CHATROOM LOVE
Chapter Thirty-Three
November 19, 2001
12:53 AM
"Come on! The plane leaves at two, and
we will be arriving at home around five AM." Ruth started fussing at them
as soon as they walked through the hotel room door.
"Mom, we only just got back from the
concert," Rose complained. "We have some time left."
"Not much. Can you imagine the crowds at
the airport on a night like this, especially with all the new security measures
here?"
"You are lucky that Tommy and I got
bored and started packing all of our stuff." Dawn came out of the
bathroom, an overnight bag in her hand.
Dawn was looking a whole lot better. She was
still a bit clammy and shaky, but at least she was no longer green and no
longer bedridden.
"It’s too bad you guys didn’t come. It
was great," Fabrizio told Tommy and Dawn, humming a Britney Spears tune
under his breath.
"I know. Tell me about it!" Dawn
complained. "We watched it all on Pay-Per-View."
"You did?" Jack asked. "I
didn’t know it would be on TV."
"Neither did we, until we were looking
at that channel that tells what’s on everything else, and we saw it and got my
dad to let us order it. We got to watch it after all."
"But it still would have been nice if we
could have gone to the actual concert," Tommy said.
"You could have gone," Dawn
reminded him. "You didn’t have to stay here with me."
"No way, babe. I couldn’t do that.
Wouldn’t you have missed me?"
"Yeah." Dawn smiled at him.
"You’re so nice."
"Ugh. Now they’re going to make
out," Helga remarked, watching them look at each other.
Tommy heard the comment. "Make out? No
way! She’s been barfing all day! That’s gross!"
Dawn punched him in the arm. "I haven’t
barfed in eight hours!"
"See? She’s keeping track of it,"
Tommy teased her.
"I think you’d better stop arguing and
get packed," Ruth interrupted, looking at the six teenagers seriously.
"We don’t want to miss the plane, and all of you have school tomorrow
except Dawn."
"School!" Rose complained.
"Mom, we won’t even be getting into Edmonton until five AM. How do you
expect us to be awake enough to go to school?"
"Rose, I told you when I agreed to let
you go on this trip that you would be going to school on Monday. Dawn is only
getting out of it because she’s been sick and we don’t want her to relapse.
Dawn’s parents agree with me. All of you are going to school in the
morning."
Rose gave her mother a disgusted look, then
stomped off to collect her things. Jack followed her.
"Don’t worry. You can sleep in English
class," he assured her. "It’s boring anyway."
"Speak for yourself. I like
English."
"Your class must be different than mine,
then." They had the same English teacher, but not at the same time.
"Hey!" Tommy called to them.
"We saw you on TV."
Rose looked up, her face brightening with
interest. "You did?"
"Yeah."
"How did we look?"
"I don’t know. You were too busy locking
lips to notice the camera."
Rose and Jack both turned red.
"Tommy!" Rose hissed. "Don’t say that in front of my
mother!"
Ruth looked at the couple, trying to keep a
stern expression on her face but not succeeding. Finally, she started laughing.
"I’m not worried," she told them.
"You had several thousand chaperones. Kissing won’t hurt you—though if any
of your classmates was watching the concert on TV, they got an eyeful."
Rose glared at her mother as Ruth left the
room. "First she tells me I have to go to school after being up all night,
and then she laughs at me. What kind of mother is she?"
"Oh, you know you love her anyway,"
Helga said, coming over to the closet and packing the last of her things.
"Hmmph. Easy for you to say." Rose
scowled, but she was in too good a mood to stay mad for long. She looked at
Jack. "You’d better go get your stuff packed. Mom’ll really be mad if we
miss the plane."
"Yeah. And she’s right about the crowds
and security. We have to get there soon if we’re gonna get on the plane on
time. Remember how it was when we got off the plane?"
"Yeah. I guess we’d better get going.
Anyway, maybe I can pretend I’m sick and miss cheerleading practice tomorrow,
and then sleep all afternoon."
"Yeah. Me, too," Dawn told her,
smothering a yawn. Even after sleeping for a lot of the day, she was still
tired.
"You really are sick. I can just pretend
I caught something from you."
"Yeah, right. Whatever. Or you can just
pretend you stayed out in the snow too long. Tommy said that he saw a weather
report for snow in Edmonton."
Rose started laughing. She wished that she
didn’t have to go to school tomorrow, but it had been worth it to go to the
concert. Even being tired all day wouldn’t make her sorry about that.