AUTHOR'S NOTE: Sooooo... guess who! I know I always do and say this, but I'm sorry it took so long. You can thank an awesome friend who shook me out of my fanfiction stupor. Please let me know what you think of it and the direction it is going in. I love feedback, good, bad, whatever. Missed you all.

Chapter 07

"I think I have… Yup. I have dust in my armpits."

Jules looked up at Nancy with a wide grin. Nancy was trying to get a good look at her underarms as they walked into the shower house. It was a small, rickety little room with three dilapidated showers and a row of toilet stalls. Jules laughed as she tossed her towel over the hook outside her curtain and climbed into the damp shower.

"Welcome to an archeology dig," she called as she jumped out of the way of a freezing jet of water. "Dirt is your new best friend. And she is clingy as hell."

"Great, just – ah! Cold!" Nancy cried out, not managing to dodge the first icy blast. She whimpered. "Why isn't this even trying to be warm?"

"It'll warm up… not much. But it will at least stop being ice water."

Jules was right, it wasn't freezing after a while, but it was nowhere near hot, so the girls' showers were short and intense. They toweled off and dressed quickly, shivering and laughing. As Nancy reached into her bag for her comb, she brushed against her phone and pulled it out.

"A missed call from Ned," she murmured.

Jules took her phone out as well and scowled at it. "That swine. He didn't call me. And he says we're family."

She and Nancy giggled and finished up, starving and more than ready for dinner. When they walked into the trailer that held the dining room they headed for the line at the buffet and piled their plates with food. They were quickly swept into seats with some of Jules's friends. Nancy got comfortable with the girls really fast. They were fun to be around and most of them treated her as if she'd been part of their group forever.

"Really? Really?" a girl named Sienna was saying skeptically.

"Yes, really!" Kat said defensively. She swooned then, her eyes glazing over as she rested her chin in her hands and stared across the dining room at another table. "Charlie Watson is totally gorgeous. Look at him!"

Jules and Nancy followed her line of sight and saw a thin, artistic-looking guy with long blond hair and big brown eyes talking to a group of people. The group laughed. Nancy recognized the boy sitting next to him. It was Art, the boy Jules had bumped into early that day. He caught sight of them and gave a charming smile, waving. Nancy nodded and Jules waved back to him. Nancy nudged her friend in the ribs and when Jules looked over, confused, she raised her eyebrows. Jules rolled her eyes and returned to her dinner.

"He's too skinny," Sienna was saying about Charlie Watson. "I like my men bulkier. Big muscles."

"Ew," another girl said, making a face. "Too much muscle is gross. Then they look like they have boobs."

"HAHA! Man boobs!"

Nancy started as her phone rang in her pocket. She pulled it out and an instant smile crept onto her face. She motioned to Jules that she was going to take a call and walked out of the noisy trailer. It was dark outside, nothing but the stars and the faint glow of light from the farmhouse windows. She raised the phone to her ear with a smile.

"Finally," Ned said. "I've been calling like crazy and I couldn't get through."

"Oh, sorry," Nancy said, grimacing. "There is almost no reception here."

"I figured. You're coming in staticy. Still, at least I get to hear some derivative of your voice. So..." he drawled. "What did it say?"

"What did what say?"

"The message in the oak. Because I know you already found it and are flying back tomorrow morning and spending the rest of spring break lounging around. With me, of course."

Nancy laughed and shook her head. "My first day here isn't even over. I haven't even been able to think about-"

"Blasphemy!" Ne interrupted. He spoke in a scandalized voice, mocking and regal. "Not thinking about the perilous Oak Quest? Never, madam!" She could tell he was smiling at her through the phone as she giggled. "Come on, Nancy. Who are you trying to kid? I am so positive that all you've done so far has been think about this dead French guy thing."

"…Maybe a little."

"Maybe a lot."

"Fine, maybe a lot. But forget about that right now. Have you heard from Burt and Dave?"

"Yes," he answered, a sort of huffy jealousy in his voice. "Dave got bored at his parents' house yesterday and drove over to spend break at Burt's. He says he'd rather just stay there until we all figure out what we are doing. I, on the other hand, am stuck doing chores for my dad. Joy is mine."

"How is the garage?"

"Sparkling," Ned replied in a dark voice.

"And your parents'-"

"If you mention them getting it on, I will find you. I will find you and I will administer a fate worse than death. I will find a way to transplant the horrible images that would play in my head into yours."

"-bathroom sink?" Nancy finished.

"Yeah, yeah. I thought so. So, what are you up to right now?"

"Nothing really. Just finished eating dinner with Jules. I need to find a way to get to the tree Boyce mapped out for me tomorrow. Maybe I can rent a car or something…"

"Nancy Drew, P.I.," Ned teased. His voice, however held a soft note of pride. "I miss you. Like crazy."

Nancy blushed. She bit her lip. "Yeah?"

"I mean, like, crazy. Like, say-the-word-and-I-will-jump-on-a-plane-and-meet-you-out-there crazy."

There was a pause and Nancy suddenly felt very hot. She slipped her free hand in her pocket and shrugged to herself. She could say the word. He would do it in a heartbeat, he'd always come through for her before. Nancy opened her mouth to respond and the door to the dining trailer burst open, Jules, Kat and the rest of the girls coming out, laughing loudly as they headed towards her. She turned back, looking down at her shoes.

"I'm sorry, Ned, I have to go," she said. "Jules and the girls just came out and we're headed back to the farmhouse for the night. I'll call you tomorrow, okay?"

"Talk to you tomorrow then. Good night. I meant it, you know."

Nancy didn't ask what he meant. She flushed again a little and said with a smile, "I miss you, too."

Jules caught up to her and slung an arm around her shoulder. "Was that my dearest cousin?"

"Yes, it was, as a matter of fact."

"Cool. Now, lie to me and tell me he sent a warm-felt hello and I can send one back to him for when he calls you, and not me, tomorrow."

"He said hi!" Nancy lied, pretending to be indignant on Ned's behalf.

Jules laughed as they headed to their room with Kat, Sienna, and Candice. "You don't have to cover for him. I don't really care. It's just fun watching you twitch to cover for your boyfriend."

"We aren't-" Nancy started, but Candice had begun a bra fight, having whipped hers off and chucked it at Sienna's head, and the room had erupted into an utter chaos of flying underwear.

Finally, after another fifteen minutes of what was now referred to as The Great Panty War, the lamps were extinguished and the girls crawled into bed. Nancy slipped into a sleep filled with weird dreams.

She was watching Pere François, dressed as a sad French clown, cutting him name into trees with a machete. A squirrel was on one of the trees and François baptized it. Then they were at a hospital wing where François, who had turned into Tom Sellek, was dying and the doctor was holding an engraved brass plate instead of a chart.

The doctor turned, revealing herself to be a very tall George, who told Nancy, "It was all those rabid Jewish squirrels that did him in. He shouldn't have baptized them."

Ned, dressed in a 50's style nurse's uniform, added in a high-pitched, girly voice, "Sometimes, squirrels know best."

Then he and Tall George broke into dance with the cast of High School Musical. "Squirrels know best! They passed the Jewish test! Baptism doesn't work! They'll think you're a jerk! RABIES!"

From somewhere behind her, Nancy heard a door creak open softly. She twitched in her sleep. In the dream, the hospital room door was pushed open and Nancy made out a familiar silhouette in the frame. Bess stepped through, her head down, long, blonde hair covering her face. Her mouth was moving and she was whispering something, but Nancy couldn't hear what. She turned away from the singing and dancing and the dying François and listened closely to Bess, who still didn't look up as she shuffled forward, mumbling. Bess stopped right in front of Nancy, still murmuring low in her throat.

"Bess?" she said in a soft, scared voice. "I can't hear you."

Bess finally looked up, her eyes hooded and a sleek smile on her face. Her teeth were dazzlingly white. Finally she spoke up loud enough for Nancy to understand, but her voice wasn't her own. Her friend whispered in a silky, unctuous tone that she recognized as Kit Kadle.

"Sweet dreams, Nancy Drew."

Nancy gasped sharply as a soft click registered in her brain and her eyes flew open, staring blindly around the pitch black room.