Teej

MORE!! And it's kinda long, too...

I looked at Blake, who looked even more surprised.
“That was weird,” he said simply. Then he too ran up the stairs, leaving me alone in the entry with bags at my feet. Mom poked her head through the doorway to the living room.
“Jenny, you’d better get some sleep. You’ll be up bright and early tomorrow,” she said.
“Yeah, okay, Mom,” I replied. I looked down around me and sighed. I knew Mom was right, as always, so I turned and went up the stairs, just like everyone else.
Mom wasn’t kidding when she said ‘bright and early.’ Not at all.
“Jen! Wake up already!!”
I pried my eyes open. “Why?” I asked groggily.
Mom huffed. “We have to get you to the church by 7!”
“But… we’re not leaving until 8! It’s only 6:30!” I protested.
“You dad volunteered to help load the trailer. We have to be there by 7!” Mom was getting exasperated- and didn’t like having to repeat herself.
She finally got me to drag myself out of bed and into some clothes. I half-sleepwalked my way down to the kitchen, where Teej didn’t look all too chipper herself. We both almost fell asleep in our cereal several times; when one of us was about to, the other woke them back up.
I fell asleep in the car on the way to the church- a grand total of 9 blocks. They let me sleep (thank goodness) while they loaded the trailer as kids showed up. Tori was actually the one who woke me up; said TJ ratted out my location, so she had to wake me up. It was almost time to leave anyway, she reasoned.
We all clamored in the two vans and one Suburban and waved goodbye to the farewell committee (our parents) gathered at the church. My mom almost cried; she apparently didn’t like us leaving… or something. Then we were on our way. Jake “bravely” led the way in the church van, Deidre (our other youth leader, who also just happens to be married to Jake) followed in another van, and Desiree (Deidre’s sister) brought up the rear in the Suburban.
I was in the second van, and so were Tori, TJ, and some other kids from our youth group: Aaron, Lindsay, and Caleb. TJ sat shotgun, Lindsay and Caleb got the middle bucket seats, leaving Tori, Aaron and I squeezed in the back seat. Which wasn’t so bad, because Aaron’s really funny.
The first fifteen minutes were high energy. We were excited- for the most part- to be going to spend a week away from home! Slowly, though, the energy wore off and we all fell asleep. When we woke up, Deidre told us she felt like she was driving a hearse; it was so quiet. Sleeping paid off, however, because Deidre informed us that we were less than 5 minutes away from the lake house. We all cheered at this news.
We wove our way through busy streets and hit a highway that ran along a string of lake houses. Soon the highway ran out and we bumped along a gravel road, taking us even farther out of town. Finally we watched as Jake’s van led us into a driveway, Des following us. After a few curves, we saw the house- if you could call it a house.
Looking more like a mansion, it was big with exquisite landscaping. The outside of the building was a creamy off-white with brown shutters and door. We all stared in awe as we piled out of the cars. Jake smiled at our astonishment and led the way inside, his arms labored with suitcases. The inside was just as grand as the outside. Smooth oak floors, a beautiful winding staircase, a spacious living room/ kitchen/ dining room, and a humongous library/office. As soon as everyone got upstairs, they went berserk. The upstairs loft was all bedrooms, two, mostly three beds in a room except for the master bedroom. There were kids running every which way, claiming rooms and room mates.
“Girls on this side of the hallway, boys on that!!” Jake yelled above the chaos. He pointed as he spoke, indicating which rooms belonged to the girls and which side the boys were on.
Nineteen members of our youth group had come; 9 boys and 10 girls. I settled into a room with Tori and TJ while Shay roomed next door with Lindsay and Rebecca, Becca for short. Across the hall were Christin, Hannah and Deidre, and in another room, Alissa, Megan and Des. The boys took the rooms in another neck of the hallway, so we were separated.
After rooms were chosen, everyone went their own ways again to explore the house. I was in the enormous kitchen before I noticed the French doors leading to the deck overlooking the lake. I timidly turned the fancy handle of the fingerprint-less glass door and stepped outside. The late morning- almost afternoon sun glared off the glass lake, reminding me that we hadn’t eaten lunch. My stomach grumbled, telling me that it remembered, too.
“Hungry?” I turned to see Aaron, sauntering outside and joining me at the railing.
I rolled my eyes. “I didn’t exactly eat dinner, you know.”
“Yeah, I know. None of us have, right? We left at…”
“Eight,” I filled in.
“We left at eight, traveled for, what, hour, hour and a half?”
“Something like that,” I replied as I glanced over at him.
“That means we should’ve gotten here about…” He squinted at the lake for a moment, calculating. “9- 9:30. Has it taken that long getting everyone’s stuff and rooms set up?”
“Not exactly.” We both turned to see Jake coming out of the fancy French door. “See, we didn’t get left until 8:30, then we stopped for gas about… oh, about half an hour into the trip. Deidre said you all were sleeping, so you wouldn’t remember. So you see, we didn’t get her until about 10:30. Probably a little after. Picking rooms and settling in, throw in a little exploring before and after, and that brings us to 12:15.”
“Well, what are we waiting for?” Aaron sounded incredulous. Jake and I both looked at him questioningly. “Let’s eat!”
 
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Hehe, I like this one... ;)

The subject of food aroused everyone’s attention, and soon all 22 of us were in the kitchen. The subject of food had also produced a problem: we had no supplies of our own and we weren’t about to take food from the Anderson’s cupboards. We finally decided to go into town and eat at Mickey D’s or somewhere cheap and take it out of the youth fund, since no one had brought any money with them. Going to town would also allow Deidre and Des to go to the grocery store and buy food for the next week.
We ended up at A&W, which filled everyone up, even on dollar burgers. Deidre and Desiree made a quick trip to the grocery store for “fundamentals” saying they’d have to come back later for more specific stuff. Soon we were back at the house, and Jake was recruiting people for the first go-round in his boat. Of course, everyone wanted to go, but only five people could. Of the five, TJ was one of them. Tori and I pulled up chairs on the deck to watch the crew; who stayed just off-shore a ways where the water was like glass. After a few tubers, we saw TJ get out of the boat, throwing her wakeboard into the lake and jumping in after it.
“What is that thing?” Tori asked me.
“It’s a…” I didn’t get to finish, because Shay finished for me.
“Wakeboard,” she filled in. Tori and I turned in our seats to see Shay coming across the deck towards us.
“Hey,” Tori greeted. “Pull up a chair. We were just about to watch Teej.”
“Don’t mind if I do,” Shay answered, dragging another lawn chair up beside me. “Anything exciting happen?”
“Nothing spectacular,” I shrugged. “But I have a feeling the show is just beginning.”
The three of us watched as TJ took her position in the water and yelled “Hit it!” at Jake.
Jake pushed down on the throttle and soon TJ was flying above the crystal water with complete ease. She did some tricks, getting more daring each time. Her final trick was a complete flip in the air before she signaled Jake that she was done. As she slowly sank into the water after letting go of the rope, Tori, Shay and I all looked at each other with raised eyebrows.
Tori spoke first, and summed up what we were all thinking with one word: “Wow.”
I nodded in agreement. “I figured she was probably good, but I wasn’t expecting her to be that good.”
“Well,” Shay put in, “I haven’t exactly seen a lot of wake boarders, but that was pretty cool.”
We watched some more people do some more tubing, and Justin get up on skis. After everyone in the boat had done something, we saw TJ sliding out of the boat once more.
“She’s going again,” Tori said, stating the obvious.
TJ’s performance was more impressive than the time before, and we once again watched in wide-eyed wonder. I couldn’t help thinking that she hid her talents well. When she went to do her final flip, something went wrong. Before we knew what was happening, TJ was in the water- and not coming back up.
Jake swung the boat around to where Teej had fallen. We saw him saying something to Aaron- we couldn’t quite make it out, but figured it was something about how to control the boat- before he heroically leaped into the water after TJ. We heard a gasp behind us, and turned to see a very, very pale Deidre with Christin at her side. Shay quickly got up to help support her while Tori ran off to get some help, but I couldn’t move. What was happening to TJ? I couldn’t breathe- the lump in my throat made it rather difficult. C’mon, Jake, bring her back up. Alive, preferably, I silently begged. The image of Landon flashed across my mind, and I started begging harder. I couldn’t lose TJ, too. While she wasn’t my blood sister, she was practically a member of our family now.
I slowly, mechanically got out of my chair and moved to the railing. Tori and Shay came back and rushed to join me, trying to make out the developments with TJ. We saw Jake’s head pop up above the water, only to go under again. Seconds passed; seconds that felt like hours. He finally came up again, this time he was holding Teej.
“GO!” we heard him yell, apparently to Aaron when the boating kids had gotten both him and TJ into the boat. Aaron took off and I had a sudden urge to run. I took off, and Tori and Shay followed me down to the dock to meet the boat. Becca and Des were waiting there too, and other kids were making their way down. Aaron pulled the boat up at the dock, and Jake laid an unmoving TJ at our feet.
 
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More!!

Um...well... Maybe I'll tell y'all sometime. ;) Meanwhile, here's more at last!

As soon as TJ touched the white plastic planks, we sprung into action. Some of the boys helped Jake out of the boat as Micah tied it up. The girls on the dock went to work getting TJ to come to. Desiree, a nurse, found a pulse and declared TJ alive. Relief flooded through me and I could breathe once again. Des went to work checking for broken bones and sent Tori and I back to the house for some towels, to dry Teej and Jake off. When we returned, TJ was still unmoving and Des made the announcement that we needed to get TJ to a hospital for more thorough tests. Aaron started running up to the house as Megan, Christin and Deidre were coming down. Deidre still looked pale, but she was all right.
At the vans, Des and Jake argued about who would drive. Matt finally interrupted, saying that the important thing was to get there. He also mentioned that he thought Des should drive, since Jake had just, “you know, saved a life and everything.” Besides, Jason put in, standing there holding TJ was getting tiring.
Finally, Jake gave in and let Desiree drive. He, Des, TJ and I all left in the church van to town. The rest of the group watched us drive away, all waving. I knew that they’d be praying. Jake and Des continued arguing all the way to the hospital; Jake still insisting that he should’ve driven. I closed my eyes and tried to tune them out, trying to process what had just happened. I knew it would be a long afternoon, and I wouldn’t have a whole lot of time to myself.
And a long afternoon it was.
When Jake, Des and I arrived back at the house that night, everyone wanted to know if Teej was all right. We explained that, yes, she was fine, and no, the only thing broken was her ankle, and yes, she’d be here tomorrow. When everyone finally got to bed, it was 10:30 at best, and I was exhausted. I fell asleep right away, but was tormented with nightmares similar to the one about Landon; all of them involved being swallowed up by the lake. Sometimes it was Tori, still other times it was TJ. And once, it was me.
The next day, we met my parents at the hospital and they said it was fine for TJ to come back with us; she was doing much better and said she was up to staying the remainder of the week- although she wouldn’t be doing anymore wakeboarding. We said goodbye once again and brought TJ and her bandaged foot home. Of course, everyone wanted to sign her cast, but she let Jake be the first.
After everyone got over the excitement of TJ’s broken ankle and neon green shell, it was time for lunch. Deidre and some of the girls had gone to the store the day before while we were at the hospital and bought more supplies. We ended up having grilled cheese sandwiches.
The afternoon was again filled with water activities, although I stayed once again safely on the deck of the Anderson’s house, watching. Especially after what had happened to TJ and the nightmares last night, I wasn’t about to go in the water. After all, someone had to keep TJ company.
 
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