Chapter 4 – The Truth (Cont.)

-Time Skip – 4.5 hours later-

Okay, here's where we will start to get into the POV changes

*"Name"* = POV change

*Marlene*

The class that this girl went to was actually kind of interesting. I was waiting in her bag, but I could hear what they were talking about. I also noticed that she was sitting next to a guy that she seemed to like. When we got out of the class and out to the truck, he walked us (her) out to the truck. They said their goodbyes and then she got in the truck. When she unzipped the bag, I started talking.

"Who was that?" I asked her. She blushed a little bit and then started talking.

"His name is Shawn. I've known him for a while, why?"

"It seems like I'm not the only one with a secret, huh."

"Yeah, yeah. I hear ya, but he's always hanging out with another girl, so I don't know if they're dating or not. I don't want to ask and feel really bad if they are and make things awkward." She said as she was driving us home. I know how she feels. We stayed quiet the rest of the way back to her house. When we parked, I had a feeling that we shouldn't go in there. When we opened the apartment door, I saw that there was good reason: the place was trashed. That was her one rule: don't trash the place. Oh dear, she's turning red from anger. I'm going to take that as a cue to leave.

"I'm going to go see if I can find the guys." I said and scurried off to find them.

*Grace*

Marlene just left to go find the penguins, and it's a good thing she did. The place was absolutely trashed; papers everywhere, broken beakers on the floor, stains on the carpet.

"PENGUINS!" I whisper-yelled, so to not cause alarm from the other apartments. "Where are you?" I asked angrily. I finally found them in the guest bedroom, all of them covered in dirt. Kowalski was the dirtiest, which made me think that he was working on fixing his machine. I gave them a look that made all of them, Skipper included, cower slightly in fear. Of course, I think that he was because of the look Marlene was giving them.

"Now listen-"Kowalski started to say before Marlene interrupted him.

"No, you guys listen. She had one rule and one rule only: Don't trash the place." Marlene started.

"And you didn't seem to listen. From now on, if you have any experiments to do, do them on the back porch. It has tinted shades so dark, no one will see you. Do we have a deal?" I said, too tired to argue with them.

"Deal" they replied. I nodded and headed to bed. A couple hours later, I realized that I couldn't sleep because I was too wound up. I decided to get up and walk around the apartment, try cleaning up a little bit from the mess. After a few minutes, I had all of the papers picked up and thrown away. I was about to start cleaning up the carpet when I heard a voice behind me.

"Need some help, soldier?" It was Skipper. I turned around and saw him standing there just staring at me.

"Yeah. Would you mind cleaning up the broken glass while I start on the carpets?" He nodded and we got started. Skipper got done first and then jumped in to help with the carpet stains. 'Interesting. Never thought that he would be the type to clean floors.' I thought to myself. Within about 10 minutes, the apartment was back to the way it was before. "Thanks for your help, Skipper. It would have taken all night to clean it on my own."

"It's the least I could do. But, I do have a question."

"What is it?" I said, walking over to a chair. He followed and stood there in front of me. He seemed to have a scared expression on his face. 'Him? Scared? HA!' I lost the thought the second it came to my head.

"It's about Marlene." He paused for a moment before continuing. I had a feeling that I knew where this was going. "I really like her. Do you think we have a chance together?" He finally asked, and I thought I was going to fall out of my chair ~1. I regained my composure after a moment.

"Let me put it this way: I think it would be great." I replied, trying to keep my voice in check.

"Alright. Thanks, soldier." He said before he started to go back to bed before he remembered something. He turned back to me. "Oh, one more thing. Could you talk to her for me?" I nodded and he turned back around and went back to bed.

"Oh boy. How am I going to talk to Marlene without outright telling her? I'm surprised I was able to keep her secret from Skipper. Talk about complicated." I said to myself. Then, I felt my phone go off. It was Shawn. He texted me and asked if I wanted to hang out tomorrow. I checked my calendar and I didn't have a class tomorrow, so it was okay that I go. I texted him back saying that I would like to. "Oh dear…" I was happy but scared at the same time; how was I going to tell the gang?

That's the end. Now for some notes

~1: Go back to Chapter 3 so you can see why I was so shocked