The Mars Project by Julie Steimle (english readers TXT) 📖

and cuts he had acquired when in prison back on Arras. He had taken a back way to his house and been snatched up by their two college-aged residents to help with grocery shopping. No agent had seen him leave with Eric and Aaron as the FBI really were not watching the family—just him.

Agent Palmer stepped back and nodded, though it was obvious to Jeff that he wasn’t exactly agreeing with the new man.

“There you are!” Eric exclaimed, pushing the cart. “Where have you been? And where is the milk?”

“Where are the eggs?” Aaron asked.

Jeff winced and stepped quickly into the aisle. “I just saw an old friend.”

They nodded, understanding clear enough. “From Home?”

Jeff shook his head. “Camp. New friend with a three letter acronym.” Pursing his lips and thinking with his arms crossed, Jeff glanced at the other two with their shopping cart. Then he peered back out the aisle. “I’ll get the eggs and milk, but you two need to get some beer.”

Both men grimaced, gazing carefully at him.

“Beer? That poison these guys try to pass as a drink? Back Home, may I remind you, that poison was outlawed for a reason,” Eric replied, disgusted.

Jeff nodded. “Yeah—and I’m betting that they know that too.”

“I don’t follow,” Eric replied.

Aaron smiled. “I get it.” He patted Eric on the back. “Come on, Eric. Let’s get ourselves an alibi.”

The redhead nodded now. “Oh.”

Jeff smiled. “I’ll meet you at the register.”

They both agreed and pushed their cart toward the other end of the store.

“Wait,” Jeff stopped them with a wave of his hand pointed down the aisle. “And see if you can get in the check-out stand right behind him.”

They peered down the long aisle where they saw a suited man pushing a semi-filled cart. It was the man Agent Palmer had been talking to.

They nodded again and hurried back down to the other end of the store.

“What brand should we get?” Aaron asked as they walked away.

“I dunno. Let’s pick a cheap one they advertise on TV,” Eric replied, shrugging. “We’re going to end up dumping it, either way.”

When they had left, Jeff walked casually back to the freezer case where he left his milk and eggs. Luckily they were still there and hadn’t been re-shelved by the courtesy clerks. He picked them up then tucked them under his arm. Then passing one of the ice-cream freezers, Jeff pulled out a box of frozen Popsicles.

The checkouts were not as full as they usually were most afternoons, Jeff figured, because it was a Thursday. The man that he had been following picked up a few more items in the instant food section then headed to the checkout counter on the far left. The ‘college boarders’ were taking a bit longer than Jeff thought necessary, so he found himself standing alone near the front of the store.

“Scrapes, where are they?” He murmured near the magazine rack just next to his target’s checkout counter.

The suited man casually glanced up when he heard Jeff speak, still waiting his turn in the checkout line. He looked up again, clearly recognizing the boy’s face. Jeff saw the reaction out of the corner of his eye but pretended not to notice. At last, out of one of the far rows, came the two college-aged men with three six-packs of beer. Jeff made a face.

“You went and got beer? You know my aunt is going to have a fit if she sees that in the house,” he exclaimed.

They pushed the cart to his checkout stand and started to unload the groceries onto the conveyor belt just behind the man they were following.

“You had to pick the farthest checkout stand, didn’t you,” Eric said dourly, much out of his nature. Perfect acting.

Jeff shrugged then pointed down the last aisle. “It was near the milk.”

Aaron lifted the large bag of granola onto the black moving belt and glanced up at the man before them. The suited man’s food was being checked at that moment. He was fumbling in his coat for his wallet. Jeff stepped into the aisle so he could be closer to the man. Then he set his milk, eggs, and Popsicles on the conveyor belt.

“Popsicles?” Aaron spurted. “Ah, is widdle Jeffy getting himself a tweat?”

Jeff let his shoulders droop, and his looks turned dark. The man next to him tried to look away, but he kept watching out of the corner of his eye.

“Why don’t you drink a man’s drink,” Aaron continued, hefting another six-pack of beer onto the belt.

“’Cause I’m a minor,” Jeff replied in annoyance. “Besides, you can’t sneak that into the house, and my aunt won’t let you take it in.”

“That will be eighty-four dollars and eleven cents,” the cashier replied.

The suited man handed her a debit card. Jeff read it quickly. It said: James Sicamore, with his card number easy to memorize. Jeff watched James Sicamore punch in his pin number.

“You aren’t going to fink, kid, now are you?” Eric threatened, leaning in.

Jeff rolled his eyes with a sarcastic reply. “I’m shaking in my boots.”

Mr. Sicamore’s checkout was done. The bagger finished packing his food into plastic bags, so he pushed the cart out toward the doors, glancing back at Jeff once more before walking out.

“Paper or plastic?” the cashier asked.

“I’ve got a bag,” Jeff replied quickly, pulling it out and unrolling it. He handed it to the courtesy clerk.

“And who is paying?” she asked.

“I am,” Eric responded, pulling out his wallet.

“Can I see your ID?” she asked him.

Nodding with a simpering grin, Eric handed her his driver’s license.

“Twenty-eight?”

He nodded. “What? You need more ID? You want a passport too?”

She shook her head, handing his driver’s license back. “No, it checks out.”

Jeff walked out from the checkout stand and casually watched Mr. Sicamore walk to his car in the parking lot as it was the most boring thing ever. The man had a plain white car, though there was no license plate in the front. Jeff walked to the window, watching him turn in the parking lot then head out the exit into the street and down to the intersection.

“Get the license plate number?” Aaron whispered to him as he watched.

Jeff nodded. “AQR-346.”

“Your total is a hundred and five dollars and sixty-three cents,” the cashier said, ringing it up.

Eric counted his pocket change and peered over at Aaron’s. “Hey, do you have ten dollars? We seem to have come up short.”

Jeff laughed stuffing his hand into his wallet. “You shouldn’t have gotten three six-packs of beer.”

They shrugged.

The register rang, and she handed back their change. “Thirty-seven cents.”

Chapter Five: Group Projects

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

When I see you, my stomach gets all up and excited.

Nothing much happens in my head or that I can feel in my heart.

 –Maybe my stomach is in love with you.

—Anon—

 

 

“Now onto the party scene. Romeo, you will read,” Mr. Humphries said, sitting down and holding his usual cup of coffee in his hand as he directed them.

Jeff looked down at the page and took a breath, knowing this was the part he had been dreading. Glancing over, he saw that Zormna was already crimson, having already read the entire play the day before when she was on break from chores at the McLennas’ house. They had made her do yard work again, only this time she had to weed all the flowerbeds. Her back was still aching from all the bending. However, that task seemed easy compared what she had to do now.

“What lady is that which doth enrich the hand of yonder knight?” Jeff read, keeping his eyes to his page.

“I know not, sir,” the boy next to him read.

“O! she doth teach the torches to burn bright. It seems she hangs upon the cheek of night like a rich jewel in an Ethiop’s ear; beauty too rich for use, for earth too dear! So shows a snowy dove trooping with crows, as yonder lady o’er her fellow shows. The measure done, I’ll watch her place of stand, And touching hers, make blessed my rude hand. Did my heart love till now? foreswear it, sight! For I ne’er saw true beauty til this night.”

Jeff finished that long line and rested, wondering how Shakespearian actors did it. It was a mouthful to memorize.

“Can he be more inane,” Zormna muttered under her breath.

“This, by his voice, should be a Montague.” Sam read Tybalt’s part but was immediately interrupted by the teacher who held up his hand.

“Wait,” Mr. Humphries said, nearly fuming, “Did I hear someone call this inane?”

Zormna swallowed and peeked up, cringing. Fighting her lower instincts to pretend she didn’t say it, she stood up and faced her teacher. “I did.”

Her teacher stood back, clearly appalled. “You obviously don’t seem to get the poetic eloquence of Shakespeare.”

Zormna dryly laughed. “What I get is that this boy, who had claimed to be so madly in love with one woman and walked around all mopey, has now completely forgotten her just because he saw another one.”

The teacher smiled at her ‘naïve simplicity’. “You don’t understand it simply because you obviously haven’t been in love.”

She laughed again. “Neither has he,” pointing at the book. “That Romeo isn’t in love. He doesn’t even know Juliet yet. He’s only attracted to her because he thinks she is pretty.”

Jeff lifted his eyes from the page, wondering if this section had hit a personal nerve, or if Zormna was stalling so they wouldn’t reach the next part of the scene where Romeo and Juliet kiss.

“Don’t you believe in love at first sight?” their teacher asked with superior amusement over what he thought the issue was.

“No,” Zormna stated with revulsion. “I believe there is such thing as lust at first sight. Real love always comes later.”

Jeff chuckled to himself. It was a personal nerve. He wondered how many men had openly lusted after her in her fourteen, almost fifteen years. Nearly every boy in school had a fantasy about her. None of them seemed to factor in her real personality though.

The teacher shook his head. “Well, some people believe in love at first sight, and that is what this story entails. Now sit down, and we’ll continue.”

Zormna scowled, but she complied. Everyone could tell that she thought there really was no point arguing with the teacher, even if she ‘knew’ that she was right.

“This, by this voice, should be a Montague,” Sam read again. “Fetch me my rapier, boy.”

Jeff and Zormna waited for their parts to come again, knowing they would finally suffer through their delayed punishment. Both had been dreading it.

It was Jeff’s line. “If I profane with my unworthiest hand this holy shrine, the gentle sin is this; my lips, two blushing pilgrims…” Zormna choked on a laugh but Jeff continued to read: “ready stand to smooth that rough touch with a tender kiss.”

She coughed as she tried to clear away her amused smirk. Zormna read: “Good pilgrim, you do wrong your hand too much, which mannerly devotion shows in this; For saints have hands that pilgrim’s hands do touch, and palm to palm is holy palmer’s kiss.”

Jeff made a face at her and read: “Have not saints lips, and holy palmers too?”

“Ay, pilgrim,” she smirked back as she replied with strange vigor, “lips that they must use in prayer.”

Jeff laughed and leaned in, watching