Spectra

Chapter 45

Lucas

"How much longer?" I groaned, reading the thermometer. Our solutions weren't heating up as fast on the hot plate as I wanted. They had to reach a certain temperature before we could mix them.

"Be patient." Emily laughed, adjusting her goggles on her face. "She said it would take most of class."

"At least it's finally Friday," I sighed. The water still had 50° to go. "We could go out tonight." I suggested, rolling my sleeves up. Emily raised her eyebrows.

"To dinner? At a restaurant?" She sounded surprised. "We don't leave the house! That would mean changing out of my pajamas."

"Fine we'll stay and watch Ainsley all night. And she'll ask you a million questions and jump on the couch and-" I went on until I was interrupted.

"Okay! I was joking, dinner would be great." We laughed.

I glanced over at the thermometer which finally was heated up sufficiently. Emily pulled the test tubes out of the water and carefully poured on into the other as I timed the reaction. I stopped the stopwatch when the solution turned blue. We recorded the time and our observations.

Mrs. Lavelle called everyone back to our seats for last few minutes of class.

"I just wanted to make everyone aware of our upcoming AP exam in May. It's close to a month away and I recommend you start going over old material from the beginning of the year." I immediately looked over at Emily. The midterm was bad enough I couldn't even imagine how this would go. The bell rang. "Have a great weekend!"

"You good?" Emily looked okay and laughed a little.

"Yeah, let's go." She smiled and stood up. We walked through the hallway and outside.

"So, where do you want to go to dinner?"

"Nothing fancy, maybe Molly's." I nodded, that was what I had hoped to hear. "We'll wait for your parents to get home and then we can go."

"Perfect." I took her hand in mine as we walked.

~~~

Later, while waiting for my parents I decided to do a quick check around the city on the computer. I searched police databases. Something strange popped up. Emily sat across from me on the counter looking at her phone.

"Uh, this is weird. There's a big fundraiser gala tonight at 7 for this organization that I don't think is even real." Emily came over behind me to see what I was talking about. "Nothing comes up if I search for it, absolutely nothing. It's supposed to be a world wide organization to save the rainforests, but it doesn't seem like it exists."

"That sounds sketchy. But if it's not real then what's going on here." She asked. "It might be a scam, maybe I should check it out later." I nodded, continuing to search.

"Lucas, sweetie, are you home?" My mom yelled from upstairs. Emily and I went up to see what she wanted. She was in the kitchen setting her purse down.

"What's up?" I asked, leaning against the counter.

"Your father and I were invited to a fundraiser tonight so you're going to have to stay here with Ainsley tonight." I looked at Emily. This fundraiser was probably the same one we saw before.