ONLY ANGEL | JJ MAYBANK

SEVENTEEN... by the book

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

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Everything is golden when Collins wakes up in the morning.

The pools of light that fall between the chasms in her curtains hanging over her window, the strands of sun-bleached hair still attached to her head that spills over her pillow, the wind chimes hanging on their porch that she hears twinkling when a breeze passes, and last but not least, the solid gold bars that John Booker Routledge is holding at his house just a walk away.

It's all Collins could think and then dream about last night and it's all she can see when she rises from her slumber. She'd held one in her hands before she'd gone home the previous night. She'd felt the weight of it in her palm, and smoothed her thumb across the surface that still shined beneath the mud-caked over it. And she couldn't seem to even comprehend that it was what it was as she gazed down at it with her own two fully functioning eyes.

Because of it, it doesn't take her much time to shake the sleep away like it usually does in the morning. Collins somehow feels like she'd never even fallen into REM sleep, yet is still refreshed and ready to take on the day. The excitement must be too much to bear.

She runs into Charlie while performing their normal routine, but she's too focused on getting ready in record time so she can go ahead and meet up with the others at the Château. They had a lot of work ahead of them and she wasn't about to be the one to hold them back because she was too busy primping.

"Don't tell me you've got a hot date at seven in the morning." Charlie quirks his brow at her from where he's been banished to brushing his teeth at the kitchen sink while Collins occupies the bathroom, running in and out far too much for him to sneak in just to wet his toothbrush.

Despite the playfulness in his remark, there's still an air of concern in Charlie's voice that he may actually be right. Also, Collins had come home at an ungodly hour and was somehow not passed out in bed in an unwakeable snooze. He wasn't sure if he should be worried that she was staying out so late. What could she possibly be doing? And why was she so eager to get back to her friends? It wasn't like they were going anywhere.

He thought back to his days as a teenager to use as comparison. When he was younger, he stayed out late getting buzzed and fucking around most of the time. But Collins had never come home stumbling through the house, slurring her words and wreaking of illegalities. He had to remember that when he found himself slipping into his strict parenting practice. He had to trust her-- but there were limits to that, right? He could still be the cool older brother but in times of need, he had to be the responsible guardian. He could trust her to the extent that if he truly felt like she was throwing her whole life away, he had no choice but to step in. Even if that meant restricting her from these new influences.

"Just got plans today, that's all." Collins told him with a small shrug. "But not like, date plans, plans with friends."

Rinsing the toothpaste out of his mouth before spitting into the sink, Charlie wiped his mouth with the back of his hand before walking up to the bathroom where Collins was still standing by to drop his toothbrush into its holder.

"What are you guys up to?" He asked casually, so as to not sound like he was grilling her for information. He was trying not to seem nosy while being as nosy as humanly possible.

Choosing her words carefully to avoid revealing anything about their treasure hunt, Collins bought herself time by pretending to fixate her focus on packing her bag, throwing in a couple of study books in there and flashing them at Charlie to throw him off her trail a bit. "We'll probably just go boating for a bit, hang out at John B's house, hit the beach, just go with the flow basically."