LOTF: Before and After

Phase 3: Chapter 62

Something had to be said for whoever decided the best time for kids to go back to school was before the typical end of the 90-100°F heat wave that often hit Northern Georgia from mid-August until sometimes as late as mid-September. The hot weather made it difficult for even the best of students to stay focused during class, and even more difficult to keep them from going to the washroom every twenty minutes on account of how much water was required to stay hydrated on a hot summer day like today.

It was Murphy's law that the school day felt like it was dragging on much longer than usual now that Ralph had a reason to eagerly watch the clock all the live long day. Knowing Jack was back at his house, working on his own school work with the comfort and peace a classroom setting could never provide made Ralph itch with excitement for the clock to finally strike 1505 hours, to set him free of the sweaty, cramped classroom after each long day.

It had now been three days since Jack was released from the children's hospital up in Dalton, and three nights he'd spent at the Langley house thus far. That was bordering on half a week; meaning there was just over one full week left until the ceremony at the academy and just over one full week and a day until Jack may or may not be going back to Dalton.

Later that day, Ralph threw himself through the door of the house forty-one minutes after dismissal at Eastern Woodland Academy. He collapsed onto the floor in the doorway, breathing heavier than an overtired dog running through the Arizona desert.

"What the hell happened to you?" Jack minimally suppressed the urge to laugh at the boy who was practically drowning in a puddle of his own sweat.

Ralph took a moment to catch his breath before he answered. "Air conditioning's broken on the bus" he panted heavily. "109 goddamn degrees in there. Another minute and I swear I would've passed out."

"You still might" Jack chuckled observantly. Ralph glared up at him standing over his body on the floor. He shuddered at the sight of Jack standing over his weak body, unsure if it was just the heat that was suddenly making him feel so uneasy.

Ralph sat up and immediately pulled his soaked through red t-shirt over his head, tossing it next to the coat rack beside him. Jack stretched his good hand out to him, and Ralph took it, allowing Jack to help him up.

"How am I the one struggling to stay on my feet here?" Ralph asked once he was eye level with Jack. "I'm not the one who looks like he's been crushed by a semi-truck."

"No, you're just the one acting like it" Jack teased him cruelly but playfully. Ralph rolled his eyes as he failed to come up with a viable defense. After all, he had been lying on the ground, gasping for air, only a minute earlier. "What's the plan for tonight?" Jack interrupted his train of though to ask.

"I dunno" Ralph walked over to the couch and let his weight collapse onto it. "I wasn't sure I'd make it to sixth period so I didn't make any plans."

Jack laughed at Ralph's flare for the dramatics. He was just about to sit down beside Ralph when an idea popped into his head. He abandoned the younger boy on the couch to hobble his way into the kitchen. A minute later, he was pleased by the relieved, wide-eyed look in Ralph's eyes when Jack tossed him a frozen popsicle from the freezer.

"You're a lifesaver" Ralph declared with an unwavering sense of appreciation as he tore open the popsicle. Jack could see that Ralph was far too hot to pick up on the irony of what he just said. Jack had the rare experience of having once had other people's lives in his hands, and the record showed that saving them wasn't exactly his M.O.

That unsettling realization was interrupted when Jack turned to watch Ralph forcefully shoved the popsicle into his throat, a desperate act to relieve himself from the agony of the moist, summer heat. Jack smiled with both intrigue and amusement, his eyes fixated on the boy beside him.