Saturday, November 4
Beat by a girl.
On Saturday morning, I am happy.
Like, really, really happy.
Even when my alarm clock goes off at 5 am, and even when Sander and I go on a seven-mile run—I can’t stop smiling. And I don’t want to stop smiling.
I’m in love.
And the best part about it is, he loves me back. I don’t think I’ll ever get used to that.
After our run, we meet Jaxon and Hunter in the basement of the loft that I didn’t even know existed. Down here, it’s full of all kinds of work-out equipment, but there is also a huge mat on the floor. I guess they do a lot of training here. I don’t think it was set up just for us.
“Why do you keep smiling?” Hunter asks, while he’s got me in a headlock.
Yeah, okay, maybe I shouldn’t be smiling while in a headlock, but I can’t help it.
“None of your business,” I say, fighting against him. Not matter how hard I pull, I can’t get his arm away. Not knowing what else to do, I pretend to relax and when I do I feel his grip loosen—not a lot, but enough. I yank on his arm and twist around. I am then able to fight him.
He looks surprised when I am no longer in his grasp.
“Good job,” he says, smiling.
But I’m not going to relax. Not yet. I know how Hunter likes to do this. He likes to pretend I’ve done a good job, then attack again, making sure I don’t get away. I watch him, waiting for him to make his move.
Hunter watches me, as if he’s waiting for me to do something. I don’t. I just watch him cautiously, waiting patiently. And I am rewarded. He tries to make a go at me, coming at me head on, but I anticipate his movement and use his momentum against him.
Somehow, I’m still not sure how it works, but I am able to lift him up slightly and slam him onto the floor without using any of my own strength.
When I look down at him, he looks shocked, like he’s trying to figure out how I did that.
Ha, that’s what he gets for doubting me.
“How the heck did you do that?” Hunter asks.
“When you got it, you got it,” I say.
Jaxon and Sander both applaud me, so I take a bow.
“I can’t believe I got beat by a girl while wearing pink toenail polish,” Hunter says.
He’s been trying to scratch the pink off his toes since he got them done, but it’s not working great.
“So, what is up with the two of you?” Jaxon asks, looking between Sander and me. “You guys have been smiling non-stop since you got home from your date last night. Was it that good of a date?”
I can’t help but smile, even though my face is warm and I know it must be bright red.
“Don’t worry about it,” Sander says.
I like his answer.
It’s really none of their business what happened last night.
It was magical.
Perfect.
“They’re so in love, it’s gross,” Hunter says, pushing himself off the mat on the floor.
I look at my nails. “You know, my nails are getting kind of chipped. I could probably use another mani-pedi.”
“Did I say gross? I meant totally precious and adorable,” Hunter says. “And, wow, Phoenix, you look great this morning. And your fighting is impressive. I think you might be better than I am.”
I laugh.
He’s just saying that because he’s scared I’m going to make him go get another mani-pedi with me, which is kind of exactly what I was insinuating. Though, I won’t ever make them go get mani-pedis with me again, not unless they really want to. While it was fun for me, I don’t think they enjoyed it as much.
“Please, continue,” I say, waving at him like I want him to continue to compliment me.
“And your eyes... I’ve just noticed. They’re so blue, like the sky on a cloudless, summer day,” Hunter says.
Everybody laughs.
Training with Sander, Jaxon and Hunter is not easy, not by a long shot. They push me harder than I ever thought I could work, and they encourage me to do better, even when I think I’m doing my best. And the thing is, they’re always right. Even when I think I can’t push more, I can. Sometimes, it feels like they’re being ridiculous by pushing me as hard as they do, but they truly know what they’re doing when it comes to training me. I’m stronger than I ever thought possible, because of them.
I’m so glad that Hunter and Jaxon have joined us on our journey, because I feel like I’ve learned so much from the two of them. And more than that, I feel like they’ve become my family. I really do love these guys—like brothers.
We get back to training. This time, Hunter doesn’t fall for my tricks, but it doesn’t matter because I am still riding my high from beating him once today. Once is enough. I will bask in this moment for the rest of the day.
No matter how hard I train, I know that the guys will always be stronger than I am. That’s just how it is. The only chance I have of beating them is by outwitting them, so I pay close attention and learn everything that I can during training. I get the feeling that in the future, my wins and losses against them will be a lot more even. At least, that is what I’m working towards.
Everybody seems to be in a really good mood this afternoon. I don’t know what it is, but it seems like the mood of the entire house has lifted. After driving for six days straight, or so it felt, I think everybody is glad that we just get to be here in New York and chill for a while.
I’m also excited because I realize I don’t have any more homework to do. I’ve done it all, so I should be caught up until East Raven opens their doors again, which definitely won’t be happening this week. The last I heard, they were still doing repairs. I bet they’ll have the entire thing done before any of us go to campus—we probably won’t even be able to tell there was an explosion.
Part of me still feels guilty about that, but since there were no fatalities or serious injuries, I try to let it go. Pondering these things only holds me back. I have to keep moving forward.
“I have a surprise for you,” Sander says, walking into the living room, holding a laptop.
“If you give me more homework, I swear I will throw your MacBook out the front door,” I say.
He laughs. “No homework. This is a good surprise.”
“Okay,” I say.
Good, no homework.
“I arranged it so you can talk to Charlie,” Sander says, holding out his computer for me. I grab it from him. “He’s going to be calling in about three minutes.”
I squeal. “Seriously?”
“Yes,” he says.
I throw my free arm around Sander, hugging him.
As if my day couldn’t get any better, it just did. I get to talk to my brother. What more could a girl possibly ask for?
“Thank you,” I say, once I pull back.
“No problem,” he says.
I sit down on the touch, opening the laptop while I wait for the call.
“I’m going to be in the basement with Hunter and Jaxon,” Sander says. “To give you privacy, but we’re also doing some extra training.”
“Okay,” I say.
I know that they don’t get to fully train when I’m with them. I feel bad about holding them back, but there isn’t really anything I can do about it. I’m glad they have time right now to train. I’m also glad that we’re safe here so they can be in the basement, training. They don’t have to be by my side twenty-four-seven.
The computer starts ringing and I smile as I click the answer button.
“Charlie!” I say.
“Hey, Phoenix,” he says. “It’s so good to see your face.”
“It’s good to see your face,” I say. “Seriously, I miss you so much.”
“I miss you, too,” he says. “How are you? How is life?”
“I’m good,” I say. “I can’t wait to tell you about where we’ve been. I know I can’t tell you right now, but if you knew, you would be so jealous.”
“I’m already jealous,” he says. “You look so tan. It’s unfair. I’m being kept in a cold climate.”
Ha.
If only he knew.
“I did get pretty tan,” I say, feeling a little sad that we had to leave Miami. Oh, how I miss the beach, the sun and the ocean.
“Can you believe they sent out homework for us to do while school is canceled?” he asks.
I grin. “I finished mine yesterday. I would’ve sooner, but we’ve been busy.”
Busy as in spending all day, every day in a car.
“I haven’t even started mine,” he says.
I laugh
Sounds like Charlie.
Charlie likes to procrastinate, especially when it comes to school work.
“How are you and lover boy doing?” Charlie asks.
I can’t help but smile at his question.
Gosh, I am such a sap.
“Do I even want to know?” he asks. “Your entire face just lit up at the mention of him.”
“Sander and I are doing good,” I tell him. “Like, really good. Last night, he told me that he loves me.”
“You already knew that,” Charlie says.
“Maybe,” I say. “But knowing it and hearing it are two very different things. So, I kind of feel on top of the world right now.”
“I’m not sure if that is sweet or disgusting,” he says.
“Should I apologize for not being a player like you?”
“Nah, I’m glad you don’t date a different guy every week,” he says. “But then again, you’re not like me. You know what you want and you go after it.”
“You know what you want, too,” I say. “Isn’t that why you date a new girl every other week?”
He shrugs his shoulder. “Maybe a little. But I think I’m also a little scared to commit to somebody. The thought of telling a girl that I love her kind of scares me.”
“You’re only seventeen,” I say. “You have plenty of time to get used to the idea of falling in love.”
“I just worry that I’ll fall in love with the wrong person,” he says. “Like my dad did.”
Charlie has an amazing dad, but his mom was a real piece of work. She got hooked on drugs shortly after Charlie was born. She hid it for a while, but one day, when Charlie was two, his mom left him at home all day by himself. He wasn’t even potty trained at the time. Charlie’s dad found Charlie naked on the kitchen counter, eating dry cereal from a box he’d climbed on top of the fridge to get. That same day, he got Charlie’s mom in rehab. She never stopped doing drugs, so they ended up getting divorced a year later.
Charlie was never allowed to go see his mom after that. Not that I can blame Rick. His mom was terrible. When Charlie was ten, his mom died from a drug overdose. I remember going to her funeral. I thought Charlie would be sad, but he didn’t know her. It was like going to a stranger’s funeral. It’s sad when I think about it now. That day, I told him that I didn’t mind sharing my mom with him.
“You’re not your dad,” I say. “And even so, what happened to your mom was tragic.”
“I know,” he says.
“And look at Rick now,” I say. “He and Mom are completely in love and happy.”
Charlie smiles. “Yeah, they are.”
“Besides, I won’t let you date just any girl,” I say. “I’m going to be super picky and I’ll tell you if she’s not worthy of your time.”
“This is why I need you,” he says. “I feel like I can’t function without you.”
“I miss having you around, too,” I say. “I’ve been having fun, but it’s not the same without my big brother.”
“Do you think we will see each other soon?” he asks.
“I certainly hope so,” I answer. “I feel like they’re close to figuring this mess out. They’ve made some great strides at least.”
I know that everything is far more complicated than I ever could’ve imagined, but I feel good knowing that I have so many amazing people on my side. Not just Spy School, but Uncle Matty and Jake, too. I know they’re going to get to the bottom of the corrupt people in their division.
“Hopefully, by the time we go back to East Raven we won’t have to lie to our friends, anymore,” Charlie says. “Lying is way harder than I thought it would be.”
“You can’t think of it as lying, because if you do, you’ll go mad,” I say. “I like to think of it as a role that I’m playing—like, I really am Phoenix Underwood and not Phoenix Black. It helps to know that it’s not just myself I’m protecting, but everybody else.”
“Yeah, true.”
“I won’t be going back to East Raven until they figure out who is behind this,” I tell Charlie. “It wouldn’t be safe for anybody and I couldn’t live with myself if somebody was killed because of me. I am just glad nobody was killed at homecoming.”
“I figured you wouldn’t be coming back,” he says. “It sucks, but I understand.”
“Hopefully, by the time school starts back, whoever is behind this will be caught,” I say.
“I hope so, too,” he says. “I really need my partner in crime. I mean, I came to East Raven so I could be with you.”
“I know,” I say. “And I can never thank you enough for doing that, Charlie. I’m sorry that all this crap happened.”
“It’s not your fault,” he says. “I just miss you. I also miss our house on the beach. I kind of hate the cold.”
“Oh, my gosh. Me, too,” I say.
Somebody to the side of his computer says something and Charlie frowns.
“They say I need to get off here soon,” he says.
“Oh,” I say.
I’m not ready to say goodbye yet. Though, to be fair, I’m not sure I’ll ever be ready.
“It’s okay. We will see each other soon,” Charlie says.
He sounds like he truly means the words, even though he can’t know for sure. Still, I want to believe them.
“I know we will,” I say. “I love you.”
“Love you, too.”
The call comes to an end and I stare at the blank screen. I’m sad that the call is over, but I’m so thankful that it even got to happen.
Life is good.
It’ll just be better once some terrorists are behind bars.
After getting off the call with Charlie, I feel even better than before, if that’s even possible. So many good things have been happening, but it’s also a little scary because I’m worried something bad is going to happen soon. Isn’t that how it usually works?
Still, I try to keep my thoughts on the positive. If I focus on the bad things, I will literally drive myself insane.
The guys all stay downstairs for about two hours, working out and training. I wonder how they will even be able to walk tomorrow. They work so hard. But I guess they are used to it.
I imagine Spy School is a lot like military school. Lots of wake-up calls and a lot of working out and pushing yourself. But, I imagine it’s also fun. I still can’t imagine a fencing class. That’s kind of crazy. I thought that only happened in movies.
“Did you have a nice talk with Charlie?” Sander asks, later that night.
We’re all watching something on Netflix, but I don’t think anybody is paying attention to it. Hunter is doing something on his phone and Jax is reading a book. Sander and I have just been talking. I think we turned it on just for the noise.
“Yeah. I miss him,” I say. “But it was so good to talk to him. I think he’s hoping that I’ll get to be at East Raven, too, when school opens back up.”
“I hope so, too,” Sander says.
But he can’t know for sure. Nobody can. They could figure out everything tomorrow, or it could be a year from now. I just have to be patient and trust that they are going to handle things as quickly as they can.
“Thanks for letting me talk to him,” I say. “He was jealous of my tan. He thinks we must be somewhere warm while he’s somewhere cold. If only he knew.”
Sander laughs. “What is it with you two and not liking the cold?”
I shrug. “What can I say? We’re from Southern California.”
“I’m from Texas and you don’t hear me complain.”
“Phoenix, he complained about the cold for the first two years in Switzerland,” Jax says, looking up from his book. “Trust me, he has no room to complain about you.”
I smile smugly at him.
“Did I?” Sander asks.
“Yeah, you did,” Hunter says, putting his phone away to join our conversation. “Every single day during the cold months, which, by the way, is about nine months out of the year where we trained.”
“I obviously got used to the cold,” Sander says.
I just smile as I listen to them go at it. I seriously love their banter and how they act more like siblings than friends.
I am a little jealous of their life before they met me. It seems like they had a blast working together. Part of me wonders if I will ever truly join their team. I know we’ve talked about it, but it’s all hypothetical.
Still, when I imagine the future, I can easily see myself doing this—cuddling on the couch with Sander while he banters with Hunter and Jax. I don’t know the rest of their team, but I imagine I’ll fit in well with them, too. It would be fun.
I’m excited to see what the future brings.