Chapter Four

A/N: I OWN NOTHING AND NO ONE THAT IS RECOGNIZABLE. I ONLY OWN LACY, CIERRA, MIA, AND ANY ONE ELSE THAT ISN'T RECOGNIZABLE.

Lacy couldn't wait to get home, so she could call Mike. He had called her twice during basketball practice. Cierra had found it to be highly amusing. Coach Martin however, not so much. She quickly grabbed her clothes from the varsity locker room and stuffed them into her bag, then walked out of the gym to wait on the sidewalk for Cierra.

'Why wait?'

She slide her phone open and dialed Mike's number. They had been talking at least twice a day for a while now. He was even calling to make sure that she was up in the mornings. Something that Lacy found to be extremely adorable. She really loved the fact that she was able to hear his voice first thing in the morning.

As of the moment that the coach had declared practice to be over, she was officially on Christmas break. Which meant that they would most likely be on the phone with each other all the time. It drove Cierra nuts when Lacy saw that it was Mike calling, because Lacy would start jumping up and down or clap her hands together really fast. Not drove her crazy in a bad way, she was really happy that Lacy was friends with him.

Mike didn't pick up, it rang and rang and rang, then went straight to voice mail. Which meant that he had ignored her call for some reason. 'He's never done that. He was probably on the other line or something.'

Cierra walked up beside her and drapped an arm across her shoulders. "What not talking to your boyfriend?" Cierra was always joking around and calling him that. 'Don't I wish?' Lacy though to herself.

Lacy laid her head against her friend's arm. "Mike is not my boyfriend, and no. It very sadly went to his voice mail."

Cierra stopped walking, which pulled her arm from under Lacy's head so it could fall back down to Cierra's side. "Don't you think that's kind of weird?"

Lacy turned so that she could answer her friend. "No. I mean he could be in the shower or something."

Cierra gave Lacy a droll stare. "I meant don't you think it's weird how you two aren't together? I mean you guys talk all the time." Lacy shrugged and they started walking in the direction of Cierra's car. "We're just not that way. Well...I would like for us to be don't get me wrong. But it's just not like that."

"What ever you say girl." The girls talked about how glad they were that they were off for two weeks and what they could do.

Mike stood in the kitchen, looking at the calendar on the fridge and smiled. 'She should be done for the next couple of weeks. Well I hope so any way. Wonder if she'd want to do anything together while she's off? Hmm, but what?' "Speaking of which, I need to call her back."

After he had dialed the oh-so-familiar number, he waited for her to pick up, he was still looking at the calendar when,"Hey you got me now leave me a message." Crap, voice mail. He left her a message and went to get dressed, he was still in the towel from his shower.

Lacy had decided that she really needed a shower after Cierra had dropped her off. After she had gotten out, she wrapped a towel about herself and walked into her bedroom.

While she was digging through her top dresser drawer, trying to find her favorite pair of panties and bra, she heard her cell phone indocate that she had a new voice mail. 'I'll check it later, it's hellacold in here.'

After finding what she was looking for and slipping into them, she decided on sweats and a brown Areopostale hoodie. Then she began the very tedious task of combing the tangles out of her uncooperative hair, which she left down to dry.

Grabbing up her phone, she pressed the dial button and climbed up into the middle of her full sized bed to listen to the voice mail. "Hey Lacy, it's Mike...obviously. Sorry I missed you earlier I was in the shower. Um, listen I wanted to talk to you about something, so if you could just call me back whenever you get this, that'd be great. " Lacy pressed the end button and laid the phone back down on her bed. 'Great, guess I'm starting to bug him. He probably wants to let me down easy.'

Sadly getting off of her bed, Lacy went down stairs to help her Mom finish getting dinner ready.

When she got down to the kitchen, her Mom was sitting at the table looking through her recipe box, apparently ,'what to have for dinner' had yet to be decided on. "Whatcha up to mom?"

Without even looking up Katherin continued to thumb through the recipes as she answered. "Tyring to get dinner planned out."

She looks really tired, and sounds exhausted.

Lacy walked around the table and placed a gentle hand on her mom's shoulder. "Tell you what mom, why don't you go fix yourself a cup of tea and let me handle dinner?"

Katherin looked up at her daughter. "Are you sure?" Lacy nodded. Her mom made herself a cup of maderine orange tea and went to the living room to put her feet up and relax. After her mother had left the room, Lacy set the oen to preheat to three hundred and seventy five degrees ferenheight.

Mike stepped outside onto his back porch, he welcomed the way the cold air felt on his face. After he had sat down in the chair by the back door, he tried to formulate a plan to meet Lacy. Mike didn't know how he was going to go about it, but he knew that he wanted to meet her and that he was going to do it. Hmm...

At that moment, his phone started playing 'The tomatoe Song' by Bryant Oden. Smiling, he took his phone out of the front pocket of his Hoodie. He answered with a really happy tone to his voice. "Hey it's about time you called."

He had answered with out looking at the caller I.D. on his phone, not a good move on his part. "Yeah man I know, I've just had a really busy schedule. You know how that goes. " Damn! It's just Glen. He had some how became really good friends with Glen Jacobs better known as Kane. Still not sure how that happened.

Looking around at the now clean kitchen, Lacy had to admit, it looked good. After she had cleared the table, Lacy had decided that she would clean the kitchen for her Mom. She had done the dishes, then wiped down the counters and the stove. Then she had wiped off the table, followed by her sweeping and mopping the floor. By that time, the dishes were dry, so she went ahead and put them away.

After she had returned to her room, she sat on her bed and picked up her phone. Stop procrastinating, just man-up and call the him. Feeling a little un-easy, she scrolled through her contacts untill she came to the one that she was looking for. She hit the send button and waited. "Hello?"

"Hey Mike, you had called earlier?" Lacy let herself fall back and land on her leapard print comfortor, waiting for him to get to the dreaded question.

"Oh yeah. Hey Lace. Sorry about that earlier, I was in the shower."

Lacy smiled. So he wasn't ignoring me after all. He said that in his voice mail ding-dong! "So you said." Lacy could hear other people in the background. "Mike is this a bad time?"

"Huh? Oh, no. I was just picking some stuff up for my pets." Pets? "You never told me that you had any pets. What kind?" "Two Ferrets, Inky and Dinky."

"Oh, I've heard ferrets are hillarious."

"Yeah do you have any pets?"

Lacy couldn't help, but to smile. Cierra always thought that she was crazy for wanting the pet that she had always wanted. She scrunched up her nose and debated on whether or not to tell him. "No, but I've always wanted one."

"If you could choose, what kind would it be?" "Oh, dear. Well I've heard that skunks make really good pets."

"Your kidding right?" She could hear him chuckle quietly, as though he were amused.

"Nope. Don't worry, my friend thinks I'm crazy too." Lacy closed her eyes. Don't put it off any longer. "So you wanted to ask me something earlier?"

"Yeah thanks for reminding me. Can I send you a Christmas card?" Lacy felt her shoulders go slack. That's it? That's the big question that I had been stressing about all damn evening? She shook her head and laughed. "That's sweet Mike. Yes you can deffinately send me a card."

She wasn't sure, but she thought that he was smiling, because his voice changed ever so slightly. "Great, well here's another one for you. What's your address?"

Lacy felt very giddy over giving him her address. It was very sweet of him to want to send her a Christmas card. "Four eighty six, route two, Webster, South Dakota, eight nine seven one two." There was a slight pause on his end of the line.

"Okay and that's going to go to your house right? A mail box at your house?"

Lacy wrinkled her fore head and nose, then smiled and looked at her phone. He's too cute. She put the phone back up to her ear and answered his question. "Yeah the mail box across from my house."

"Okay now here's another question I want to ask you." Lacy shot into an upright position faster than she thought was humanly possible. My address wasn't what he wanted to know? Oh, dear lord help me breathe. "Yeah..."

There was a pause on his end of the line. Good Granny Mike just tell me! The silence continued for another moment, and she thought she heard him toss something into a cart.

Then he finally broke the silence. "Okay Lacy look, I haven't done this in a while so I'm just going to be blunt about it." Lacy couldn't move if her life depended on it, it were as though she were frozen in place. All she was capapble of doing, was sitting there on her bed and wait for him to continue. "What are you doing while you're out on break?" What if Mike wants to see me? This isn't real...

"Lacy you there?" Lacy had to close her mouth and clear her throat before she could answer. "Um, I don't think I heard you right. Could you repeat the question?"There was no hesitation from him this time. "WHat are you doing while your out of school? I thought I'd get your schedule from you, because I thought it would be good to know when you're doing what."

Lacy couldn't help, but to feel a little down hearted. What were you expecting the man to say? That he wanted to meet you? "I have basketball games on Tuesdays and Fridays at 5:30. and practise on Mondays and Thursdays from 2:00 to 5:00."

"Sounds like an easy schedule to remember. Well hey I'm up here at the counter so I'll see you later." With that he had hung up.

See you later?

"You mean talk to you later." See you later... don't I wish?