Nick and Noelle by Kara Lynn Russell

Author:Kara Lynn Russell [Russell, Kara Lynn]
Format: epub
Publisher: White Rose Publishing (an entity of Pelican Ventures, LLC)
Published: 2009-12-30T22:00:00+00:00

Nick And Noelle

Chapter Seven

Noelle went to the church early on Saturday morning, but Nick was there before her. “He really can’t wait for this to be over,” she thought sadly.

They spent the whole day decorating. A whole painful day together. They put up trees in the Sunday School wing of the church, in the fellowship hall, the youth lounge and the gathering space. They twined strings of white lights around the beams in the sanctuary, reminiscent of a starry sky. The tree in the sanctuary was the largest of those they’d put up, well over eight feet tall. By the time it was almost finished, Noelle was exhausted.

The church looked beautiful. They‘d worked hard, but had hardly spoken to each other at all—not even to argue. They were putting up the last of the ornaments when Noelle realized something.

“Oh, no!” she cried.

“What’s the matter?”

“I forgot the star for this tree. I’ll have to run back to the store. You go ahead and finish up. It will only take me a few minutes.”

“I’ll come with you.”

“You don’t have to. I can—”

“I’m not letting you go to the store alone at this time of night,” insisted Nick. “It’s already been broken into once.”

Noelle glared at Nick. Why was he always treating her as if she were helpless? “There hasn’t been any more trouble since then.”

“I’m still going with you.”

“Oh, all right. But I’m driving.” Noelle thought she could retain that much control at least.

“Fine,” conceded Nick.

They made the trip in frigid silence. Noelle pulled up to the store and turned off the car.

She felt Nick’s solid presence at her back as she opened the door to the shop and walked in. The store was dark, but with surprise, Noelle realized she could hear voices in the back. She stopped abruptly and Nick ran into her. She stumbled, but he reached out and steadied her. They exchanged glances, and she realized he heard the voices, too. Noelle started to walk toward the back, but Nick stopped her. “Stay here,” he whispered and headed toward the back door.

Noelle didn’t argue. She just followed him, one hand fumbling in her purse for her cell phone. As Nick reached the back room he flipped on the lights. Noelle’s mouth dropped open in surprise. On the floor, in a circle of sleeping bags and food wrappers sat Drake, Deirdre, Ryan and Kendra.

“What’s going on here?” she asked.

The kids froze. Deirdre looked like she was about to cry and Drake looked angrier than usual. Ryan and Kendra were frozen in fear.

Noelle repeated her question and Deirdre sprang to her feet. “I’m s-so s-sorry.”

“Do your parents know where you are?” asked Nick.

“We don’t know where our parents are,” Drake answered. “Our Mom left a long time ago. Dad remarried. Ryan and Kendra’s Mom is dead, and now Dad took off too.”

“We t-tried to keep going,” Deirdre said. “But…um… Drake and I couldn’t find jobs at first and we were …um… evicted from our apartment.”

Suddenly the “break in” made sense.

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