Chapter 10: The Trip Back!
TWO AND HALF WEEKS LATER!
The Chipmunks, and Chipettes, along with Dave, and Miss. Miller, sat on a small plane that is now flying over the Atlantic Ocean. Finally the others get to see this so-called Island that Simon was forced to live on.
"It was great for the two detectives to set up the licence to be able to make this trip to the Island." Miss. Miller said to Dave. Dave, who sat beside her, nodded in agreement. "Yea. Especially knowing that the Government had put a 'no trespassing' law on the Island. The detectives would have come too, but Simon wanted to just have us come along and no one else."
Simon peered out the window of the small plane and started panicking almost immediately. The captain was heard on the p.a. announcing that they would be landing soon. But that was not what bothered Simon. Memories of the first time he came to this Island began to haunt him. He found himself tensing up and hyperventilating. Jeanette, whom was sitting beside him, started to stroke his hand to comfort him.
"It's ok, Simon! We are here with you!" Jeanette said calmly.
"We're all here!" Theodore chimed from the seat over in the next aisle.
Simon looked up and saw his two bothers; Dave, Miss. Miller, Jeanette, and her sisters all were watching him with concern.
Even though his family and friends were with him, he still felt uncomfortable. He bent over and stuck his head between his legs to help himself breathe easier. The others could only imagine how Simon must be feeling right now.
********
15 MINUTES LATER!
The plane landed and everyone walked out on the runway. Simon was hesitant, but took a deep breath and stepped off the plane. As everyone watched Simon, ever-nervously coming off the plane and taking small steps down the stairs. They were uncertain if he would be ok on this trip.
"Where do you want to go first, Simon?" Dave asked.
Simon got his bearings together before answering. "Um, I.I guess we could go to the quarters where I stayed in." He figured a short tour before he retrieves the box wouldn't hurt.
Everyone nodded before grabbing a few empty duffel bags and flashlights. Then they followed Simon towards some damaged buildings.
********
THE OLD SLEEPING QUARTERS!
The door opens and eight flashlights shine inside a dark room. Six chipmunk teens and two adult humans walk into a messy room with three beds and a bathroom located to the left. It felt weird being back on the Island. A part of Simon felt that he had never left. He panned the room and froze. A pale look came over Simon, for a brief moment he swore that he was seeing his friends Tom and Brian as 10-year-old ghosts sitting on their beds looking back at him.
Miss. Miller reached over to the wall and tried to flick the light switch on, but nothing happened. She then stepped forward and moved her flashlight around the room to have a better look at it. "The explosion that the detectives explained to us must of done more damage then anyone thought! This room is a mess!" Miss. Miller said.
When Miss. Miller spoke up it made Simon jump a bit. This all was very distressing and hard to maintain a calm appearance. He thought about what she said and smiled in a shy, embarrassed manner, and then turned to his family and friends. "A-a-actually, this room always looked like this."
Everyone looked at Simon as if he were a stranger. "Mr. Clean and Tidy? Mr. Responsibility?" Alvin said in shock.
"Well, a-after a while, we just gave up on following the Founders' rules and made our own." Simon shrugged as he hung his head in shame.
Alvin shook his head in disbelief and walked beside one of the beds and felt his foot bump into something. He looked down and shone the flashlight on an empty whisky bottle. Carefully moving it aside, Alvin continued to look around the room.
Theodore and Eleanor noticed red spots on the floor near the bathroom. "Were you guys panting something in here, Simon?" Theodore asked.
"No! Art was forbidden, among other things! Why Theodore?" Simon said from the other end of the room.
"Well, there are this red spots over here by the bathroom!"
Eleanor bent over to have a closer look. She shone her flashlight on it and realized what it could be. "Theodore, it's not paint, it's blood!" Everyone looked to Simon for answers.
Simon looked away for a moment; he rubbed the insides of his wrists as he decided on how to explain the blood. "The Founders used to beat the insides of our wrists with a whip whenever we did not obey any of their rules." He finally said. "Sometimes when one of us came back from a beating we would bleed a lot. We'd try to clean up any splotches after dressing up our wounds as best as we could, but apparently we still missed a few spots."
Simon looked up at all the concerned faces and turned away to ignore the stares and went to the bed where he used to sleep. He sat down and reached behind the bookshelf beside the bed and pulled out a notebook. Dave walked up and sat down beside him.
"What is that?" Dave asked, while watching Simon as he absent-mindedly flipped through the pages.
Simon gave a shy smile as he remembered the moments he'd spent sneaking around campus grounds with Tom and the others then frowned again before looking up towards Dave. "We weren't aloud to do anything artistic or write any personal notes. About four to six months within the first year being here we found these notebooks in a specialty-looked room in one of the buildings on the east side of the Island. We instantly started to fill them with all sorts of personal notes about our experiences, plans to try to get off the Island, and creative writing; like poems and short stories. This helped us to maintain a sane mind and not fall under the Founder's mind control. In order to keep them secret from the Founders we hid them behind this shelf and in some panels in the wall here."
Again, Simon flipped through some of the pages and started to read a few lines on one of the pages. "This is one of Brian's books!" Then he hands Dave the book. He reached behind the bookcase again and pulled out two more books and placed them beside Dave.
Dave, Miss. Miller and the girls skimmed through the books that Simon laid down on the bed. There were some parts that they couldn't understand, because of the fact that some of it was written in different languages. Simon got Alvin and Theodore to help pull back Tom's former bed. Then Simon walked up to the wall and started to tap certain areas until it sounded hollow. After finding the right spot, Simon lightly punched the wall and made a hole that revealed more notebooks of all sizes and colours.
Everyone helped to put the books in a duffel bag that they brought with them. Then they went into the room next door, where Brenda and Renee slept. There they found more notebooks and sculptures that Brenda did in the wall. They carefully placed them in a different duffel bag and left the rooms.
After dropping the bags off at the plane they continued their tour throughout the campus. Simon took them to some of the classes and lecture rooms where Simon attended, and to the laboratory where Brian created the purple bomb. Some of the old buildings were unreachable, due to the fact that it had been burnt to the ground because of the explosion. He even lead them to the cafeteria where they were fed the green substance that he and the others called 'the slop'. Simon explained how the stuff had all the necessary ingredients to keep the children alive and healthy, not to mentioned that if anyone of them would eat it now, that they would all get sick and die of poisoning. He even took him to the most dreaded room that created the most fear in him.The Whipping Room.
Simon stood in the middle of the room just stared at the infernal contraption that haunted him in his nightmares. He started hearing echoes of screaming children as they were receiving their 'punishment'. The screams kept getting louder, and Simon could feel the pain each child was receiving. He could even hear his own screaming from when he was being punished for the first time.
Without out realizing it, Simon was hyperventilating as he tried to cover his ears from the terrified screams. Dave and the other could tell that Simon had a hard time letting go of the horrible memories. They themselves could not hear the screams, but could feel Simon's pain as he was reliving the nightmare this room held for him.
Dave confronted him and placed both hands on his son's shoulders and gave him a quick shake to break him out from the brutal visions. "Come on Simon! Lets gets you out for some fresh air!" Simon opened his eyes and quickly agreed.
--------------
It took a few moment for Simon regain his composure and continue with the tour of the Hell he'd endured for five years. He next showed them the shelter, where the F.B.I. found all the missing children and a few of the Founders dead, except for Simon and his friends. Simon suddenly got a chill through out his body. He stood there and watched all the ghostly children drinking the 'punch' and dying in front of him. "Ok, lets get out of here." He said.
"I second that." Alvin said. He too, as well as everyone else, was getting an eerie feeling from the room. Only Simon, apparently, saw the ghosts. It mattered not though; there is a dense air in that room that everyone could feel.
---------------
Simon then took them into the woods where the secret field was and a few other spots where he and his friends hung out and played, secretly of course.
This part of the tour brought out the lighter side of Simon. Dave and Miss. Miller watched their teen chipmunks as they ran and played through the trees. Simon led them to a field where he, Tom and the others hung out. Dave and Miss. Miller started to set up a spot for a picnic lunch while Simon showed his siblings and the Chipettes a view on the cliffs.
As they stood there and watched the view, Simon looked over and noticed an image standing by a narrow path. As he kept looking at it he realized that this image looked like Mary. He then swallowed a huge lump in his throat. This is it. He needs to make due his promise to his friends.
--------------
Moments later the hungry chipmunks returned, except Simon and Jeanette. "Where are Simon and Jeanette?" Dave asked with suspicion.
"Oh Simon suddenly got into one of his quiet depressed moods, and said that he needed to be by himself for awhile!" Alvin shrugged.
"And what about Jeanette?" Miss. Miller said in a worried tone.
"She went with him! Guess she figured he shouldn't be alone!" Brittany said as she picked up a sandwich.
"When do you figure they'd be back?" Dave asked feeling annoyed with this news.
"Don't know! He said he'd be gone about fifteen to twenty minuets!" Theodore said while chewing on his sandwich.
Everyone had no choice, but to start lunch without Simon and Jeanette and hope that Theodore would leave them a sandwich or two for when they get back.
--------------
Jeanette stood and admired the beautiful scene of the ocean waves crashing against the rocks on the cliffs below. She turned to see Simon looking somewhat baffled and confused about something.
"It's a shame this place hold so many bad memories for you, this such a beautiful Island!" She said trying to get his mind on something else.
"Huh? Oh, ah some memories weren't that bad. Only the ones that were with the Founders." He let out a deep sigh. "I guess that would be most of the time!"
Simon again brought his attention to the path that just seemed to have just ended. He was sure there was the entrance to a cave somewhere around here, not far was a small waterfall. He can hear the water running. But the thought occurred to him that the cave must have been elsewhere. Ready to try again, Simon turned to Jeanette to tell her when something moved in a bush beside him. He was sure there was someone or something there, but it was gone. It almost sounded as if it ran through the bush. Curiosity got the better of him, and he went to investigate.
He pulled back some of the branches and discovered the rest of the path. 'The vegetation must have grown over the path since I was here last?' Simon thought to himself.
"Simon, what are you doing?"
With a smile, Simon turned to his mate. "Come on, I want to show you something!"
--------------
The couple entered a small cave; inside was a bed mattress lying in the back of the cave. Jeanette looked at Simon suspiciously. "Do I even dare to ask why you brought me down here?" She said with a smirk.
Simon started laughing, "Jeanette, I have more class then that!"
"So why *are* we here?" Jeanette wined.
"The last time I saw Mary-Anne alive was here!" Jeanette had a tense look on her face when Simon said that and watched him as he sat on the mattress. He leaned over and started to touch along the wall of the cave. "She told me part of the 'suicide' mission she and Jeff, Rob, and Mark went on. Then she showed me a black box and said if anything went wrong, that I should get Tom and the others and continue in their mission to expose the Founders for who they really are." He paused for a second and regretted that his friends couldn't be here to help him with this part of the mission. Looking up at the wall of stones again, he continued the search for what he was looking for.
Simon was starting to get frustrated, until he felt one of the stones move. "Ah, ha!" He cried. "Anyway, I had forgotten about it during my first year back home, do to the fact that I suffered an enormous break down and went into a deep depression..."
Simon paused for a bit again as he moved the stone to reveal a hole in the wall. "The last couple of months I kept having this reoccurring nightmare. For a while I didn't know what it meant until a few weeks ago. That's when I figured out what it was trying to tell me something. I went downstairs to my study room and found in one of the cd's a key and a note. After reading the note I suddenly remembered this box and the promise I made to Mary before she left the Island on her last mission!" He said this as he pulled out a black box from the hole. "I also figured by coming back here I would find this box and get rid of some demons that still haunt me at the same time."
"What's in there?" Jeanette questioned as she sat down on the mattress beside Simon.
"Hopefully, some answers to a lot of questions." Simon solemnly answered. He looked up and saw Jeanette as she concentrated on the box. His focus now was on how beautiful she looked right at this moment.
"It looks like it needs a key or something to open it." She said with a sigh. Then looked up into Simon's greyish/blue eyes. "You said you found a key.did you bring it?"
"Hmm?" He brought himself back to reality, "Ah, no. I-I hid in my desk back home."
"Oh!" Jeanette suddenly had a disappointed look on her face. She looked up into her love's eyes again when she felt him touching her cheek. "Jeanette, thanks for coming down here with me." Simon said softly. "This whole trip isn't easy for me. And quite frankly this cave has always given me the creeps.
Jeanette smiled warmly. "You're welcome." She said. "I understand how stressful this all is for you." They kept looking into each other's eyes. As if like a magnetic pull, they slowly moved in for a kiss.
"We should get back!" Simon said when he finally pulled back to take a breath.
"Uh ha!" Jeanette replied before moving forward for another kiss.
---------------
45 MINUTES LATER, BACK IN THE MEADOW!
Simon and Jeanette finally returned to see their worried parents and siblings.
"Where have you been?" Dave snapped.
"We walked around." Simon simply answered.
"Where did you get that box, Simon?" Miss. Miller asked.
"Um, we found it." Jeanette quickly answered for Simon.
"Where?" Miss. Miller asked again.
"In a cave." Simon said in a truthful manner.
"Hmm? Did a bit of exploring, did we?" Alvin teased.
"Ah, I guess you could say that." Simon smirked.
"Here, we saved you guys some sandwiches!" Theodore perked.
"And some juice." Eleanor added.
"Great, I'm hungry!" Jeanette said as she welcomed the sandwich that is handed to her.
Simon laid the box down on the ground and sat on it while eating his sandwich that his brother handed him. As Simon ate his sandwich he started to stare outward at the ocean. Something he'd done often when he sat at this spot with his friends. Without looking at his family and friends he asked, "Can we go home, now?"
"Sure!" Dave answered with a sigh.
A small smile crossed his lips, he would ask that same question to Tom, Mary-Anne and the others, but would often get a 'no' for an answer. By hearing the answer he always wanted to hear made him feel that a weight has been lifted.
TWO AND HALF WEEKS LATER!
The Chipmunks, and Chipettes, along with Dave, and Miss. Miller, sat on a small plane that is now flying over the Atlantic Ocean. Finally the others get to see this so-called Island that Simon was forced to live on.
"It was great for the two detectives to set up the licence to be able to make this trip to the Island." Miss. Miller said to Dave. Dave, who sat beside her, nodded in agreement. "Yea. Especially knowing that the Government had put a 'no trespassing' law on the Island. The detectives would have come too, but Simon wanted to just have us come along and no one else."
Simon peered out the window of the small plane and started panicking almost immediately. The captain was heard on the p.a. announcing that they would be landing soon. But that was not what bothered Simon. Memories of the first time he came to this Island began to haunt him. He found himself tensing up and hyperventilating. Jeanette, whom was sitting beside him, started to stroke his hand to comfort him.
"It's ok, Simon! We are here with you!" Jeanette said calmly.
"We're all here!" Theodore chimed from the seat over in the next aisle.
Simon looked up and saw his two bothers; Dave, Miss. Miller, Jeanette, and her sisters all were watching him with concern.
Even though his family and friends were with him, he still felt uncomfortable. He bent over and stuck his head between his legs to help himself breathe easier. The others could only imagine how Simon must be feeling right now.
********
15 MINUTES LATER!
The plane landed and everyone walked out on the runway. Simon was hesitant, but took a deep breath and stepped off the plane. As everyone watched Simon, ever-nervously coming off the plane and taking small steps down the stairs. They were uncertain if he would be ok on this trip.
"Where do you want to go first, Simon?" Dave asked.
Simon got his bearings together before answering. "Um, I.I guess we could go to the quarters where I stayed in." He figured a short tour before he retrieves the box wouldn't hurt.
Everyone nodded before grabbing a few empty duffel bags and flashlights. Then they followed Simon towards some damaged buildings.
********
THE OLD SLEEPING QUARTERS!
The door opens and eight flashlights shine inside a dark room. Six chipmunk teens and two adult humans walk into a messy room with three beds and a bathroom located to the left. It felt weird being back on the Island. A part of Simon felt that he had never left. He panned the room and froze. A pale look came over Simon, for a brief moment he swore that he was seeing his friends Tom and Brian as 10-year-old ghosts sitting on their beds looking back at him.
Miss. Miller reached over to the wall and tried to flick the light switch on, but nothing happened. She then stepped forward and moved her flashlight around the room to have a better look at it. "The explosion that the detectives explained to us must of done more damage then anyone thought! This room is a mess!" Miss. Miller said.
When Miss. Miller spoke up it made Simon jump a bit. This all was very distressing and hard to maintain a calm appearance. He thought about what she said and smiled in a shy, embarrassed manner, and then turned to his family and friends. "A-a-actually, this room always looked like this."
Everyone looked at Simon as if he were a stranger. "Mr. Clean and Tidy? Mr. Responsibility?" Alvin said in shock.
"Well, a-after a while, we just gave up on following the Founders' rules and made our own." Simon shrugged as he hung his head in shame.
Alvin shook his head in disbelief and walked beside one of the beds and felt his foot bump into something. He looked down and shone the flashlight on an empty whisky bottle. Carefully moving it aside, Alvin continued to look around the room.
Theodore and Eleanor noticed red spots on the floor near the bathroom. "Were you guys panting something in here, Simon?" Theodore asked.
"No! Art was forbidden, among other things! Why Theodore?" Simon said from the other end of the room.
"Well, there are this red spots over here by the bathroom!"
Eleanor bent over to have a closer look. She shone her flashlight on it and realized what it could be. "Theodore, it's not paint, it's blood!" Everyone looked to Simon for answers.
Simon looked away for a moment; he rubbed the insides of his wrists as he decided on how to explain the blood. "The Founders used to beat the insides of our wrists with a whip whenever we did not obey any of their rules." He finally said. "Sometimes when one of us came back from a beating we would bleed a lot. We'd try to clean up any splotches after dressing up our wounds as best as we could, but apparently we still missed a few spots."
Simon looked up at all the concerned faces and turned away to ignore the stares and went to the bed where he used to sleep. He sat down and reached behind the bookshelf beside the bed and pulled out a notebook. Dave walked up and sat down beside him.
"What is that?" Dave asked, while watching Simon as he absent-mindedly flipped through the pages.
Simon gave a shy smile as he remembered the moments he'd spent sneaking around campus grounds with Tom and the others then frowned again before looking up towards Dave. "We weren't aloud to do anything artistic or write any personal notes. About four to six months within the first year being here we found these notebooks in a specialty-looked room in one of the buildings on the east side of the Island. We instantly started to fill them with all sorts of personal notes about our experiences, plans to try to get off the Island, and creative writing; like poems and short stories. This helped us to maintain a sane mind and not fall under the Founder's mind control. In order to keep them secret from the Founders we hid them behind this shelf and in some panels in the wall here."
Again, Simon flipped through some of the pages and started to read a few lines on one of the pages. "This is one of Brian's books!" Then he hands Dave the book. He reached behind the bookcase again and pulled out two more books and placed them beside Dave.
Dave, Miss. Miller and the girls skimmed through the books that Simon laid down on the bed. There were some parts that they couldn't understand, because of the fact that some of it was written in different languages. Simon got Alvin and Theodore to help pull back Tom's former bed. Then Simon walked up to the wall and started to tap certain areas until it sounded hollow. After finding the right spot, Simon lightly punched the wall and made a hole that revealed more notebooks of all sizes and colours.
Everyone helped to put the books in a duffel bag that they brought with them. Then they went into the room next door, where Brenda and Renee slept. There they found more notebooks and sculptures that Brenda did in the wall. They carefully placed them in a different duffel bag and left the rooms.
After dropping the bags off at the plane they continued their tour throughout the campus. Simon took them to some of the classes and lecture rooms where Simon attended, and to the laboratory where Brian created the purple bomb. Some of the old buildings were unreachable, due to the fact that it had been burnt to the ground because of the explosion. He even lead them to the cafeteria where they were fed the green substance that he and the others called 'the slop'. Simon explained how the stuff had all the necessary ingredients to keep the children alive and healthy, not to mentioned that if anyone of them would eat it now, that they would all get sick and die of poisoning. He even took him to the most dreaded room that created the most fear in him.The Whipping Room.
Simon stood in the middle of the room just stared at the infernal contraption that haunted him in his nightmares. He started hearing echoes of screaming children as they were receiving their 'punishment'. The screams kept getting louder, and Simon could feel the pain each child was receiving. He could even hear his own screaming from when he was being punished for the first time.
Without out realizing it, Simon was hyperventilating as he tried to cover his ears from the terrified screams. Dave and the other could tell that Simon had a hard time letting go of the horrible memories. They themselves could not hear the screams, but could feel Simon's pain as he was reliving the nightmare this room held for him.
Dave confronted him and placed both hands on his son's shoulders and gave him a quick shake to break him out from the brutal visions. "Come on Simon! Lets gets you out for some fresh air!" Simon opened his eyes and quickly agreed.
--------------
It took a few moment for Simon regain his composure and continue with the tour of the Hell he'd endured for five years. He next showed them the shelter, where the F.B.I. found all the missing children and a few of the Founders dead, except for Simon and his friends. Simon suddenly got a chill through out his body. He stood there and watched all the ghostly children drinking the 'punch' and dying in front of him. "Ok, lets get out of here." He said.
"I second that." Alvin said. He too, as well as everyone else, was getting an eerie feeling from the room. Only Simon, apparently, saw the ghosts. It mattered not though; there is a dense air in that room that everyone could feel.
---------------
Simon then took them into the woods where the secret field was and a few other spots where he and his friends hung out and played, secretly of course.
This part of the tour brought out the lighter side of Simon. Dave and Miss. Miller watched their teen chipmunks as they ran and played through the trees. Simon led them to a field where he, Tom and the others hung out. Dave and Miss. Miller started to set up a spot for a picnic lunch while Simon showed his siblings and the Chipettes a view on the cliffs.
As they stood there and watched the view, Simon looked over and noticed an image standing by a narrow path. As he kept looking at it he realized that this image looked like Mary. He then swallowed a huge lump in his throat. This is it. He needs to make due his promise to his friends.
--------------
Moments later the hungry chipmunks returned, except Simon and Jeanette. "Where are Simon and Jeanette?" Dave asked with suspicion.
"Oh Simon suddenly got into one of his quiet depressed moods, and said that he needed to be by himself for awhile!" Alvin shrugged.
"And what about Jeanette?" Miss. Miller said in a worried tone.
"She went with him! Guess she figured he shouldn't be alone!" Brittany said as she picked up a sandwich.
"When do you figure they'd be back?" Dave asked feeling annoyed with this news.
"Don't know! He said he'd be gone about fifteen to twenty minuets!" Theodore said while chewing on his sandwich.
Everyone had no choice, but to start lunch without Simon and Jeanette and hope that Theodore would leave them a sandwich or two for when they get back.
--------------
Jeanette stood and admired the beautiful scene of the ocean waves crashing against the rocks on the cliffs below. She turned to see Simon looking somewhat baffled and confused about something.
"It's a shame this place hold so many bad memories for you, this such a beautiful Island!" She said trying to get his mind on something else.
"Huh? Oh, ah some memories weren't that bad. Only the ones that were with the Founders." He let out a deep sigh. "I guess that would be most of the time!"
Simon again brought his attention to the path that just seemed to have just ended. He was sure there was the entrance to a cave somewhere around here, not far was a small waterfall. He can hear the water running. But the thought occurred to him that the cave must have been elsewhere. Ready to try again, Simon turned to Jeanette to tell her when something moved in a bush beside him. He was sure there was someone or something there, but it was gone. It almost sounded as if it ran through the bush. Curiosity got the better of him, and he went to investigate.
He pulled back some of the branches and discovered the rest of the path. 'The vegetation must have grown over the path since I was here last?' Simon thought to himself.
"Simon, what are you doing?"
With a smile, Simon turned to his mate. "Come on, I want to show you something!"
--------------
The couple entered a small cave; inside was a bed mattress lying in the back of the cave. Jeanette looked at Simon suspiciously. "Do I even dare to ask why you brought me down here?" She said with a smirk.
Simon started laughing, "Jeanette, I have more class then that!"
"So why *are* we here?" Jeanette wined.
"The last time I saw Mary-Anne alive was here!" Jeanette had a tense look on her face when Simon said that and watched him as he sat on the mattress. He leaned over and started to touch along the wall of the cave. "She told me part of the 'suicide' mission she and Jeff, Rob, and Mark went on. Then she showed me a black box and said if anything went wrong, that I should get Tom and the others and continue in their mission to expose the Founders for who they really are." He paused for a second and regretted that his friends couldn't be here to help him with this part of the mission. Looking up at the wall of stones again, he continued the search for what he was looking for.
Simon was starting to get frustrated, until he felt one of the stones move. "Ah, ha!" He cried. "Anyway, I had forgotten about it during my first year back home, do to the fact that I suffered an enormous break down and went into a deep depression..."
Simon paused for a bit again as he moved the stone to reveal a hole in the wall. "The last couple of months I kept having this reoccurring nightmare. For a while I didn't know what it meant until a few weeks ago. That's when I figured out what it was trying to tell me something. I went downstairs to my study room and found in one of the cd's a key and a note. After reading the note I suddenly remembered this box and the promise I made to Mary before she left the Island on her last mission!" He said this as he pulled out a black box from the hole. "I also figured by coming back here I would find this box and get rid of some demons that still haunt me at the same time."
"What's in there?" Jeanette questioned as she sat down on the mattress beside Simon.
"Hopefully, some answers to a lot of questions." Simon solemnly answered. He looked up and saw Jeanette as she concentrated on the box. His focus now was on how beautiful she looked right at this moment.
"It looks like it needs a key or something to open it." She said with a sigh. Then looked up into Simon's greyish/blue eyes. "You said you found a key.did you bring it?"
"Hmm?" He brought himself back to reality, "Ah, no. I-I hid in my desk back home."
"Oh!" Jeanette suddenly had a disappointed look on her face. She looked up into her love's eyes again when she felt him touching her cheek. "Jeanette, thanks for coming down here with me." Simon said softly. "This whole trip isn't easy for me. And quite frankly this cave has always given me the creeps.
Jeanette smiled warmly. "You're welcome." She said. "I understand how stressful this all is for you." They kept looking into each other's eyes. As if like a magnetic pull, they slowly moved in for a kiss.
"We should get back!" Simon said when he finally pulled back to take a breath.
"Uh ha!" Jeanette replied before moving forward for another kiss.
---------------
45 MINUTES LATER, BACK IN THE MEADOW!
Simon and Jeanette finally returned to see their worried parents and siblings.
"Where have you been?" Dave snapped.
"We walked around." Simon simply answered.
"Where did you get that box, Simon?" Miss. Miller asked.
"Um, we found it." Jeanette quickly answered for Simon.
"Where?" Miss. Miller asked again.
"In a cave." Simon said in a truthful manner.
"Hmm? Did a bit of exploring, did we?" Alvin teased.
"Ah, I guess you could say that." Simon smirked.
"Here, we saved you guys some sandwiches!" Theodore perked.
"And some juice." Eleanor added.
"Great, I'm hungry!" Jeanette said as she welcomed the sandwich that is handed to her.
Simon laid the box down on the ground and sat on it while eating his sandwich that his brother handed him. As Simon ate his sandwich he started to stare outward at the ocean. Something he'd done often when he sat at this spot with his friends. Without looking at his family and friends he asked, "Can we go home, now?"
"Sure!" Dave answered with a sigh.
A small smile crossed his lips, he would ask that same question to Tom, Mary-Anne and the others, but would often get a 'no' for an answer. By hearing the answer he always wanted to hear made him feel that a weight has been lifted.