chapter three
"no pogue on pogue macking"
"AND I THOUGHT THE CHATEAU looked bad."
After John B had attached an anchor to the sunken boat that exploded curiosity in the teenagers minds, they all headed on to where the Coast Guard was making their central for the surge. However, it was no luck, because the men that were in charge wouldn't listen to a single word the children had to offer. So, they decided they would go to the motel — the one that was printed on that card John B had found earlier in the morning on the wreckage.
Lynn, along with the rest of the scooby gang, were staring at the poor excuse of a motel that the keycard belonged to. She couldn't tell if it was because of the hurricane, or because it was actually a crappy place beforehand, but it was a pure shitshow.
"This place is a shitshow," John B commented, and she let out a small chuckle under her breath because the guy had managed to actually read her mind.
"Motel or meth lab?"
I'm gonna say both," Lynn stated with a teasingly funny eyebrow raised, glancing over towards Kie, who was sitting right beside the girl.
"Doesn't look like a place somebody with a Grady-White stays," JJ explained while his eyes stayed trained on the upcoming motel.
That part, totally made sense. Why would someone with such great taste in boats stay at a terrible motel like this? It truly didn't make sense to Lynn.
"No, it looks like a place where someone with a Grady-White would get killed," Pope puffed out, and Lynn nodded alongside him knowing no one was really paying attention.
Slowly and steadily, they made their way to the shoreline where they could tie off. JJ jumped off first, making sure the boat was in fact secured for the rest of his best friends. Then John B was the next to top off the boat onto the soft grass, where lastly Lynn moved to the front of the boat — following the same action that both JJ and John B had done to land right in between the two taller boys.
"Hey, you're not coming," JJ pointed his index finger warningly in Lynn's direction, making her roll her bright blue eyes with annoyance. "It's could be dangerous."
"Dangerous to explore a motel room? Get over yourself JJ, I'm coming with you to make sure you dumbass's don't do something dumb," Lynn responded, full of sass and attitude, narrowing her first eyes towards the two boys.
JJ then glanced quickly to John B for help, but he only shrugged as a simply reply, "I mean, she's kinda got a point."
"Dude!" JJ exclaimed dramatically, and Lynn only decided to strut right past the two boys and towards the motel stairs. The keycard had a light colored 229 scribbled onto the plastic, but it was hardly even recognizable, but still meant they needed to head up to the second floor.
Lynn heard Kie mumble something to John B, while her and JJ stood there for a moment, but she couldn't make out the words. Kie handed the key off to John B, and then they were off to find the motel room.
They made their way to the top floor, the floor which the apparent room was on. Lynn was excited, actually, because this adventure was only the start of what they were going to be doing this summer. This summer was going to be different than the rest, she could tell — just had this feeling.
"Just be so careful, John. God, what the heck was that about?"
Lynn didn't even realize how much she had zoned out from the conversation, and then she tilted her head to the side as to what exactly the boys standing in front of her were saying. JJ had placed his hand on John B's chin while hugging him from the side, and she chuckled at the sight of them being their usual chaotic selves.
"God, you're so weird," John B grumbled under his breath, which only seemed to fuel JJ's happiness of being able to accomplish his goal of annoying everyone.
"Since she heard you're being threatened with exile, she's just been, like, 'Oh! Be so careful, John B!" JJ let out a girly moan when he came to the finish of his sentence, and Lynn cringed at the sight of him doing it. He started to massage John B's shoulders, and she let out a quick snort.
JJ talked about Kie plenty, practically all the boys had a crush on the girl at some point. Kie says the same thing about Lynn, that the boys had a crush on her at some point too, but she was just mainly focused on JJ potentially having a crush on her.
"Get off," John B reluctantly responded, shrugging his shoulders lightly to get JJ's hands off him, only managing to do so when the blonde boy gave up his action.
"You two are weirdos," Lynn shook her head while deadpanning at the boys, who both seemingly glanced over their shoulders at the same time.
"Oh, just give me that John D already!'" JJ moaned out, and Lynn let out an even louder laugh than before, where she merely had to cover her pink lips in order to control the fit of laughter. It was honestly quite funny to witness, but JJ always seemed to be quite funny to witness. "When are you gonna swoop on that, man?"
"Hey!" Lynn scolded JJ, jabbing her elbow into his ribs, where that previous entertained demeanor shifted a bit more serious. "Don't talk like she's an object, ass."
"Bro, you know the rule," John B replied, completely ignoring Lynn's last comment, while raising both his arms in defense. "No pogue on pogue macking."
Lynn squeezed her tiny body so instead of walking behind the two boys, she would be right in between them. Curious, she raised her eyebrows in John B's direction — she was always wondering whether or not he genuinely liked Kie or not, and couldn't tell the difference between his joking.
"You need help," John B noted, and Lynn mumbled a 'yes' along with him under her breath. JJ shot a look of a fake hurt expression, and she grinned in his direction. "Not like a little help, you need a lot of help. It's like every girl who just has a heartbeat, you're like..."
John B tried his best at making a fake moan, that actually made her laugh because it definitely wasn't a real one. He pretended like he was banging air, and then Lynn let out another snort — having boys for best friends definitely had perks.
Of course, she'd seen JJ flirt with plenty of girls, and of course she knew he'd been with a lot of them. Lynn's been with a fair share of boys herself, but none of them stood out through the crowd, so eventually the fun would end. Although she had never actually done the deed.
"Gross," Lynn stated with a shiver, and when she spoke she saw JJ glancing over his shoulder, to gaze back at the girl. He sent her a wink, and she only rolled her eyes while shaking her head to the side, trying to get rid of those damn butterflies in her stomach.
"Hey, this is us."
The teenagers all came to a sudden halt in their steps as they heard John B speak up, and then Lynn identified the green painted door that they had come upon as the numbers 229 were poorly screwed in.
JJ began to knock without hesitation, just hitting his knuckle softly against the wood two times, and then after a second he raised the pitch of his tone higher than Lynn thought was even possible for the boy, "Housekeeping!"
Lynn almost snorted at him and his ridiculous little voice changes, and John B glanced to her with a hilarious grin plastered on his face as well.
"Should we try it?" John B questioned after waiting a moment with no response, shrugging her shoulders softly.
"Yeah," JJ replied, and then he looked at Lynn for her response, and she nodded alongside. "No power. No security cameras. No ones gonna know."
When John B finally unlocked the door, they slowly poured into the room one by one. It wasn't as bad as the outside looked, and it seemed pretty clean to be honest, but still had a quite disgusting smell swell in the air. There was a backpack on the first bed by the door, and then another on a table, papers were scattered a few places.
"Check the bags, see if there's a name on there somewhere."
Lynn didn't pay much attention to John B saying it because she figured JJ would listen to him rather than her. So, she took the time to drag her flashlight all over the room. There wasn't really much of anything, so she started searching the wooden drawers. She heard JJ and John B talking in the background, about some map on the nightstand, where they were possibly fishing.
"Standard — tissues for when you get lonely," JJ wiggled his eyebrows at Lynn firstly, and then over at his male best friend.
She then started paying her attention back to the drawers, then Lynn swung open the very bottom one, and saw a small safe with a keypad.
"Hey, guys," Lynn called out in the air, her eyes just staring hard at the safe, not daring to escape. If there was anything valuable in there, there were about a billion different passcodes in the world they could try.
"Nice, Lynn," John B complimented, placing a hand on her shoulder as he gave it a squeeze. Then, he crouched down beside her while he leaned forward to get a look at it.
"Good job, princess," JJ added, and she flashed him a proud smile as she backed away a bit to give John B some space. That nickname always seemed to make a smile grow on her face, without even trying.
"There's too many passcodes though, we might never find out what's in there," Lynn explained, just stating the facts, straightening out her back as she stood back up.
"Punching shit at random, that will definitely work," JJ mused towards his best friend, and Lynn sort of agreed with him. There were the slimmest of chances possible that John B will just be able to magically guess the numbers—
"—Wait a second," John B interrupted her thoughts, and then got up from his kneeling position to walk back to the nightstand with the map. He grabbed a small piece of paper, and she wasn't able to see what was scribbled on it before he went back to sit in front of the safe.
"Oh my God, you got it," Lynn gasped as she saw the light switch to green, and then suddenly JJ stopped his ranting and turned around to face them.
"Holy shit," John B breathed out, and Lynn's pink lips spread to an even bigger gasp. Inside the safe was a few wads of cash, which was more than she had seen in her entire lifetime, but the real source of her gasp was much more dangerous — a black, slim handgun.
"JJ!" Lynn scolded as soon as she witnessed JJ push both of them to the side to take ahold of the gun. Then her face straightened out as she tried to reach for the object, but JJ moved his hand higher so she wouldn't be able to reach. "I'm going to actually murder you."
"This is a SIG Sauer!" JJ exclaimed with excitement bubbling, and she wondered why in the hell that meant he had to pick it up.
"Put the gun back, JJ!" John B shouted, but quietly because they didn't want people to know they were here, and certainly not with a gun.
"This is a fucking spendy gatt, man! Just, bop!" JJ then repeatedly made the popping noises to mimic a gunshot, and Lynn was extremely ready to pull him out of that motel room by his ear.
"Just take a pic of me, right here," JJ demanded with that same excitement. And then he tried his best, but failed miserably, at trying to pose with the gun, and Lynn's palm collided with her forehead as she was wondering how she actually has a crush on this boy.
"Make our own incriminating evidence? Is that what you're talking about?" John B asked with a serious tone, pointing towards the gun. Then Lynn heard the smallest thump, and both John B and her turned to look at each other, confused. "Wait, what was that?"
John B skipped over towards the closed window, and then pulled the curtains draped down to expose both Kie and Pope with their arms raised and tiny screams escaping their mouths.
"Cops! Cops!"
"Shit," Lynn groaned, and then she glanced to both boys to see what the next move was. Then, John B raced over to the front window, and peaked his eye out, and then mumbled 'cops' and they all rushed back towards the window Kie and Pope were standing, but by now they had ran back to the boat.
Then, seemingly at the same time, their eyes landed on the tiny roof outside the window. Lynn climbed out on the small window first, and then JJ was behind her, quickly followed by John B directly behind him. It seemed like just as soon as they all made it out, they heard the front door open.
John B was on the right side of the window, while JJ and Lynn were huddled extremely close on the left. He was all the way to the end of the roof, and had an arm wrapped tightly around her waist, pulling her close into his chest. She took in his scent for a second, he smelled like a mix of beer, salt water, and sweat, and to be honest, it was just about her favorite smell. She felt his heart beating on her back, and she knew hers was probably just the same. One wrong step, and JJ and Lynn were both going down.
Lynn glanced to the ground, and she felt her breathing get even heavier by the second. She was absolutely terrified of heights, anyone who knew her would know that. And right now, staring at the ground while JJ and her were barely hanging on, was scaring the shit out of her.
"Evelynn, it's okay," JJ whispered in the softest voice towards Lynn's ear, tickling it a bit, and she tore her eyes from the ground to look at JJ's blue ones. This was one of the many moments that made Lynn feel that he possibly liked her back, and she loved each and every one of them.
She then took in several deep breathes, and buried her head into JJ's shoulder so she wouldn't stare at the ground anymore. Then, she heard a loud clatter and as she glanced over to John B, she noticed that he must've knocked a piece from the roof off towards the ground.
JJ flinched, and pulled Lynn even closer to his body than she thought possible, knowing that the cops probably heard the noise and would look out the window.
In a second, Lynn heard the shades pull out and she saw the officer out of the corner of her eye. She bit down on her lip as she waited for the cop to turn around, to start screaming as the kids trying to hide on the roof.
But they didn't.
"Let's go. No ones here."
a/n: don't forgot to vote & comment! ilyyy