"RING! RING! RING!" Ah, the sweet annoying sound of the bell. But today, it wasn't as annoying as usual. Only because...ITS THE LAST DAY! I leaped out of the cold metal chair with joy, almost tripping on my face. Lucky for me, I didn't actually land on my face, or land at all.
Hi, I'm Rosetta Robinson, but all my friends call me Rosie. I'm 16 years old, and I live in a very small neighborhood, just big enough to fit 10 houses. But the size doesn't matter. I am lucky enough to live right across the street from my best friends, Alexa Gillies, and Chelsea Stewart. I've known them since kindergarten, which is obviously why they are my best friends.
"Hey Rosie, wait up would ya? I feel like I'm chasing a cheetah!" Chelsea hollered from at least 15 feet away. I rolled my eyes, giving her an exaggerated attitude. "Oh please Chelsea, and you call yourself a marathon runner?" Chelsea is the fastest runner in our grade, and she's complaining that I'm going to fast. She lets out a little giggle. "So, where's Alexa?" I shrug my shoulders, as if I was saying "How am I supposed to know?" I look around for a moment, hoping to see her. I guess hoping for something works, because I spotted her. She was sitting on the bright orange bench near the water fountain. Although something was a little different. Way different. She was with a boy...
Chelsea and I trudged over to the bench, just quietly enough so she couldn't hear our steps. "I see your with a boy huh?" Alexa jumped. "Chelsea! You know I don't like you sneaking up on me like that!" Oh, I forgot to mention, Chelsea and Alexa disagree with each other sometimes... Actually a lot. I'm basically the one who keeps there friendship tied together. "Alexa, who's this young fellow?" I question politely. She pauses for a moment. "Rosie, Chelsea, meet Ryan. He's in my Spanish class. We were project partners for half of the year." Ryan gives us a friendly wave, along with a "Hello." I wave back, but Chelsea just stairs him down. "So are you two like, hooked up or something?" I elbow Chelsea right in her rib. She lets out a big "ouch." "Do you have anything responsible to say at all?" I do make a point. She rarely ever says anything responsible enough for her age.
We have been talking to this Ryan guy for 5 minutes now. He seems like a charming guy. He has great grades, he's the team captain of the football team, and from the way he's talked, he has a kind personality. "Hey, I hate to end this conversation, but I think my friends are getting a little impatient." I glance over near the sign that says "Bridleway Charter School." I see three tough looking guys, who seemed to look pretty impatient just like Ryan said. "You'd better go." Alexa said. Your friends look like they are going to kill someone." Ryan lets out a laugh. "Hey, it was nice talking to you. Can I get your number?" Alexa immediately reaches for her purse, and digs out a pen and a piece of paper. "Sweet. Thanks. Have a great summer. Nice to meet you, Chelsea and Rosie." I just smile, and Chelsea of course Ignored him.
Alexa stares at him as he walks away. She seemed to have gotten lost in her thoughts. "Alexa, I hate to interrupt your thinking, but we better go home too. My mom is probably wondering where we are." Usually after school, Chelsea and Alexa come over my house to hang out and do homework, and we are usually home by now, because it take us ten minutes to walk to my house.
I dig out my keys from my purse, and unlock the lock on my metal door nob. Before I could even call my moms name, she was standing there right before my eyes. "Where have you guys been? You are a half hour later than usual. I got worried." Instead of me arguing with her, Alexa and Chelsea explain everything for me.
It's just me and my mom. My dad, well, he left us a long time ago. But I'm not gonna get to much into that. My mom asks me for my report card. She's not so anxious to see it, because she knows I get all A's.
For the past three hours, We've been playing two truths one lie. Basically what that is is when you tell two truths about yourself, and then one lie, and the other player has to guess your lie. Pretty simple game. "Hey I have an idea!" Alexa yells out randomly. "Let's hear it." I respond. "How about since it summer now, and we have no homework or anything, we should play a game outside late at night." Wow. A late night game. We all haven't done one of those since the 6th grade when we actually didn't have to worry about school. "I love it. Let's do it." Chelsea expresses. "Woah woah woah. I haven't even asked my mom yet. Let's see what she says." Chelsea has a bad habit of making choices for other people.
I sprinted down the stairs and talked to my mom about playing manhunt. She said it was alright as long as we are back by 9:00. We all agreed to start at about 8:00, because that's when the sky usually gets dark. So we basically played two truths one lie until then.
"Finally, 8:00!" Alexa yells. We all rushed outside into where my woods were. "Ok so here's how this is going to work. One person hides, two people seek. The hider has to get back to the base, which is my house, before they get tagged. If they do, they win, got it?"
They both nodded. Chelsea wanted to hide first. We gave her a thirty second head start, so she could find a place to hide. "Ready or not, here we come!" We dashed into the woods. I could feel the hard branches scratch across my legs, as I speed past them. All the sudden, we heard a noise coming from the trees behind us. There she was, standing there like she was lost, because she had no where to go. She thinks she can outsmart us huh? Well in reality, she can't because even though she's faster than me, I'm smarter than her. Alexa and I went separate ways out of the woods, so we could block her from the base. We saw her aiming towards there, but then we stopped her and tagged her. "HA! We win." "Oh shut it Alexa, you wouldn't of even got me if you didn't have Rosie on your team." When I mentioned they disagree a lot earlier, I also meant they argue a lot too. "Ok, ok." I stopped them from arguing. "Who wants to hide next?" "ME!!!" Alexa screamed. Well, I think she wants to go next, so I might as well let her. Like we did for Chelsea, we gave Alexa thirty seconds. Once her thirty seconds were up, we ran back into the woods to "hunt her down." Chelsea and I kept looking and looking and looking, but she was no where to be seen. "Where the hell could she be?? We've been looking for her for five minutes now!" I told Chelsea to calm down, and that we would find her.
Ten more minutes have past now, and it's almost 9:00, and she's still no where to be found. "Should we go tell your mom? Rosie, I'm worried." She let out a huge sigh. I never imagined those words coming out of her mouth. "Good idea. Let's go." We were about to walk out of the woods, until we heard a loud scream. "ALEXA!" We both bellowed at the same time. We bolted as fast as we could, trying to follow the screams. I had no time to think, and I kept running. I didn't care if I got lost, if my best friend is in trouble, I need to save her. My heart was pounding out of my chest, faster and harder than ever. Before I knew it, my foot was caught on a branch, and I fell directly on my face. "Rosie come on, we need to hurry!" I was almost going to say something like "Thanks for the help." But now is not the best time because I'm not the important one.
It's exactly 8:55p.m. and we still haven't found her. I've never been so worried in my life. Pounds of sweat are dripping down my face, along with blood from when I fell earlier. There was no more screaming, but I could still hear the screams in my head. I glanced everywhere as I hurried down the path of the woods. Suddenly, we got to this path. A path I've never seen or went down before. I slowly walked down it, and all of the sudden, I hear my name being yelled out a hundred times over again. It's one of the most farmiliar voices I know. "Alexa?!" I distinguished a body running towards me. "Rosie!" It was Alexa. She jumped right into my arms. "Alexa where the hell have you been?!" We've been looking for you for 20 minutes now, and- "Chelsea, I can explain! There was this...this guy...and all the sudden, he started to chase after me. I don't know who he was or what he wanted, but I ran for my life. We need to go home, now." She was right. It was 8:59. We need to.
We rushed down the mysterious path and started to head towards home. Until, I saw a figure, right near the exit of the woods. Alexa stopped us. "He's back. Rosie, he's back." Right before I ran up to him, he disappeared. "Rosie..." Alexa said calm and quietly. I pivoted to glance at Alexa. The figure was standing right behind her. "Alexa..." "I know." She responded to me. I just stared at it as it stared at me. I turned back around and looked at Chelsea, and then I heard one more scream. Before I knew it, Alexa was on the ground, and looked dead. And the scariest part was, it happened at exactly 9:00 p.m.
