Chapter Eight: Switch Off
According to Amori we have to switch now. I didn't even have any idea that we were doing anything. But no, she's just handed me an eight-subject five star notebook and a pen and told me to record everything that happens to us. Lara's giving her a very weird look but Amori has settled back into her seat and her headphones are drowning out the world around her. Looking back through the book it's obvious that she's been keeping this since we met in the seventh grade. It's a basically a record of our lives. Maybe I should take over. She after all has been keeping it for eight years. It just seems sort of odd that on a plane over the Pacific she'd say 'Ok, you have to document our lives now'.
Amori told me just state my name for the record and continue our life story and give it back to her in eight years. Ok, I'm Scott Summers and the loon who's just handed me this notebook is my cousin Amori Kyle. I live in Bayville, New York but I'm originally from Anchorage, Alaska…
"No, no!" Amori looked up from her Cosmo. "I already wrote all your stats. I did that back in seventh grade. Just tell what happens to us."
"You are strange." I said, closing the book. "What's with this anyway?"
She shrugged. "It just sorta came into existence one day. And it's yours now for eight years."
I raised my eyebrows, flipping through some of the pages from before. It seemed that when she moved to the mansion the entries went off on other topics like Hannah, her mother, or Remy. Remy? I grinned at her skimming over the entry. The general gist was that she had a major crush on a certain Cajun.
"Does Remy know all of this?" I teased. Lara looked over my arm to see what I was teasing her sister about and her face lit up when she read the page.
"You wanna hug him, you wanna kiss him." Lara said in a singsong voice.
"Oh damn." Amori blushed, staring out of the planes window. "I wrote that in there?"
"Not in those words." I said. "But we get the idea."
She sighed rubbing the bridge of her nose. "It's not like he doesn't know so you don't have to go rubbing it in his face. Besides Scott what happened to, I stay out of your love life and you stay out of mine. I haven't tried to set you up with Jean any more have I?"
"Oh God Amori." I rolled my eyes sky ward. "I set you up one bad date…"
"Two. You took me to the eighth grade dinner dance. Remember." Amori shot back.
"That was cold." Said Lara.
"I'm kidding Scott." She said, giving me puppy dog eyes. "And anyway, yes I do like Remy. He's sweet."
"And he's turning you into an alcoholic." I joked.
Amori gave a heavy I'm-more-mature-than-you sigh and plopped her headphones back on her ears. "Let me know when we're there. Shouldn't be more than an hour." As if to verify the comment she gestured down to the blue Pacific Ocean below us.
Lara and I assured her we would then I turned back to the notebook in my lap.
An hour until we get to Hawaii. I know it's Christmas and all, but I have this really weird feeling that something bad might happen. Maybe it's just the distance getting to me; being so far from New York and all. It could be that Hannah's going to be there and that she lives in the same house as my brother. I think it's defiantly more the logistics of the whole thing though. Hawaii's just so far off. If something bad were to go on would anyone back at the mansion find out? I didn't have this feeling when I was there in October just before Halloween, and that was really bad with that storm and Alex and I almost drowning. Maybe I'm just overly paranoid, but somehow I don't think so.
*~*
It was very hot when we got off of the plane in Hawaii. That might sound like a dumb statement, but it was true. The airport was fairly crowded because of holiday traffic, but I was able to find Alex quickly after we entered the terminal. His almost bleached white hair stood out among the crowd. Hannah was with him twirling car keys on her finger while leaning against a palm tree. I groaned slightly when I saw her and when I pointed them out Amori shared my reaction but a little more vehemently.
I see you guys over there. Come On! Hannah sounded a lot happier than she had been in Bayville. Her minds voice was light and had an under tone of a laugh in it. Amori even smiled a little after hearing her call.
"Scott!" As we approached my little brother grabbed me, squeezing fiercely. I returned the embrace, grinning all the while. Amori and Lara greeted Hannah (civilly I noticed) with tight smiles and hellos and then turned their attention to Alex as Hannah introduced them. Amori granted herself a friendly demeanor when she turned to Alex, and by the time we were walking out to the parking lot the were in a heated discussion.
The back of their jeep was loaded with surfboards, a cooler and various other things one would take to the beach. Hannah had to push some of the stuff out of the back seat before we could all fit in.
"Hope you guys aren't too tired." Said Alex, climbing into the drivers seat. "The beach awaits. And, they're no storms in the forecast."
"That's not funny Alex." I rolled my eyes, wondering how he could joke about that.
"Definitely the beach." Said Lara. "We're not that tired, right?"
Amori and I nodded in agreement. Hannah laughed. "Well even if you were, Alex's driving would keep you awake. You might wanna buckle your belts…"