Wondering why

Part 18

Creek.

Creeeeeek.

I slowly open my eyes and look over to where the creaking is coming from. Someone has just come through the door and is trying to tiptoe across the room. It looks like everyone fell asleep here. Lucas is scrawled across the floor. I am all curled up and practically hugging the arm of the chair. Joel is next to me, with a blanket across the two of us that he must have put there after I dozed off. Kathrine and Connor are sleeping cuddled up on the sofa opposite us, along with Jay. And Blake is on the floor with his head against the sofa near Joel. And hunter is nowhere to be seen.

I softly kick my feet down to the floor careful to not wake anyone up. I have a horrible headache when I sit up. I twirl around to see that Jared is the one creeping across the floor. He turns his head to look over and see's that I'm up. "Sorry, I didn't mean to wake you up."

I get up and make my way over to him, "It's fine. What are you doing here?" I ask in a hushed voice conscience that everyone else is still asleep.

He reaches over to the stairs and grabs a jacket from the railing, "I forgot my jacket. I didn't think there would be eight of you asleep in here at ten-thirty." Ten-thirty? I check my phone in the pocket of my jumpsuit to confirm the time. "Do you need a lift home?" I look at everyone asleep, I could get one with Joel, but I will either have to wait or wake him up.

I grab my stuff, "Yes, that would be great." I hop into the passenger seat of his car, I haven't been in here since he drove me home from detention.

We made small talk on the way, "So what are doing today?" he asks his eyes still on the road.

I don't know. "Nothing much. I will probably go on a run, do some homework maybe."

"Where are you going to run to?"

"I don't know." What is with all of the questions?

We pull up outside the house, and Jared turns to look at me, "Go get changed, I will pick you up again in fifteen minutes and I will take you to the best place to run in Willowbrook." I am hesitant to agree, "What afraid you can't keep up, with the all star running back?" He says, lightening the mood. I smile, but quickly change to my game face.

"You're on."

I hurry to get ready, and drink about three litres of water to tame my headache. I slip on my shoes and hear the 'honk' outside. I quickly text Joel, to tell him I got a lift home and am going for a run as no one is home.

Locking the door behind me, I get back into Jared's car. "So where are we going?" I ask as we drive through the centre of town.

"Just wait and see." We pull into a layby on the side of the road and hop out. I take in the surroundings, there isn't much around, on one side of the road there is a small forest. It's not very dense so lots of light makes it through.

"Are you planning on trying to kill me again?" I ask.

"I'm waiting to see if you do that all by yourself." He smirks, I smile at how funny he thinks he is. "Come on." We start walking through the forest, Jared turns around and sees me behind him he goes off in a run, "Try and keep up." I roll my eyes and follow after him.

After only about four minutes of running we come to a clearing. There is a huge rock. Then a huge hill going down, overlooking the town. The view is amazing. You can see the entire town. You can see all the small figures in the distance going about their life. It's just amazing. I stand there in awe for a few moments more then look back at Jared. "This is crazy how did you find this place?" I ask.

He shrugs his shoulders, "I come up here to think, it puts things into perspective." He says as he sits on top of the huge rock. I come around and join him, pulling my knees up to my chest. We sit in silence for a few minutes looking out over the town.

"So how come you're not scared of heights up here?" I ask him.

He looks at me with a deadpan expression, "I'm not scared of heights." I hold back a smile, and nod. "And anyway, you can see down the hill. It's not like a sheer drop."

"You're an idiot." I say lightly pushing his shoulder, no longer holding back the smile.

"Shut up." He nudges my shoulder back.

"You are more scared of heights than Fiona was scared of going green." I say nudging him back with more force.

"No I'm not" he pushes me back even harder, "and how did you bring Shrek into this?"

I push him back with even more force, "Don't try and change the subject."

"I'm not scared of heights" he says with even more frustration, and pushes me again so that I actually fall off the rock and land on the grass. I roll over, Jared is above me in a second, "I am so sorry." He says guilt all over his face. "You can punch me," he closes one eye and waits, "Just do it."

I slap him around the leg and laugh, "I'm not going to punch you."

He looks at me with confusion written all over his face. "I have an idea." I say as I swivel myself around on the ground and pull him down next to me. "We should roll down the hill." He still looks confused. So I go for it. I start rolling. I can feel the grass underneath me, and all the uneven patches of land. I laugh the whole way down, and I can tell he has followed me down because I can hear his laughter behind me. I reach the bottom and come to a halt and have to give myself a moment to get my laughter out. I feel dizzy and disorientated but it was fun.

I catch my breath from all of the laughing and call out "race you to the top!" he is up in an instant and we are both sprinting up the incredibly steep hill. This was a bad idea; I can't make it. Jared is pulling ahead of me. I run across the hill to him, I try to follow his footsteps but my legs burn. "Jared wait, I can't make it."

He turns around and gives me a grin and a wink, "I win." I roll my eyes and sit down half way up the hill, he joins me. We sit there until I catch my breath. We both then get up and I moan about having to go the rest of the way up. He rolls his eyes and grabs my waist, it takes me by surprise, but then he throws me over his shoulder with my legs in the air.

I don't resist because I don't particularly want to walk up the hill. "Your butt is hanging out of your little running shorts," He teases.

He pokes the bit of bare butt hanging out. "JARED!" I shout as I slap his ass hard. "If you weren't carrying me like a sack of potatoes, then my butt wouldn't be hanging out."

"You're a sack of dead weight," he says laughing to himself. If he could see me now, he would know I was rolling my eyes.

At the top of the hill, Jared puts me down and we make our way back to his car on the road, we walked so it took us about ten minutes. We drive back in a silence listening to the radio. "That was fun, we should do it again." I say.

"You're right. Let's make a deal." He starts, "If one of us is depressed, or something, we text each other something like..."

"SOS" I jump in.

"Ok SOS. Which basically means meet at the top of the hill. And we can roll down the hill, or do some other crazy shit you think of." He smiles, a genuine smile. Not one of the ones he uses when he's making a joke or trying to flirt, a genuine smile. And it is infectious.

I smile too. "Deal" I hold out my hand.

He stops outside my house, takes my hand and shakes it. "Deal."