"plain ol' Jane told a
story about a man who
was too afraid to fly,
so he never did land."
THAT NIGHT, THE SIX KIDS GATHERED around a campfire like ants around a sugary or sticky substance. Tightly glued together, mostly in silence.
As Pope was out on the last log in the campfire to keep it burning, he sat down on a log. “Hey guys, so, my dad’s already gonna kill me, so what’s this mandatory meeting about?” Pope was clearly losing his patience with the silence between the teens.
JJ pointed gun fingers to himself, looking over at John B, seated comforrable next to his sister, already half asleep with her head on the boy’s shoulder, “Might as well tell him, man, before we’re gaffed.” JJ voiced.
John B sat up, “You ready for this?”
“Yeah.”
“So, the gold never went down with the merchant-”
“Here we go again.” Pope sighed, convinced that even giving in a shot was a no-go. From what Red could tell, he was done risking his relationship with his dad and school to look for a treasure they don’t know existed.
“No, hear him out.” JJ shook his head.
“It’s been here the whole time.” John B continued, Red perked up, suddenly more interested.
Red motioned with her hands for him to keep going, “Go on.”
“It’s here. On the Island.” John B stated, flustered by it himself.
“Are you serious?” Asked Kie, a mixture of confused and starstruck.
Pope raised his hand, “I’d like to voice my septicemic.”
John B pushed himself off the tree truck where he and Bennie were sitting, “I’m sure you’d love to, Pope, but can I please present you with my evidence, sir?”
Pope rolled his eyes, a small smile appearing on his lips, “Proceed.”
John B cleared his through, “Okay, so. In my backpack, I have a letter from Denmark Tanny.”
“Are we supposed to know who that is?” Asked Kie.
Bennie snapped her fingers at the name, “I know that name. And if I’m not mistaken-”
“I thought you might, Bennie, and yes, there's a giant painting of him at the Cameron’s”
“Yeah! In the study, there's a huge portrait. I once asked who it was but neither Rafe of Wheezie knew.”
“Yep.” JB grinned. “Denmark Tanny was a slave that survived to Royal Merchant wreck, check this out.” John B handed Kiara a crumpled-up piece of paper, presumably a letter, telling her to read it out as he continued. “Slaves weren't mentioned as crew members on the ship, but my dad, he found the complete manifest. That was his big discovery. So Tanny used gold from the merchant to buy his freedom, and after that,, he bought his farm, drumroll please, because that farm is… Tannyhill plantation.”
“Tannyhill!” Kie repeated.
“Yes, so after that, he used his money to free even more slaves, and then he sol a crap ton of rice, which pisses off the white planters, and then they decided to lynch him.” John B walks around the campsite, as if visualizing the story in his own head as everyone eagerly listened, waiting for each sentence. For Bennie, this had been a bedtime story, but she still looked and listened to her brother’s words. “So on the day that they were coming to get him, he writes a letter to his son as a farewell, and in the last line of that letter he leaves a coded message about where to find the gold.”
Kie leaned in closer, talking in a whisper, “Where?”
“Harvest in the wheat.” John B copied her ways of speech, also whispering. “In Parcel Nine, near the water. Except, there’s no wheat.
“Wait, isn’t wheat code for gold?” Red caught on quickly, asking the question as if remembering something.
“Bingo.” John B smiled, pointing at her. “Check this out.” He then grabbed a paper from his pocket, and kneeled next to Bennie. “Here, look, the gold is in Parcel Nine, near the water.”
“Holy Crap…” Pope breathed, glaring at the paper resting in John B’s hands.
“Now, any guesses on what we need for the next step? Red?” JB turned over to the blonde girl, who perked up at the mention of her name, her eyebrows knitting together in thought.
“Um…”
“Wrong. All we need is the original survey map of the property, and we’ve found the gold.”
Pope seemed less spectacle about the entire situation. It’s crazy what you can do with some fast action and a little hope. “This might have a small chance of actually being true…”
“Dude, it’s like King Tut!” JJ cheered, nearly jumping up and down like a toddler in excitement.
“You’re a genius!” Bennie grinned, ear to ear.
JJ engulfed John B in a giant bear hug, even lighting him off of the ground as they grew near to the fire. Bennie laughed her head off at the boy’s stupidity.
“Woah! Fire.” John B looked behind him, noticing the fire blazing next to them. “You’re gonna burn.”
JJ put the boy down, “I am so proud of you right now.”
John B put his hand on the boy's cheek, having a little moment in a joking manner, “That’s very sweet of you.”
“Alright, enough bromance.” Bennie cut in with a laugh, hugging her brother, then pulling back away and clapping her hands together into a folded position. “What’s the…”
“Plan?” Red finished.
“Yeah, The plan. What’s the plan?”
John B nodded, “Alright, Sarah Cameron’s coming tonight, and she’s bringing the original survey map-”
“Wait, wait. Hold on.” By the tone Kie was using, anyone could tell she was furious about Sarah Cameron coming into contact with her. Red didn’t quite know why Kie and Sarah hated each other so much, but she never asked. “Sarah? Why Sarah?”
“Uh…”
JJ leaned closer to Bennie, who also seemed eager to watch them fight this out. “This is gonna be good!” JJ sang.
“Yeah, let me get my teacup ready.” Bennie laughed, following the older boy’s antics, making Red chuckle.
“Sarah, um… she got me into the archives at Chapel Hill the other day, and that’s where I got the letter,” JB explained, already aware that he was in deep crap.
Kiara scoffed, crossing her arms on her chest. “Chapel Hill? That’s where you were? With Sarah Cameron?”
“Yeah…” John B sighed.
“He’s macking on her,” JJ shouted, letting Kie hear his opinion.
“I wasn’t macking-”
“You were totally macking Sarah Cameron.”
“I wasn’t macking on her, okay?” John B became slightly defensive. “I was just using her for… access.”
Bennie chuckled, leaning towards JJ in a whisper, “I bet.”
JJ broke into a pit of laughter, trying to keep it concealed but didn’t do a very good job, as John B glared at the two of them. “Sorry.”
“Did you tell her about the treasure?” Kiara sneered, seemingly even angrier than before.
“I was trying to get to the archives!”
“Is that a yes?”
“I mean… I- I left out key details!” John B mumbled, trying to help his case, but somehow it made it even worse than before.
Kiara was practically fuming with anger, thinking John B had betrayed her in some way. “You what?! You let more kooks in on our secret? What about pogue lyfe? What about the t-shirt company, bro?!”
“I was using her for information!”
“Hm. Why don’t I believe you.”
“Kie, I’m trying to make us filthy rich here!” Kie became silent, letting herself hear him out. “So we can pay off the boat or send Pope to an autopsy school to study dead bodies- Look, you guys know me! Do I look like the kind of guy to fall for Sarah cameron?”
“These days, who isn’t?” Bennie half-joked, to the point where it was hard to tell if she was joking or being serious as she was probably referring to her brother’s relationship with the Cameron girl.
Pope turned to her, “Do you want us to anwer that?”
John B shook his head, “Just stop.”
“Look, you don’t know her yet! You can’t trust her.” Kie talked slowly as if it were a warning.
“Her brother did hit me in the back with a golfclub…” Pope sided.
“Rafe and Sarah are two different human beings!” Jb defended, fed up with all of their antics.
Bennie raised her hand. “I can second that. Rafe is actually kind of nice.”
“Kind of nice? Golf club Rafe is kind of nice?” Pope asked in a raised voice.
“I mean he tucked me in last night.” Bennie shrugged, earning confused looks. “Don’t ask.”
Everyone’s attention faced back to JJ as he spoke up, not to joke for once. “What did she do to you, exactly?”
“She’s… like a spitting cobra.”
“That’s a bad analogy.” Pope whined.
“Listen to me!” Kie yelled, irritated by everything. But anyone could tell she was just trying to protect them.
“Kie, remember how you felt when you first met Red, back in your kook school? You didn’t like her, right? But now you’re close! And- At first, I didn’t like Bennie ‘cause of Topper, but Bennie’s awesome! Red’s awesome! Maybe, Sarah’s awesome too.”
“No, Guys! This is different.” Kie cut him off, getting angrier as the conversation progressed as if she was claiming her territory. “Whatever we get, she’s gonna try to take.”
Just then, John B subtly pulled Red aside and whispered in her ear, “Take Bennie home. And take JJ too.”
Red nodded, pulling JJ up from his seat. “C’mon.”
She then grabbed Bennie’s arm and pulled her away with her, “For the record! I’m with Kie on this one!” Bennie yelled before being turned away and hushed by Red. “Love you!”
Red rolled her eyes with a small smile, Approaching the car she was brought there in, aka the Twinkie.
“Wait, how are they gonna get home?” Asked JJ, tossing her the keys from his pocket.
“The Chateau’s like… a five-minute walk.”
“And what are you gonna do with the Twinkie?”
Red turned to him, “You’ll take it back to John B’s after we get you all cleaned up.”
The blonde boy nodded in understanding, opening the passenger seat door of the minivan, Bennie loading herself tiredly into the back which was stenched of weed and alcohol.
Red’s eyebrows furrowed in confusion, catching the quick attention of JJ. “What?”
“I can’t drive stick.” Red sighed, glaring at the boy as if asking a question she needed to know the answer to.
“Yeah.” JJ muttered, quickly switching seats with the girl he once sat adjacent to.
Red settled into the passenger seat, and JJ began to drive.
It was then that Bennie propped her head out of the back, “Aw! We’re like one big happy family! On our way to Disneyland.”
JJ and Red exchanged smiles, “I don’t recall you’re house being Disney Land.”
“Well, just imagine it is, Red.” Bennie giggled, returning to her spot, slouching in the back. “Except the parents are leaving the kid at Disneyland because they’ve had enough of her whining.”
The last few minutes we’re purely Bennie ranting on about something neither Red nor JJ wanted to hear, but as she had said earlier, She talks a lot when she was nervous. Understandable considering the state that her brother was in.
As the three approached the large two-story house, lifted upon an artificial hill, Bennie grabbed hold of the backpack she had dragged along, got out of the van, and stopped in front of the door.
“My stop. Thanks for driving me.”
“Do you want me to walk you in?” Asked Red, looking further into the window of the house.
“Thanks, but, There’s no need.” Bennie spoke, waving her off. “Somethings up with Topper, I wanna make sure everything is okay.”
Red nodded, turning away from the girl and back to the windshield, waving her a small goodbye as she approached the house until she was out of JJ or Red’s line of sight.
Then, Red would give JJ careful instructions on what to do to get into her house without being spotted by her father on the new cameras he installed.
Carefully getting into the house, Red shooshed JJ every now in then as she led him up the stairs and into her bathroom where she set him on the counter and grabbed the basic first-aid kit concealed in her wooden doors underneath the counter in the kitchen, pulling out a couple of alcohol wipes, and some bandaids.
JJ watched her movements carefully, glaring every time she moved her head, setting various materials on the counter next to him.
Opening the paper bag holding a wet alcohol wipe, JJ wasn’t afraid of the sting he would soon feel.
Red carefully pressed the wipe against his cheek, and he ever so slightly winced at the pain, but remain quiet besides a small yelp.
“You okay?” She mumbled, making sure he was okay.
JJ nodded, signaling her to continue bandaging his cuts and bruises until she clipped the first-aid kit back shut.
“Rafe and Topper did all of this?” Asked Red, looking closer at his wounds that looked older than what either of the boys could have caused less than 2 hours ago.
JJ looked down at the counter, not wanting to look her in the eyes, “No, part of it was The Old Man.”
Red’s expression softened, “Oh… I’m… sorry.”
“It’s nothing that hasn’t happened before.” JJ half-smiled at Red, which was supposed to reassure her, but somehow made her feel even worse.
“I’m… gonna go put this back,” Red mumbled, picking up the first aid kit and going down the stairs to put it back.
Approaching the bathroom JJ once sat in, Red quickly noticed that the boy was no longer there.
“JJ?” Red called in a hushed tone, searching the bathroom further.
“In here.” His voice called from a room off down the hallway recognized as Red’s.
Red quickly made her way down the hallway into her room, where JJ looked around, glaring at the varius photos she had in her room scatter across the walls and dresser.
JJ’s eyes quickly narrowed onto a picture in a wooden frame that contained a picture of Red and Lucas likely from a few years before.
He pretended not to notice it, but Red knew he did, so she picked up the photo and looked at him.
JJ looked over between her and the picture she held. “What… happened? Like since he’s back… and stuff.”
Red sighed, smiling shortly, “Nothing.”
“Nothing?”
Red thought for a moment, “Actually, something did happen.”
“What?”
“You.”
JJ looked both flustered and confused, “Me? What do I have to do with any of this?”
“Because… If it weren’t for you, I would’ve thought that Lucas was my soulmate.” Red replied, a sincere smile dancing on her face. “You see, When I met you, It occurred to me that we weren’t.”
JJ tilted his head, “How?”
“Well, when you’re soulmates… you don’t… fall in love with somebody else.” Red explained before letting out a sigh, “Not the way I fell for you.”
“You fell for me?”
“Hard.” Red allowed the gap in between both of their faces to close.
Suddenly, without intention, the kiss became more intense, slowly becoming more intimate as the pair moved their lips in sync, slowly making their way to the edge of Red’s bed lined with pink sheets.
JJ naturally yet gently pushed the girl down on her bed, her face still cupped in his hands as he continued kissing her.
As JJ’s lips began wandering towards her neck, Red could feel that this was more than just a kissing session and she didn’t know how to feel.
“JJ…” JJ’s head shot up at the girl’s words, making sure she was okay.
The boy backed up from Red, “I’m sorry.”
“No, no, no, no. Don’t be.” Red felt slightly embarrassed.
“It’s… totally fine if you don’t… want to.”
Red shook her head, a smile resting on her face, “No, I do.”
“Are you sure?”
“I think.” Red’s smile slowly faded as she looked at JJ for a moment. “It’s just… I’ve never… y’know and, I guess it scares me sometimes.”
“Why?” JJ asked carefully.
“Because… When it’s happening… I never feel more… defensless, or… you get to see a side of me that no one has before. And what if it doesn’t mean as much to you as it does to me.”
JJ cupped her face, “Honestly… with anyone else, it wouldn’t. But for you, it really does. Because you’re not just a fling.”
“I would hope not.”
“But, since It means so much to both of us, I don’t want to push you.”
Red shook her head, "no. I want to."
"100%?"
Red pulled his neck down to kiss her as if responding to him.
And it was all that Red asked for. Because it was special to the both of them, and JJ wouldn't ever let Red go.
im not good at writing
smut, and even if I was,
I think I'd just get uncomfy
writing those scenes,
some things should be
left to your imagination
So imagine away??
edit: it's so fun to redo the
Format of an entire two books!
(Said literally no one ever)