My Revenge Obsession

Chapter Ten- Hang 'Em High

 Biting the skin around the left thumbnail in anxiety, I watched Jake cut the call on his mobile. He paused, looked down, kicked off from the wall he was leaning against and headed back over to the car. I ducked my head to watch his every movement as he got closer, noticing the slight hesitation before he opened the driver's side door and climbed inside. The smell of unwashed boy hit my nose and I saw how greasy Jake's hair was as he took off his sunglasses and stuck them on top of his head. He looked at me.

 "Do you want the good news or the bad news?" he asked.

 I thought for a moment. "Bad news."

 "George is most definitely still pissed at us."

 "Right." It didn't take long for the unsurprising information to sink in. "Good news?"

 "Everyone's fine at home and probably not going to murder us when we get back."

 That was as good as it could possibly be, so I accepted it. Jake pulled a map out of the glove compartment and started studying it while I kicked my shoes off and drew my knees up to my chin. My eyes followed Jake's fingers as they traced across the paper, following lines I didn't really understand. It surprised me that he was bothering to consult the map considering we'd mostly been driving aimlessly for the last week. But our aim was to get back in time for Christmas, and I definitely had no idea how far away home was.

 When Jake didn't talk or do anything for a while I stretched out one of my legs to nudge his thigh with my toes. Even though he glanced up and sort of smiled before looking back down, I could feel a strange vibe coming from him; either something was wrong with him or something was wrong back home. Either way, he wasn't going to tell me.

 Without speaking, he put the map away, flicked his sunglasses back down and started the engine. Outside by Foo Fighters was playing on my hooked up iPod, we pulled out of the petrol station and started heading down the millionth motorway. Wherever we were, there were a lot of trees. All of them were very tall and lined the long stretch of road, and I thought about how the whole area had probably once been covered in forestry only for it to be cut down and built on top of just so we humans could get from point A to point B.

 It was quite pathetic, really, how we just destroyed everything.

 We drove on and on until it started to get dark, which was quite early considering how far into the winter the year was. Then Jake pulled off the motorway at a junction and started gunning for the first non-shitty town we came across. I knew for a fact there wasn't a lot of money left in his wallet which meant making the harsh decision between eating well and sleeping well.

 Though, of course, we opted for eating well.

 I pointed for the first place which had a sign saying 'All You Can Eat' and Jake hit the accelerator, making us lurch straight towards it. He got out of the car, walked round to my side, opened my door and coughed. I took the hand that he held out to me, got out of the car, linked my arm through his and kicked the door shut behind me. Jake locked the car over his shoulder as we laughed and started running towards the restaurant which turned out to be a Chinese buffet place.

 Inside we only had to wait a few minutes for a table. We both ordered just water to drink, not only because it was all we could actually afford but because I knew Jake didn't like to drink when it was just the two of us. I'd told him that it didn't bother me- even though it did- when he drank, but he refused to do it anyway.

 As soon as the smell of food had hit my nose I had become instantly ravenous, and so it was only moments after the waiter presented me with a plate that I leapt up and practically ran over to the buffet and started desecrating the pristine white china. There was no way my puny stomach was going to allow me to eat everything, but that didn't stop me from grabbing chow mein, crispy duck, sweet and sour pork balls, seaweed and a mountain each of rice and prawn crackers.