Spy School Egypt

Chapter 4: Romance

"This is horrible," I grumbled, checking my phone for reception.

"What is?" Erica cheerfully asked as if we didn't just fall from a plane and nearly get ourselves killed but instead had been relaxing in a hot tub.

"There's no freaking reputation in this freaking desert," I groaned, clicking desperately on my phone.

"Stop saying freaking," Erica said cooly.

"I can't be freaking, stop saying freaking, this freaking place freaking sucks!" I said sarcastically, with a hint of teasing. I mainly was saying this to annoy Erica, but I knew for a fact not to upset her too much unless you wanted to get your head jammed between a door by her. (Although there were no doors near here)

Murray and Agent Durkee also hopped along with me, although I could tell none of them was happy along with us.

"This place sucks. There's no water, food, or a hotel. I can't even use my phone!" Murray rambled on. "We lost all our belongings, and I don't even have any hamburgers to munch on to make myself feel better. There's no water, I have a bit of throw-up all over me, and I'm starving and..."

Murray continued to talk about how horrible this place was, rambling on and on. I took this as an opportunity to speak with Erica and caught up with her.

"Erica," I asked quietly.

"Yeah?" She said.

"Do you consider me a bit more than a friend," I asked quietly? I knew this wasn't the time to ask it. There was sand in my shoes, and it was extremely itchy and, really, hot, but I felt like the odds of survival was probably less than 10 percent, and I might not make it alive, so I figured I might as well get the question out that I always wanted to ask.

"I-," Erica started to talk, but then caught herself and said, "I can't answer that question, and you know it, Ben."

"I know," I said softly. I started to say something but was cut off by Erica.

"If you know that's true, then don't ask again," Erica said softly but had a harsh attitude behind it. Erica started to speed up, trying to avoid my question, but I caught on.

"Erica, we probably won't make it out here alive, and I really want to know the answer before I die," I said.

"When the secret service captured us, and when you thought that was the end, we made it out alive," Erica told me.

"That was different, we had people there, and I actually looked like we could maybe survive. Now we don't have any supplies or anything," I responded, which was true. There was nothing around us, maybe just a few dead sticks and some annoying mosquitoes buzzing around.

"But we have energy and walking feet," Erica said.

"That doesn't matter if energy is going to be wasted and if we don't have an aim. At least on our other missions, we knew what we were doing. And," I said as I pointed to Murray, who was nearly dead on the ground, "we don't quite have energy and walking feet anymore."

"Like Martin Luther King once said, if you can't fly, then run, if you can't run, then walk, if you can't walk, then crawl, but whatever you do, you have to keep moving forward," Erica said.

"Yeah, but moving forward to where? We don't have an aim," I complained. Erica must have gotten seriously annoyed because she suddenly grabbed me by the shirt and pounded me to the ground. Sand leaked in my shirt, and everyone perked up, thinking something was wrong. Erica whispered to me.

"I'm not going to tell you the truth, but I am going to do this," Erica said and then leaned in. I knew at that moment she was going to kiss me like in the movies, but Murray wasn't walking where he should have and tripped over us.

"Waaahhhh," Murray yelped and fell flat-faced on the ground. Erica's face was beet red, and so was mine. Erica got up and purposely stepped on Murray's back for payback.

"Whoops," she said sarcastically, "try that again, Murray, and I'll step on your neck so hard, your head and your neck aren't connected anymore."

"Understood," Murray croaked and then got up warily, staying away from Erica. I knew that Erica was going to kiss me, but I was wondering why. She wasn't opening up the truth that she liked me more than a friend but kissed me. I was still a bit stunned and didn't move for a while. And then I knew.

A small watch she slapped on my hand. I knew that it wasn't there before. I could tell the time without looking at it, so I never needed it. I took a closer look at the watch and immediately knew it was a watch that could tell what you were doing and had a communication button on it. I figured that was a way to talk to Erica if I lost her in the desert. I knew having a watch would be suspicious, so I put it in my hoodie's pocket. I glanced at Mike and Trixie to see if they had a watch, they didn't. Erica was walking normally like the kiss didn't happen. Figures.

Mikes and Trixie ran over and tried to get me to talk.

"Did Erica just kiss you? Did you just melt her icy surface?" Mike asked with an awed smile. Although Trixie looked the tiniest bit jealous but still tried to act normal.

"Does Erica like you?" Trixie asked me.

"She doesn't. She didn't kiss me. She just told me something about the mission," I responded, thinking that Erica probably didn't want the others to know about the watch; if she did, then they would all be wearing a matching one of mine.

"Nah, she definitely likes you," Mike said, giving a playful shove. I felt highly uncomfortable talking about this subject, so I just decided to save my breath. We were in a desert with no water, and the best thing to do was to save our breaths. After talking to me for a few minutes with no answers, they gave up.

Suddenly, Murray and Agent Durkee flew around to us. When we all just noticed that we didn't keep an eye on them. We turned around to them, and Erica reached in her boot to grab a small gun she always kept in there when we realized they already had a gun pointed at us.