One Stupid Thing

1:7:24

I rode up to the Chateau on my board early in the afternoon. Maybe it was just the gold talking, but I have a great feeling about today. The sun is shining, the air is warm, I'm having a good hair day, and the best part: hardly any mosquitoes.

"Hey, Stella! Over here," Kiara waves to me from the far side of the house. I quickly ditch my skateboard in its usual place and approach her.

"Where is everyone?" I ask her. We walk side by side towards a tall wooden fence.

"They're out front. Is it just you?" she asks me as she lifts a latch and a gate swings open.

"Yeah. Sarah and John B said they wouldn't be far behind me, though." I follow her through the gate and close it behind me.

"Gotcha. Pope and JJ have been trying to devise a plan all morning." Kiara rolls her eyes in playful annoyance and we approach the Twinkie. The boys are hunched over a piece of paper, scribbling things down as if we are on a time crunch.

"You know we have time, right?" Kiara says as she climbs into the van.

"Yeah. I mean the gold isn't going anywhere," I point out and sit beside her. Both Pogues are too focused to look up from their blueprint.

"If we found the gold, it's only a matter of time before someone else does too," Pope says as he aggressively erases a mistake and fixes it.

"Yeah, you never know. Some crazy professional treasure hunters could come along and swipe the gold out from under us," JJ adds. He looks up at me for a mere moment, connecting his eyes with mine before looking back.

I perk my head up at the sound of gravel crunching beneath footsteps. John B and Sarah walk over hand in hand.

"Hey, Lovebirds!" I call to them.

"Yo, JB! Let's do this thing," JJ says. The two boys hop out of the Twinkie, and Sarah replaces them.

"So, what have we missed?" Sarah asks. Kiara holds out the blueprint that the boys had. It's an amateur drawing, scribbled down in pencil.

"He said it looked something like this." Kiara points at the picture and drags her finger down towards the bottom of the well. "That's 50 feet down, and they're using 100-feet rope. So I guess this little wagon will go...." She pauses and laughs. "...straight to the gold room."

Sarah chuckles beside me and shakes her head. "Who drew this?"

"Who do you think?" Kiara replies. We all laugh and look out the window. Pope is already looking back at us.

"Oh, he is so into you," I tease and shove Kiara playfully.

"Ooooh!" My sister coos.

"He is not!" She shoves me back. "You guys can't be talking. Not with the other two following you around like lost puppy dogs!"

"Okay, you can say that about Sarah, but definitely not me!" I laugh. "It's not like that!"

"Dude, you can't deny it," Kie says.

"Yeah, we all see the way he looks at you!" Sarah gives me a look.

"Speak of the devil." Kiara spots JJ walking towards us.

"Kie, this better work," he says as he drops the few bars of gold on the floor of the van. "We can't pawn this if there's a giant wheat symbol on it."

The brunette Pogue picks up the blowtorch that was sitting beside her and holds it up. "It's gonna work."

We all file out of the Twinkie. Kiara, JJ, and I gather around a kitchen pot set up on a table while Sarah watches from beneath a large, oak tree with John B. JJ dumps in the bars and Kiara fires up the blowtorch, aiming its flame directly at the precious metal.