I Found Myself Falling...Not For the Right Thing Either

I giggled to myself, as I saw Craig shoot me a pissed off look, but it quickly disappeared as he responded to Jake and entered his room, leaving the door slightly open as he took a last glance at me. My laughter overflowed and turned into hysterics. Tears were running down my face. He was pissed at me because what I did to him yesterday.

I mean I did leave him waiting in a hallway for me for an entire block.

I thought he would’ve realized by the time half block rang that I wasn’t going to show up since I was already on my teacher’s bad side from entering the classroom way after the class had officially started. Yet, I was wrong. He actually waited the whole entire time for me! If you think about it, it was kind of sweet. As soon as I got a text from him yesterday I knew he was pissed.

He got even angrier when I couldn’t explain to him why I didn’t show up.

I didn’t want to tell him about Liz. First of all is because of him and her dating. Secondly, she did punch me and act like an ass. Lastly, he didn’t need to know. Nobody needed to know what happened and how she broke down. Yeah she did crazy stuff and became a total bitch, but I wasn’t that cold-hearted to go and advertise her breakdown in the bathroom, especially since she wanted to change.

I knew that if I told Katie and James about it they wouldn’t believe me; I don’t think anyone would, but knowing Liz for so long I knew she was going to change back to who she was before this year happened. I had thought long and hard about it and I trusted her. So that’s where I was when Craig and Jake came up with their ‘amazing’ idea of going to Laser Tag with everyone.

James agreed right away, along with Kent, Ian, and Jared. Katie went along with it and even though we really hadn’t talked about everything going on with her and Jake, she convinced me to go to.

“I’ll go as long as we’re on the same team.” James said, linking arms with Katie and I. Craig snorted.

“Sure Fag, I-I mean James,” he stuttered as I gave him a hard glare, “You, Katie and Rae, versus all of us.” A smirk formed on his face as my eyes narrowed. Too bad I didn’t get my input as everyone around me agreed on the challenge.

“We’ll need team names!” Ian concluded as we piled into two separate cars, four in each vehicle.

“Don’t you all feel like little kids?” Katie asked, taking a glance over at me, but I was too busy watching as Craig made a few stupid faces in my direction from the other car. I held back a giggle, trying not to turn the spotlight to me, but Katie did that for me. “Rae, don’t you think so?” My head spun around to see James, Katie and Kent staring at me.

Shaking my head I answered, “Not a bit.”

So with that we headed to Laser Tag. Gosh, okay maybe we were little kids the way we were all basically jumping up and down in the car the whole ride there, screaming team names ideas or tag names for one another. When Jared got up to our speed on the highway they were just as excited as us, none of them even glanced at our car as they were yelling to one another. None of us knew about what, but we could only imagine with four guys in a car and all headed to Laser Tag.

“They’re probably coming up with strategies.” Kent commented, pressing down on the brake as we came to a red light.

“Probably, but then they’ve got a one up on us. I think we need a plan of attack!” James declared.

“We do.” Katie and I agreed.

“So we should probably start off with who gets who…”

“You all know I’m on the other team, right?” Kent commented, making us all look at him. James gave a swift nod and my hands shot to Kent’s ears, covering them from our voices.

“There.” I told him, smiling. He only chuckled and continued to drive down the road.

“I’ll get Ian and Jared.” James called.

“I’ll get Jake.” Katie smiled, leaving me with Kent and Craig.

“Fine I’ll get this idiot and the other one.” I agreed, looking over to Kent who was smirking. “What?” I asked, removing my hands from his ears.

“You know I could hear everything you said, right?” I rolled my eyes.

“Sure you did.”

“Oh I did.” Kent teased.

“Then what did I say, huh?” I taunted, but before Kent could answer, the Laser Tag place came into view and the car sped up since Jake had already pulled into the parking lot. We quickly took the spot next to them and emerged from our vehicles. One by one we all rushed towards the doors.

Other than the fact that we were all fully grown, the people in the place would’ve thought we were a group of little kids coming into the building for a birthday party the way we all rushed into the big open area of the waiting room. There were three TV screens on the west wall, windows on the east one. In front of us was a desk. It was the kind that you see in hotels. A woman stood behind it, her hair in a ponytail and her eyes looking down as she wrote something down.

It wasn’t too long before Ian was hitting on her, making us all roll our eyes when she turned him down rather quickly.

“I have a boyfriend.” She muttered, pressing her lips into a thin line.

“Well, that never-” Jared quickly grabbed Ian by the hood of his jacket and pushed Ian behind him.

“Sorry, um…” Looking down at her name tag he continued, “Jenna. We’d just like to play a game or two.” He ended his request and apology with a smile. The girl, Jenna, glanced around our group before giving us a curt nod and typing something on the keyboard she had on her desk.

“How many?” She asked.

“Eight.” Her fingers moved so fast over the keyboard it was incredible, I almost didn’t hear Kent call to me because of how hypnotized I was by her fingers.

“What?” I asked, glancing over my shoulder at Kent.

“So you’ve got me and Craig, huh?” I frowned which only caused him to smirk in triumph.

“Dammit, you did hear.” I grumbled, thinking of something witty to say, but nothing came to mind. “Yes, I’ve got you and Craig.”

“Funny how that happens doesn’t it?” I smacked his arm.

“Shush, will you? Nobody knows!”

“So there is something going on between you too!” Kent exclaimed, bringing his voice down a few notches so no one else would hear.

I had to make sure that nobody really did hear so when I noticed everyone either talking to each other or giving their names to Jenna, I answered him, “Yes, there is.” A smile broke out across his lips and Kent pulled me into him, squeezing the life out of me.

“Aw, Rae, I’m so proud of you! You’re growing up so fast!” The corner of my lips tugged back as Kent released me.

“Oh most definitely. Before you know it I’ll be going off to college, getting married, having some kids-”

“With Craig.” My hand flew faster than a race car to cover Kent’s mouth. Luckily, again, nobody hear him, but he was cutting it close.

“I swear to god if you say something too loud I’ll kick you in the family jewels.” His hands instantly flew down South and he shook his head in understanding. Satisfied, I dropped my hands from his lips.

“Rae and Kent, hurry up! The game’s about to start.” Both of us hadn’t even noticed that everyone made their way to a door just before the TV screens and chairs against a wall.

“Coming!” We called, rushing towards the darkened room.

Once our bodies were in the door was shut and nothing could be seen. For about a second or two it stayed like this and then a switch was flicked and the room lit up with green and red lights. Each light belonged to a vest and laser gun, the green on one half of the room and red on the other. Some of our clothes lit up the room as well since they were light enough to be picked up by the black lights.

“Welcome to Laser Tag. My name’s Dan and I’ll be your instructor for today.” A man in total white clothing announced from behind us all. He was the one who turned the lights on and closed the door.

“Aw man, I was hoping for Jenna.” Ian spoke up, making us laugh.

Dan cleared his throat before saying, “Jenna’s my girlfriend…” That, ladies and gentlemen, made us laugh even harder as Ian sunk behind Jared, hiding from our instructor’s view. “Well, now that we’re all in the room and ready to play, let’s begin.”

Directions were given and we all obliged to them, grabbing a vest and dropping it over our heads. Katie, James and I were the red vests and everyone else was green. I couldn’t figure out how to buckle my vest so I was thankful when I turned and had James fastening the straps on my waists while I tried to fidget with the ones one my shoulders. It seemed that Katie had the same problem because she sighed loudly before turning and giving the both of us pouts.

Surprisingly, Jake stepped up to the plate and helped Katie since he had already finished with his. This made my eyebrow raise in question. What was really going on between the two? It was obviously more than just one night. Too bad I didn’t have time to ask before our instructor started speaking again.

“So we’ve only got a few rules here and since you’re all basically in college or still in highschool, screw the no running rule. Run all you want, just don’t get hurt or it’ll be my ass that my boss will deal with.” We all chuckled at bit at Dan seriousness. “Besides that more little kid rules. No hitting, tripping or playing dirty even though that never stops anyone so go ahead and do whatever you want. The one rule that stands though is once you’re out, you’re out for two minutes then you can join back in again.” A loud bang was sounded behind us and we all turned to see Ian with his gun on the ground and his vest halfway on.

“Can someone help me?” He asked; an embarrassed expression on his face. If it weren’t for the black lights, the red tint in his cheeks would’ve been evident to us. Jared sighed and went over to help him out while Dan continued with the rules and other directions to the game.

“Each game will be ten minutes long. After each game you will follow the bright yellow arrows on the walls to this room. We’ll wait a few seconds and then go back in for the second round. Does everyone have that?” We all nodded to let him know that we understood. “Good now when shot with a laser from the other team your vest will have ten seconds till you’re done for. In those ten seconds you can either hit the person that shot you or get a team mate to shoot you. If either of those is done you are still able to play in the game.”

“I’m all good!” Ian shouted through the room making us all roll our eyes.

This made Jared say, “Only because you needed some help.” Ian went to shoot an excuse, but he didn’t get a chance before Dan continued, clearing his throat to get all of our attentions.

“You don’t have to play fair, but maybe try to. Each team will start in a different section of the laser room. Red will go out that door,” He explained, pointing to a door at the end of our vests that was lit up red at the top, “and green will go out that door.” As you could guess, there was a door with green above it on their side. “Those are the ways to get back to this room and to enter the laser room. There are exits that lead to outside if for some reason you can’t be in the laser room any longer. Those will have exit neon signs above them so you can see them.”

Dan said a few more things, but my mind wandered off as I stole a glance at Craig. He looked like a kid with the vest and laser gun. Well, an incredibly sexy kid with his slightly rustled hair and the way he smirked at me when he caught sight of my gawking.

“Now, please crowd around your doors and get ready for the first round to begin!” Doing as Dan said we all crowded around our team doors.

I glanced back at Craig whose lips stood out slightly in the lights letting me be able to read them as he mouthed, ‘Get ready to go down.’

A smirk plastered itself across my lips as I whispered to him, “Sorry hun, but that’ll be you.”