Sunflower

Chapter 9

5 years ago

Annie

"Good morning, Lucille," Professor Quinn smirks when Lucy and I enter his classroom. He loves to give Lucy a hard time.

Lucy sighs and rolls her eyes. "Good morning, Dr. Quinn, medicine man."

He smiles proudly and we take our seats. Professor Quinn is an old and lonely man, since his wife had just passed away not long ago. Lucy reminded him of his daughter, Amber, who has been living in England for the past five years. Since Lucy never really got along with her own father, I think she secretly likes the playful banter with him. She humors him every day, even though she pretends it annoys her.

He starts today's lesson on human anatomy while Lucy furiously copies down notes by hand. I record his lectures and save myself the work, but Lucy insists that she remembers things better if she writes them down. And it must work since she's acing this class while the rest of us are barely passing.

"Chris's birthday is coming up. What are you planning for him?" I lean over and whisper.

She pauses and looks at me. "What do you mean?"

"He's your boyfriend. Are you not planning on doing something special for his birthday?"

She chews her bottom lip nervously, probably deciding whether or not she wants to entertain my question or continue on with her notes.

"You should strip for him," I smirk, nudging her with my shoulder.

"What?!" she gasps a little too loudly.

Everyone around us turns around and Professor Quinn stops talking.

"If Lucy and Ethel could keep the noise down, the rest of us would truly appreciate it," he says, giving us a bored look.

"Sorry, sir," Lucy apologizes quickly, giving me a mean stare.

I snicker.

Lucy goes back to her notes while I watch her in amazement. "Who is Ethel?" I finally ask her.

She pauses, sighs in frustration and rolls her eyes. "Lucy's best friend."

"I'm starting to think he just doesn't know my name."

"Shhh!" the girl on the other side of me hisses, putting her finger over her mouth like an angry, old school teacher. Her super tight ponytail makes her eyes narrow and mean, but I only roll my eyes at her.

I sink into my chair, seconds away from dying of boredom. "Ugh, you people are so uptight. I hate you all."

"I should throw him a surprise party," Lucy says out of nowhere.

I sit up and look at her in surprise, impressed. "That's perfect! We can do it at Louie's! We seem to always end up there on Friday nights anyway."

"Okay, yeah. We can do it at Louie's," she agrees.

"And then you can strip for him after."

"What?" she asks, furrowing her brows.

Before I can answer her, the fire alarm sounds, and we all look around in confusion. We never know whether or not to heed its warning since the fire alarm gets pulled a couple of times a week for various reasons- mostly because someone didn't study for a test.

We all file out of the classroom and into the hallway. I grab onto Lucy's shirt and let her lead us outside to the quad.

"My favorite girls in this entire school!" Cole says, smiling like a goon as he approaches us.

"Hey Cole! Where's Jessica?" I ask him.

He scoffs. "I ditched her already, are you kidding? She talks way too much."

"You're not looking to settle down, are you," Lucy chuckles.

He shrugs. "If I find my person, I find my person. Until then, I'm not going to settle. Besides, Jessica was hella jealous of you two."

"Why? She's beautiful," I say. "She has no reason to be jealous of us."

"Yeah, but she didn't like that we're close friends."

Lucy and I share a look. Cole doesn't seem to be into either of us, but could he be? Is that why none of his conquests stick around for very long?

"Hey guys!" Chris calls out, jogging up to us.

I watch Lucy's eyes light up and the most beautiful smile spread across her face when she sees him. Poor girl is whipped already.

"Hey baby!" she says when he wraps his arms around her and kisses her forehead.

"I missed you," he says, pressing his forehead to hers.

Cole and I look at each other and roll our eyes. "It's been no longer than two hours since you last saw each other," Cole says.

They act as if they don't even hear us. They just keep smiling at each other like they're in love. It's sickening.

"So what are you doing for your birthday?" Cole asks Chris, pushing him away from Lucy.

"I don't know. I don't like being the center of attention, despite my dashing good looks. I'll probably just hang out with Lucy like I do every night," Chris shrugs.

"Actually, I had already made plans with Annie tonight," Lucy grimaces, looking to me.

It takes every bit of restraint that I have not to face palm. What the hell is she doing?

"You made plans with Annie on my birthday?" Chris asks, looking a bit hurt. I don't blame the poor guy. But Lucy would never do that to him, she's just a really, really bad liar.

Lucy looks to me with panicked eyes, begging me to help her out. Of course, I'm no better at lying than she is. "Well, it's important. I'm...going to visit my mom and Lucy is coming with me."

"So...you can only go see her on this one specific day?" Cole asks.

"Uh, yes, actually. See, she's....she's in jail," I blurt out.

Lucy looks at me like I'm crazy while Cole and Chris look more sympathetic. "Wow, Annie. I had no idea. I'm so sorry. How long has she been locked up?" Chris asks.

Lucy and I share a look, panicking.

"Twelve years," Lucy says.

"Twelve years?! What the hell for?!" Cole asks, almost excitedly.

My mom isn't in jail, and to my knowledge, never has been. She damn sure isn't capable of pulling off a crime that would land her in the slammer for twelve years. She's the sweetest, biggest softie I know.

"Armed robbery," Lucy says.

And I can't hold back the face palm this time.

Luckily, I'm able to recover quickly. "Great, Lu. Now everyone knows."

"Oh, don't worry. I won't tell anyone," Cole says.

Chris only looks at me in confusion, as if he's still trying to figure out whether or not he believes this story.

I'm starting to buckle under pressure, so I feel the sudden need to flee. "Lucy, come on. We've got to get to the library."

"Oh. Yeah," she says, giving Chris a look as I drag her away.

"But the building is on lock down! We're in the middle of a fire drill!" Cole calls out to us.

We pause and look at each other. "Chris knows I'm lying," Lucy whispers.

"No kidding! You told him my mom, who could be freaking June Cleaver, is doing twelve years for armed robbery!" I hiss.

"You're the one that said she's in jail!" she hisses back.

I blow out a breath, trying to think clearly. We can do this. We just need Chris to be distracted for a few hours. "We've just got to make this story believable for a few more hours. After the party, we can tell him the truth."

"Yeah, because I'm sure he hasn't already found out three minutes into this story that we're lying," Lucy scoffs.

"Just be cool," I warn her, turning to face Cole and Chris, who are still looking at us like we're crazy. "I meant a different library. On the other side of town."

"Ugh, please lets just go!" Lucy growls, grabbing my arm and pulling me away.

After we've put enough distance between us and them, I pull out my phone to call Andrew. We need at least one person to know what we're up to since I'm sure we'll need to help getting this whole surprise party pulled off. We're off to such a fantastic start.

"Hello?"

"Andy, I need your help with something."

"Okay..."

"You're probably going to be getting a phone call from Cole or Chris saying that Lucy and I are acting strange."

"Why? You two act strange all the time."

"Lucy wants to throw Chris a surprise party for his birthday tonight and to keep him from finding out, we sort of...told him and Cole my mom is doing twelve years for armed robbery and we're going to visit her in jail."

Silence.

"Andy? Are you there?"

"Yes. I just wanted those words to sit with you for a minute."

"I know, it was a dumb lie. Lucy just wants it to be a surprise and we had to come up with something on the spot. Something good enough for Lucy to get away on her boyfriend's birthday without it being suspicious."

"Well, congratulations, you probably blew it. Is that why you're calling me? To come save you, like always?" he asks.

I can practically hear the smirk in his voice.

"Yes," I sigh in defeat. "Can you just...keep Cole and Chris busy until we get everything ready?"

"Why Cole?"

"Because he heard the massive failure of a lie too. I don't want him to ruin anything by asking too many questions. Besides, don't act like you mind keeping Cole busy. I know you're secretly in love with him."

"Fine. I'll see what I can do. But if they ask me about the poorly constructed lie, what should I tell them?"

I take a few seconds to give it some thought, tapping my finger to my cheek. "Well, you're a lot better at lying than me or Lucy. Just go along with it, but make it believable."

"Believable?" he repeats.

"Yes. Get creative. Lucy wants to blow her man's mind!"

Andrew

I'm used to being the clean up crew for Annie and Lucy's schemes, so spending my Friday night backing up one of the most absurd lies I've ever heard is no surprise to me. What is a surprise though is how suddenly nervous I am around Cole.

I know he's not gay, but he's been so friendly to me. He's not that way towards Chris. They're friendly enough, but it's nothing out of the ordinary. I won't get my hopes up though. I've had my heart crushed by straight guys before. And that's my curse- I want the ones I can't have.

"So...what do you know about this whole armed robbery thing?" Chris asks as the three of us take our seats at the bar.

"What?" I ask before I quickly recover. "Oh, you mean Annie's mom."

"She's in prison, right?" Cole asks, sitting on the other side of me.

"Yeah, she went to prison for robbing her ex husband at gunpoint. If you ask me, she was just taking back what was right fully hers, but the police didn't quite see it from her perspective," I answer smoothly.

Cole nods, seemingly buying it. Chris, on the other hand, still doesn't look convinced. As a matter of fact, he's texting Lucy now and I can read everything from here. I shouldn't keep looking, but I can't help it. I'm nosy.

Chris: I think you're lying to me about where you are. If you didn't want to hang out with me, why didn't you just say so?

I bite my lip, trying to come up with something to say, something that will draw his attention away from Lucy for just a few more minutes. She and Annie are next door at Louie's, getting everything ready for a surprise party that they hastily planned.

It's not Lucy's fault though. Chris has made her stupid. She's starting to become forgetful, clumsy, foggy...it's kind of cute though, so I don't mind it. She's in love. Don't we all want to be in love?

"I think Lucy is up to something," Chris says, sighing a he puts his phone back into the pocket of his jacket.

"What do you mean?" I ask.

"She's acting strange. I mean, she's never once mentioned that Annie's mom is in prison until today. And the way they were acting earlier..."

"I agree. They were both acting strange. Do you think they could be lying about Annie's mom?" Cole asks.

Bless his poor, dumb, handsome heart.

"Of course they're lying about that," Chris scoffs. "And it's a terrible lie."

"Andrew, you've known them forever. Is Annie's mom really in prison?" Cole asks.

I could easily lie and say yes. After all, in just a little while, they'll find out this is all made up anyway. But I just keep on digging and digging, because...why not?

"Yes, she is," I reply rather pointedly. "And Annie has been waiting to see her for years, but her mom keeps refusing her visits. She finally accepted and Annie only just found out about it this morning. She didn't want to make a trip like that alone, so she asked Lucy to come with her."

Chris's face falls, making me feel terrible. "Wow. I'm so sorry. It just sounded so...crazy..."

"It's a crazy story," I shrug.

"So...Lucy isn't just ditching me on my birthday then," Chris says, mostly to himself.

"No way. She eats, sleeps and breathes all things Chris," I chuckle, patting his back. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I've got to go wash the taste of this lie out of my mouth."

"What?" Chris asks as I'm walking away.