Chapter Four

   When I opened my eyes, I saw that Patrick was gone and that Sarah was asleep, with her head on my shoulder. That was so weird. It made me remember that Saturday afternoon when Katelyn had come over to my house and we spent the time watching movies in my bad. And it made me remember how she had fallen asleep there, right beside me.

   And then, suddenly, Sarah woke up. She looked up, straight into my eyes and she understood what I was thinking because she had felt it too. Maybe that was the reason she’d woke up. Maybe she was dreaming about her.

   When I finally said something, my voice came out groggy and low.

   “Morning.”

   “Hi,” she replied, her voice also low as she backed away from me. “Look, I didn’t mean to.”

   “It’s okay,” I said, trying out for a smile. “I know you didn’t.” And it was true. In my mind it wasn’t possible that we would end up together, eventually. I was about to say something when Patrick showed up.

   “Good morning, my darlings. Did you sleep well?” He asked, looking more at me than at Sarah.

   “Yeah, I guess so.” I said, while Sarah kept silent. I guess I was right. About her night.

   “Jack and Lilly are making breakfast. Shall we meet them?”

   “Sure, let’s go. I’m starving!” Sarah stated, as she got up and took the lead, even though she didn’t know where they were.

   Patrick gave me a meaningful look and we both followed her.

 

   Apparently ‘breakfast’ was a cup of cereals. And I do mean a cup �" a plastic cup filled with cereals and milk. There weren’t even spoons because no one remembered to bring any. I thanked God I’d brought my energetic bars and we all ate in silence, until the end of Patrick’s fourth cup.

   “I think I’m good,” said boy declared when Jack asked him if he wanted yet another cup.

   “About time,” I said. He poked me with his empty plastic cup.

   “Like I’ve never watched you eating like an animal,” Patrick replied with a grin.

   “Yeah well, But while I eat like a magnificent lion, you eat like a filthy pig.”

   Patrick unsuccessfully tried to copy a pig’s noise, making us all laugh and then we all tried making animal noises until we couldn’t laugh anymore because our cheeks hurt and because our stomachs hurt and because we were out of breath.

   When we all managed to calm down, I asked, “Now what? What do we do?”

  

   “Well, we have two options,” said Lilly, “we can stay here and do the hell we want, or we can go home.”

   We all fell in silent for a while, thinking about what to do next. I was kind of having fun, hanging out with these guys. I think this was the most fun I’d had since that day. I didn’t know if I wanted to go home, if I was ready to get back to all those memories and feeling. A part of me wanted to just in some room of this gigantic mansion.

   But I couldn’t. I had my parents and I couldn’t leave them just like that. I looked at Sarah, wondering if she was thinking the same thing as me.

   “I don’t know about you, but I may have to go home,” Patrick stated. “It’s my little sister, you know. My mom works this afternoon and needs me to look after Sally.”

   “I guess I should go home too. Being my father’s birthday and all that.” I said, agreeing with him.

   The others, seeing that we were leaving, started talking about going home as well.

   And so, before I knew it, we were all on our way back to the place where we’d left our cars.

 

   Except, when we got there, our cars weren’t there anymore.

   “Oh no, no, no. No!” Jack said, “What the hell?!” He had his hands on his head and was clearly starting to panic.

   “Calm the f**k down,” Sarah told him, looking calmer than you’d expect someone who had just found out that her car had been stolen to be. “We locked them. There’s no way someone could’ve stolen them without turning on the alarms.”

   “Sar, I’m not sure we could hear the alarms even if they had been triggered,” Lilly pointed out, only half focused on answering her sister. The other half was concentrated on calming her boyfriend down. I figured she wasn’t just as freaked out as her boyfriend because her car was still parked near his house �" I knew she’d just gotten a new one as a present from having made it to college. Jack, however, was still in school with us because he’d gotten held up and was repeating history and mathematics).

   “That’s a good point,” Patrick said, “But I still need to get home.” He looked rather hesitant as he spoke, as though he was afraid Jack would get pissed at him.

   I decided it was better to come up with a plan before Jack actually did get pissed.

   “So I guess there’s only one choice left,” I said, making them all stare at me. “We split up.”

   “What?!” At least three of them said �" I couldn’t make out which three though.

   “Look,” I turned to Patrick. “You really need to get home, right?” He nodded. “And the only one who knows the way out of here is Jack, so he clearly need to go with you.”

   “Man, I’m not leaving my car.” Jack interrupted me.

   “Let me finish,” I asked him before I kept talked. The plan was coming to me as I spoke. “Yes, you need your car and so does Sarah, so I say we split up. Jack, Lilly and Patrick walk back to his place. Sarah and I stay here and look for the cars.”

   “Didn’t you need to go home?” Sarah asked, speaking only to me.

   “Yeah, but the other opting was that your sister stayed in the woods with you and what kind of man would I be if I left two girls alone in a suspicious forest?”

   “You’d be yourself,” Sarah replied, but I could see the beginning of a grin in her expression.

   “I don’t care what kind of man you would be,” Lilly intervened, “but I can’t leave either. I need to stay with Sarah, I’m her sister.”

   “You’re also the only one with a car,” Sarah pointed out, and I could tell she was playing the ‘I’m not a child anymore’ card. “I think Patrick could use a ride after all the walking. Besides, someone needs to tell Mom and Dad we’re fine.”

   “And what exactly do I tell them?” That you didn’t come home because you wanted to stay at my boyfriend’s house?” Lilly asked, sceptical.

   “Ugh, why do you complicate everything?!” Sarah wondered, “Tell them… tell them…”

   “Tell them she’s going on a date.” I said. “With me.”

 

   Everyone wend dead silent while staring at me. But I didn’t care for anyone’s reaction except Sarah’s. Her eyes were a mix of surprise and acceptance.

   “Yeah, that’s a good idea. Tell them that.” Sarah said to her sister, without taking her eyes off me, though.

   And so it happened. Jack, Lilly and Patrick left �" the latter not without giving me a meaningful look first -, leaving me and Sarah with the hard job of finding two cars in the middle of a forest that none of us knew.

   When the three of them disappeared, I started looking for tire tracks on the ground, hoping they could lead us to the cars.

   “Whoa there, Mr Detective! What on earth are you doing?” asked Sarah.

   “Looking for clue,” I answered, without taking my eyes off the ground.

   “Fine, I’ll search around, in the bushes.”

   Maybe ten minutes later, Sarah exclaimed, “Daniel, Daniel, come here! Look at this!”

   I instantly got up, my brown hair falling to my eyes, and ran to meet her. I crouched beside her and looked at where she was pointing. And then I saw it. A line in the ground, marked by the folded grass due to a big weight that could only be from a car was distinguishable in the earthy ground.

   “Great job! We have to find the other ones.”

   And sure enough, we did. Four tire tracks led from the place where the cars were to the middle of the forest.

   “Well, at least now we have a direction.” I said, trying to cheer her up.

   “Yeah… We should start following this as soon as possible. We don’t have much food and we have no idea how far the cars are.”

   “Right! Shall we then?”

   And we adventured into the wild.

Author's Note

Note: Cris is italics, Is is normal.