Hidden In The Attic: An AJR Fanfiction

Chapter Twenty-Three

↤↤↤↤↤ Adam ↦↦↦↦↦

I cross my ankle over my knee, sitting on the couch in the living room once more. After finding nothing upstairs, we all came back down to meet with Kib, Jay and Ryan once they're done with their search in the attic. Julie and Hanna are sitting together one one of the chairs and Jack sits beside me in the middle of the couch with Danny on his other side. He said his back still hurts like hell, but he doesn't want to miss out on anything else.
And then there's the priest, sitting silently in the other chair. He said a soft hello to us when we came back down the stairs, but no one has said anything since. It's extremely uncomfortable; I catch him glancing warily at me whenever I move. Does he still think I'm a demon, or something? What did I do to him?
I'm distracted by my racing mind when I hear the rest of us coming back downstairs from the attic. I hope for a second that they found something of use, but they all come into view empty-handed.
Jack nods to Ryan. "Find anything?"
"No." Ryan goes to stand behind the couch. Jay looks like he's about to speak but Kib elbows him and he doesn't.
"Okay," Hanna says. "Shut up. R- uh, Father Robert, sorry we dragged you into this. You can leave now, if you want. Thanks for your help."
He smiles warmly, a huge amount of relief on his face. "It's no problem. I'm glad I could help you."
"Do we have to pay him?" I ask, wondering if exorcisms are cheap. They don't seem like they'd be. "I can go get my wallet upstairs."
He waves his hand in the air dismissively. "No, no, no! Don't worry. You don't have to pay me anything at all. I'm just glad I could help. I'll be on my way now."
I feel kind of bad, leaving this poor man to get home in the dark after all that we've put him through. "I can drive you back to town," I offer.
He still looks like he's scared of me. "No, it's completely fine. I can walk back home myself; I'll be alright."
"Oh, okay. Thank you," I reply as he stands. He kind of rushes for the front door and through the window I can see him almost jogging down the path to get away.
"So what now?" Jay asks, sitting on the floor in front of the T.V.
"We should just leave," Danny answers. "We can't do anything else."
Jack nods in agreement next to me and everyone else stays still and quiet.
"We can't leave," says Julie. "The car isn't gonna start."
Danny sighs. "Maybe it's fine now," he suggests. "We have to do something. I don't want to just sit here."
Kib groans. "God, we shouldn't have let the priest leave. We could've stolen his car."
We all share a muted chuckle.
"Alright," I say, standing. "Let's try again."