My Life in Rosewood

Chapter Seventeen

It is now the following day, the day of the dance-a-thon. The dance is what the school thought would be perfect to save up for our junior class trip to Washington DC. Each sponsor (parents or guardians) puts a certain amount of money down for each dance their kid has. Uncle Byron and Aunt Ella have two kids they are sponsoring now instead of just one, so Uncle Byron is putting down $10 a dance for me while Aunt Ella has Aria for $10 a dance. As much as I love them it still feels weird that they have to pay things for me as if I'm their child. It was bad enough they spoiled me when I was just living next door, but now I'm actually part of the family. I of course appreciate everything they do for me, I just have to readjust

Despite all this, I. Am. Not. Ready. I really hate dances but I humor it for the sake of Andrew since he loves them. Who am I to decline a date from the person I adore? Luckily I'm not worried about what to wear to this one because it is casual attire. Which means I can be in jeans this time around with a plaid shirt, buttons undone, the sleeves pulled up to my elbows, a tank top shirt underneath and black sneakers. This is my element when it comes to being in my comfortable clothing.

As I roll out of bed this morning I see that Aria isn't here. It's an hour till noon on a Saturday, so I just assume that she probably woke up earlier than me (naturally) and is downstairs. But when I get to the kitchen after using the bathroom no one is here but me. Uncle Byron is at work, Mike at practice and Aria is who knows where. The best guess I have is that she's running around with the girls because of this anonymous person still bothering them. I know on occasion she'll just up and bolt out of the house at weird hours of the day or night and I can't do anything about it. The last few nights especially she has been acting odd. She hasn't said why, but I can of course guess the reason now. But she looked really shook up and it alarmed me so badly that I told myself I'd get to the bottom of it. It makes me nervous knowing something that no one else does. This situation seems delicate and hard to figure a way out of it, which I understand why she begged me to keep quiet but the longer I know the harder it is to stay out of it. I feel like I need to help somehow but I wouldn't even know where to start.

After some breakfast I take the opportunity to go into our room and start to search around her section. I'm not sure what I'm looking for but I'm hoping something pops out enough to give me some type of clue that maybe, just maybe I can figure out the specifics. So I go through her bed, her dresser, our closet. Basically anywhere things could be hidden with no such luck. Then I see a pile of her books at the bottom of her bed on top of a trunk and walk over to it. I start to open them, seeing if anything falls out. That's when my phone buzzes, making me pull it out of my pocket.

"If I were you, sweetie, I'd stay out of this. Keep your trap shut and head out of the clouds of this mystery. Otherwise everyone will know what oh so loving Auntie Katie did."

My heart sinks deep into my stomach and I gulp. Not only does it seem that their mystery friend found out that Aria told me regardless of keeping quiet and being sneaky, but they somehow know about my situation with Katie when I hadn't told a soul about the specifics. This is insane and makes me feel weirded out as I look up from the phone and start to look around, even staring out the window. It's like I was being watched this whole time. I feel like I should have seen this coming, but it definitely doesn't sit well with me.

Now I jump practically out of my skin as my phone rings this time, getting me out of that daze and I see that Mona is calling me. I'm so not in the mood to speak to her, but I answer the phone anyway. Luckily all she wants to know is what color is my outfit. She knows that I'm not dressing up the way I had last time, but sometimes she likes to at least match her best friends in some aspect. She even does it with Hanna. Once she rambles on for a while from her excitement of the dance she hangs up and I'm back to being aware of how hard my heart is thumping from the fact that someone is watching me. How else would they know I had just been looking for clues in my own room?