Chapter 50
"You're up early. That excited that it's Friday?" Fox rolled his eyes at his mom as he poured cup of milk. "I think I'll go for a run before I head to school, you know, can't hurt to get a little exercise." Vixy smiled as she watched her son walk out the door.
'Now which way do I run?' He normally runs deeper into the neighborhood, towards Krystal's house. 'Why not try a different route this time around?' He took off on his new route, looking at his phone to make sure he would be back in time to leave for school. 'School starts at 8, so heading out a little later than usual won't hurt me any' He thought to himself as he looked at his phone, he was out longer than he thought.
Fox made it to school on time, if barely. He sat down at his usual seat in first period, still no Krystal. He could merely shake his head and work on his schoolwork for the day.
"So, that's it? You're giving up?" Lucy was shooting Fox daggers at lunch. "I guess that's something you can say, but I wouldn't. I just don't know, maybe this is something that needs to be done. If she doesn't want us to find her then we won't. I have to let go of some things, it's hard for me to swallow but this just might be it." Fox had another weak smile on his face as he swirled the applesauce on his lunch tray. That was that, his mind had been made up.
He walked to his car after school looking around at the parking lot, seeing all the people talking about their plans for the weekend. 'Funny, for one year she made things so different, made things such a big deal. Now look where we are.' Things were a little different now.
"Hey! Wait up!" Fox turned around and saw his friend running towards him. "Hey Slippy, what's up?" "What are we doing this weekend? We still are trying something right?" A little bit of a surprise, because normally they say something in their group message a day or so before Friday. "Yeah why not? Let's go to the arcade, I hear they have a new piloting game there." Slippy had an excited look on his face, it had been a while since they had gone to the arcade.
Fox headed home to get something to eat then would meet them at the arcade later that afternoon. "So then, rock paper scissors to see who two go first?" Falco's proposal was unanimously agreed on. Falco and Slippy were the victors and the first two to pop in a few quarters and have a duel of aerial proportions.
It wasn't close.
"I'm sure hoping you played for fun, because the score sure wasn't close" Falco just laughed while patting the frog on his back, Slippy could only roll his eyes. Fox and Bill hopped onto the chairs that simulated piloting through air or space, it was their choice. Fox and Bill were soaring through an asteroid field, trying their best to avoid the floating rocks and to keep their virtual ships intact.
They would spin, jerk the ships back and forth, the asteroids came faster with each passing phase in the game. Fox's forearms were flexing as they gripped the control and he jerked them back and forth to avoid anything that threatened his ship. The intensity of the game made it easy to focus, as if the sounds from the game didn't do that enough. The competition was a close call, ending in a tie between the two players.
"Dang, you must be off your game. Usually you win by a landslide dude." Fox just shrugged his shoulders. "Maybe, maybe not. I just wanted to have some fun, but dang it feels like the game got harder than the last one they had here." Everyone thought about that and seemed to have a mutual feeling towards it. "Yeah it does feel like it's been a while since we even came here, much less played a game." Falco cocked his head back and forth thinking about it.
They walked towards the food court because it had got to that time. "I grabbed a little something to eat before I came here, so I'm just gonna go grab a smoothie then get us a table." Fox grabbed a strawberry smoothie and plopped down at a table just across from the pizza place the other guys went to.
He looked up from his phone and smoothie and saw something that made him smile. 'Must be a girl's night out'. There was Lucy, Katt, and Amanda walking by chatting it up without paying hardly any attention to whatever was around them.
He wanted to wave but he knew they wouldn't see him, instead he waved at the guys as they grabbed their pizza and started looking for Fox. "Man I forgot how much I like this café!" Slippy remarked with vigor as he smelled his pizza. "Yeah seriously, we should come here more often. Really, I can't remember the last time we came out here." Everyone nodded with Bill's comment.
"So uh, Fox how's Krystal? We haven't seen her in a while." Fox suddenly stopped drinking his smoothie. Falco nearly regretted his questions, feeling that maybe he struck a nerve. "Hey dude uh, I'm sor-" Fox waved his hand to dismiss his friend's insecurity.
"No dude don't worry about it, it's cool." He paused to take a sip from his smoothie. "Really, I don't know. I haven't seen her in a while. Haven't heard from her either." There was a pause. "I uh, really I don't know. I can't find her anywhere, I went to her house the other night and there was no one there at all. No noise from the other side of the door, just a dim lamp was on."
He told them about his dream and the reality that awaited him the next day. "I can just hope that maybe I'll see her around and that the fate that she had in mind in the dream stays in the dream. That's just about all I can do now is hope."
They all patted him on his back. "Hang in there bud." Slippy told him. "That's about all there is left to do, maybe one day I'll find her somewhere. At this point I just want to talk to her, now with my memory back and all. I just wanna talk to her, we don't even have to…" His mind trailed as he spoke.
"But its okay, I miss nights like this where it's just us. The guys again, for a long time she was the center of everything. Not that that was bad, but maybe this isn't as bad as I initially thought." He lifted up his smoothie for a toast to his boys.
"May it end well, but until then, LET'S DO IT TO IT!" they all smashed their cups together and chugged the remaining contents of their cups.
Hey everyone. Please hit me with a review/some feedback so I know I'm bringing some decent content to the table. No point in writing if no one enjoys it, hope you all have been doing well.
