Into the Mist

Chapter 10

On Sunday, with the deadline to my photography project approaching, I walked over to Joey's house and rang the doorbell. It took several minutes for his mom to answer the door. "Yes?" she asked. Despite it being after ten, she was still wearing a robe.

"Sorry," I said. "Is Joey still asleep?"

"Did you try texting him?"

"No, my phone's broken."

She heaved a sigh. "I'll go see if he's up."

She slammed the door in my face.

Mrs. Grossman had never been super nice to me, not in years. When we had first moved in and I became friends with Joey, she seemed friendly enough, but she and my mom never hit it off. After the incident, things got worse. Joey was upset that I couldn't come out and play, and his mom came over and ranted about me "snubbing" him.

It was only after my brief stay at the hospital that she calmed down. Joey understood, and my mom let him come over to play with me inside. We played so many board games.

But Mrs. Grossman never quite recovered. She had told Joey not to hang around with me once. Joey told me about it at school.

The door opened, and Joey popped his head out. "Hey! What's up?"

"Um, so I was thinking I should get a move on with my photography project. Did you talk to your friend with the fog machine?"

Joey stared at me for a few moments. "Uhhh... yeah."

The look on his face did not inspire confidence. "And?"

"She said no."

She? I tried to ignore that. Joey was a nice guy, he was sure to have some friends who were girls. Other friends who were girls. "Oh. How come?"

"You could have just texted me," Joey said. "You still have my number, right?"

"Yeah, but my phone's broken."

"Broken? Did you drop it?"

"No, remember? Yesterday, in the..." I gestured to the thin wisps of white clinging to the ground. "I didn't have any signal at all?"

"Did you try turning it off and on again?"

I reached out to slap him in the face, but he pulled back too fast. "Of course I did. My dad couldn't even figure it out. He's going to take it to work."

"Oh. So you're phoneless. I guess that means you haven't texted Cesspool or her minions."

Hands on my hips, I gave him a stern look. "No, I haven't. I can't text anybody."

"I'm gonna go take a shower and get dressed," Joey said. "Maybe we can try another photoshoot in the fog. It's not too bad today."

"No way," I said. "I'm not going back out there. Who's your friend? Maybe I can convince her to let me borrow the fog machine."

Joey gave me a long look.

"What? Who is it? Do I know her?" I asked. And suddenly I knew exactly who it was. "It's Ella, isn't it."

"Yeah."

"Why did you tell her it was for me?" I demanded. "Come on, Joey, use your brain. She hates me! She isn't going to do me any kind of favor. She probably spit in my coffee yesterday."

"Oh, come on, Bree! You're best friends with the girls who made her life a living hell in middle school. What did you think was going to happen?"

I stepped back. "I never said anything to her."