Sleight of Hand [Show 'em Who's Boss #1]

7: Acrophobia

This was the day everything really kicked off. I was beginning to make connections in the mystery that surrounded me. Jakob picked me up from school, on time surprisingly and then refused to tell me where he was driving us. I gave up in the end and just as I was dozing off Jakob shook my shoulder.

     We were parked outside the local sports centre.

     "What are we doing then?" I grabbed Jakob's hand in excitement and dragged him towards the entrance. Jakob pulled me backwards, stopping me in my tracks.

     "We're not going in there," he said, shaking his head.

     "Well why the hell did you bring me here?"

     He smiled. Jakob led me around the side of the building and I suddenly understood where we were going. The sports centre had been advertising their new rock climbing walls for months now. They were going to be around the back in a fenced off area. They weren't due to be open for a few more weeks, so I sensed we'd be breaking in to be the first members of the public to try out the latest attraction.

     I could feel the excitement buzzing inside of me. I loved it when Jakob came up with crazy dates like this. He had never been the kind of boy to take me on cheesy dates at stupidly expensive restaurants where the portions of food aren't even enough to fill your stomach. Our dates were always illegal, dangerous, stupid or all three.

     This date probably came under the 'stupid' category. That and I suppose it might possibly be count as trespassing or breaking and entering which would technically make it illegal. Oh, and then 'forgetting' to wear a harness whilst we both raced to the top of the rock climbing walls. That's certainly dangerous. Looks like this date comes under all three categories and yet I still decided to spice it up a little.

     "Rules, Jakob. We race to the top of the wall and each time the loser has to remove an item of clothing. We repeat until one of us ends up completely naked."

     "It's the middle of December and you want to rock climb naked?"

     "I won't have to worry because I'm not going to lose!"

     "Okay, on the count of three..."

     "THREE!" I shouted and we raced to the top of the wall.

     And like I said, I didn't lose. Jakob removed a shoe.

     "This is stupid," he said as he dropped his foot onto the muddy ground. It squelched and Jakob grimaced. His face was priceless.

     "Guess you better not lose the next round then!"

     By the fifth round we were both without shoes. I, rather stupidly, hadn't worn socks in my shoes but the mud felt quite nice on my feet. Now that we were both shoeless our feet had very little grip on the wall. It didn't help that out feet were also caked in mud, making us climb even slower as our feet are constantly slipping. There's no telling who will win now.

     We lasted quite a while before we finally got caught. That was the best part of the whole date. There's really no thrill in breaking into a place if you don't get caught. At the time I was down to my nothing but my T-shirt and underwear. Jakob was only in his boxers. (It might sound like I'm amazingly good at rock climbing but the truth is that I just had more layers of clothing than Jakob).

     We were in the middle of a race when someone shouted from below.

"WHAT ON EARTH DO YOU THINK YOU ARE DOING? BREAKING AND ENTERING. INDECENCY IN A PUBLIC PLACE. GET DOWN RIGHT NOW OR I'M CALLING THE POLICE."