Just Try It

Chapter 43- So What Happened?

Thursday, February 16th 12:20pm

Lincoln High School Lunchroom

When Sondra got back, lunchtime was almost over.  Ms. Mac Inness stopped in the office with Sondra's grandma, while Sondra went to see if she could get anything from the lunchroom.  They made her a quick plate and she joined her friends.  As she crossed the room, Sondra noticed a lot of quick glances toward their table.  The whole table was strangely quiet.  As she sat down, she noticed that Samuel was glaring at Finn. 

At first, Sondra couldn't figure out what the problem was.  Then, Finn looked her way and opened his mouth.  Even as Sondra waited for his question, she heard a thump from under the table, and Finn's mouth snapped closed even as he flinched.  Everyone else at the table continued on like nothing unusual was happening, and it dawned on Sondra what was going on.  She gave a sympathetic glance towards Finn, but was distracted by Moe.  

Moe was just picking at his food, and she felt like an awful friend as she slid in next to him at the table. While he was dealing with the possibility of being ineligible to play due to his grades, and having people learn about the scars he spent his whole life hiding, he deserved to have his friends stand by him.  However, she had to leave to deal with her mom in court.  The timing couldn't have been worse.

Sondra took a moment to squeeze his hand, and was rewarded as Moe turned to smile at her.  Everything seemed so much better now.  She turned back to her tray, only to hear another muffled thump from the other end of the table, but this time Finn continued his question, "Well, how did it go?" 

Samuel hissed at Finn, "We agreed not to pester people for details right away."

Even though the table was glaring at him, Finn gave an unconcerned shrug as he pointed out, "She has been sitting several minutes already.  Besides, everyone else  wants to know how it went.  Don't deny it."

"Is that why the table was so quiet?" Sondra asked in amazement.

As everyone gave embarrassed nods, Sondra smiled and said, "Judge Rheinholdt temporarily gave custody to Grandma, but I have to work on reunification with my mom.  We already talked about having the visits at the dojo, since Ms. Mac Inness is afraid that Pamela try to take me.  She also doesn't want me to go anywhere alone."

Jamie's eyes narrowed and she immediately asked, "How likely is it that she will try to take you?"

Sondra avoided everyone's gaze, and gave a little shrug.  It was a struggle, but she kept her tone unconcerned as she answered, "You never can tell."  

Moe put an arm around her shoulders protectively and said, "I... I mean we'll make sure she doesn't have a chance."

Even though that had been her plan, Sondra turned bright red.  As Danica chuckled pointedly, the bell rang.   The rest scattered while Sondra and Moe quickly ate a few bites of food from their trays.

None of them noticed Nancy sitting by herself.  She had sat in the farthest corner, and watched as she thought of her losses.  First, Aaron was sent away.  Then, Susie was suspended until Monday.  Now, Malcolm would be gone for the rest of the week too.  The plan had been for him to wait until Moe was alone.  Then, it would be Moe's word against Malcolm's.  She would have stepped in and provided an alibi, like usual.  Instead, he had ended up loosing a fight with Korbin.  How had that happened? 

While it was interesting that Malcolm had finally lost a fight, she decided that it didn't matter.  What was important was that she no longer had anyone left to put her plans into motion. They weren't all supposed to leave her at the same time. 

Nancy still couldn't figure out where she had gone wrong with her other plan either.  After she had seen the pictures, she had been sure that Moe wouldn't come to school today.  She had gone to a lot of trouble to pop into visit Susie and swipe her phone for a few moments.  Now, no one even seemed to care.  It made her want to scream.