THE SURFACE
Chapter Four
Lexi swayed her head from side to
side, daydreaming.
"Lexi..."
Her head stopped swaying suddenly
and she flipped open her math book. "Uh…what page was it again?" She
continued to flip through the book.
"Six hundred sixty-two.
Problem three." Her math teacher rolled his eyes.
Lexi read the problem silently.
"Negative eighteen?"
Mr. Andrews shook his head.
"No, it’s negative twenty-nine hundred. Please try to pay attention,
Lexi."
She slumped back in the chair and
looked at her best friend, Gabriella, taking notes and twirling her hair around
her finger. Lexi ripped a small piece of paper from her notebook and wrote out
a note to her.
Hi, Gabby.
She folded it up as small as
possible and waited until Mr. Andrews had turned to the whiteboard. She tossed
the note where Gabby could see it. Surprised, she opened it and scribbled
something back.
Hey, what are we doing after
school today? Are we still going shopping?
Lexi shrugged her shoulders.
"I might have to work today," she whispered. The bell rang and
everyone got up and moved out the door, headed for their lockers.
"I don’t know why you’re in
advanced algebra. You can’t even stay awake!" Gabby turned the combination
and opened their locker.
"I don’t know. I got placed
there because I’m in all honors classes, remember?"
"Yeah, yeah, yeah. I
know." They grabbed their things and went down the stairs and out the
door. Realizing it was warm out; Lexi took off her sweatshirt and shoved it in
her bookbag. When she looked up, her ex-boyfriend was only a few feet away.
"Cute and money at three PM,
Lexi. Watch out." Gabby fidgeted with her skirt.
Lexi looked up. "Oh,
wonderful. Let’s go." She grabbed Gabby’s arm and pulled her towards the
sidewalk.
*****
Ashley looked up at Jack. She had
decided not to wait any longer and just give him the note. He sighed sadly.
"Ashley, I want to know
where she is," he said quietly.
"Jack, I--I really don’t
know how to tell you, but--she died."
He swallowed and looked at her,
confused. "That the truth?"
Ashley nodded. "Even ask
Lexi. You should really go to her if you want to know about Rose. She knew her
much better than I did. All I know is that she lived in the apartment that Lexi
and Lizzy do."
There was an awkward pause.
Ashley looked at the time and got up. "I gotta go to work. If you need me,
I’ll be downstairs." She walked out and went back downstairs. Less than
two minutes later, she rushed back up.
"Jack, can you come downstairs?
The police somehow traced you back here."
*****
Lexi and Ashley sat around,
nothing to do. Melinda came out of the back office and saw their expressions.
She sighed deeply. "Look,
girls. I didn’t know, all right? I didn’t know he was wanted or I would have
turned him in."
Ashley looked up. "Why?
Because you wouldn’t want me to be harmed again? Ever since—never mind. Just
forget it!" She stormed off upstairs to Jack’s old apartment.
Lexi stared blankly at the
counter.
"Was it something I
said?"
Lexi looked up. "No, it was
everything you said." She walked up towards the apartment to talk to
Ashley.
*****
"Good to have you back,
Dawson." The security guard looked through the glass at Jack, who was
sitting on a chair in the middle of the cell with his head in his hands. Katie
walked up beside him and looked at Jack. She shook her head.
"You’re kidding. So, you all
went after him after all, huh?"
"Yep. And it’s good to have
him back. They found him in New York, of all places."
She breezed off without a word
towards Arnold’s office.
*****
"God, not again," Lexi
mumbled to herself as she went over a jump on Titanic’s Rose. The pole fell off
of the support cup again.
Ashley shook her head as she
broke her own mount, Firefly, into a canter and over a rather large jump before
cantering back to Lexi and Rose.
"Show off," Lexi
mumbled under her breath.
The trainer finished fixing the
jump. "All right, Lexi. Try that again. Don’t be so quick over it. This
isn’t a competition."
She nodded and broke Rose into a
canter. She was much more cautious about the jump and landed without the pole
coming after her.
Ashley clapped and Firefly nodded
her head as they slowed into a posting trot.
"All right. That’s it. You
guys can dismount and groom them."
*****
Later that night, Lexi, Ashley,
Gabby and a few other friends were sitting outside of their favorite
restaurant, Catch.
"Can you believe that they
found that guy living right above your aunt’s shop, Ash?"
"Yeah. What a shock,
huh?" she lied.
"I was so scared for you when
I heard that!" Gabby took her drink and took a sip of it.
Ashley shrugged. "I didn’t
even know, either. Maybe my aunt did," she lied again. She looked at Lexi.
"Hey, where did you get that cute top?"
"Kitson. My best friend got
it for me before I left LA."
"It looks really hot on
you." Gabby smiled.
"Thanks. Your top is cute,
too." Lexi sat up as their food came.