The Long Haul

Chapter 26

It was Saturday - the official last day of this unjust punishment that had been thrown on Alex. She'd officially suffered for a full two weeks. To not repeat last Saturday's events, she decided to get up on time and get ready without complaint. She'd go through the damn motions of today and then she'd be a free girl!

Jay holstered his gun and clipped on his badge in the kitchen after polishing off his breakfast. "Ready to go?" he called out.

Alex grumbled something and stood up from the couch, heading toward the door with just herself and her cell phone to keep her entertained today.

"Aren't you forgetting something?" He raised an eyebrow.

His sister tiredly looked herself up and down. She had a shirt, pants, socks, and shoes on. Sure she could have spent more than five seconds on the messy bun, but there was no way he was calling her out on that. "What?"

Jay took a deep breath. "Your homework."

"What homework?"

"Don't you have any to do?"

"But it's fall break," she explained matter of factly.

Jay crossed his arms. "So they don't give homework over fall break?"

She felt like he was trying to trap her in a lie. "Not what I said."

He felt himself losing patience by the second with this teen. "Then explain," he said flatly.

With a dramatic sigh, she explained, "I have all week to do homework. No need to do it the first day."

"Why not get it done now and out of the way?" he countered.

To which, Alex just shrugged. "I don't wanna."

"It's not a suggestion," Jay said firmly, showing he wasn't budging on this.

Alex opened her mouth to retort something else, but she immediately snapped it shut, reminding herself that today she was just going to roll with it and get this damn punishment over with. The last thing she needed was to give him a reason to extend it into her fall break.

Pleased that she didn't have a sarcastic comeback, he nodded in approval. "Good. Now grab your bag and let's get moving."

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The district was quiet with little to no commotion all morning. The team trickled in and out all morning - some choosing to come in late on this rare occasion.

After about an hour and a half, Jay reached a good point where he could stop the endless paperwork he was working on at his desk. Luckily they were between cases right now, so the next few days would just be catching up on notes if all went well. The stars were aligning for a successful move tomorrow to their new apartment. Jay had been looking forward to it all week, and was eternally thankful that Adam and Kevin had agreed to help him move everything. Finally, the siblings would have additional space for them both.

Jay glanced over to his right to check in on Alex. She was clearly daydreaming with her head resting on a propped up fist as she stared blankly at her computer screen. Not that he could blame her - doing homework on a Saturday morning did sound pretty awful, but he wasn't about to admit that to her.

He thought it over for a moment, and he decided that now was a good time to follow through on his plan. He opened his bottom desk drawer and grabbed something that he'd purchased recently. The idea had occurred to him when he went for a snack yesterday afternoon, and he secretly hoped that it would go over well.