Smarter Than You Think

Chapter 4

We decide to go to the outdoor pool. A lot of things here may suck, but there are some perks. We go to the locker room at the pool. There's lockers for everyone so you can keep your swimsuit and towel in there. We get changed and come out. The pool is never too cold since part of the hot tub flows into the pool. There's a ledge on one of the hot tub walls where you can jump off of into the pool. I choose to soak in the hot tub first.
"Come in the pool, Stevie!" Gannon shouts from below.
"In a few minutes! I wanna soak and then I'll jump off the ledge!" I yell back.
"You're gonna be freezing. The hot tub may flow into it, but it's not that warm." Alexandra says sitting next to me.
"I do it every time. It's fun. You scared?" I tease her.
"Nope, I'm just not stupid. Your body will go into shock from the sudden change of temperature." she tells me.
I roll my eyes. "Yeah right. I've done it before and that never happens. That's just your excuse to not come with me." I say.
"If it's so fun why don't you jump in right now?" she asks.
"Gladly." I say standing up.
I climb up onto the ledge. It's not very hard since I'm pretty tall.
"Do a bellyflop!" Cole shouts at me.
"Fine!" I respond.
It might hurt but I've done everything possible when jumping into the pool. I put my arms out from my sides and lean forward. I feel the slap hit my entire body, but I shake it off. I do the donkey kick all the way over to everyone else.
"You look like a freaking mermaid every time you do that." Matt says.
I laugh at him.
"You should've done a flip." Joshua says.
"I'll do one in a little bit." I say.
A moment later I hear a splash and water gets me in the face. I look to see who jumped in. I see wet curly hair from the person swimming over. I shake my head.
"I thought Alexandra didn't like jumping in." Cole says.
"She does. She's just mad I left her up there." I say.
"I thought Kayla, Anush, and Bailey were up there too." Gannon says.
"They were. She just suspects that's I think I can do anything better than her." I tell them.
She comes up to us and wipes the water from her eyes.
"Decided to join us?" I say.
"I can do things too." she says.
"Never said you couldn't." I say.
She rolls her eyes at me, but then her face lights up.
"Stevie, can we please, please, please do the thing we did last time?" she begs.
"Oh, no. I am not doing that again. You guys dropped me like fifty times." I say my eyes widening.
"What's she talking about?" Gannon asks.
"So Stevie's really flexible, so they had her do the splits and had Alexandra lift her up, and Bailey and Anush on either side of her legs holding them up, and Kayla had her arms out behind Stevie so she could catch her if she fell. They dropped her countless times. It was honestly pretty amusing." Joshua explains.
I stick my tongue out at him. "I don't like being dropped and drowned over and over again." I tell them.
"It's not that hard." Matt says.
"Oh yeah? I'd like to see you try." Alexandra says.
"Is that a challenge?" Matt asks.
"Yeah actually it is." she says.
"Oh my god. This is not happening." I say rubbing my forehead with one hand.
"It sure is. Gannon get over here and do the splits." Matt says.
"What? No!" Gannon says quickly.
"Yes! Just do it already!" Matt commands.
"No way, dude! I can't do the splits! I'll tear my legs out of their sockets if I try!" Gannon protests.
"Dude, it doesn't have to be full splits. Just pull your legs apart and let me pick you up." Matt tells him.
"Why me?" Gannon asks.
"We need to recreate this so its like the guy version of what they did. You and Stevie are dating so it makes sense if she was on top then you need to be on top." Matt says.
"That doesn't make any sense, whatsoever. I don't understand the logic in this but, you know what? Fine, but you owe me big time." Gannon sighs.

Alexandra tells Kayla, Bailey, and Anush what's happening and they come down into the pool. For about fifteen minutes the guys struggle and get frustrated until they decide they've come as close as possible.
"Okay this is it!" Cole shouts.
Gannon sits on top looking like someone impaled him with something. His legs are about a third of the way into the splits which impresses me considering I thought he wouldn't do it at all. His face is white as a ghost, and he looks like he'll fall at any second. Then I see the flaw in this. There's only four of them and there were five us. No one is behind Gannon. It's not that serious since he'll just fall into the water but still. The fact that they didn't notice that earlier is considerably embarrassing. It's embarrassing for me too through. I've been watching this unfold for a while and didn't notice that.
"Gannon, don't fal-" I'm cut off as Gannon topples into the water. The guys swim over to see if he's okay and my friends and I burst into giggles.
Gannon swims over to us.
"Thanks for the warning!" he says.
"I was telling you just as you fell." I say laughing at him.
"Yeah okay, Stevie." he says reaching over for me.
I try to swim away but he grabs my leg and pulls me closer. He wraps his hands around my waist and flips me over so I'm upside down. I scream as he lifts me up and then drops me into the water. I do a flip under water and come back up.
"Thanks!" I say.
He laughs at me. I swim back over.
"You are ever so welcome." he says.
And so we spend the day at the pool only taking breaks for snacks.
At five we get out of the pool to change in the locker rooms.
"You and Gannon are really cute." Kayla tells me in the locker room.
"Whatever." I say smiling to myself.
She shakes her head at me. We finish changing and walk to dinner. While we're eating Gannon stares at me as if looking for something.
"What?" I say.
"You have green eyes." he comments.
"Yeah? You have brown eyes. What difference does it make?" I ask him.
He shrugs. "Just think eyes are cool. The colors, the little details, you know." he says.
I shrug. "I guess. Anyways have fun today?" I ask.
"Yeah. Also I was meaning to ask, didn't you say we go in field trips on Thursdays?" he asks.
This catches me by surprise. Then I realize we didn't go on a field trip today. I was distracted by going to the pool and my friends. You'd think I would've noticed a red flag like that.
"Oh yeah. We usually do. Strange." I say trying to hide the worry in my voice.
I must not do a very good job of it.
"Stevie, how bad is it that we didn't go on a field trip?" Gannon asks clearly worried and confused.
"We probably just missed it." I say with false hope.
"People were all over the pool, plus they would've come looking for us and you know it." he says doubtfully.
"It's fine, it's fine." I say feeling more and more worried by the second.
"On a scale of one to ten how bad is this?" he asks.
I just stare at him, my lips pursed.
"Okay. On a scale of one to ten how likely is it that the cause of this is something bad?" he continues.
"Let's just say this has never ever happened and they should've said something about it to everybody. Made an announcement. Something. But the fact that they haven't said anything. That worries me." I say.
My stomach feels like somebody tied it in a knot. I take in a shaky breath.
"You okay?" he asks.
"Dunno, but we need to ask someone about this." I say.
Gannon and I tell everyone we're full and are gonna go do something. We put our dishes away which is fine by me since I've lost all appetite. We head to the front office and ask them to speak to Ms. Rose. That's probably a first and last. They tell us to wait outside of her office. After a few minutes she opens the door and tells us to sit the two chairs in front of her desk.
She walks past us and sits in her desk chair.
"What could I possibly help you two with today?" she asks obviously surprised to have us in her office when we should be eating dinner with our friends.
"Well you see, we noticed that we didn't go on a field trip today. You didn't make an announcement about it, and it didn't seem like you would be." I explain.
Her face changes into an odd expression. Uncomfortable maybe.
"We decided it would be nice if we just gave everyone a break for once." she says in an uneven voice.
"Weren't you worried about people getting restless?" I blurt the words out before I can stop myself.
Gannon elbows me. Ms. Rose's face turns pale.
"Leave." she says quickly.
"No. You haven't given us any answers." I say.
"Get out right now." she repeats.
"Why are you acting so weird?" I ask suspiciously.
"Stevie, don't ya think it's about time we leave?" Gannon asks me.
"No, I don't actually. She's being really weird." I say.
He gives me a look that makes me think he's predicting I'm about to do something stupid. Maybe I am. Ms. Rose acting weird is the second red flag that I should take as a cue to shut my mouth. But I never learned that you can't get answers on demand. Really though, I should shut my mouth. No, I shouldn't. I want answers from her.
"Stevie, have you ever heard of the rule, three strikes and you're out?" Ms. Rose says in a dangerous tone. "Well I've given you two chances, and I'm going to give you one more. I highly suggest you take it. Get out of my office or things will get ugly."
"No." I say.
I don't like how she's acting. Maybe it was a stupid choice to not leave.
"Alright. If you are going to be difficult then things are going to get difficult." she says. "Mr. Hine! You may come in now!" she shouts.
A look of confusion flashes across my face. Gannon looks at me as though I just got us killed. That's what she's acting like though.
Mr. Hine sure enough comes into the room.

A/N: So, I tried to shorten the chapter as promised in the previous one. I apologize if in dialogue there is a lot of he says, she says, I say because I'm trying to get away from that. I'm just a beginning writer and I'm still working out the flaws in my writing. In the future I'll try to make it so that there's not as much of that. I'll try to update every Tuesday night. Thanks for reading! As usual, if you like what you're reading than please do follow, vote, and comment to give me some feedback on my story. Stay awesome!