Found

Chapter 2

It's next week already and I'm getting packed for my trip to oakridge. I've always been a very particular and organised packer imagining every possible situation I could be in and packing accordingly be it summer, monsoon or winter.
Suddenly there's a timid knock on the door and i look up to see jane standing there with her hands in her pockets looking down at the floor looking gloomy and upset.
I usher her in and make her sit on the bed. "What happened, everything alright?" I ask worried. She starts  playing with my scattered belts paying no attention to my question. I squat on the floor in front of her knees holding her hands. "Janey is something the matter dear? You're making me worried." She looks towards our hands and replies with a shrug and then gets up and goes to the window and I follow. She finally speaks up "Ali do you mind if I come with you on the oakridge project?". Feeling strange I reply "Ofcourse not but what about your work, won't you be creating a heavy backlog for yourself?". She just looks directly at me for the first time since entering in my room and says "I need some time away from all the work and chores I just wanna go somewhere away from all this for once where I can just do what I love with people I love without a care about the consequences".
There was not a single tear while she spoke but hearing her voice break made my heart ache and at that moment I just hugged her and she broke down on my shoulders.
Mrs. William passing away was hard for their whole family but more of a shock to Jane. She did what she had to everyday, working all day,hanging out with me and sabrina, trying new things,all to distract herself from the pain she was feeling but she couldn't, and in all these moments I felt so restless seeing her so sad and not being able to do something for her, to pull her out of this and paint a new life for her where she is happy and loved.
After some comfortable silence, she left to pack while I went into albus's room to explain things to him about the whole week and ofcourse I found him with a foam spray and some tools.
"Albus I'm leaving for oakridge tomorrow, do you need any school supplies for the week?" I ask while collecting his dirty clothes from all over the room. He gets up seeing me do all the work and collects the rest of the things an puts them in my basket. "Not really I'm all covered but could you please tell Sabrina to not drop me and kate in her car it's freaky clean and I get uncomfortable eating in it" he says smiling sheepishly. "Fine I'll give her my keys but please be on your best behaviour and don't annoy her because you're this close to getting your last strike which means back to New York baby bro."
"Oh come on, me and sabrina are way better off without you, we're like the Gilmore girls of stella springs."
Paying no attention to his blabbering I remind him that since Jane is coming along with me he's supposed to look after kate to which he looks at me with narrow eyes and says "Dont tell me to look after my best friend Alina, If I may remind you I was the one who made her specially customized care packages for her when she was upset about her appearance due to some really harsh girls at school whom I personally will let them fall in lava if I could." After giving me the last look he picked up the basket from my hand and left to do the laundry like the sass queen he is. I've always been proud of albus for expressing and loving everyone so passionately.
After I finished packing and stocking grocery I called sabrina to check in if she needed help at the cafe today otherwise I would start reading the file about the teenager I'm gonna be with for the next week. After some hours of learning about Nathan Parkinson from oakridge I was about to go to get me a snack when I saw Diane calling. She is the project head of our teen book community. "Hey sweetie are you all ready for tomorrow, I'll be sending the car for you early morning". Hearing her voice just filled me with excitement and energy for tomorrow. "Yeah,I'm all done but what made you call any problem?"
"Nah nothing of that sort just calling you inform you that Nathan's parents are out for the week so he's living with his older brother in his apartment so the address details are a bit changed from the files so hope you don't get confused."
"Oh um I didn't get any calls from the parkinsons but thank you for informing,could you please send me the guardian's contact information as I would like to inform them I'm bringing along a friend and check in If the accommodations would be a problem." After ending the call Diane sent me a number to which when I called and pressed my ears to the phone I was greeted by Ed Sheeran's castle on the hill which to be honest felt great to hear and after a few rings when someone finally picked up all I heard was a husky voice saying "Hello".