Prologue.

It was an uneventful Saturday afternoon that Gianna decided to sneak out of home in her parent's absence. Her mum had left for the city and her dad had gone downtown to present some designs to a client. She was left with the elder sister's responsibility to look after Petra, her annoying little sister. 

From previous encounters, both parents won't be home until forty minutes to dinner time. Latest, thirty minutes. So she had two sweet hours, as seldom, to wander around the estate. Rather unfortunate than fortunate that Venisa didn't report to work as she will have to deal with Petra.

"Where are you going?" Petra appeared behind a frozen Gianna when she was two feet away from the door. In her hand was her favorite brown teddy bear their father had offered to her on her seventh birthday.

When Gianna had pended the book she was pretentiously reading, to give her father the impression of a studious teen before he left, Petra was locked up in her room. Probably indulged in her conventional barbie prince and princess escape from the dragon castle.

"What are you doing down here?" Gianna shot back.

Petra lowered her gaze to the annoying incessantly smiling stuffed animal. "I wanted to ask you to come play with me since Venisa isn't here but you weren't in your room."

Gianna rolled her eyes. "Well, no thank you in case you found me in there. Now shoo."

"Where are you going?" She pouted. "Can I tag along?"

"Of course not." Petra's lips began to quiver, in addition to it was the irresistible sad Pucca animated series look that her buns complemented. All of which made Gianna crack as quick as a dried-up branch. "Fine but you're going to keep away that creepy thing. And," she emphasized with an index finger. "No one has to know. I mean, no one."

Petra was a typical Magpie. There was no way her mouth would stop moving unless it was duct-taped considering she spoke even in her sleep. The little girl gleefully nodded, wiped her cheeks, and flung Mr. Grumpy on the settee.

"You'll quietly follow me. A noise and you'll have your ass back home."

Again, Petra nodded, happy to indulge in a spy kids recurrence. Now, Gianna had a little secrete path which Petra was discovering for the first time. With a mental prayer of not being exposed by magpie, she turned to Petra who was seriously tiptoeing on the mowed lawn, with a finger on her lips.

Petra paused, nodded, and set back on her toes when her sister started moving again.

Gianna stretched her neck over the hibiscus hedges to make sure the guards were distracted enough to not see her skim through the passage she had created from the hedges. It was tiny yet enough to squeeze through.

"This is awesome!" Petra whispered as she crawled to the opposite side.

"Shhhh," Gianna urged, dusting the knees of her grey jeans. "This way."

Once out of the embrace of the residence, in other words, into the wild as she called it which was none other than the leftover two and a half hectares of land or so out of three that her parents had bought, Gianna and Petra brushed through the corn plantation that led to the small land reserved to the McCarthy through a shortcut she'd discovered not too long ago.

From a distance, she could hear laughters and screams.

They all were playing outside with Sean gently pushing a giggling Bianca on the swing Mr. McCarthy had recently constructed whilst Kelly sat on a rocking chair on the small patio meticulously scribbling, her face placid. She was drawing, Gianna thought, as usual.

"Gianna," Kelly was the first to notice as she rose her head to capture the scenery she was busy sketching.

Gianna unearthed herself completely from her niche. "Hi."

"You came with Petra," Bianca just noticed. "Sean, please help me down."

When that happened, Bianca ran towards Petra and began their kid's talk. Before Gianna walked away she warned her sister to not stray away.

"Hi," she greeted again but this one was specifically to Sean who growled in response and walked away. "Your brother really doesn't like me."

She joined Kelly on the patio but didn't sit on the spare chair as Kelly gestured. Instead, she leaned on the wooden guardrails and folded her arms above her chest.

"And I'll keep telling you he does."

Kelly played the optimistic card as usual. She was fifteen too but acted twice her age. Beautiful and elegant in her ways, Kelly had a family signature pointy nose above small pink lips that barely opened unless it had a good reason to. Her eyes were a deep shade of blue like Mrs. McCarthy's and her lustrous sand-tinted hair never grew past her clavicle. Female edition of Sean she would say.

Gianna scoffed. "And you'll never have a better justification for your answer."

"He's usually glum, you know that."

"There you go again. He's not with you. Not with Bianca. Not even with his friends. Why me?" Her voice thickened, just then did she realize how she sounded; like it affected her so bad that she wouldn't live to see the next second. Gianna devastatedly raked her cellentani curls.

"Why does it bother you this much?" She smoothened a dark part of the maize farm she was sketching to give it the effect it required to perfection. "Do you have feelings for him?"

Gianna chuckled. "Whatever made you think about that?" She turned to face the scenery Kelly had been seduced by. "I don't. Besides, I have a boyfriend and you know that. Plus, he has a girlfriend too. I'm just baffled I'm hated for unknown reasons, that's all."

"Seth, you mean? Are you both official?"

Kelly knew about Seth as much as Mimie. That she visited almost every weekend under the strict supervision of her mum, of course, and that she'd had a childhood crush on him.

"Not really," She sadly retorted.

"What's keeping him?"

"I don't know. Perhaps he's scared. Julia assured me he isn't seeing anyone else in school."

She had secretly crowned him boyfriend since Julia told her he'd confessed his crush toward her and wouldn't stop talking about how he hated how much time it took for her to visit. He even went as far as telling her how he'll wish for them to pack in together in college. And now she couldn't understand why he hadn't made a move yet.

"He's waiting for the right time. In the meantime keep acting like you know nothing. Done!" She stretched the sketchbook to admire her handwork. "How is it?" She whirled it.

"Flawless."

"You think so?" She made a face. "I think I over emphasized on the shadow here," She pointed out.

Gianna didn't pay any more attention as her mind had drifted off. Not to Seth this time around but to Sean. She wondered if her family buying the McCarthy's former estate was the reason for Sean's behavior but why was it only towards her? He often appeared warm and welcoming with her parents when they exchanged gifts and tidings, when they randomly met, or was it all a facade?

"Come on, Gigi, I have something that'll expunge Seth from your mind." She hooked her arm to Gianna's. "I was able to d******d the last season of Hell bound last night. I started the first episode and oh my god, you won't belie—"

"Don't be a spoiler."

An hour had wasted when the cast of the third episode popped up the screen. Gianna deducted her weight from Kelly's bed ready to leave but before that, she had to confirm something.

"Is the estate the reason?"

Kelly seemed lost for a flash then said, "of course not. Why will you think that? You know we're forever indebted to your family for granting us a piece of the estate. We're lucky they purchased it even. Not everyone will go as far as that. Sean is just usually grumpy. Forget about him, Okay?"

Gianna leerily smiled, "If you say so. Well, I'll have to get going before my parent's return. Thanks for the movie."

"Make sure to come back soon. There'll be caramelized popcorn."

"Sure. Just don't watch past the fourth episode lest you get bored when next I visit."

"Sure."

Gianna waved her two friends goodbye to embark on the journey of the Spy kids. When their parents made it home the two girls acted like angels they thought them to be with Petra back to Barbie prince and princess escape from the dragon's castle and Gianna pretending to wake up from a deep slumber with a book randomly displayed around her pillow.

"Hey mum, hey dad." She feigned a yawn and rubbed her eyes when the door to her room flung open.

"We're sorry to wake you up," her mother apologized. "We were just checking up on you girls. By the way, dinner will be ready in less than thirty. Make sure to be on time."

"Okay. I'll be down in a bit."

"And oh, do you by any chance know what happened to Petra?"

Gianna's countenance alerted. With an innocent frown she said, "No? She's been in her room all day, I guess. Why?"

"Her hair's a mess. It's fetched branches and dried leaves from Jesus knows where."

Gianna suppressed a giggle. It must have resulted from the hedge path as they hastily shuffled to not get caught and be exactly in time.

"She doesn't want to tell me anything logical besides 'I finally rescued the princess from the Dragon's claws'."

Gianna couldn't hold it anymore as she burst into a hysterical peal of laughter. She had told Petra upon their arrival that a pledged Spy does not talk about her mission to anyone, whether successful or not, unless in a matter of life and death. In addition to that, if she wished to keep playing with Bianca her lips ought to be stitched. That did the trick. That shut the magpie up. Even though she doubted Venisa will agree to that.

"Perhaps she was playing frisbee with Noah in the back yard," Gianna shrugged.

"Plausible. But that was risky. Noah is yet to be vaccinated."

"And that's why she didn't want to tell you."

Louisa huffed, "Come down as soon as possible. Your hands should be impeccably clean, okay?"

She heard her mother mumble the two days old grievance about how bad of an idea it was to bringing a stray puppy home as she dismounted the stairs.