Together We Fall

Chapter 9

Chapter Nine

"Wake up."

I'm shaken awake to see Trace staring back at me. He has dark bags forming below his eyes but somehow he still manages to pull of an exhausted look.

He throws his blanket off and rises to his feet, "Come on, help me get them up."

Without question I take my blanket off. It feels heavier than I remember so when I start investigating as to why, I realize I was sleeping with three blankets. I never got up in the night to get anymore.

Trace rushes over to Lucas and begins kicking him, "Get your ass up, we need to go."

Lucas' eyes open and he gives Trace a bewildered look before checking the time on his phone.

"Why the hell are we up? It's only seven o' clock. The store doesn't open for another three hours."

Trace rubs the back of his neck, "That's what I thought too but apparently, we were wrong. Somebody's here."

I slip my shoes on and Adalyn's eyes shoot open, "You couldn't have started with that!"

She jumps up and Lucas wakes up Josephine who was the only one still sleeping.

Trace clears his throat to gain attention and begins talking, "Someone is here but they aren't inside the building yet, I saw them drive up less than two minutes ago but we need to hurry. Josephine and Adalyn if you could get the projector back like it was that'd be great. Ethan go cut the lights, it's daylight now so we don't need them anyways. Be careful because someone could walk in at any moment and hear or see us so be sure to stay away from the door and keep your eyes peeled." the three of them run off the complete their task and everyone else starts gathering the blankets we have scattered and folding them.

With the help of six people, folding up some blankets is fast.

The lights flip back off and Trace and I grab the two stacks and begin walking back to put them where they go. Putting back blankets that we slept on and that lied across the floor is rude but in our defense that's why you always wash everything before you use it.

We set the stack back on the shelf and turn to go back.

As we walk I see a little toy fairy. It's a tall, skinny girl with purple hair and blue, sparkly fairy wings. I would've loved this when I was a little girl.

Trace notices me stop and turns to see why. He looks at the fairy for a small moment as if he's wondering why I'm looking at a sparkly doll for an eight year old.

I shrug to silently answer his question and the two of us begin walking again. A question comes to my mind and I turn to face him, about to ask if he's ever seen Tinker Bell. I open my mouth to speak but before the words come out, he's pulling me against him and has a finger over my lips.

His hand is pressed on the small of my back as he takes a step backwards and pulls me towards him. Once he's sure I'm not about to talk, he turns me around. We can't see anything except the same pair of dirty shoes that we saw last night. The view of the shoes alone is enough to cause worry inside my stomach.

In the matter of two small steps, Trace and I would be directly in the old mans sights. I was about to walk right out in front of him and I would have if Trace wasn't paying such close attention to everything and stopped me before I could.

Trace takes my hand in his and begins leading us away. We get to the end of the isle and our pace quickens, not caring as much about the small sound of our footsteps.

We get about five more isles away and stop in the toy section. There's toy dinosaurs, trucks, and baby dolls going all the way down it. I pull out my phone to warn the others about him. Trace searches the store for something, probably a way out. The only two doors we know of are at the front center and the back corner, both of which are on the opposite sides of the store from where we are now.