YES! HERE IT IS!!! HaH! Okay, i may be more excited than I should be, but this was a fanfic more than two years in the making...
AND NOW IT'S DONE!!!!!! AHHH!!!

Thank you to Sarimia, Off Dreaming and especially RandomBlood for all the reviews.

Now, where did I leave off?

Oh yeah...
Jackjack...

I brought my mouth to Charlie's ear and begged, "Please, don't let him take me..."

Charlie looked up and met the face of the only other living person I loved.

"Hi," he said. "I'm her brother. I've come to take Lydia home."

CHARLIE'S P.O.V.

"No... Charlie, please, don't let him...don't let him..." Mouse begged, holding onto me so tightly I felt like I was going to tip over.

I have never seen a man with more contradictory features. He had tattoos everywhere, but he was wearing a clean polo shirt. His features looked rough but his eyes melted as they looked only at Mouse. He was carrying a blue umbrella in one hand.

The stranger just smiled sympathetically and reached out for Mouse. She shuddered as his fingertips touched her shoulder.

I pulled her back away from him. I didn't know who he was, but any person who would make Mouse act like this couldn't be trusted at all.

"Come on now, Lydia. You're free, now. The Warden was just arrested, the camp is closed, and the guy who gave you the drugs was found three days ago. He confessed everything. He even described you in every detail and—"

"THAT'S BECAUSE IT WAS YOU!" Mouse screamed, pulling from me and facing the stranger.

"YOU were the one who gave me the cocaine and YOU were the one who got me into this shit hole that I'd rather be in instead of being with you, Jack!"

Jack backed three steps away.

"That's not true, you don't understand—well it is true but..."

He was cut short by a punch in the face.

Jack was knocked over into the mud. An A-Tenter who was running around tripped on Jack's head and fell into the mud.

A few of the 'campers' were now gathered in a crowd around what was happening.

Mouse stood over her brother, staring down at him.

"I hate you, Jack! I hate you! Why did you come! You told me you never wanted to see me again and now you just..."

Mouse closed her eyes.

"Why did you come?" she said, choking back a lump in her throat.

I walked towards her, but she put her hand on my chest to stop me.

"I'm sorry," she only said to me.

"No, I'm sorry," said Jack, getting up.

"But I only sent you away to protect you."

Some references near the end to chapter 35

MOUSE'S P.O.V.

There was a thud. The sound came from Mrs. Morengo, the woman in the purple suit, closing her car door... with Caveman and Zero inside.

"I'll be right back," Charlie said, running towards the car.

Jack smiled, glancing at Charlie as he ran off.

"Who's that?" he asked playfully.

"He," I stared defiantly into his face, "is none of your fucking business, Jack."

He stopped smiling, but that look in his eyes was still there.

"Come inside. You're soaking wet. I'll explain everything there." He reached for my hand, but I snatched it away.

Eww! He touched us!

"Where else are you going to go, Lyd?" he said to me, looking around. "The camp is hereby closed."

"Anywhere else."

"Please... you don't know what it was like..." he picked up the umbrella and held it over his head even thought he was soaked.

"Mom and dad... it was the worst time for them to leave you..." he hesitated. "I just couldn't take care of you, do you see? My life was a mess."

He's lying! He's gross and he's lying!

"I did drugs... I sold drugs... I almost killed a man, Lydia! I was drunk almost every day...And then our parents had to die and...I just couldn't be the one to take care of you."

He handed me the umbrella. I looked into his face, trying to find some spark of a truth, or a lie, or anything! I took the umbrella and held it numbly over my head, letting him stand in the rain.

"Then, when I was in the middle of one of my... business attempts... I saw you walking there right past me, and I suddenly thought of it... I thought... maybe being in jail was better than being... with me."

"Why couldn't you just leave me with someone else? Why couldn't you give me away?!"

"Because then I'd never be able to find you, or have some reason or motivation to fix myself... which I did. I did! And now I'm begging you to give me one more chance."

Most of the boys were now standing together and looking at us to see what I would say next.

"What about the letter?" I asked in a small voice that wasn't mine.

Jack shook head. "What letter?"

"The one saying how much you hated me... and..."

"I didn't write any letter."

w------w

h--------------------h

a--------------------a

t-------t

The Warden had planned everything.

Jack and I sat in the Rec room, we being the only two there. He told me that one night, whilst he was as drunk as a squirrel in a beer keg, he used the phone number that the judge had given him and called the Warden, telling her everything.

"And I mean Everything. Every single detail, even things that had nothing to do with anything. I just rambled on and on about whatever was in my drunken mind and she just listened."

He was surprised that the Warden didn't tell the police, and that she told him she would 'let' me stay.

It wasn't until now that we realized the Warden only let me stay because I was one extra person to dig for the treasure. By this time, the Warden had also realized, thanks to the "ancestors" that I was Kate Barlowe's granddaughter, that she could also use me to lead her to that treasure.

She wrote the letter to make me hate him, and so if he ever tried to call me or send me another letter, I would just reject him altogether and want to stay at camp Greenlake.

After all of that, JackJack sighed and forced a smile.

"Do you hate me?"

"Meh."

"Who was that boy?"

"That was Charlie... Charlie Walker."

JackJack laughed—which annoyed me—and slapped the table.

"Who knew... Trout Walker would get his chance with Kate Barlow after all!"

"You mean their ancestors."

"Yeah well..."

"And I'm not a real Barlow... I'm adopted."

"Yeah well..."

He held the tips of my fingers. "You're a Barlow at heart."

"That was so corny."

"Yeah well...'

I felt another presence in the Rec Room.

"Hey Caveman. I thought you left."

Caveman and Zero stood there at the door. Charlie came up behind them.

"That note you found... remember? The one Kate Barlow wrote, saying the treasure belonged to you..."

I shook my head. "It has Stanley's name on it. It was stolen by my great grandmother, but it originally belongs to the Yelnats."

"Yeah but..." Caveman started.

"Whatever is in that box belongs to you and your family. It was taken away from you by a crazy woman who's dead now... so she can't really stop you from taking it..."

Silence.

"Cool."

And they left.

Charlie stepped into the Rec-room, soaked. He could tell from looking at our faces that I'd changed my mind about my decision concerning going back home with him.

"Good luck, both of you," he said, standing there.

"What's going to happen to you?' I asked Charlie. I didn't move from my spot and neither did he.

"I'm basically an orphan now. I guess I'll be sent to some facility filled with children of great pain and angst in their hearts."

"I can always adopt you," JackJack said.

"No no... that would make Mouse my sister—or my aunt, or something..." he looked at me, still shaking his head, "and that wouldn't work."

I stood up.

"So then what?" I asked.

"So then..." Charlie shrugged. "Goodbye."

What?

"But..."

"I'll write to you..." Charlie said, taking two steps forward.

"I don't have an address... you don't either."

"I'll call you.'

"We don't have phone numbers..."

"You and your negative thinking."

"This can't be where we leave off."

"But it is."

I lifted my hand for him to shake it. He instead brought it to his lips.

Let's go! If you make me stay here a moment longer I'll grow a tumor inside of you!

Jack got up and walked me to Mr. Sir's office where I noticed a small, blue Toyota.

"Get in," JackJack said gently as he opened the door.

Jack put the key in the ignition and the car started with a low hum. I missed that sound so much.

"Seatbelts."

I heard a tap at my window.

It was Armpit.

JackJack rolled down the window.

"I'll miss you, Maggie." Sniffling, he took out a piece of paper from his pocket.

"This is my mother's number... our mother's number," he said, laughing. "Please tell her Theodore says 'I'm sorry'. Will you do that?"

I took the piece of paper. "Okeedoke."

The car drove away.

I took one last look at the Warden, Mr. Sir, and Pendanski being arrested and taken away, the D-Tenters waving goodbye, the other boys dancing in the rain, and Charlie silently watching his mother get shoved into a police car.

At the last minute, he looked my direction and said something to me.

"What?!" I cried out of the car window.

He said it again, but I never heard him.

He was too far away.

Without turning to face him, I said to Jack; "did you know that black boy is my brother, too?'

Jack didn't show any signs of surprise

"Really? Tell me about it."

And I did.

-goes to eat a sandwich-

Well, my story ends here.

For a while, JackJack and I lived in the car, and then at a motel. He found a job at a Wal-Mart's as a cashier.

Eventually, with the inheritance money from our parents, we managed to buy an apartment in New York.

I mailed Stanley and Zero, telling them about my "travels". Then two weeks after, a very skinny and clean-shaven Stanley Yelnats arrived at our home with a cheque for fifty thousand dollars in his rich little hand.

On the envelope it said for Maggie.

I was happy.

When I turned sixteen, we decided to go visit the place we used to live; the exact alley where I was arrested and taken away to Camp Greenlake. Nothing changed, except for the new Hooters built two buildings away.

A drunken man, also stuffed up on dope, surprised us from behind. He stupidly pulled out a pistol and told us both we upset the oyster gods and that we needed to be killed.

JackJack tried to get the man to leave, and when he didn't he tried to take the gun away, but Jack ended up getting shot in the neck.

He died.

The drunken man staggered off, leaving me sitting on the concrete soaked in my dead brother's blood.

That was when I realized what my 'guardian angel' had been telling me all along. Those two years with my brother were just one long goodbye. That day, he died so I could live, just as that angel in my dream had said he would. Two years was all I had, but it was all I needed.

That was the worst day of my life.

I was then told to pack my bags. They took me to Texas where Armpit—who insisted on being called Theodore— had lived with is family.

They welcomed me with open arms. I learned to answer to the name of Mouse, and Maggie. No one called me Lydia ever again.

Just a few years later, I managed to have a place of my own.

Then, one Christmas, the doorbell rang.

I opened the door.

A handsome man in a moustache stood there in a scarf and a French coat with a colorful parcel in his gloved hands.

"Oh, hello." I said.

"Merry Christmas," he said.

"Who the hell are you?"

'God, you've become so beautiful."

"That's nice."

I closed the door.

The doorbell rang again.

I opened it.

"Oh... it's you."

"You didn't take my present," he said, giving me the box.

I took it.

"I hope it's not a bomb. I haven't taken the turkey out of the oven yet."

"It's not a bomb," he assured me, "It's a present."

"Oh good. That's what I thought it was."

He shook his head.

"You haven't changed... but you look so... so much happier, Mouse."

I stopped twisting the ribbons on the parcel and looked right at his strange grin.

What did you call me?

Then I realized...

"Can I come in?" he asked.

I couldn't help but smile.

"Sure, Charlie...but WAIIT!!"

"What?"

"Wipe your feet."

Thanks to everyone who reviewed, including Thunderspell, Lilmizzrebel31 (although I think she changed her pename... it's been so long!), MAD4magik, Czelene (with all your different names to make it look like different people with the same idea... good luck giving away illegal medications under false names. You know what I mean... : )., Nosilla, narutorules03, Fk306animelover, ArwenEvenstar83, Renodori (Perky Pyromaniac, yes, I remember that name, lol), DisasterZone16, and meltedicecreamisme.
You people kept me going.

It's strange, you know, finishing a story like that. I feel as if I'd finished a book or something, and now I have nothing else to do. I never planned for it to finish, and I never planned for Charlie to last for more than two chapters, that horrible bastard child that I've come to love among many other characters. I enjoyed writing this so much, and I enjoyed all 224 reviews even more!

And

Thank you for reading.