"Out of all of us here, you'll be the one running scared." The words flew out of my mouth despite that I didn't actually believe that he would. If I had to put money on the one whom I thought would be terrified tonight, I'd say Kailey. However, for the sake of needing a retort, I told a fib.
"Can you two not bicker for five minutes?" Ricky was exhausted with the constant fighting between Justin and me.
Justin ignored Ricky and kept his focus on me. “I guess we'll see."
Yeah, we’d see.
I focused my attention back onto my drawing in the dirt. Even though I didn’t believe that it would be frightening, I was ready to go inside. Just because it might not be scary didn’t mean that it wouldn’t be fun. I needed something fun that night since I had been having a terrible day leading up.
School was long, to say the least. First, I got a C+ on a test. That was not a grade that I normally made and was definitely not what I was expecting from that particular test. Then, at lunch I accidentally dropped my food on the ground and a random teacher on lunch duty scolded me as if I dropped the food on purpose. Finally, someone stole my favorite pencil.
Then I got home and had to hear my siblings' mouths whining about how I never got around to asking Javier about bringing them on the trip. In my defense, I never told them I would. I told Easton that I would think about it. I was still thinking about it, but only because I felt bad for them.
My aunt was also angry for no good reason. I dropped a plastic cup on the ground and she acted like I had just shattered every one of her glass plates. I thought that she wasn't going to let me go out tonight because of that, but she didn't care. Her moods would flip in an instant sometimes and it gave me whiplash.
And to top it all off, I couldn't stop thinking about Javier.
I was still drawing in the dirt. I had turned my horse into a clown and my lack of skill in drawing made the clown look extra scary. A couple of minutes passed by as I played in the dirt.
My attention was suddenly captured by the mention of a name that belonged to the person that had been conveniently showing up at the right times. Kailey spotted them first. "Is that Javier and Paxton?"
"Javier's here?" My head rose in search of him.
Kailey nodded as she waved at them. It took them a minute to spot her, but when they did they began walking over to us.
"Why are you calling them over here?" I whispered in panic.
"I didn't!" Kailey raised her hands in defense. "I was just being friendly. If you really don’t want them to come over here then I guess I’ll-”
"No!" I said a little too loudly. The people in front and behind us turned their heads because of my sudden outburst. Embarrassed, I spoke more calmly. "No, it's fine. They're already coming over here."
Kailey smiled like she always did, Justin seemed disappointed as he watched Javier and Paxton walk toward us, and Ricky and Bella were giving me funny looks. I shrugged atthem and they shrugged back. I wished that I could read minds because I couldn’t always read my friends’ faces. I wanted to know what they were thinking.
"Hi guys," Paxton greeted with a toothy grin. He always seemed to be in a chipper mood. Everyone greeted the pair. "How long have you—"
"Where's Diane?" Justin interrupted.
Javier paused and pressed his lips together. After an awkward few seconds of staring, he answered Justin's rudely asked question. "She didn't want to come. She doesn’t like horror."
Justin frowned but he didn't say anything else. His want for Diane made me raise a brow. What was going on there?
Paxton side-eyed him but ultimately kept quiet. "How long have you all been out here?"
Bella checked her phone for the time. "Almost two hours."
"And you'restillhere?" Javier asked with a scoff. He turned around to see the long line behind us. "Do you really want to wait that long, Paxton? It's already nine."
It was the one night that the only haunted house in town gave discounts to students. Did they really not stop and think that there would be a ton of people here?
Paxton frowned. "If you want to come back another night, we can."
Another night when it would cost the full price to get in? Hell no, that made no sense. Suddenly, I had the urge to do something that I wouldn’t normally do.
"You can join us," I suggested. "We're almost to the front, so you won't have to wait much longer and you won’t have to come back."
Everyone looked at me as if I had grown an extra head. Even I was shocked with myself.
Paxton’s face lit up. "Really?"
