- Aria's POV -

Poke.

Poke.

Poke.

Pok-

"Just one hundred more years . . ." I mumble, throwing my hand on some strange surface.

"Ow! Stop smacking my face. Gosh, even while you're half asleep you're violent." My eyes fly open and I look at my hand, which was resting on Miles' scowling face. For the fun of it, I hit him again and turn on my side so that he can't see my smirk.

He groans and starts to poke me again. "You did that on purpose, didn't you, Sleeping Beauty?"

I smack at his hand and sit up, but I'm still too tired so I rest my head against his and yawn. "What time is it?"

"Seven something." He says, rolling off the bed and landing on the floor with a thump. "I think your clumsiness is rubbing off on me."

I laugh and hop onto the ground, lending him a hand. But as soon as he is halfway up, I drop his hand and he falls again.

"What was that for?" He grunts, standing on his own.

"Fun, obviously." I say, twirling around and heading back downstairs for food. When I get to the dining room, the adults are already there, along with Miles who is burning holes in the back of my head with his eyes.

"It's about time the two of you wake up." Uncle Paul chuckles.

"Need I remind you who was sleeping in the whole time we were trapped in the basement with some psycho?" I cross my arms over my chest.

"We need to talk about that." Aunt Lydia says, gesturing for us to sit down and join them for dinner.

Mmm, the moment I've been waiting for. Food. Yummy, tasty food. Oh, how I've missed you, smoked salmon. It's been so long.

"So, what happened, exactly?" Gabe asks.

I look to Miles, who's stuffing his face full of food. "Where do I start?"

"Add the bewwining." He talks with his mouth full, and I can't even say 'ew' because to be honest, I do the same thing.

"At the beggining?" I ask for clarifcation. He nods.

So I do. I start by telling them how we got stuck in the basment and move onto what we found, and then how we got trapped in the closet. Miles butts in sometimes, adding a few important details I seem to miss. By the time we finish storytelling, everyone is done with their meals.

Kristen still flinches each time we say her eldest child's name, even though Miles had told her what happened already. Gabe looks like someone took Mjölnir and smashed his head with it over and over again. My aunt and uncle both look like they are about to rip a person's eyes out of their sockets.

"We'll discuss this with Officer Jones as soon as possible." Gabe says, clearing his throat.

So, that's it? I wasn't expecting this reaction.

"Anyways, Miles, Aria, have you got Hailey anything for her birthday yet?" Lydia asks. We shake our heads.

Oh, no. Her party is in two days and I haven't even got her a gift yet! What do kids even like?

After dinner, Miles and I travel back up to his room in search of something to do. I draw the curtains and look into my room, sighing when I see that my own curtains are closed. Have they found anything yet? Probably not. They never do.

"Chocolate?" Miles holds out a piece from a chocolate bar to me when I turn back around.

I nod and snatch it greedily. "I officially don't hate you anymore."

"What? Really?" He gapes, dumbfounded at my confession. "If I'd known all it would take to win you over is giving you chocolate, I would have done that a long time ago."

Wait, what?

"So you don't hate me, either?" I ask.

Miles shrugs. "After that talk we had about Mike and everything else, I guess not."

"I still dislike you, though." I punch his shoulder and sink into his chair.

"Progress." He winks, flashing me a dazzling smile. I huff and grab Stitch from off the bed, hugging him to my chest and using him as a pillow.

"Do you have any ideas of what to get Hailey?" Miles asks.

"I'll probably just paint her something." I reply, strolling across the room and digging my hands into my duffel bag in search of my art supplies. I pull them out and lay them on the floor, keeping the canvas in the middle. "Do you have an easel?"

"Yeah, I think Mom has one." He leaves the room for a minute. When he returns, he places the easel by a wall. I gather my materials again and put them near the easel, then turn back to Miles.

"Want to help?" I hold out a big paint brush to him.

"Uh, sure. But I'm terrible at art, just so you know."

I laugh and grab another big brush, then place the canvas on the easel. "You don't need to be good at art to make what we're going to make."

"And what's that?" He questions, playing with the brush and waving it around like a magical wand. "Bibbidi bobbidi boo!" Miles points the brush at me, grinning from ear to ear.

I take my own 'wand' and twirl it at him, then poke his chin with the end of it. His grin only widens, if that's even possible. "We are going to throw paint at the canvas. That's why we're using these huge brushes."

"Oh, that sounds cool. Is that it?"

"Nope. After that, I'm going to make an outline of a chameleon and blend all the colours together." I explain, opening the container of green paint. I use the brush to scoop out a huge glob of the paint and show it to Miles.

"This is going to be one colourful chameleon." He says, dipping his own brush into the orange paint. "My room's going to get messy, isn't it?"

"Obviously. We're throwing paint. You okay with that?" I take a few steps back from the canvas.

He nods and stands next to me. "So how do we do this, exactly?"

"Watch," I get into the same position that I would do if I were throwing a ball and hold on tightly to the brush, then flick it hard enough so that the paint hurls towards the canvas. "See? Just like that."

He makes an 'O' shape with his mouth and focuses on he canvas, then repeats what I just did. The orange paint splashes right in the middle of the tarp. "Whoa, I didn't think throwing paint would be this fun."

We continue doing this for the next hour with music blasting. We crack jokes and laugh in between, and I feel much closer to Miles than before. Once the canvas is completely covered with different colours, I let Miles rest and finish the painting with the outline of a chameleon and blending the paint. When I'm done, I present the creation to Miles.

"Tada!" I exclaim, my lips curving into a cheeky smile.

"Wow," His eyes widen. I look at the painting and bite my lip. Will Hailey like it? "It's beautiful."

I tear my gaze away from the canvas to look at Miles' expression, but he's already staring at me. He takes a step closer and doesn't stop until there's almost no space between us. My heart slams against my chest as I look into his eyes. I freeze when he presses his thumb against my cheek. I feel him rub something wet and he smirks, I jerk away and look into the mirror, only to see green paint smeared all over it.

"Just a little bit more and you'd look like Shrek." He comments, laughing like a maniac.

I grin wickedly and spin around while he is distracted by his own laughter. There's only a bit more paint left, so why not have some more fun?

Miles' back is facing me while he now admires the patterning of our artwork, so I snatch the container of yellow paint and scrape out whatever is left of it with my brush.

"Hey, Miles?"

He turns around. "Yeah, Sho-"

The paint lands on his right cheek, leaving him confused. "Did you just throw paint at me?"

"No, it was Stitch!" I point accusingly at my alien plushie. Miles rolls his eyes and grabs a brush, dunking it into the blue paint. He aims for me and I move out of the way, but I'm not fast enough. It gets into my hair, and I silently thank myself for tying it up in a bun.

"Oh, it's on." I declare.

And that's how we get caught up in a paint war.