The only clue that made the lack of an adult on Valerie's house clear was the fact that she wasn't woken up by the music of an album her aunt had randomly selected from her wide collection. No, instead she was woken up by her own alarm that ringed uncontrollably making her drag her hand out of the mattress and placing it on the twin alarm clock. Plenty of times she had thought about moving to an electronic alarm clock like the one Audrey had at her house or ditch them altogether and solely rely on her phone. Every time that happened, she forgot about it or figured that since the one she had did the trick pretty well waking her and probably her neighbors up, there was no need to update. Not to mention, it used to belong to her father making the idea of getting rid of it something the teenager wasn't entirely certain she wanted to deal with.

After pulling herself out of bed, Valerie took a shower after which she put on her school uniform. A dark blue with thin green lines plaid skirt that reached up to her knee, a light blue buttoned blouse and socks of the same color, a gray blazer and a red tie. Looking at herself in the mirror she stared for a few seconds staring at the space above her brown eyes making sure her eyebrows were properly plucked, and she was free of acne in her forehead. She looked at herself with pride, happy once again the treatment she had been prescribed was successful.

Making sure the tie was properly tied, next she braided her dark brown hair. Valerie dragged her feet to the kitchen to make herself a sandwich, opting to ignore one of the meals her aunt had left her in the fridge. As good as her aunt Moira usually cooked, Valerie wasn't in the mood to put her food in the recently bought microwave.

Usually her mornings consisted on her aunt waking her up to the music that ranged from classic works of art to some foreign song they had heard on a trip to Mexico and that Valerie had thought she would never have to hear again until her aunt decided to prove otherwise. Her aunt made breakfast while she got ready to school. They talked during the morning about anything they could think of. Valerie left after finishing her breakfast and brushing her teeth when Audrey rang her house's doorbell and waited for her outside. Always patient the days that Valerie took extra time searching for whatever part of her uniform or school materials she had almost forgotten.

This time she was fully ready by the time the doorbell rang. She took her lavender schoolbag, filled with buttons that went from popular boybands or punk rock that her aunt had listened to and gave some of her old pins to her claiming it would serve as good decoration over the soft color. She made sure to give her the ones she had repeated, just in case she would lose them. Valerie hasn't lost a single one of them since she began to take them to the secondary school, she even went as far as to pick a fight with a boy who claimed a particular pin was too cool for a girl to have.

Valerie opened the door. Audrey was waiting behind it, her dark blonde hair held up in a ponytail, glossy lipstick in her smiling mouth as her gray eyes focused on her friend who was making sure the door was properly locked once she left. Audrey stood ten centimeters taller than Valerie and had an unnatural talent to make everything look good on her.

"I thought your aunt arrived today," she commented. Audrey, who walked to Valerie's house to pick her up since they were twelve was also used to the music in the background while the woman bid a quick heartfelt goodbye to the teenagers.

"She does," Valerie said adjusting her schoolbag beginning her path with Audrey. "She is supposed to arrive around midday I think." Valerie meditated for a few seconds.

"Oh," Audrey stated, simple "you didn't say where did she go this time."

Valerie looked at the road that she walked through every day; the trees on the sidelines decorating the outside of each home, some houses had flowerpots that were in full bloom announcing the arrival of the summer. They, besides plaques with numbers were the only thing differentiating one house from the other. Valerie liked her neighborhood, how the appearance of the houses and the material of which they were made of made it look like if they came outside of an old fairy-tale book.

Some houses had turned the floors into apartments. Her family had kept it the exact same for many years, like Audrey's grandma had before the family moved. The conversation between both of them didn't stop, not even when they arrived at the school and took seats right next to each other. More often than not earning a scolding from the first period teacher who was too tired to deal with anything.

"I think it was somewhere in France, or maybe Belgium," the brunette meditated, it was hard to keep tabs of where exactly her aunt went.

"Sometimes I find it hard to believe your aunt has never tried to convince you to skip school and join her in her trips, don't you ever wonder what she does? I know I do, and I don't live with her."

"Then why don't you ask her?" Valerie shrugged.

"Because my mother said asking people older than you what they did for a living was rude, and that she would ground me if she ever found out I was sticking my nose under 'Miss Pendleton's business'" Audrey tried to imitated the tone her mother tended to use whenever she wanted to display an air of severity to her daughter. "As you can see, I am not allowed to satisfy my curiosity." She added with a pout.

"I think she sells stuff or helps identify the price of really old things. I always thought she was some sort of restorer" Valerie commented jumping on a puddle left from the rain that had fallen the night before and wondered if it would take any importance on the camping trip they had been planning for a month.

"It would make sense. The time she went to pick you up when we were like nine, ten? I don't know," Audrey rambled "she told my mom the place where she kept the good plates and the expensive bottles of liquor was older than everyone in that house combined. Now she doesn't even let my brother walk anywhere near it."

"Sorry about that." Valerie laughed along Audrey.

"Don't be. It was fun to see her the entire journey of expressions her face took" Audrey laughed "I should be the one who is sorry, I can't go to your match. Miss Auguste insisted I- we shouldn't skip any rehearsal."

"They can't have a show without the main girl, can they?" Valerie said nudging her friend's arm with her shoulder "Don't worry about it. As long as you make it to the camping trip, of course."

"I wouldn't miss it for anything on the world," Audrey claimed, a hand on her chest "We've been planning this since May and we're going to spend or first day of summer on the wild, hiding from the bears and the bugs," the blonde assured.

"I'm pretty sure there are no bears on that forest," Valerie smiled "At least, that's what Jonathan said when I asked" She commented walking past the school's gate.

The exterior of the secondary school the girls went to didn't seem to be much younger than the houses on the small town of Summerlot. The Milton Secondary School took pride on the fact that the building was very well kept for a place that claimed to be nearly three hundred years old. Legend said the place used to be the home of a very rich family before a spirit came to take vengeance on them for unfairly accusing him of stealing a family treasure. After that the family ran away and donated the place to be turned into a school, the legend says the family treasure is buried somewhere underneath the building and that the spirit will finally be free when the truth comes out.

"Speaking of Jonathan," Audrey added standing taller "I think the soccer team is still practicing right now, do you want to go?"

Valerie's first idea was to refuse and just convince her friend to drag their feet into the classroom where some of their classmates would probably already be trying to take as much advantage of all the time they had before a teacher arrived.

"Do you think Gabe will be there?" Valerie inquired, flushed cheeks, missing that Audrey's were in the same condition before the girl smiled sly and hit her ribs with her elbow.

"Shall we see the boy who has been your friend since when you blabbered? No, we're going to see the guy you are after instead, Valerie"

"Shut up" Valerie mumbled following Audrey to the soccer field.

In all the years Valerie had known Jonathan she had never really thought of him as the athletic kind. He was standing on the goal, his hazel eyes struggling to focus on the balls coming his way with the sun hitting him on the eyes, his dark hair shining under the sun. He was handsome and ready to finish secondary education. Something like that was hard to see when he struggled to get onto the proper position as the goalie after the ball the player threw at him bounced on his chest, barely touching him before gracing back to the field allowing the boy to kick it to his teammates.

"Merrick focus!" The coach screamed at the teenager who awkwardly tried to regain position.

The next person's turn to kick the ball was Gabriel Smith, he had dark skin and short hair, he stood taller than nearly everyone in the school. He had dark eyes and smiled amused at Jonathan who limited himself to take advantage of the fact that the coach wasn't looking to lift his middle finger to the other teenager. Valerie's entire vision was now focused on Gabriel as he played with the ball with his feet stopping it from dropping to the floor.

"Smith! Go!" The coach screamed, Gabriel allowed the ball to fall to the floor before kicking it in Jonathan's direction. Instead of hitting the teenager, the ball went against the post. Valerie frowned for a second, she was sure the ball was going to arrive inside the goal. That didn't stop her from laughing when she saw Jonathan get onto his knees and drop his body on the floor in exhausted surrender.

"See you this Monday gentleman!" The coach screamed "And I hope none of you even think about not coming because you'll be running ten times this field the next class."

Jonathan remained on the floor for a few seconds, however, Valerie's eyes were no longer on him. Instead they focused on Gabriel who was running on their direction, waving his hand at her and Audrey.

"Hello!" He said, his voice was deep.

"Hi!" Valerie's voice came higher than usual, she focused her eyes on the ground, her mouth in a line.

"Don't you dare touch me," Audrey's voice was stern and for a second it reminded Valerie of the blonde's mother.

"Why not Audrey?" Gabriel laughed reaching for the girl's sides, Audrey took a step back raising her hand.

"You are all sweaty and gross" she said wrinkling her nose, Valerie watched the exchange amused, even if something was pressing her chest.

"You overreact" he laughed, putting one hand over her shoulder as she tried to recoil away, her face twisted in mocked disgust. "Are you ready for the trip?" He turned to Valerie this time who had tried to focus on Jonathan instead of her two friends.

"I am, yes. Everything is in a bag at home and I'll be ready to go as soon as you guys pick me up" Valerie spoke excited.

"Didn't Valerie tell you?" Audrey stepped in before Gabriel could say anything, leaning onto him "She has a fencing tournament today. If she wins, she gets a step ahead into going to the nationals. Maybe you and Jonathan can go and see her fight someone with a sword"

"Is that true, Valerie?" Gabriel questioned; his voice resounded with excitement. Valerie stared at the field, it was nearly clear, except for Jonathan who was finally standing up from the ground and beginning to walk to them.

"It is." She smiled "But it's not a big deal, really. You don't have to come"

"Rubbish!" he exclaimed letting go of Audrey. "I'd love to go" Valerie felt Jonathan's hand pass over her shoulder and rest his head over hers, Valerie didn't move, already far too used to Jonathan being like that. "Idiot, are you coming to Valerie's competition?"

"What are you talking about?" Jonathan questioned "I've never not gone to one"

"What about the time you had appendicitis?" Valerie raised an eyebrow, amused smile on her face.

"I have only not gone to one. A perilous mistake I shan't repeat" Jonathan corrected. Valerie huffed, a smile on her lips. She and Audrey bid a quick goodbye to the pair of boys promising to see each other later in the afternoon in Jonathan's case.

Something Valerie enjoyed of her seat in class was that Audrey was at her right, which made note slipping a simple, harmless task; that it was close enough to the window that she could easily see the weather outside and the people passing down the street and the fact that it lined perfectly for her to look at Gabriel during class.

She engaged in conversation with a few of her classmates discussing the homework when Gabriel walked through the door. Valerie's eyes darted in his direction. Her classmates rushed to their seats when the teacher walked into the classroom putting her books and paperwork in the desk, asking for the homework to be handed to her while she scribbled the title of a book on the board.

The day remained uneventful; the sky only had a few white clouds. Valerie decided to take it as a good omen for their camping trip since she had spent the entire week wondering if rain would be enough to stop them from going.

A.N.
If you liked this chapter, please consider leaving a comment or giving it a vote, it would really make my day.
Until next time!