What Lies Beneath

Ten

Patty was relentless; she wouldn't stop drumming her fingers against the table, nor would she stop glaring at the clock, as though that'd speed time along. My jaw had been propped on the palm of my hand, my eyes side-eyeing her. I guess I should cut her some slack. After all, this was her first official school offense. She was having a mental breakdown, so to speak.

"Patty, glaring at the clock isn't going to get you out of the library faster." I sighed, flipping to the next page of the book I'd picked off the shelves. Contrary to my taste, it was a non-fiction book, but it was about animals in the wild. Luckily, I liked animals. Therefore, the facts were interesting enough to keep me entertained.

"Tyler, you don't understand. My parents are going to kill me!" Patty groaned.

"Because Mr. Kaegi refused to help us, and then got mad when we helped each other?" I scoffed. "Oh, give me a break."

"He's probably called our parents already. I bet he's told them we were talking in class! My parents will believe him. I won't even have a chance to explain! Aren't you scared your mom will flip?" She pulled her bottom lip into her mouth, tearing the flesh back with her teeth.

"Not when she finds out what really happened." I shrugged.

Mr. Kaegi was nothing but a thorn in my mother's side. Even then, that didn't stop him from being a major a-hole. As punishment for talking out of turn (his words) during class today, he assigned Patty and I to one week of detention. However, that wasn't going to fly on Patty's radar. Detention on Patty's permanent record? Only in her nightmares. So, she begged and pleaded for him to change our punishment to something less damaging.

I didn't see how being forced to help out in the library all of this week, for one hour after school, was a less damaging punishment. Cleaning bookshelves. Cleaning tables. Storing books back into their proper place. And the list went on. It was basically manual labor without pay. But who was I, right? Needless to say, it put a damper on my mood.

"Well, aren't you lucky. . ." Patty muttered.

"Not as lucky as you think I am," I said barely above a whisper. Patty's eyes lingered on me, as though she wanted to say something, but was relying on her eyes rather than her words. She then folded her hands on the table and perched up straight in her chair. If she was trying to make herself look occupied, it wasn't working.

"Do you think Mrs. Jude has any newspaper articles I could read? We're all done here, and we have ten minutes left before we can leave. So, I figured it'd be okay." She changed topics.

"You really like keeping up with the news, huh?" I flipped another page in the book.

"It's all I can do when I'm not studying. I'm passionate about what goes on in the world," she said, shrugging. "What about you? Why don't you like keeping up with the news?" Because my visions were the only harsh dose of reality I needed, was what I wanted to say.

That was only the tip of the iceberg though.

Lake Bellinor's news was filled with politics, crime, and lots of other negative topics. Being that mayoral elections were nearing in a few months; I expected the height in politics. But everything else? There was more to Lake Bellinor than bad news. That much, I knew, as much as I liked to point out everything wrong with this town.

"Because my life already has too much news to keep up with," I settled with.

"Doesn't it bother you though?"

"What?"

"Not knowing what's going on. Or better yet, knowing there's so much going on in our community. A place where us, as citizens, are supposed to feel safe! Now, I know there's no actual safe place in the world. But I fear for the direction Lake Bellinor is heading.