This is Prompt No. 84-Breakfast

Mitchie dressed carefully, pulling at her collar. "I think it's choking me," she said to Anna as her friend buttoned up the back of her dress.

Anna rolled her eyes. "It's not choking you. It looks perfectly fine. You're just worried, and so everything around you feels tight."

Mitchie turned around to smile at her friend. "Wow. I should ask your opinion more often," she said. "Then I'd know what's going on inside my head."

Anna smiled. "That one's easy," she said softly. "You're trying to do the right thing for Mitchell and I, but you're worried about what's going to happen in the future. You're worried that your plan might not work, and I think you're worried that Mitchell will change his mind."

Mitchie pointed her finger at Anna teasingly. "Mitchell is definitely my biggest problem," she said and slipped out of the room to head downstairs for breakfast.

She found Mitchell waiting at the top of the stairs for her and immediately tensed. After a month of arguments with him to get him to go along with her plan, was he suddenly going to back out? She would soon find out. "Good morning, Mitchell," she said politely, and rather stiffly.

Mitchell looked haggard, and Mitchie could guess that he hadn't slept last night due to all his worrying. Yesterday, April 17th, Virginia had seceded from the Union, and war was now inevitable. "Are you sure you want to do this?" he asked in a whisper. "You don't have to. We can call the whole plan off right now and no one would blame us."

Mitchie looked evenly at her brother, so protective of her, and said, "I would blame myself." With that, she swept down the stairs, heading towards the dining room. She heard Mitchell sigh and hurry after her, knowing that everything had to be perfect for this plan to work.

They found their parents already seated, and they each took their spots across from each other, bidding their parents good morning as they sat. "How are you, father?" Mitchie asked innocently.

Her father took a sip of his tea and nodded to her in response. "Fine, thank you."

"Good," Mitchie responded, helping herself to a piece of toast. She must wait, she realized. She must wait until the absolutely best moment she could find.

Her father looked up from where his newspaper was strewn out across his spot at the table and remarked to no one in particular, "It seems that the south is becoming a dangerous place to live."

Mitchie felt a nudge at her shin from under the table and knew without looking up that it was Mitchell, signaling that she should make her request. Well, it was now or never. "I quite agree," she said, startling both of her parents, who had not been expecting any sort of reply. "Do you remember that boarding school that you've been wanting to send me to?"

Mr. and Mrs. Torres exchanged glances, wondering where this question was heading, but Mr. Torres nodded and said, "Yes, we do. Go on."

"I'd like to go," Mitchie said bluntly.

Mrs. Torres frowned. "But you didn't want to go before!" she protested.

"Well," Mitchie said, adopting her most charming expression, "I've had a change of heart. I'd like to go, and I'd like to take Anna with me."

Mitchie waited, looking back and forth from one parent to the other and trying not to look desperate. It seemed to take a very long time for her father to say, "Very well, I suppose you can go. Perhaps the north will be a safer place for you right now since the war will be beginning soon." He actually smiled. "Yes, I think that's an excellent idea, my darling."

Mitchie clapped her hands delightedly. "I'm so glad you like it. I'd like to leave in a week."

This brought silence to the table. Mitchie's hands clenched in fists under the table and her heart started beating wildly. Would they let her go at such a strange time of the year? Could the plan really work? She felt herself tense as her father scanned her face, apparently looking for any indication as to why she would want to go at such a strange time of the year.

"If that's what you want," he said after a long pause. "I don't see why not." He set his paper down on the table and stood up, brushing off his vest. "I'll get in touch with the school and in a week, you'll be off."

"Along with Anna, right, Father?" Mitchie prompted, making absolutely sure that Anna would go with her.

Her father smiled. "Of course! What's a lady without her ladies maid?" He kissed the top of Mitchie's head and then left the room, heading to his study.

Mitchie and Mitchell soon excused themselves from the breakfast table and headed back up the stairs. They walked in absolute silence, their joined hands the only source of contact between them. As Mitchie pushed open the door to her room, she found Anna standing there in the middle of the room, her hands nervously twisting back and forth. She looked from one person to the other before she finally asked, "Well?"

Mitchie broke into a huge smile, feeling the tension and fear evaporating now that it was all over. "We leave in a week," was her only response before Anna was launching herself at Mitchie, hugging her and trying hard not to cry.

The three friends held each other for a long time before Mitchie turned to her brother, wiping the tears from her eyes and teased, "Well that was the most interesting breakfast the Torres family has ever had!"

A/N: Well, the plan is in action! Mickeyhagg, Shane's chapter is coming in just a couple more chapters!