Road Trip by Caleb Baker (universal ebook reader .TXT) 📕

She did as she was told, accelerating to the window labeled "one". This was the window she had to pay at, the next would be the one where she got her drink. The man at the window gave her some change and she accelerated once more, this time to a window labeled "two". The same exact girl who gave Chris the food this morning was still working. She looked a little tired, but still pretty. John let out a gasp, which made both Alice and Emily look at him in disgust. 

"Hey," the girl said, as she handed Emily her drink, "you're the boy from this morning," she was looking at me. 

"And you're the girl from this morning," I said, making her laugh a little. 

"I never did get that call, you know," she said smiling. 

"Yeah sorry, I've been pretty busy," I replied, "and you still seem to be working."

She pouted her lips, "I get off at seven, so 'll be expecting a call," she said. 

"Alright," I said chuckling a bit, "but I left my drink in my friends car, that means I lost your number."

"Well that's no problem," she said still smiling, "I'll just give it to you again."

She turned around and went further into her booth, unseen. 

"Drive, drive now!" I said to Emily, laughing a little. 

She floored it, making sure to leave the resonating sound of a car screech. John, Alice and I all turned around to see the girl poking her head out of the window, with a frown.

"What was that all about?" Emily asked when were halfway down the street. 

"That was Caleb's secret admirer!" John answered, before I could. 

"It wasn't really a secret, dummy!" Alice said. 

"This morning, Chris, john and I all went there and she gave me her number, on my cup of Iced Tea." I said truthfully. 

"Oh," Emily said, "she seemed kind of odd."

"You mean hot!" John said, "Caleb, you realize, you can never go there again. She'll probably spit in your drink or something."

"Yeah, I guess your right."    

The rest of the car ride involved making fun of me and my new girlfriend, the "Dunkin Donut's Girl". I did find it funny, I knew how to be a good sport, but I was more than relieved when we arrived at John's house. John and I took Alice's bags in, while the girls took the groceries. John kicked open the door, and led us all inside. He and I brought the bags down into the basement while Emily and Alice brought the food into the kitchen. We met the girls in the kitchen and started to help put away the groceries.  "So what are we gonna do?" Alice asked, as she skipped over the numerous bags of cantaloupes. 

"I figured we could order a couple of pizzas and watch a movie," John said, the most logical thing he had come up with in hours. 

"That sounds good, but we should order it now though, before any pizza places start closing," I said looking out the window. 

The sky was darkening. It was growing a darker shade of purple from the sun setting. 

"I know Pepperell House has really good pizza," John said reaching into his pocket and pulling out a cell phone, "what do you guys want to order?"

We all exchanged looks of wonder. 

"How about a regular cheese, and then a pepperoni," Emily said, looking at everyone's faces, trying to find looks of protest. 

"Alright," John said. 

He ordered the pizzas, but he gave the guy he was talking to a hard time, by telling him not to mess anything up or he'd exact a swift revenge. We all traversed to the basement which was beautifully ornamented. A long couch curved around a large coffee table, a flower pot placed in the middle of it, and a plasma screen television was mounted on the wall across from it all. A pool table was set some five feet behind the couch, and a large bookcase filled with numerous things stood up against the walls. A screen door set at the back of the room led out to the patio, backyard, pool house, and an in-ground pool.     

The girls walked over to one of the bookcases to try and decide what movie to watch, while John and I set up the TV and DVD player. 

"The RV has one of these things, you know," John said as he turned on the TV. 

"Really? Jeez, is your uncle rich or something?" I asked trying to find the power button on the DVD player. 

"No, my uncle's name is Dave," John said laughing at his own joke. 

"Ahh, I get it," I said not laughing. 

"But, all kidding aside," John started seriously, and pressing the power button for me, "he is rich, he wrote some novel for Dungeons and Dragons, and now he's making a lot of money."

"That's pretty cool, well minus the Dungeons and Dragons part," I said. 

"Yeah... Wait 'till you see the RV..." John said somberly. 

"Why, what's wrong with it?" I asked, "it sounds pretty awesome already."

"You'll see," he said. 

This made me worry. Whenever John got serious, it meant something bad was going to happen, from my experience anyways, and I'd known him for a long time. 

"Hey guys," Alice called from somewhere to our right, "how does a horror movie sound?"

"Great," John answered joyously, "which one?"

"I don't know those kinds of movies all to well," Emily said, as she scanned the bookshelf. 

John abandoned the television and walked over to the shelf next to Emily, and began helping her look for a movie. 

"How does a Freddy movie sound?" he said after a minute of looking. 

"That's fine, I'm probably gonna fall asleep halfway through it anyways," Emily said yawning loudly. 

"What about your coffee?" Alice asked. 

"Oh, it's gonna take a lot more than one coffee to keep me awake," Emily said derisively. 

The doorbell rang, making the sound of grandfather clock chimes. 

"That must be the pizza," I said leaving the TV and making my way to one of my suitcases, "I guess I did leave my stuff here," I said to anyone listening. 

"That was fast," John said slightly amazed. 

I intended on paying for the food with my own money, considering John and Emily payed for the groceries. I skipped two steps at a time going up the staircase to the foyer. As soon as I opened the door the pizza guy thrusted the food into my arms with a force that knocked me backwards and into the railing. 

"Those are so hot!" he cried waving his hands and hopping a little.  He was right, the pizzas were extremely hot, it didn't really bother me all that much though. The smell of the food wafted under my nose, causing me to sniff loudly. 

"That'll be twenty-four ninety-five," the guy said, regaining some of his dignity. I extended my arm and dropped the money that included a tip into his outstretched hand. 

"Thanks a lot man!" he said as he practically galloped his way back to his shabby looking car. 

"He was really weird," I said mumbling to myself as I shut the door and started on the stairs to the basement. 

"I smell something good!" John stated, coming over to meet me and help with one of the boxes. 

"Careful, they're hot," I said, setting down the box in my hands on the table between the TV and the sofa. 

"It looks good," Alice said, her mouth watering. 

"I'll go get plates," John said, reluctant to leave the pizzas. 

"Don't worry, they're still gonna be here when you get back," I said noticing John's face at the staircase.  His expression loosened heartily and his steps bounced as he went up the stairs. 

"Maybe... I'm starving..." Emily said under her breath, while she took a slice out of the box of cheese pizza. 

"Jeez! Are you like, pregnant or something," Alice breathed, hearing Emily's comment. 

My head shot up, my eyebrows arched, and my throat almost choked on my own saliva, all of this going unnoticed. 

"Oh, please..." Emily replied laughing, "and who would be the father?"

Alice looked like she was thinking, her hands on her hips and her foot lightly tapping without rhythm. 

"What about Danny?" she said after some time. 

"Danny who?" Emily said covering her mouth. 

My eyebrows were now reaching new found heights. 

"Danny Gray!" Alice said. 

"Oh! Danny?! No, we never..." Emily's voice trailed off, only to return a few seconds later, "although... There was that one time-"

I hadn't blinked in over two minutes, my eyebrows were now lost in a sea of hair, and my teeth were clenched so hard I thought they might shatter. 

"Em?!" Alice cut her off.

"Who wants plates?!" John yelled bounding down the stairs and coming to destroy the awkward moment.

No one responded. Alice was locked by the eyes with Emily, who only returned her gaze stupidly. I had taken to staring unblinkingly at the decorative flowers placed in the middle of the table set before me. 

"What's going on?" John asked almost as awkwardly as the conversation he had just missed, "never mind, I don't care. Look I got plates with little pieces of fruits on them. So when you finish your meal, you have more food to stare at!"

This broke the silence between us three, but for some reason I couldn't find my appetite anymore.      The rest of the night went by smoothly. After completely exhausting herself from screaming, Emily had fallen asleep on the couch, just as predicted. Alice wasn't awake much long after, she had given one last hearty scream of horror and fell asleep almost instantly. John and I stayed up to watch the rest of the movie, although our yawns and noisy stretching drowned it out. John was snoring almost as soon as the screen went black with the credits slowly rolling upward. I took my place of rest on the floor next to the couch, above me laid Emily, completely blanketed and sleeping, curled up like an armadillo. Alice was further ahead on the couch, sleeping serenely, and in the same position. John was sleeping soundly on the floor with me, but on the other side of the table, crammed between that and the sofa.     

I couldn't get Emily off my mind. What had she done with Danny Gray? I didn't even know that they had dated. It seemed that as well as I thought I knew Emily -through all the years, starting from the third grade- there were still things unknown about that girl. What was the there to find out? and what if I did find things out and didn't like them? I was deathly afraid of changing my feelings for Emily Matthews.     

The sun rays woke me up the next morning. They shoved their beams of light through my closed eyelids, making me see everything around me in the color red. Another one of my senses was acting strange too, my nose was smelling something... something delicious. I sat up, feeling my back crack. Maybe sleeping on the floor wasn't the best idea, I thought as I looked around to my surroundings. John was snoring only three feet away from me, the coffee table between us, but I wasn't really focused on that. The girls were missing, both of their stations riddled with blankets and strewn about pillows.     

Now standing, and the blood now circulating to my brain, I could see the situation clearly. A wonderful aroma, the girls missing, John drooling profusely could only mean one thing: the girls were cooking breakfast, and John was never gonna wake up. I walked to the staircase, slowly, and scratching myself. The doorbell rang, causing John to let out a whelp. 

"OJ Simpson is innocent!" he cried, his eyelids half open and spittle covering his mouth. 

"I'll get it!" I yelled incoherently. 

My legs didn't want to move, they were more asleep than I was, but still I trudged onwards, up the stairs and to the door. Chris and Lauren stood under the threshold, both wearing broad grins.  "Hope we didn't miss breakfast!" they both said at the same time.  I would have shut the door in their