Loose Ends

Chapter 48

"See you at the dance," the girl said politely.

"Thanks," he said to her before looking back at Grace. "See 'ya, Grace." Grace waved and Jack walked away. Further down the hallway at Lauren's locker Jesse was telling her he could now attend the Halloween dance, if she still wanted to go.

"So someone messed up the schedules and they had to shuffle some games around. Our next game got moved to next week so coach is giving us a couple days off to rest up."

"Sweet! So you still wanna go as pirates?"

"Yeah. Did you wanna go out to dinner first or no?"

"Nah. The dance doesn't go 'til late so we can just eat at home before we go."

"Sounds good," Jesse told her with a smile. He leaned down to kiss her just as the warning bell sounded. They quickly joined the stream of straggling students scurrying off to their respective classes. The morning passed like any other day and lunchtime found Amy and Ricky enjoying their lunch with Madison, Lauren, Justin and Jesse. As she did every day, Amy called the nursery to check on John. Ricky smiled knowingly but didn't say anything, secretly finding it comforting that Amy worried so much about their son when he wasn't within her line of sight.

"Thank you for calling Little Cherubs Daycare center, this is Diane speaking."

"Hi, Diane. It's Amy."

"Hi, Amy. Give me a moment to patch you through to John's room." Amy tapped her fingers on the table as she waited for Jennifer, the main attendant in John's play room to pick up.

"Hi, Amy. I was just about to call you." Amy was suddenly on full alert and her look of alarm made Ricky suddenly tense as well.

"What's wrong?" she asked anxiously, getting the attention of everyone else at the table.

"It's nothing serious," Jennifer assured her. "John's just a little sick. He has a slight fever and he just threw up his snack." Amy let out a relief sigh.

"I'm on my way." She quickly ended the call and gathered up her lunch, Ricky doing likewise.

"What's wrong?" he asked tensely.

"John's sick." Her eyes became sympathetic. "He's got a slight fever and he just threw up." She turned to Lauren and Madison. "Could you guys get my assignments for me?" They nodded in sync.

"Of course," Madison assured her. Amy and Ricky headed inside towards the counselor's office.

"Do you want me to come with you?" Amy shook her head.

"There's no point in both of us missing the rest of the school day. I'll text you if he gets worse," she assured him as they reached the counselor's office and Amy waked in.

"Hi. What can I do for you two?" she asked politely.

"I need to leave campus."

"Because..."

"I just spoke to one of our son's caregiver's at his daycare center and he's sick. I need permission to leave campus to go take him home." The counselor looked puzzled for a moment.

"It's Amy, right?" she asked as she pulled out her tablet of permission slips to fill one out. She nodded and the counselor turned towards Ricky. "Did you need a pass too?" He shook his head.

"No." She finished filling out the form and handed it to Amy.

"Thanks." She quickly went to her locker to retrieve her purse and jacket. At the last minute she decided to grab out all of her textbooks and notebooks and put them in her bag, just in case she needed them to finish up her homework that evening. Ricky took some of the books from her and carried them out to her car. Her things deposited in the backseat, she turned to Ricky. "Can you give Ash a ride home? I'll text her to let her know."