TIME & TIED: AWARENESS

ARC 1.2 - Of Her Peers

PART 7b: GROUP CHEMISTRY 2

Julie took Carrie's arm and quickly led her away from the bike stand as another person rode up. "I'm questioning how well you feel myself," she remarked, lowering her voice. “Regardless, no, we can't postpone this. Frank is only in charge of the chemical cupboard this week. Plus I already called in a favour from Joe. Why, do you really want Frank to continue stalking you all through the weekend?"

"Oh! Well, no. But... okay, about the chemicals, what exactly do you have planned?" Carrie said. She now wondered if she maybe shouldn't have been in such a rush to execute her plan. Retrieving more details from Frank before departing would have been helpful.

"Carrie, I assured you no one would get hurt," Julie reminded, tossing some hair back over her shoulder. “There’s nothing to worry about, it's just a slightly more elaborate prank than usual."

"But... I'm curious. You know me," Carrie pressed, trying to keep her tone nonchalant.

Julie narrowed her eyes slightly, peering back at Carrie for another couple of moments. Finally she shrugged, then glanced left and right. "Oh, very well, it does concern you after all."

She smiled proudly. "See, Joe Drew's also in Frank's chem class and he happens to know which chemicals they're going to need for an experiment today. I gave him a key to the lab's storage cupboard and told him to mix the labels around a little bit – nothing dangerous obviously, they never let students handle dangerous stuff. But enough to make Frank look stupid, or at least careless. We then drop a hint Frank's way as to the reason behind the mixup, and if he's as smart as he seems I don't think he'll push the point with you any more."

Carrie processed that. "So... you have a key to the chemical storage cupboard? When did you get that?" she asked in confusion.

"Sue was in charge of it last week. I got a copy from her," Julie stated with a shrug. Carrie stared back at her friend. "Oh, come on Carrie, don't look so surprised!" Julie chided. "Haven't I always told you good things will come our way?

“When we were mere Grade 9 students, all we could do was make ourselves known with the freshmen and gain respect from our elders. It wasn't until last year that we started to ascend the status ladder, picking up the bright followers who could sense which way the tide was turning. It's THIS year that we'll really start getting into the good stuff! At last we're in a position to take much firmer control of what's going on in school,” Julie concluded, punctuating her final remark by clenching her fist and pulling it down dramatically.

"But... Julie, you're part of the richest family in the area," Carrie pointed out. "If you want more control over what goes on in school, you could have your parents put a word in."

Julie frowned and crossed her arms over her chest. "Not as satisfying," she mumbled in reply.

Carrie blinked. "It's more satisfying to forge keys?"

"I didn't forge keys!" Julie said haughtily. "As a member of the student council executive, I merely suggested to Sue that it might be a good idea to have an additional set of keys made for times of emergency. Moreover, that I should keep track of them so that they don't fall into the wrong hands. Sue agreed. I may even get around to telling the rest of council about it eventually."

Carrie felt her head starting to spin. Had Julie's schemes always had such a complex basis? "And what's the deal with Joe?"

"Joe wanted to be the captain of the chess club. And oddballs like Frank notwithstanding, I do have certain connections within the geek faction and can pull some strings... but why are you suddenly so concerned about this anyway??" Julie demanded, starting to tap her foot. "After all, we're in the clear and everyone gets what's coming to them, same as always. That’s what you care about, right?”

"Oh, well, sure,” Carrie asserted. She supposed that she hadn't ever bothered paying close attention to Julie's methods, so there was no way of knowing if this was a recent Grade 11 thing or not. Come to think, why wasn’t she simply explaining to Julie about the time machine?

Well... that could involve mentioning more about her mother than she'd care to - even Julie didn’t know about the Bermuda Triangle - plus something about Julie having knowledge of the machine bothered Carrie on a subconscious level.

Dissuading or even stalling her friend was turning out to be harder than Carrie had anticipated though. "But... you're sure Frank can't point the finger back at us when he learns who engineered it? This seems risky," Carrie ventured.

Julie sniffed. "Hardly. Really Carrie, I thought you had more faith. In over two years at school here, have we ever been fingered for anything disreputable? There's never concrete proof of our involvement. Even if Frank tries, I dare say the teachers wouldn't be any more inclined to believe him over me. Wouldn't you agree?"

"Eruh..." Carrie floundered. Julie had thought everything out remarkably well! But... wait, Carrie didn't have to delay things to prove her point about time travel. She could get away with changing the circumstances. "In that case, here's another idea! How about instead of switching chemical jars, we actually remove one or two of them!” Carrie proposed.

One of Julie's eyebrows shot up high onto her forehead. "What, THEFT?”

"Well..." Carrie paused, trying to think of exactly how to incorporate this. There had to be a way.

Julie cut into her thoughts. “I admire the audacity," the brunette acknowledged. "But no good. Switching, while irresponsible, is subtle and explainable as Frank being distracted. Theft would take a bit more doing... and is a rather drastic first step, even given the geek’s attitude towards you.”

The first bell rang signifying five minutes until the start of classes. "Okay, wait, I... I don't necessarily mean theft outright," Carrie attempted to explain, the plan coming together in her mind.

"Tell me at lunch then," Julie stated. "Chemistry isn't until fourth period and we shouldn't be late for our homeroom math test."

"But..." Carrie froze. "Math test?"

Julie frowned again. "Carrie, maybe you should think about seeing a doctor. Seriously. You're acting awful weird today."

'I certainly wouldn't mind getting out of here - AND out of the math test,' Carrie sighed to herself. 'But now I have to make sure I'm around to talk to Julie at lunch. Agh!'

"I... I'll be fine. Let's go," Carrie stated rubbing her forehead.

***

It was worse than she'd imagined. These upper level math tests were hard enough when you actually spent time going over your notes. By Carrie's perspective, she hadn't looked at function notation for several days. This did not bode well: her B- average could well slip into the C range. All because she'd come here to change time as an example for Frank.

Carrie glanced over briefly at his seat to see him writing. She wondered if he had any clue as to what was in store for him that afternoon. Probably not, if he was still anything like the boy she’d spent time with two years ago.

Looking back at her test paper in annoyance, Carrie doodled a couple of figures onto her page. The way things were going, Frank might still get in trouble for something today too. Honestly, that alone was starting to bother her, which in turn annoyed her even more. After all, back in the woods, she had resolved to pay more attention to the things she did, right? And it wasn’t Frank’s fault that she’d interfered in his past, indirectly making him more interested in her at this point in time.

Carrie stopped, gripping her pencil harder. Wait a minute. At this point in time, Frank had NO IDEA what was going to happen to him today... so would he realize when she changed things? All she'd confirmed in the future (that was, her present) was that something weird had happened during chemistry class. And now she was no longer postponing it.

So would Frank remember what had originally happened in Julie’s plan as well as Carrie’s change? Or was there a chance he'd only remember Carrie’s change and think she was lying about Julie’s original plan?

Carrie's mouth went dry. Damn, this time travelling was becoming a lot more complicated than it had any right to be. She looked back over at Frank's desk again. He was looking back at her.

She froze up again, and for the first time that year at school, their gazes locked together for several seconds. He seemed uncertain. Ultimately, Carrie pulled her head back down to her test paper, feeling embarrassed over having been caught. She'd better concentrate on the test now, and figure out the time stuff next period. There had to be a way to ensure that she had proof for him!

At the back of the class, the only observer of the brief interchange between Frank and Carrie was a young asian girl. She had relatively short hair, though it was long enough to be pulled back into two small ponytails.

Their classmate blinked a couple of times in surprise, looking from Frank to Carrie and back. She then shook her head slightly, and returned attention to her own test paper. Less than thirty seconds later, three more of her math problems had been solved without so much as a glance at her calculator.