All Grown Up (10 page)

"Yeah.
Carrie, Brent, the three of us, of course, Calvin, Will, Lu…." She stopped and looked at me. I didn’t move or flinch. I heard her, but screw it. I’m not getting upset over it.

"So it’s a coed thing?" Leo asked her.

"Calm down, Leo." Max said as he sat up. "I think it’s about time for us to take off, don’t you?" He said as he looked at a watch that didn’t exist on his wrist. I laughed and Leo shot a look at me.

"Yeah
, I guess." He was hesitant but he got up and headed back over to his house. I took a deep breath when he left.

Once they were gone
, Mina was on me with a thousand questions.

"So
, what happened in the car? Did you talk? What did he say? Oohh, did you kiss him?"

"Mina!" I shouted. "Stop it, nothing happened."
He just wouldn’t let me leave and felt up my leg before he left just now. Ugh!
"We went and got the truck and then drove back separately."

"Yeah right, then why do you look like you are hiding something?" Roni eyed me as she spoke.
Damn her!

"Okay, he asked me questions about computers and some other stuff, but it wasn’t a big deal." I shrugged and continued to type away on my laptop.

Before I saw it coming, Roni’s hand snapped my laptop shut.

"Spill it
, Chloe." She smirked at me with Mina standing next to her. I sighed in defeat.

I told them everything thing that happened, every single detail. I hated bringing it all back up. The only thing that I left out was the leg thing before I got off the bed.

"Chloe, I think that my brother is completely into you." Mina said with a slightly dazed look on her face.

"I have to agree. I m
ean, he wouldn’t let you leave?"

I shook my head.

"Hmm."

I didn’t like
where their minds may be going.

"Look
, it’s not a big deal. He’s leaving today and I’m sure that by the next time he is around, it will be long forgotten." I opened my laptop back up and returned to what I was working on.

Realizing that it was eerily quiet in this room, I looked over my laptop to see Mina and Roni talking in hushed tones on her bed. I didn’t like the look of that.

Chapter Eleven
Pitching A Tent

Chloe

For the past two weeks
, Mina had done nothing but talk about Halloween. Roni and I were about to stuff a pumpkin in her mouth to shut her up. Thankfully, the camping trip was tomorrow and would last for the entire weekend, so Mina’s mind had switched into camping gear.

Currently, Mina had us shopping for ‘camping gear’. Now Mina’s ‘camping gear’ consisted of cute outfits that could be worn while camping. Roni and she both had about four bags full of new clothes to go camping. I didn’t quite understand. I mean
, wouldn’t you be out in the woods getting dirty? Why would you wear new clothes? Mina forced a couple of new pairs of shorts and pants into my arms and I had grabbed a couple hooded sweatshirts.

After finishing shopping at the mall, I made them stop at Wal-Mart so we could pick up things that would actually be needed for camping. We grabbed two tents, sleeping bags, bug repellent and other various camping necessities.

The camping trip arrived quickly. Roni and I were loading up the truck with all of our things, waiting on Mina. After Mina’s stuff was loaded, we climbed into the truck together and headed to the beach to meet with the entire group.

When we arrived
, we noticed a large group had already formed. Lauren and Lucas were attached at the hip.
Gag!

Will and Calvin were tossing a football back and forth. Christy and Randy were leaning against their car with Jay standing in front of them. Jessica and Reagan were sitting in a car and then there was Clint and Kevan along with
Amelia and Claire. Once everyone was packed into their cars we all headed toward the campground that was about twenty minutes past the beach.

Arriving at the campsite
, you could see where other’s had been there not too long ago. There was still wood piled up near the large fire pit and large stones that circled around for seating. Everyone started grabbing their things and claiming their camping spots. Mina, Roni, and I began building the two tents that we had brought with us.

"You need some help?" I turned my head to see Jay reaching over to help with the tent pole.

"Thanks Jay, but you don’t have…"

"It’s not a problem." He smiled a large
, bright, white smile that seemed to make his skin look even darker. "I already helped Randy get his tent up and you guys look like you could use some assistance."

"Umm
…thanks." I turned back around and we started getting the first tent up, quickly moving on to the second one.

"These are nice. You guys did a good job picking them out." Jay stood observing the two tents that were now fully erect
and secure.

"Thanks!" Mina said bubbly. "Roni and Chloe are the two who picked them out
, though."

After all the tents were put up
, everyone started situating bags of clothes and sleeping bags into their tents, then moved on to folding chairs, a radio and coolers. Calvin had brought a grill that would fit over the fire and brought a small gas stove that he set up on a picnic table. The guys grabbed more picnic tables and situated them around the campsite better.

Once everything was set up, music was playing and a small fire was started
, everyone seemed to go off to do their own thing. Christy and Randy headed over to the woods to get more wood. Calvin, Jessica and Will went down to the water with fishing poles and Lucas and Lauren seemed to be ‘busy’ in their tent. Mina, Roni and I decided to go for a hike.

"Do you mind if we tag along?" Jay caught up to us with Clint and Kevan.

"Sure, no problem." Mina smiled to them.

We all walked for
a while, Jay catching me by my arm a few times when I slipped. When there was very little sunlight left in the sky, we decided to head back to camp. Luckily, Kevan was with us. He knew his way around the woods and we were back at camp before it got too dark to see.

You could see the campfire from the edge of the woods. It
lit the site up brilliantly. We all headed over and saw that there were hamburgers and hotdogs already done. Grabbing a plate of food each, we sat around the fire eating, talking and laughing with everyone.

Waking the next morning was a lot harder than I thought it would be. Luckily
, I could smell coffee. I was more than thankful to whoever brought and got up early to make it. I climbed out of my tent, completely sure that my hair was a tangled, frizzy mess. I slid my sweatshirt on over my head and walked towards the smell of coffee.

Jessica, Calvin, Jay and Will were all sitting at a picnic table looking as rough as I probably did.

"Morning guys," I yawned out, stumbling to the coffee.

"Morning," the guys said in unison.

"Please tell me why I agreed to go camping of all Godforsaken things?" Jessica said out loud to anyone that would listen, while she shook her head in her hands.

"Oh
, come on. The fresh air is good for the soul." Will took a deep breath in and exhaled into her face.

"Eww
, Will! Coffee and morning breath. Yeah, not a good combination." She shrieked.

I couldn’t hold back the laughter as I sat down between Jay and Will. Jessica glared at me
but I just shrugged and kept laughing.

Mina and Roni appeared about fifteen minutes later and they
looked just as haggard as everyone else. As more people began to wake up, I got up and helped Calvin start breakfast.  Jay and Roni decided to help as well.

After breakfast we saw that some other campers had started a basketball game on the camp’s court
. We decided to get dressed and walk over. I liked to watch but wasn’t coordinated enough to play. When the game had finished, Roni pulled me out to shoot some baskets.

I reluctantly got up and started shooting around with her and Mina.
We grew bored of that quickly and started goofing around instead. We were trying to steal the ball from each other, when my incredible coordination decided to rear its ugly head. I tripped over Mina’s tiny foot. Before I could kiss the pavement, I was grabbed and pulled upright. Flipping my hair out of my face, I saw Jay smirking down at me.

"Thanks," I blushed. "I’m always tripping over nothing."

He laughed.

"No problem." I went to walk away but he still had a grip on my arm. I turned back to him with my eyebrows raised in curiosity. "
Wanna walk down to the water with me?"

"Uh…" I hesitated and his face dropped. It was
like looking at a little five year old boy having his toy swiped away from him. "Sure, Jay." His face quickly pulled up into a smile.

He let go of my arm and we walked down to
the water where people were fishing.

"So
, Chloe, what do you plan on doing after high school?"

"Well, I
’m waiting to hear back from a few places about scholarships and admittance. You know, all that fun stuff." I smiled at him.

Jay and I ended up talking for about an hour. I hadn’t realized it
had been that long until Roni showed up to get me for the volleyball game. I groaned and reluctantly got up to follow her, Jay close behind.

Back at camp
, the next game was getting ready to start. Everyone split up into teams. Mina and I ended up on the same team, Roni on the opposing. I sucked at sports and knew it, but that didn’t stop me from trash talking the other team.

The game was tied, we would score and almost immediately the other team would catch up.
I avoided the ball at all costs, backing up all of my previous trash talk, letting someone else nearby cover my position. However, the last hit sent the ball directly at my head. I was about to duck when Mina jumped and landed into my side, sending us both tumbling to the ground and laughing hysterically. Jay appeared above us laughing. Reaching down, he helped Mina up and then me.

"Sorry." He said leaning over to me. I gave him a curious look. "I couldn’t get there in time to catch you." He smiled and went back to his position.

By our last day at camp, I couldn’t have been happier about getting out of the damn tent and sleeping in my own bed. I smelled like charcoaled ass and seriously wasn’t about to take another cold shower. I'd had enough of those for the rest of my life. Everyone packed up early in the morning and hung out for a few hours until we all started to disperse one group at a time.

Arriving hom
e, I ran straight to the shower.

"Bitch!"
Roni jokingly yelled after me as I slammed the bathroom door closed.

"HA
HA!" I yelled in victory.

After showering away the weekend and feeling more like myself
, I went down to the truck to get my stuff. I dumped my things out into the washing machine and started to wash the grime and fire smell out.

I could hear the shower running when I got back to my bedroom. I sat down to my computers and fired them all up. The sound of all of them buzzing around me was like an instant high.

"I missed you all. My babies!" I rubbed my fingers gently across the keyboard.

"You are sick!
S-i-c-k!" Mina said as she entered my room from the balcony. I laughed hilariously at getting busted talking to my damn computers.

"Yeah
, well….so what?" I stuck my tongue out and she laughed at me.

Mina sprawled out on my bed and Roni came out of the bathroom in some comfy lounge clothes and sprawled across her bed. It only took a few minutes till I heard their even breathing and knew that they had fallen asleep. I chuckled silently at the both of them and went back to my computer.

I pulled up my email account and started checking through my emails. While I was going through to delete the spam, I noticed a new address. I knew who it belonged to immediately. Leo. I hesitated, biting my lip for a few minutes and looked up to see if Mina and Roni were still sleeping. I opened the email that had been sent at two in the morning.

Hey,

How did camping go?

Leo.

It was strange. It was a very simple email but it was just strange. It took me about ten minutes to figure out what to reply back or whether I should reply at all. I sucked it up and hit the reply button.

Hi.

It was fun, glad it’s over.

Chloe.

I hit send and wanted to instantly bring it back. I am such an idiot. Why didn’t I just ignore it?

"
Arghh," I groaned out loud.

"What’s your problem?" My head shot up and I saw Mina lying on her side with her head propped up on her hand looking at me with a raised brow.

"Nothing." I mumbled.

Other than the fact that
I just replied to an email from your older brother.

"I just messed up something and I don’t know how to correct it." I shook my head and closed out all my email stuff in case she decided to come over.

"You better not have messed up my program." She scolded playfully and stretched. "I’m hungry! Let’s go down to the diner and get some food."

"You get to wake up the grouch then." I pointed to Roni. Mina started throwing pillows over at Roni.

"What the fuck!" Roni’s head shot up and saw Mina holding her sides laughing. "You will pay, Mina!" Quicker than Mina could comprehend, Roni was off her bed and tackling her. Mina broke out into loud laughter as Roni tickled her relentlessly.

I turned off my computer and slipped on my shoes.

"Last one to the car has to pay for lunch!" I yelled and bolted down the stairs with Roni and Mina close behind. Laughing so loud brought Judith out of the kitchen to see what the commotion was.

"Girls!
Settle down!" Judith yelled, as we made our way to through the door.

"Sorry
, Judith!" I yelled and touched the truck first.