A/N-An update again, a new chapter just for you guys! 8D What will happen after that FAX-y kiss? A plot twist...read on!
booklover404 - Thank you, it always makes me happy to see a new reviewer. ^_^
Life of a Winged Teenager
Chapter 9
The next morning, I woke up to the smell of bacon frying in the kitchen. I walked lazily into the bathroom and stumbled through a quick shower. I had no sooner walked out of my room with clean clothes, when I ran right into Fang, who was kneeling on the floor, his hand outstretched to offer me a plate of bacon and scrambled eggs.
I whacked him on the head with my hairbrush but took the food from him nonetheless, and walked into the living room, sitting down on the couch to eat. I wondered if Erasers would burst in on us today. I hoped not. It would be nice just to have a day off.
That's when I remembered Nudge and Iggy, partially because they walked around all morning hand in hand. Not to mention the fact that Ella had been avoiding them and moping around all morning. Oh, crap. Was this a love triangle? I rolled my eyes as Ella walked into the kitchen for the fifth time, looked in the fridge, decided that she was too depressed to eat, and sulked out of side.
Fang walked into the room with his laptop and plopped himself down next to me. He waved it off. "She'll be fine," he reassured me, but strangely, coming from a guy, this didn't make me feel any better. "I'm going to go talk to Nudge," I announced, and quickly left the room and looked in Nudge's. She wasn't there. I rounded the corner back to the living room. "Have you seen Nudge?" I asked Fang, who was chuckling. "She wasn't there, huh," he mused.
I huffed and left the room, set on finding Nudge. I walked outside, around the backyard, into the small garage, down the road to the park, and checked with my mom. "No, I didn't see her here," she said when I called her at work. "No, sweetie, I don't know where she is. I'll be home later. Bye."
I sat down on my bed, defeated. Where was Nudge? I hadn't seen her since she had been walking around with Iggy. …Iggy…maybe Iggy knew where she was. I walked into the basement, expecting him to be playing on the Xbox with Gazzy. No such luck. Stalking upstairs to Iggy, Gazzy and Fang's room, I figured I'd find him there, if nowhere else.
When I opened the door, I opened my mouth to speak. "Iggy have you seen where Nu-" I paused and my eyes widened. "Iggy, Nudge, what the hell are you doing?!" I gasped at them. Right there on the bottom bunk bed, just sitting there, were Iggy and Nudge. Making out. Like, making out, making out. "Oh, God, my eyes! Get your own house and you can do that!"
They jumped apart. Iggy had a shocked look on his face, and Nudge just looked plain guilty. "You, me, my room, now," I hissed at Nudge. Once we were in my room, I slammed the door behind me. "What did you do to Iggy?" I shrieked at her. I could tell she was near tears, but that didn't make me forgive her. "He looked so shocked at what he did. Do you know you're only eleven years old?"
She looked up. "Actually, um, Max, that's not really true. See, when I was looking at my file, I noticed the date that I was born, and it wasn't the date that I picked for my birthday. You noticed that I look older than I am, and I do, but not that much older. I'm really thirteen years old right now. I look older because I am older, Max."
"… … …You are grounded…until the day you die," I stated, still in shock. Nudge jumped up. "Oh, please! You and Fang can do it and I can't? You can have a relationship and I can't? You don't think it's weird for me, that you two obviously love each other so much?" she exploded.
"Not only that, Nudge, although you are still too young! Iggy doesn't know you're older! It's wrong, Nudge! And did you think of how much you're hurting Ella by this? She loves Iggy, too! You didn't even talk to her. I get that you really like Iggy, but please be responsible for this!
She sat there for a minute. "E-Ella likes Iggy? Well shit, Max! Iggy thinks Ella's cute, I know he does. If I tell Iggy, they'll be together, instead of me and him, and I love him too! Do you care about Ella more than me? Is that it?"
I sighed. "No, Nudge. Seriously, don't take it too fast. I'll be…okay with you and Iggy…together for now."
"Thank you thank you thank you, Max! I love you so soo much!" she squealed as she happily skipped off to tell Iggy.
Fang walked in from outside the door where he had been blending into the wall. "Are you jealous of her?" he asked worriedly. I sighed. "No, Fang, I'm not in love with Iggy. But think about it. This is going to be weird, Nudge and Iggy together. Not to mention how crushed Ella will be."
He reached out to hug me. After a few seconds he said slyly, "Y'know, we could do the same thing as them…if you wanna," he grinned at me. I rolled my eyes and pushed him back. "No, Fang!" I walked away grumbling something about ruining the moment. He chuckled as I left the room, but I didn't hear his disappointed sigh until I was out in the hall.
If Nudge and Iggy had to date anyone, I was glad it was each other. We didn't need any more creepy Lissa, Sam and Amber repeats. I was also pleased that Nudge told me first about her age. I was actually trusted above others, and I was happy about that. I tried not to think about what Nudge and Iggy were doing in the next room, and I was too kind to knock. Angel walked past and snorted into her drink.
Now that everything was taken care of, I was walking around the house, paranoid that we were about to be struck by a flying Eraser or chased by another enemy. The words of the blonde woman flashed into my head, "Despite its somewhat primitive looks, that experiment was only the first edition of a series of experiments the school has planned to unleash on you. He was like a rough draft, only to prepare the scientists at the School to see what they were up against."
I decided to do something interesting. So I called the flock for a meeting. "I want to do something we've never done before," I began, "And I'm really hungry. I'm sure you all are too. Sorry that my mom's small fridge doesn't really cut it for us."
Gazzy paused. "Where are you going with this? It sounds like you're talking about food. Is there food? Food is always a good way to go. When in doubt, pig out."
I grimaced. "We're not going to another all-you-can-eat barbeque buffet, Gazzy. I had enough of that in 2005."
I pressed onward. "No, guys, I'm talking about going to an actual Chinese restaurant. With little booths and rice noodles and egg rolls and fortune cookies. Really. Why not try it?"
Fang contemplated the thought. "Alright, I'm in," he finally decided. Seeing the hurt look on my face from them taking so long, he added, "I think it'll be a lot of fun. I think we should go." I beamed at him, and he actually smiled back at me. It felt good to have him on my side now.
"Hell yeah," said Iggy. "We've terrorized barbeque places, McDonalds' and even that fancy restaurant in New York. I'm in."
"If Iggy's going, I'm going!" piped up Nudge, clinging onto Iggy's arm. "Me too!" squeaked Gazzy, followed by Angel's approving nod. I smiled at all of them. Grabbing one of my mom's credit cards, I marched out the door with them.
Fang didn't hesitate to grab my mom's other car. I find it awesome that my mom has two cars, interchangeably switching them. But today, she happened to leave behind the nice one. And I wasn't about to let Fang wreck it. "Er…Fang?" I squeaked, trying to send him a message. He, however, didn't seem to receive this message. "Come on, get in!" he exclaimed excitedly.
I groaned as I was forced to pile into the car. I plugged in my seatbelt tightly, knowing what was coming. No sooner had we done this than Fang pressed hard on the gas and we were speeding off about 50 miles an hour. As he quickly accelerated, turning corners and just missing pedestrians, laughing like a maniac, Nudge clinging to Iggy claiming that she "didn't want to die today!!!", I felt like I wanted to throw up. "Fang, slow down!"
In two minutes flat, we were already there. I was breathing heavily, and Fang had turned to us all, grinning. "Wasn't that awesome?" he asked, his eyes glowing like a little kid's. "Sure, Fang," grumbled Iggy as he filed out of the car and clutched his stomach. "If I ever live through the pain, I'm going to slaughter you and dance on your grave."
I dragged Fang out of the car before he could do much more damage. In the restaurant, it was nice and air-conditioned, and I walked up to the podium in the front. "Table for six, please," I said sweetly to the waiter. Fang glared at me. "Aren't you the charmer," he grumbled as he slid into the booth next to me.
They brought us actual menus, just like at the fancy restaurant in New York. I took my time looking through it, and we ordered four large entrees to share. We were waiting for quite a while, making small talk and comments about the weather. About halfway through the waiting, Iggy chose that moment to say, "If cars could do it, would they have little baby cars?"
I stared at him. We all stared at him. First, that was so Iggy. He would do that to you. But car sex? Wasn't that kind of a new one? Nudge, Gazzy and Angel burst out laughing, while Fang and I were staring at him blankly. Iggy continued, "Wouldn't it be cool if cars could get it on?"
I silently closed my eyes and counted to ten. This was so weird. I finally opened my eyes and thanked God when the server brought us our food. Everything was so delicious, because none of us had ever had Chinese before. But the most interesting part was the fortune cookie at the end of the meal.
Angel opened hers. "You have a powerful gift. Using it will only bring you happiness," she read sweetly, then proceeded to laugh maniacally.
Gazzy opened his. "You have a serious condition. Consider visiting a doctor," he chuckled as he proceeded to wield his dark gift.
Nudge coughed. "Hold it in, Gazzy! Ok, here it is. 'A good thing will soon come your way. Be patient and love the ones around you'. Awwww."
Iggy opened his and had Nudge read it. "Pay close attention to the ones around you. Someone close to you will surely bring you happiness," read Nudge, and my thoughts immediately flew to Ella.
Fang passed on the fortune cookies and handed me mine. I read off of it, "One among you will deceive you soon. Keep your eyes out for a traitor," I said, and we all laughed. "So, like, everyday stuff, right?" laughed Nudge.
As we filed out and I endured one more horrible ride in the car, I couldn't help but think if the fortune cookie message could actually be true.
I went into the backyard when we got home to find Total chewing on his rubber squeaker toy. He paused mid-chew, and the toy dropped to the floor. I smiled. "It's okay, Total, I'm not here to make fun of you. I promise. I wanna take you for a walk, actually."
He cheered up some. "Oh, well okay. Can we go to the park? You know, that dog park where the other dogs are? I met some last week, and they were really nice." His stub of a tail wagged, and I couldn't say no. Really, I just wanted to think for a while. "Okay, we'll go. I'll go get a jacket and your leash."
He gave me a look. I backed down some. "Okay, okay, no leash," I said as I grabbed my jacket and yanked it on. "Let's just go to the dog park. Right now," I said, leading him through the gate around the back.
We were off soon enough. With the dog park only a few blocks down, I sighed a sigh of sweet relief as I was finally able to focus on relaxing in the fresh air. Total interrupted my tranquil thoughts. "Max? You seem kind of lost. Like, you're not really here," he commented. "You should forget about saving the world for a while. I mean, it can wait for a little while. And I know it's hard, being you, but you should try leading a more normal life. It can be more relaxing," he added happily. "Personally, between you and me, I think all this global warming crap is a little bogus."
I laughed out loud –and no, I will not ever write "lol". Curse it all, I just wrote it.-, and it felt weird to be laughing at something Total said. Normally I don't consider him that intelligent and interesting. I know, I know, I don't talk to dogs a lot. Shocking, really. I was walking past the bank and a McDonald's when I heard a conversation going.
"I know, I know it didn't work the first time, we'll get them next time."
A few seconds later, "We'll construct it better. It won't be able to lose."
After that, "I'll make sure it gets to them safely. There will be no mistakes this time."
I backed up until I heard the voice again. I saw a guy talking on a phone. I moved closer to inspect it. I gasped as I realized it was Jeb.
I picked up Total and ran back to the house. He protested. "Hey, I thought we were going to the dog park!" but I didn't let him win. I burst through the front door of the house to find everyone. I sat there panting for a minute. When I could think again, I shouted, "Jeb is a traitor!"
They all looked at me. "W-What?" said Fang.
"Jeb is a traitor. I heard him talking on the phone when I was on a walk with Total! He was talking about a new monster to send after us, and he knows we're here!"
"The fortune cookie was right," Gazzy mumbled in awe.
"He was talking to someone, I'm sure of it. He's gonna arrange for it to find us…" I trailed off as I realized that Nudge and Iggy had fallen to the floor. I took a deep breath and smelled something in the air. "Hey…wait…" I said groggily as I fell to the floor, and everything went black.
Wahaha, cliffhanger! Mwahaha. Wait till the next chappy!
~Rachel
