Broken Then Fixed: Gruvia

Chapter 14:

Me, my family, and Gray sat in the living room, tense and anxious. We were sitting, waiting for the phone to ring with the news that they've found Jamie. They said yesterday at the meeting that they would send people to follow through on my plan, today. We were now waiting for the results of the operation.

It rang.

I got to it first.

"Hello?"

"Juvia I swear to God if you weren't coming then why didn't you text us?!" Lucy shouted.

"U-Uhm, we had a situation with the investigation, and I forgot. S-Sorry . . ." I said. I had completely forgotten the fact I was supposed to meet the girls yesterday to hang out. And trust me, Lucy is scary when she's worried.

"Oh, it's fine! The investigation should come first! Just don't forget next time, okay?" She replied, more calm now.

"Yeah definitely. Why did you call the house phone instead of my phone, anyway?" I asked.

"I did call your phone. You never answered so I thought I'd call the house instead," she said.

I looked over at my phone and realized it was on silent.

"Oh sorry. I put it on silent when we went to the police station for the meeting. It was changed to yesterday which is why I didn't come," I said.

"Understandable. Just tell us if you find him, okay? We're worried about you, ya know."

"I will, thanks! I have to go, talk to you later, Lucy!" I said.

"Bye!"

I turned to everyone, who was staring at me, and shook my head. They sighed and we went back to waiting. Not even 5 minutes later, the phone rang again. This time my mom got to it. She put it on speaker.

"Hello?"

"Juvia," I heard Lyon's voice. My eyes widened. I looked at Gray, who was getting his phone out to record. My mom was about to speak but Lyon spoke before her.

"You may have thought I'd forgotten about Friday, but I haven't. You're punishment is to ignore all of your friends for tomorrow, with the exception of when you are in biology class for the project. Understand?" He said.

I looked at Gray and he nodded, signalling he had caught all of it on video. I whispered something in my mom's ear, and she nodded.

"Lyon, I was trying to tell you, but I'm not Juvia. This is her mother. What the hell did she do for you to give her punishment? What happened on Friday?" Mom asked.

Silence.

"We're doing a test for my Human Interaction project in my biology class. My teacher said we had to take a situation from a list and act it out. The situation I picked was Controlling Parental Punishment. I'm acting as the parent and Juvia is acting like the daughter. I told her I would call today so we can act it out. Did she forget?" He said.

She looked at me and I shook my head to say there's no such project.

"She must have forgotten to tell me. Thank you for remembering. It shows good demonstration of responsibility. Juvia is busy right now, so you can continue your project tomorrow. Is that okay?" Mom asked.

"Of course, Ms. Lockser. Tell Juvia I'll see her tomorrow!" He said and hung up.

She out the phone down and looked at me. "When he said it was punishment for what you did in Friday, would that be when you pushed him away and ran to school?" She asked.

I nodded. She sighed. The phone rang for a third time. My mom picked it up, hoping it would be the investigators this time.

"Hello?"

"Hi, is this the Lockser family?" The voice asked. It sounded familiar.

"Yes, it is," she said.

"Great. I'm one of the investigators you met yesterday. We have news of the operation. It was a success. Your son is indeed being held by Lyon Bastia," the voice said.

I gestured for her to give the phone to me. She did, and I spoke into it.

"Hello, this is Jamie's sister. What do you mean you've found him? We never sent anyone to find him. We don't even know where to look. Did the police hold on information that we should have known?" I asked, faking an oblivious act.

There was more silence. Then he hung up. I smiled triumphantly and put the phone down. I turned to face three confused and angry people.

"Juvia, why the hell did you do that?!" Gray asked.

"We could have figured everything out!" Mom said as well. Dad stayed quiet but I knew he thought the same thing.

"OR, we could have put Jamie in even more danger than he already is," I said.

They looked at me, confused.

"What do you mean?" Dad asked me.

"What I mean is, that was not one of the people assigned to the operation. That was the fake investigator that came to our house. I recognized his voice. I have a great memory, you know," I said.

"Maybe you were mistaken?" Gray suggested.

"I am not mistaken, Gray. Didn't it seem weird? They would have called us to come to the police station just like normal procedures, instead of telling us right away. You guys were so excited that you didn't notice, but me being able to notice things even when excited or nervous, allowed me to pick it up." I said.

"But, how?" Mom asked.

"You get kinda used to using this skill when you're trying to look for clues of your brother's disappearance while being under the watchful eye of a stalker," I said.

"Come to think of it, they would have called our personal phones, not our home phone," Dad mentioned.

"Exactly. Whoever that fake investigator is, he's a rookie. Lyon's family may be a bit rich, but this plan of theirs was obviously thrown together quickly," I said, "Now to contact the REAL investigators."