Mission Gone Wrong

Chapter 17

"We need to go back," I finally say. After the hug that we shall never speak of again but will constantly be on my mind, we broke apart and just laid in the sun side by side. If I was alone, I might have gone swimming, but with Miguel right there, no way in the world.

"Why?" He asks. He has fallen into the trap of this place, it's so relaxing, you forget time is a thing and that you have other duties.

"Because we have to go help the others. I have to lead them, and I'm going to need your help doing so," I say gently, and he groans.

"Come on, up," I order. When he doesn't make any motion, I grab his arm and pull him up.

"Alright, alright, I'm getting up. No need to try to yank my arm out of socket," He grumbles.

I start walking off, when something catches my eye. A splash of color, where there shouldn't be any. "Go on ahead; I'll catch up." I call out.

Miguel gives me a quizzical look, but goes on ahead. I start walking on over to the walls, the edge of the cliffs. I look around, and see our little 'bridge.' Once again, it was just our imagination. It was really just an old, fraying rope we really shouldn't have trusted to hold our weight spanning across the swimming hole, that ended in a cave in the cliffs. Of course, you have to duck down not to hit anything if you were going into the cave to explore, even though it's the middle of winter. Totally not speaking from experience.

I start running, and then leap up, catching the edge of one of the ropes. I then climb my way up, and along the cliffs.

"Amazing," I whisper, as I see them. It's a surprise lily; a pinkish reddish surprise lily growing in the caves. One I would have sworn I didn't see earlier. The flower that was Brady's favorite, in the shade that was my favorite.

"Alright, I get it. I'll let go, but I promise I will remember you. Always." I vow, and then feel a warm gust of wind. I close my eyes, and let my hands drop.

I splash right into the water, cutting right down to the bottom. I push off of it, and surface seconds later. Now that I'm soaking wet, and will get the ever so pleasant experience of walking back to the docks in my soaking wet clothes, I swim to shallower water.to the large rock. I'm surprised we didn't come up with a name for this rock, besides the Great Rock. I mean, everything else had a name.

I slosh out of the water, not as graceful as I used to be. Of course, I used to have to do this at least three times a week. You get pretty good at silently emerging from water when beating your boyfriend in a mock battle depends on it. Then it was humiliating the annoying instructor who simply couldn't understand sarcasm, or Anderson that it depended on. I honestly can't decide which one I needed to learn it quicker for.

I see Miguel wandering around aimlessly, probably trying to find the trail back. "It's this way," I call at the correct path which he wandered past.

"How long were you going to wait?" He asks, and I smile slightly.

"Not too terribly much longer," I answer with a smirk, and he just shakes his head.

"And you guys didn't mark it because why again?"

"Because it would be irreverent. It isn't that good of a secret hideout if you make the path to it obvious."

"But then other people could find you here," He points out.

"And that's a good thing?" I ask rhetorically. He just shakes his head.

"You know, some day I'm going to prove that you don't really hate people that much and that it's all just a show." He vows.

"Good luck," I scoff. Sure, I might not hate people as much as I portray myself too, but it's pretty close.

I start to shiver as the wind blows. Normally I have goosebumps because of the cold, but right now I'm sure you could notice them three yards away. It's frigid. Though, that probably has more to do with the fact that I'm wet and the sun has way went down, then the actual temperature.