Kiss of Courage

Chapter Eight

Chapter Eight: Tally

The movie night was a HUGE hit! We had so much fun. I've never really played Xbox before, but I loved it! It was so intense, and I got to use a gun... Tee hee tee hee! When Elizabeth screamed though, I must have jumped about half a metre off the chair Nick and I were sitting on. She scared the shit outta me! The rest of the night was lots of fun- especially when Jacob challenged Josh to a chip eating/pop drinking contest, then Nick and Gaelan figured they'd better 'man-up' and join in. Pretty soon, we had four fat boys who pretty much couldn't move. Elizabeth laughed every time she looked at one of them. What a maniac <3 But when the phone rang, no one paid much attention. Elizabeth wiggled herself off the couch. Squashed between Gaelan and Megan, who were seriously into the movie, wasn't easy. They looked like they were going to maul her for interupting, but at least she was going to make the phone shut up. I'm not an eavesdropper, but Liz's tone of voice clued me in that there was something up. Evangeline noticed too. We listened as Liza's face got whiter and whiter (trust me- Liz has a nice light chocolatety brown skin tone, and it was REALLY dark, but she still turned white) She nodded and it seemed like she couldn't breathe. Finally, she said a quiet 'Thanks' and hung up. She turned and started to march upstairs. I got up and so did Evangeline, but Gaelan was closest to the stairs and got to her first. He grabbed her shoulder and spun her around. She had a determined look on her face, but her lip quivered a bit.

"Liz...?" I started.

"Everything okay Lizabeth?" Gaelan asked, recovering from his guy-shock. Whenever a girl is pissed or looks like she's about to cry, guys freeze up. It's retarded.

"Liza-bith bith?" Evangeline said quietly, using another one of her many nicknames. Elizabeth's lip just quivered more. She started to speak. (Let's be honest, she garbled.)

"M-m-my m-mom." Her lip shook a bit more. Nick, Josh and Jacob had come over to see what was going on.

"Did something...happen?" Jacob asked. She started to whimper.

"S-something happened....t-to my m-mom..." And then she cracked. Tears started streaming down her face. She didn't make a sound, but she sank down onto the steps. She cradled her head in her hands.

"I n-need to gooo.....to the hospital..." She looked up at us. She wiped away her tears, and stood up. In a very quiet voice she spoke again.

"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. Go back to your movie. I'll see you guys tomorrow maybe." And she turned to go upstairs. Evangeline and I ran up after her. But we got upstairs just in time to hear the door close. We grabbed our jackets, slipped on our shoes and ran out after her. We heard voices calling us. We turned to see Gaelan, Nick, Jacob, Holly and Josh running behind us.

"Why aren't you guys gonna finish the movie?" I screamed to them

"She's our friend too!" Holly called.

"We need to make sure she's okay!" Gaelan screamed.

"We're coming with you!" Jacob and Nick said.

"ROADTRIP!" Josh screamed running. Despite the bad timing, we laughed. He would try to lighten the mood.

We continued running up the street. Finally, Evangeline realized that we actually didn't know where she'd gone.

"Uhm guys? Problem." I slapped my forehead.

"We don't know where she's going." I finished. We stood in silence, then Nick spoke up.

"Would she go to Evangeline's first, or go straight to the hospital?" We thought for a minute.

"Probably go straight there if something urgent happened." Jacob reasoned. Holly nodded in agreement.

"But just to make sure, we should split up." I said. We all agreed.