Back in my bed, a flood of emotions swept through me. To do what the FBI wanted me to do, to go it alone, seemed impossible. I wouldn’t be able to confide in anyone, so no one could help me carry the load; a heavy burden to carry alone.
Couldn’t Jeremy see that I was just a kid and not strong like he thought? The pressure of this whole thing seemed to be crushing the life out of me. I wondered if Marybeth had felt this way before finding comfort in her phone call on the balcony. I wished I had someone to call. I resisted crying, not wanting the terrorists to hear.
After only a few minutes, though, my chest burned and I couldn’t hold it back any longer, I started to cry. I tried to whimper quietly, but it didn’t take long before I sobbed uncontrollably. I curled up into a tight ball, wishing I could disappear. I didn’t want anyone to see or hear me, but at that moment, if anyone had walked up to me, even the most gorgeous guy in the world, I wouldn’t have cared or noticed. I thought the tears would never stop. Everything I’d been holding inside escaped all at once and a sweet cleansing took place. Something deep inside me told me I could do this. Something was giving me strength. My chest burned as my load seemed to lighten. Eventually, sleep enveloped me.
I woke to a pitch black room. No faint glow showed itself around the sliding glass doors and the clock by my bed glared at me. 4:30 a.m. I had to squint to not hurt my eyes. I rolled onto my back and rubbed them gently—they felt puffy and sore. When I opened or shut them, it felt like sandpaper stuck to the back of my eyelids, scratching my eyeballs.
I could hear Marybeth’s even breathing on the other side of the room and wondered when she had come in last night. Had my group returned at seven o’clock, like every other evening? Did they go to the rec room after dinner? I must have fallen asleep quickly after getting back from the FBI building.
I tossed back the covers and walked to the bathroom on tip toes, shutting the door quietly behind me. Feeling around for the light switch, I closed my eyes before flipping it on. If the clock light had hurt my eyes, I could only imagine what a real light would do. With my eyes still shut, I felt around for the sink and turned the water on, waiting until it wasn’t freezing cold before cupping my hands under it. It felt great to wash my face. With each splash, I opened my eyes a bit more, allowing the water to rinse out the saltiness. It burned a little at first, but then the sandpaper under my lids washed away, and I could finally open and close my eyes without pain. I dabbed my face with a towel and took a peek at it in the mirror.
My eyes looked about half their normal size, which was never large anyway. I wondered if mascara would hide any of it. I felt rejuvenated and exhausted at the same time and I leaned my head against the mirror and took a few deep breaths.
“Please, give me strength,” I prayed in a whisper. “I can’t do this alone.” I waited, eyes closed, and a sweet peace returned. I felt strong.
When I lifted my head off of the glass, a large, red circle appeared on my forehead. Rubbing it didn’t take it away, and I figured a shower was my only hope.
Even after the shower, my puffy eyes stared back at me from the mirror. Darn it!
I carefully opened the bathroom door after turning off the light and waited for my eyes to adjust. There was a slight glow around the curtains now, and I picked out some clothes to wear and put them on. The clock read five-thirty. Luckily, the sliding door opened easily and didn’t make a lot of noise. I left the curtains shut but slipped behind them to the balcony. I understood now why Marybeth had escaped to the balcony the other morning. It was a great place to hide.
The calm and cloudless sky gave me exactly the opposite feeling of what I had felt yesterday. Some cars drove on the street below, but not many. I had to remind myself that this was a government town, and the government worked from eight to five. It was a little early for the seven-thirty mayhem on the streets of D.C. A slight wind gently caressed my face.
Tall buildings surrounded me. At home we only had a few slightly tall buildings with hills looming over us. Instead of street after street of hotels and businesses like I saw here, most of our streets had homes on them, even downtown. Thinking of its beauty made me long to return. I missed home in an odd way. I wanted to escape it because of the people at school, not the glorious landscape. What would happen to me when I got back home? Would I have time to change enough for anyone to notice? I hoped any further change I experienced would be minus the pain.
I wondered what my family had been doing. Had they thought about me at all? What would they think if they knew what had happened to me these last few days? Not much probably. They thought I could handle anything and wouldn’t worry.
I’d been in D.C. a week now. I couldn’t remember what we had planned for today, our last real day of sightseeing. What could we do on a Sunday? Maybe we would relax a bit before the real work of the trip began tomorrow. I kind of wished we’d worked the first week of the trip and played the second. It was odd to do it the other way around. Don’t all moms tell kids to work first, then play? If only we had done that, we wouldn’t have run into the trouble in the ballroom. I really didn’t have an interest in politics and it would have been nice just to continue to explore D.C. and not have to worry about “our” political careers.
I heard some noise behind me as Marybeth climbed out onto the balcony with me.
“Hey,” she said.
“Hey,” I said.
“What ya doing?”
“Couldn’t sleep and it’s just so nice out here.”
“It really is.”
“Marybeth, I’m sorry you didn’t know about the scholarship.”
“That’s okay. I probably wouldn’t have qualified anyway. My parents make too much.”
“Why did you want to go on this particular trip?” I asked. “Why not choose a cheaper one. I saw a lot of cheaper ones advertised on the internet.”
“This trip is the best one. The fifty kids in this particular group get special treatment. The ones in all the other groups that combine with us at the last debate, the day before we leave, don’t get half of what we do. Look at where we are staying, for instance. All the other groups are in dive hotels, eat crappy food and only get to go see the things that every other sight-seer who comes to D.C. gets to see. Even our bus is cush. This particular group was developed to give political hopefuls the chance to see first-hand, the inner workings of politics in D.C. without getting their hands dirty. This is for the elite. This is partly how they protect their inner-circles of power and keep that power within the same few hands. We get to spend the day with a page, shadow a lobbyist and Congressman’s aide or a Senator’s aide. We get to be with Mrs. J., who is infamous for setting up future politicians. The people you see eating with us every day, will be the ones leading this country in the years to come. It’s all about power and connections. I’m surprised you didn’t know all this.”
I wanted to tell her that I wasn’t interested in politics at all, and I was only here to create a new me, but I figured it would be too big of a pill to swallow, considering the scholarship and all. “It’s not like they spelled it out like that on the internet. I just picked the one that had a scholarship.”
My stomach growled so loud that I thought it would wake everyone in D.C. We laughed and climbed back into our room. Marybeth told me to go down to breakfast before my stomach disappeared, and she would meet me there as soon as she got ready. I didn’t argue. I grabbed my things and took off for the elevator.
Being the only one from our group in the breakfast room felt odd, but I was too hungry to worry about it. Like always, the buffet had everything possible on it; a perk of this tour, I guess. Would our future leaders really come from this group of fifty kids? I loaded my plate high, sat down and dug in. Next thing I knew, Rick sat next to me.
“Wow,” he said, looking at my overflowing plate. He rocked into me, his shoulder touching mine, and then his entire arm snuggled up next to mine. I looked up at his grinning face, only inches from me.
“Very funny
,” I said.
“You beat me, ya know. I’ve been the first one down here every day until today.”
“Slept in, did ya?” I said, turning back to my food. His arm still pressed against mine.
“No. You just got here early. I guess you feel better now, huh? I mean you’re eating and everything.”
“Yeah,” I said. “I thought I was going to die yesterday. I must’ve eaten something bad.” I laughed, but what I really wanted to do was cry thinking about puking my guts out, not to mention having to re-live the worst moments of my life with the FBI agents.
“When we checked on you last night you were sleeping like a baby,” he said.
“You checked on me?” I clenched my hands together.
“Yeah. We were all so worried, we checked on you as soon as we got back.”
“We?” I hoped against hope that we did not include Alex.
“Marybeth, Mrs. J. and I.”
“Oh.” I was relieved that Alex hadn’t come, but at the same time, I wished he had. I looked at my plate and decided I wasn’t as hungry as I thought. When I reached for my glass of water, Rick was still touching me.
I looked around him as casually as I could. Yep, no one there. I looked in the other direction, no one there either. There we were at this large table, elbow to elbow, while there was room enough for us to be ten feet apart.
At that precise moment, Kira walked in. Our eyes met. Her eyes narrowed and the corners of her mouth dropped. She started stomping our way. I suddenly felt guilty.
I hadn’t done anything wrong, though and didn’t need to feel guilty. Sure, Rick was sitting with me, touching me, but I hadn’t invited it.
“Hey Kira,” I shot out, as the gap between us narrowed.
“Hey, Kira,” Rick said casually. “I was just about to tell Christy about yesterday and everything we did.”
“Really,” she said through clenched teeth.
I finished my water with one big gulp.
“I’ll be right back,” I said, as I stood up, waving my glass in the air to indicate I needed a refill. After filling my glass with ice, I pressed my cup to the water dispenser and got bumped from behind. Kira.
“What the heck, Christy. I told you he was taken,” she said, her face red and her eyes extremely wide open.
One thing’s for sure, Kira’s direct. She doesn’t beat around the bush.
“What are you talking about?” I asked, playing dumb.
“Hello!... Rick, the guy you were all over when I walked in,” she hissed.
“All over? Really? Look, for the last time, I’m not interested in Rick and he’s not interested in me.” The thought of his arm touching mine danced through my mind and I had to look away from her.
“What?” she asked. She stared at me intently.
“I’m truly not interested in Rick, I said. “He’s yours, if he’ll have you. Have at it.” I looked her directly in the eye so that she couldn’t misunderstand me.
She let out a breath, and her shoulders sunk a bit.
“You mean it, don’t you?”
“Of course,” I answered.
She looked at me and then looked in Rick’s direction and then back at me again.
“I told you this before,” I said. “Believe me, this time. I was all by myself before he joined me. Did you want him to sit way over there?” I pointed to the other end of the breakfast room.
“Well, maybe. I mean, I don’t know.”
The sad thing was that she really did.
“Stop being so suspicious, Kira. He was just being a nice guy and didn’t want me to sit alone. Why in the world would you think he liked me?”
“You looked so cozy together, laughing and talking. He’s so cute and nice. You do think he’s cute, don’t you?”
“Sure, but I’m not interested. Can we drop this? If you get all jealous on me again, I’ll have to hurt you. Seriously.”
“Fine. I’ll keep the claws in for now,” she said with a little growl. “But you better watch it.” She laughed half-heartedly and went to get some breakfast. What she really meant was that I better stay away. I noticed that the room was getting crowded.
After I’d filled my glass, I headed back to the table. Almost everyone from our group sat around tables now. If my plate hadn’t been marking my spot, I would have had to sit that ten feet away from Rick that Kira wanted me to sit. I stopped in my tracks. Alex was sitting next to my empty seat. I was going to be sandwiched between Rick and Alex, and by the looks of it, I would never fit in the small space they’d left me. My heart skipped a beat, and I looked back at Kira and thought about offering the space to her. She hadn’t claimed a spot yet and would have to sit far away from Rick and all of us, for that matter, and she wouldn’t be happy about it.
“Christy,” Rick called out. “What are you looking at? I saved your place. Come on.”
I couldn’t breathe, thinking about sitting next to Alex. I really, really wanted him to like me, and it was scary. I didn’t want the inevitable pain of rejection that always came.
“Uh, there’s not enough room for me,” I said, motioning with my glass at a different table. “I’ll go sit down there.”
“Don’t be crazy,” he insisted. “There’s plenty of space.” He poked Alex and said something to him that made him look at me.
“Sorry, Christy,” Alex said. “Scoot down guys!” he yelled to the left side of the table and everyone moved down.
“There you go, Christy,” Alex said, patting the bench next to him.
I tried to smile, but I had no clue if I had been successful. My heart raced and I seemed to have lost my mind. I couldn’t think.
“Thanks,” I squeaked, more quietly than I’d intended, feeling my cheeks burn.
“No problem,” he said, his hand still on the seat.
I looked up to see Kira getting some orange juice. My mind kicked into gear. I wanted to gag at the thought. Think before you drink and only drink what you get yourself, I reminded myself.
“Come on,” Alex said again, still patting the seat and looking at me.
Those deep brown eyes got to me, and I hurried to sit down, leaving Kira to her own fate.
CHAPTER TEN