Kill Me Sweetly

Chapter 22

            This chair was probably the comfiest chair in the history of comfy chairs. Sighing in pleasure I sank deeper into the velvet cushions of the seat on the bus my class was taking to the Adirondacks for our field trip. I must admit that even though we were scheduled to be on this bus for twelve hours, two of those hours have already passed, it wasn’t too bad. My favorite part was when Ms. Robin had Crystal cite all of the rules of the field trip in front of us all before we left the school. Then since the school was rich they could afford the best Bieber buses that money could buy; there were seat warmers, TV monitors for every chair, and cup holders; nothing says fancy rich kids like cup holders.

            Then there was the fact that Nick was on the outside seat (I called window seat) right next to me. I must say he looked absolutely adorable sitting there quietly reading a small paper back novel with his blue eyes narrowed in concentration as he lazily flipped the pages. Every once in a while he would either smile or frown as he got absorbed into the letters that littered the book.

            Leaning forward I moved his book back a little and saw the title, Of Mice and Men. “You actually read classic books,” I asked a little surprised as I fell back into my seat. I know I shouldn’t have been too shocked but in all honesty I was expecting something to do with sports or maybe death. You know, I probably would have been less surprised to see him reading sucky vampire romance novels; actually, no, I would dump him on the spot if that was the case, but just not classics!

            Turning another page he replied without looking at me, “Yeah, my mom always had books littering the house and when I was bored I would read them. I got really in Charles Dickens for a while and then when I finished all of those I moved on to others, like The Wrath of Grapes or The Invisible Man. I tried some Shakespeare but I could never get into his plays. Then I asked my mom to send me some books in the mail about two weeks ago and I thought now would be the perfect time to try to finish some.”

            I let him get pulled back into George and Lenny’s adventure and turned to chat with Sam and Tim who were in the seats behind us. Well I was all set up to talk but found both of them quietly sleeping, leaning on each other, Sam’s hand interlocked with Tim’s. Not having the heart to wake them up just because I was bored I turned forward to see what Natalie and Dylan were doing in front of us. When I peeked my head over the seats to stare down at them I saw both of them listening to Natalie’s IPod and laughing at the pictures she was showing him when she was on her vacation to Florida.

            Sighing in defeat since I had no one to talk to, I started going through my backpack to see if I had anything that I could possibly do for an hour or two. There was my IPod, a book that I’ve had my entire life from Adam, my wallet that had about one hundred dollars in it and my fake driver’s license, my sketchbook with a pack of drawing pencils and an eraser, and at the very bottom of my bag I had stored my assassin’s belt with one of my new knives and a few pictures. There was one of me and Adam in my training room back in New York, one of me and Sam lying on a blanket in the clearing making goofy pictures at the camera, and the last one was one that Sam took of me and Nick while we were dancing outside during the dance smiling at each other.

            Grinning I shoved the pictures safely back into my bag and took out my IPod and sketchbook. Putting in the ear buds I started listening to some Journey and Kiss songs while flipping to a blank page tapping my chin thoughtfully on what to draw. The gang war last night popped into my head so I started out by sketching the bridge with the opposing ‘armies’ on the opposite sides. The dark river glinted underneath everything giving off the reflection of the crescent moon before on the highest point of the bridge sat a shadow outline of me holding on to the two ropes that would trigger the trap.