The Spirit of Summer | The Andersons: Book 1

Chapter Nine

Home sweet home was all I could think during the deafeningly silent car ride home. Understandably, nobody was speaking a single word- after all, we had just witnessed a dead body in our hallway and we had just witnessed a freshman get mutilated by an imperceptible force.

The quiet was suffocating, though. So suffocating, that the second my shoes scraped against the tiles of our house, I felt like an invisible weight had been automatically removed from my shoulders.

Mr. Craig had taken Terry and Leo to Monica's house so that they could check up on her. We'd wanted to come along with them, but they'd known Monica longer, so it ultimately made more sense for them to go on their own. Not without saying that they'd be back to hang out though.

As happy as I was to be home though, all I could do was glance around at the minimalistic furniture and expensive paintings like they were foreign to me, like I'd never seen them before. It was only 10:15 in the morning, and I had no idea what to do to occupy myself since I'd never come home from school so early before.

Mai was in the kitchen, already fixing herself a glass of Jen's diluted lemonade and resting her elbows on the countertops. Krysy plopped herself onto one of the couches, stretching so that her tall frame took up all the available space. Jen was standing by the bookshelves, her nose already buried in the first page of The Beginner's Guide to Biology that Kat had... borrowed from the school library. Speaking of Kat, she casually tossed her blazer over her shoulder, running her hands through her wavy, black hair. "I'm gonna go take a nap. Someone wake me when Terry and Leo come back."

As Kat started to make her way upstairs, Mai's phone began ringing. She pulled it out of her purse as she approached us, staring at the screen with a somewhat puzzled expression.

"Who is it?" asked Jen.

"Mom, " Mai replied.

"Put her on speaker, " said Krysy.

Mai followed Krysy's request and, a few seconds later, the sound of Mom's voice filled the air in the living room like a flower-scented aerosol that had just been sprayed. "Hello? Mai, are you there?"

"Yeah, Mom, I'm here. "

"Am I on loudspeaker?"

"Uh-huh."

"Good, " Mom said. "Because this is something you all need to hear. I've been meaning to call sooner, but I've been really busy lately- what's this I hear from Mrs. Raying about you girls leaving the house and showing up again at eleven in the middle of the night?"

We exchanged worried glances, eyeing each other in total silence.

"Hello?" Mom called out. "Am I speaking to myself?"

"Guys, let's just stay really quiet and act like the signal's bad, " Krysy whispered. "And then, when she calls us again, we'll have something to say then. "

Mai shrugged. "That's an option."

"Um, no, it's not an option, " Kat disagreed, her eyebrows furrowed and her arms crossed indignantly across her shoulders. "Jennifer and I came back home at 19:00 sharp! We didn't even finish our movie! I'm not gonna get into trouble because of you guys."