"Aren't you eating lunch, Tasha?" I asked as I watched her suck on some green smoothie in front of us. 

She shook her head furiously with the straw still in her mouth. After a moment, she stopped drinking and took it out of her mouth. "I'm on an all juice detox thing until the dance to make me feel less bloated."

Did that kind of stuff even work? I maintained a serious face while I listened to her explain to me how many calories were probably in the chicken wrap I was eating but I let the noises of all the other people in the cafeteria drown her out.

To be honest, it was always a miracle for me to keep a straight face during lunches with Tasha and her friends. We sat in a big group of her, me, Charlotte, Violet and a few more girls who were considered popular but not popular enough to hang out with Tasha. To think there was once a younger part of me that aspired to hang out with the pretty and popular girls in high school seemed stupid. I would rather be sitting at a table with people trying to memorize the first 72 numbers of pi than listen to their unintelligent conversations.

The one thing that I had worked out during my last period when I didn't pay attention to my science teacher's boring drawling voice was that if Eric was going to be gone for today and tomorrow, I should at least get closer to cracking this case. I didn't want him to seem like I had achieved nothing during the time of his absence.

"Hey guys," I said in a low voice. Tasha stopped her conversation on the amount of weight you could gain if you ate gluten every day and looked at me. I swallowed nervously and tried to think of a way to ask the question. "You know how on my first day you said you'd help hook me up with some NT drugs, did you guys actually work out how to do that yet?"

"Oh, I didn't tell you?" Tasha asked.

I could feel my heart race in an instant. "Tell me what?" I leaned forward slowly.

"There's a number. You text it and say that you're in need of a hook-up and then they text back with a location and you meet them there. That's what Henry said anyway." Tasha answered and she went back to sucking up her smoothie.

It made so much sense. All the weird meetings in classrooms were starting to look like they were obviously drug swaps. The RUA had been on the right track this whole time.

I took a deep breath before wondering whether if I asked more questions, it would look suspicious but then figured that this drug was starting to become so common that I probably wouldn't look shifty at all.

"Do you know the number? The one to text?" I asked while trying not to look too eager to find out. I took another bite of my wrap to look more casual.

"I don't have it stored on my phone. Just in case the narks start doing some serious investigation." Tasha answered.

"Narks?" I asked while feeling my heart beat faster.

"Yeah, you know, the police whose job is to specifically solve drug cases and all that," she explained.

"Yeah, I'm familiar with the term narks, I just don't know why you'd be worried about them. Do you think that there are people trying to find out who is behind the drugs?" I asked squeezing my hands shut tightly.

"Well, obviously. I mean you heard the principal over the speakers a while ago." one of the skinny girls with thin long straight black hair answered.

She was right. They had said they were trying to catch on to who was the dealer no too long ago. I just hoped that no one was suspicious of undercover students here. Otherwise, I could be screwed.

"Anyway, look," Tasha began as she zipped open her bag. She reached in and pulled out a piece of paper that was stored inside a compact mirror. You had to admire her creativity. She held out the piece of paper for me to grab.

I slowly reached my hand out as she explained. "I have the number written down on here, just copy it out and give me back the paper when you're done."

I looked at the paper with amazement. This was it. This was really the final link to the person who was behind it all. I grabbed the paper from Tasha and copied it into a school book I had on my, triple checking that I had got the number right.

I handed her back the paper and smiled. I took one more look down at the piece of paper that was in the palm of my hand.

This was really it. This was what was going to end this whole case. And send me back to my normal life.

Okay, so I wasn't exactly in a rush to hand over the phone number to the RUA. But I was definitely going to at some point. I'd just decided to hold it off until Eric came back. But until then, I kept it with me close by and copied it out in a few other places just in case.

I'd arrived at home once the day was over and typed the number into my computer to again help reassure myself that I wouldn't lose it or forget it before Thursday afternoon. I sighed in relief as I closed my laptop screen. I can't believe Tasha had forgotten to tell me about the stupid number. And then she'd just brought it up so casually! If only she knew the importance of me getting it...

I shut my eyes for a moment to just take everything in. This case was coming to an end so quickly that I could barely process it. It looked like Kennedy High and all the people in it were going to be out of my life by next week.

I fell back on my bed and just processed everything that had happened to me over the last few weeks. The attack at the school at night time, Brad, Eric, quitting gymnastics. It all seemed like too much to handle. The RUA had changed my life, I just wasn't sure yet if it was for better or worse.

A moment later I heard the sound of a door slam. I sat up on my bed and quickly got up when I heard the footsteps enter the house. I hadn't even realized my mother wasn't home yet. I quickly made my way to the door to open it slightly. Before I had a chance to look out I heard a loud voice call out from downstairs.

"Becca!!" My Mom yelled. I bit my lip nervously when I heard how angry she sounded. I made my way down the stairs as fast as I could in order to found out what was wrong.

My mother stood at the bottom of the stairs with her arms folded, looking irritated.

"Mom?" I asked worriedly as I stopped on the bottom step.

"Guess who I just bumped into at the supermarket?" she asked

Panic filled my head as I thought of all the possible people that she could have run into. Teachers or students from my school who mentioned that I hadn't been in attendance for the past few weeks, a member from the RUA, a student from Kennedy High.

"Coach May." She said finally, interrupting my thoughts.

I felt my face drain of color. Oh no.

"Now when exactly were you planning on telling me you quit gymnastics?" she yelled. Her face was turning red and the scream lines were visible on her face. I hadn't seen her this angry in a long time.

I swallowed. "Mom, I'm sorry, but you have to listen to m-"

"You have been doing gym practically your whole life Becca, you can't just quit now just because you feel like it. And you definitely can't quit without me knowing first or at least telling me afterward!" she yelled.

"I'm not quitting just because I feel like it!" I argued, raising my voice.

"I really don't care why you quit Becca, you obviously weren't thinking clearly. You're going back to training next week." She said firmly.

I looked at her in horror. "No, I'm not Mom! I don't want to go back."

"You are the state champion, this is what you do best! I'm not going to let you just give up!"

"It's too late!" I yelled. "I'm not doing it again, I quit on Sunday," I told her.

"Sunday?" she raised her eyebrows in surprise. "What have you been doing all this time then? Coming home late every night."

I opened my mouth trying to come up with something. Crap. I'd walked myself into that one.

"And don't say you were with Debby and Kevin because I have seen them on afternoons playing tennis at the country club."

I closed my mouth, feeling trapped.

"What is happening to you, Becca? When did you start lying and hiding things from me?" she asked.

I couldn't hold it back any longer. "You want to talk about lying Mom?" I asked angrily. "How about last night? And every other night over the past few days that you've gone out and claimed it was for some charity event party. I know what's going on Mom. You're seeing someone."

I watched her open her mouth in shock or as if to argue but I cut her off.

"Don't try to deny it. You've done this before." I had remembered her doing the same thing a few months back. Walking out of the house all dressed up and claiming to see some friends of hers. Two weeks later she'd introduced me to some guy named Derek who was in his thirties and sold CDs on the street. It didn't work out between them.

"So let's not make this all about me." I continued saying. "Before you start claiming that I'm the liar in this family, maybe you should take another look in the mirror." I turned around and started walking back up the stairs to my room, leaving my Mom standing there.

"Oh, and don't worry about dinner I'm not hungry," I mumbled as I slammed the door and locked myself in my room.

It was a total lie, I was starving. But not enough for me to actually want to go back downstairs and go to the kitchen. I wasn't going to risk facing my Mom again. It was weird, though. I think I'd known this entire time that my Mom must have been seeing someone else, but I didn't completely realize it until a minute ago.

How could she hide something like that from me? I was such an idiot for not realizing earlier. All the going out late, the charity events at our house-

"Oh my god," I said out loud.

He's been in our house.

I groaned as I let my back hit the door and I slid down to the floor. Could there be anything creepier? I've probably walked past him at some point when I was downstairs. I've probably seen the guy but not paid enough attention. He knows where we live. Great.

"Ughhh." I groaned louder as I banged my head against the door in frustration.

At least he wasn't like the guy that sold CDs on the side of the street. But still, some guy who wore tuxedos and turned up at parties to brag about how rich he was? At least my Dad had always thought that my Mom's parties were a bit over the top. I quickly shut him out of my head, not ready to start thinking about that whole different issue all over again.

I took a deep breath as I got up off the floor and moved to my bed. In all honesty, I felt like crying. But no tears would come out. It was strange because I knew that I would have to cry at some point. I knew that it was only a matter of time that I broke down in front of someone for the smallest thing. So instead of releasing my feelings, I stayed lying on my bed watching the fan swirl around and around for hours until I finally drifted off to sleep.

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A/N: Whoo we hit the twenties guys! The big TWO OH. Let's partayy! ALSO, THIS STORY HAS GOTTEN MORE THAN 500 VOTES! LIKE WOAH GUYS THAT'S CRAZY! THANKS FOR TAKING THE TIME TO READ AND VOTE FOR THIS STORY! I'M HAVING A GREAT TIME WRITING IT x

-- Future me: haha, this used to be chapter 20, hence the confusing author's note