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[Alex's POV]

When Alex got home, loud music greeted him even before he'd opened the front door. It made him smile inadvertently. His father wasn't home much, but when he was, he liked to cook dinner. And whenever he prepared food, he would turn up whatever music soothed his mood and turn it up loud enough so that it would tune out all the clamour of the kitchen (and a certain someone piping along). The music that greeted him today was Spanish salsa, which made Alex wonder what they'd be eating this evening.

So yeah, the loud music could be considered "normal". What wasn't normal, was the smell of something burning once he entered the living room. His dad was a good cook. He'd never let his food burn.

The smell was caused by an unattended flat-iron, face down, plugged in and working on a T-shirt. A thin thread of smoke was rising up from the sizzling parts where the iron touched the fabric. It was on the verge of catching flame.

Sadly enough, this wasn't a new occurrence, so Alex sprinted to the ironing board, set the flat-iron up straight, unplugged it, grabbed the first bottle of water he came along and dumped its contents on the sizzling T-shirt, just to be safe.

"God damn it, dad!" Alex called towards the kitchen but didn't get a reply.

"DAD!" he yelled again, loud enough to be heard over the music this time, and was rewarded with a face peeking around the kitchen corner.

There he was, Mar Black. It was clear that Alex resembled him. They had the same black hair, the same tanned skin, the same build, the same taste for clothes, the same sense of humour, the same interests, ... Everything! Except for the colour of their eyes, which were grey for Mar and blue for Alex.

For a man in his forties, Mar looked incredibly young. With his shoulder-length black hair, currently pulled up in a half ponytail, and not a wrinkle on his face to give away his real age, it wouldn't be the first time somebody mistook him for Alex's older brother instead.

That man was looking at him curiously, clearly wondering what all the havoc was about. In reply, Alex sighed and held up the burned and soaked T-shirt.

"Oh!" his father exclaimed, disappeared behind the kitchen corner to turn down the music and reappeared a moment later.

"It was my last neutral one too," he sulked. With good reason, in Alex's opinion. Today his dad had especially taken the day off to hear all about his son's first day of school, but usually his dad was rarely home. He would always be locked up in his laboratory, researching one thing or another. When he would find the time to buy new T-shirts was a big question mark.

"I thought I'd told you not to touch a flat-iron ever again? You could have burned down the house! You didn't touch any of my clothes, did you?" Alex asked and started looking around the room, half expecting to find a heap of burned and discarded clothes, but found none.

"Shush, don't nag boy," his dad chuckled as he ruffled Alex's hair, sniffed the air and hurried back into the kitchen.

"Don't baby me!" Alex yelled after him as he straightened out his ruffled hair and followed his dad to the kitchen.

Sometimes Alex wondered how things would have been if his mom had still been around. Not that he actually knew the woman. Nope, she was a huge taboo subject. One his dad did not like to talk about and avoided at all cost.

Alex sighed as he leaned against the cupboard next to the stove. His dad was stirring some yellow-red substance, which seemed to consist mostly of rice and shrimp.

"How was your first day of school?" his dad asked.

"Great, actually. I finally managed to make some friends and one of them even gave me a tour of the school earlier," Alex said, feeling himself cheer up again.

"That's good then. Is that why you're late?" Mar asked as he glanced at the clock on the wall.

"Yeah... I also bumped into one of my classmates on my way home after that," Alex said. "I think she doesn't like me very much."

"Why would you say that?" Mar asked in surprise.

"Well, she always acts nervous when I'm around," Alex said. "I'm not too certain that I did her a favour when I chased off her bully."

"A bully?! You didn't get into a fight, did you?" Mar asked. He looked like he was ready to drop everything to conduct a thorough medical examination on his son.

"No, I didn't need to. The guy said he was only there to talk to an old friend," Alex grumbled. His dad considered his words for a second.

"Sounds like a smart kid to me. He weighed his chances of winning in a fight against you and knew they were nought," his dad said. Alex rolled his eyes at him. He knew his dad was trying to move his thoughts.

"He was a lot bigger than I am though," Alex challenged, curious to see what his dad would say next.

"Tssk, as if. He could be a gorilla for all I care, he still wouldn't have been able to touch you."

"That's too much," Alex laughed and then stilled. "It's still strange though, she didn't strike me as the type to get bullied. And I'll be honest with you, it kinda hurt that she seemed to be more afraid of me than of the bully."

Mar gave him a look that Alex couldn't decipher. It reminded him of pity but didn't quite cover it.

"Don't worry, Alex. You only met her today. Give her some time to get to know you," Mar said. "Now, will you set the table? Dinner is almost ready."

"Do I still have time to change out of my uniform?"

"Ten more minutes until the paella is ready."

"Ok, I'll hurry!" Alex said as he raced up the stairs to his room. He still didn't understand why Otto had reacted to him the way she had, but his dad didn't seem to think there was a problem. So he pushed it to the back of his mind to think about it some other time.