it, you have ideas for these schemes, and you can’t help but run into trouble, but do you SERIOUSLY have to condemn yourself… so many times!”
Darryl chuckled a bit as he got up. “Come on, even if it was underhanded, you have to admit it’s pretty funny…”
Molly and her parents turned to each other and rolled their eyes as she gave a frown. “Darryl, what do we do with you?”
The young boy chuckled as he put his hood over his head and gave a smirk. Pete shook his head before giving a sigh, “I expect you to return that five bucks back to your teacher…”
“Yeah, yeah, I will.” Darryl said as he relaxed a bit.
“Come on, family, lay off the kid.” Another voice came up as a familiar blue ghost with a large nose appeared as he gave a snicker. “Okay, yeah, he’s a bit of a troublemaker, but at least he’s finding some fun in this. Heck, very devious of him to pull the ol’ ‘ fake ticket’ trick.”
“Scratch.” Molly gave a slight groan as she shook her head, before giving a sigh. “Well, whatever. I can’t let Darryl’s tricks distract me right now… I got to prepare!”
With that, Molly turned face and started to run off, her face immediately turning from a bit of frustration to an excited look as she rushed up the stairs to her room, with Scratch and the others watching, with the ghost giving a sigh. “That girl… always excited about something…”
“Yeah, but that’s why we love her.” Sharon smiled a bit.
“Uh, what’s going on?” Darryl asked as he looked up in confusion.
“Ugh, Valentine’s Day is coming up. Best time for couples, maybe, but for a ghost like me… I have no reason to celebrate it.” Scratch grunted grumpily, before pausing. “Hmmm, unless, of course, someone gave me a box of chocolates, then… I’d do it for the chocolates.”
“Ohhh… I see.” Darryl lowered his eyelids in disgust. “The whole romance part of it. I’m guessing Molly’s preparing something special for Ollie…”
“Yeah, pretty much.” Scratch frowned as Pete and Sharon smiled a bit.
“Well, I personally think it’s nice that Molly has found a nice boy to go out with… and one that shares her interests…” Sharon smiled.
“Yeah, it’s almost like you and me, right, sweetheart?” Pete smiled as he held his wife’s hand.
“Oh ho ho, stop, Pete…” Sharon giggled.
Darryl looked back in disgust as he crossed his arms. “Mom, Dad, do you have to act like this right now?”
“Oh, Darryl, you’ll understand one day when you find yourself falling in love with the right girl…” Pete smiled, before pausing. “Or the right boy, honestly, we wouldn’t judge.”
“Me, find a significant other?” Darryl scoffed as he turned back towards the TV. “Yeah, right. The day I fall in love will be the day I give away money to the poor.”
“Heh, yeah, Darryl! Don’t you let societal norm define you!” Scratch chuckled as he settled next to him on the couch, before reaching for the remote. “The single life is the BEST life, in my personal opinion.”
Pete and Sharon shook their heads as they laughed a bit, before Pete said, “Oh, son, you say that now because you’re young, but you just wait…”
“Oh, Pete…” Sharon grinned as she cuddled her husband. “I’m feeling a little frisky today…”
“Are you now?” Pete chuckled as he led Sharon out of the living room, the two of them laughing as Darryl gave a small groan and scoff.
“Ugh…” Darryl shook his head. “Valentine’s Day… what a dumb holiday.”
“Hey, I agree with you, kid.” Scratch said as he gave a smile. “Sometimes, I can never understand that holiday… I mean, for what, a few cards and declarations of love? You see that basically every day, it’s nothing special. Now, Halloween? Christmas? THOSE are holidays worth remembering!”
Darryl nodded with a smirk before turning on the TV, only frowning as the first thing that was on was a couple kissing. “Ugh…”
With that, Darryl switched the channel, only to see another couple kissing on a nice backdrop in Paris. “Ugh…”
Darryl switched to another channel as he noted a man and a woman as they were exchanging gifts, the man saying, “I hope you love my Valentine, sweetheart!”
“Oh, darling, you know whatever you give me, I’ll always love you.” The woman said as she made lovey-dovey eyes at the man.
“Seriously, isn’t there anything on that isn’t about couples kissing?!” Scratch asked as Darryl looked annoyed, switching the channel.
“And now, for the final minutes of the Men’s Basketball game between the Hillwood Chargers and the Townsville Bulls!” An announcer said as the screen was now showing a basketball game.
Darryl blinked twice as he looked over at Scratch as the boy shrugged, “Hmm… I suppose that’s all right, I mean… there’s no kissing or lovey-dovey stuff in basketball…”
“Yeah, turn it up a little…” Scratch said, looking curious at the game.
“Will do!” Darryl grinned as he started to turn up the volume a bit as one of the players was seen leaping up and scoring a basket.
“And with just a minute left to go, and another basket scored, this game is just about over! The Hillwood Chargers have the ball, and the clock is just running out at this point… and the Hillwood Chargers have won the game! Looks like the head player’s girlfriend is coming over and…”
Darryl’s eyes widened as he felt disgusted, seeing what was on screen as a girl ran over and hugged one of the ball players, sharing a kiss. “UGH, COME ON!”
“Yeah, sports are overrated anyway…” Scratch grabbed the remote and switched it off, before picking up a laptop. “Fortunately, we can always STREAM our shows! I’m sure we’ll find one that-”
“On second thought, Scratch…” Darryl groaned as he held his head. “I need some air for a minute. You can go ahead and watch whatever… I need to clear my head out of this whole Valentine Day stuff…”
With that, the young man got up and walked away, causing Scratch to look off in confusion, before giving a shrug as he went back to the laptop, trying to find a good show.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Outside the streets of Brighton, Darryl was walking down the long road of Main Street, trying his best to get his mind off of everything. “Love… Valentine’s Day… what does everyone else know?”
He looked around and noted the way everyone was putting up decorations in the city for the special holiday tomorrow… AND the fact that there was more than a few people looking rather excited. He groaned as he held his head… he just kept walking and walking, trying to keep his mind off of Valentine’s Day.
Now, it wasn’t that Darryl hated Valentine’s Day, far from it. He just didn’t understand what use the holiday was, when basically, couples can fall in love every day. What was it about this day that made it special, anyway? Darryl didn’t know, and he honestly didn’t care. Love was a foreign concept to him, and he was never going to understand it…
However, sometimes denying love can be a childish thing, as one way or another, Cupid’s arrow could always find its mark. But let’s leave Darryl to stew for the time being…
As a few minutes before Darryl had even arrived, an influential young girl of about thirteen was using her phone to film herself in front of some streets as she was giving a vlog.
“Valentine’s Day is coming up, Fandreas, and I’m sure you’re all excited for this day as much as I am!” Andrea chuckled as she gave a peace sign. “Davenport’s may be out of business, BUT what hurts us only gets us to pick ourselves back up!”
Indeed, Andrea was looking pretty happy as she was talking to her fans through her phone, streaming herself as she was walking through the streets, showing off everything she could. However, truth be told, it was the only thing keeping her distracted from some small, devastating news. The news that she had been hoping to avoid in her head… but even then, it just filled her head and wouldn’t go away. She had recently gotten into contact with Alina Webster, who she hadn’t seen since business camp, and had hung out with her for the most part. And although the two had a vibe going that day, something had happened that… well, for the most part, while Alina was pretty cool with Andrea, she had her eyes on someone else…
This completely ruined the blue haired girl’s confidence from the inside as she felt the hurt of rejection come slamming down on her. Although she was pretty cool with it on the outside and gave her respects for her fellow rich friend, on the inside, she was upset… she had hoped that she would have confessed close to Valentine’s Day, and wanted to get a date… but the fact someone had approached Alina first… it ate at her, devastated her.
Still, she didn’t want to show that to her fellow Fandreas, so for now, she kept that part silent as she decided to retract herself back to her old ‘persona’ and started to act like her own self. Though, on the inside, she was still hurting a bit.
“Look at all those nice hearts hanging from the side. I bet a lucky couple would love to stand under those!” Andrea laughed a bit, although partway through, the laugh fell to a small sob, before Andrea took a deep breath. “Uh, sorry about that. It just… thinking about love can… make you cry sometimes, you know? And that’s pretty normal! Uh… hey, a Valentine’s Day parade could be uplifting for a lot of people, you know! For couples and… the special someone you want to hang with… yeah…” Andrea paused as she bit her lip. “Uh… doesn’t that sound fun?”
However, she said the last bit so weakly as thoughts of what Arina had told her devastated her psyche. She groaned before holding her phone up. “Uh, I’m sorry, Fandreas, I’m just… not up for a stream today…” She noticed some hearts being sent. “No, no, thank you all for the hearts, but really, I’m okay. Just… going through a lot in my life. I need some time to think for myself. Thank you for tuning into my stream, Fandreas, don’t forget to subscribe!”
With that, Andrea ended her stream fast and turned off her phone before putting it back in her pocket. She paused, before shutting her eyes. “Ugh, this is the worst week of my life!”
With that, Andrea started to move fast, not wanting to see the decorations in front of her… not wanting to be reminded of love right now…
At the same time though, someone had turned the corner… and…
BUMP!
Both Darryl and Andrea had collided as they fell to the ground.
“Ow…” Darryl frowned as he got up. “Hey, watch it, will you?”
“You ran into-” Andrea complained as the two got up before the two got a good look at each other. Andrea blinked. “O-oh! You’re Molly’s brother, aren’t you? Darryl?”
Darryl paused silently as he looked over at Andrea’s face, examining her as if for the first time. “Yeah. That’s me. Andrea Davenport, right? Molly’s said a lot about you, but I don’t think we talked… uh… face… to… face.”
“Uh… y-yeah…” Andrea paused as she and Darryl looked into each other’s eyes. “I guess we haven’t…”
For a moment, Darryl had stood there in silence, just looking over Andrea as Andrea was looking over at Darryl. They didn’t realize it yet, but this was but the first step in what would become a very interesting relationship… as Darryl’s heart was beginning to beat a lot faster than usual. He had met Andrea a few times before with Molly close by…
But this was the first time he was in the same area alone with her as the young boy had started to feel… pretty strange…