Just as Lonna was sitting at the desk wondering if anything else could go against her today there was a knock at the classroom door. Lauren got up from what had been her desk all off that day to answer it. Standing at the door was Peter Jones the school caretaker. “Hi Peter what can I do for you?” Lauren asked him politely. “Hi, Ms Rodriguez the office asked me to let you know that your Uber is waiting outside.” He told her looking at her with an air of disdain. Lauren remembered that he did not like the teachers at the school. He had told him one day when she was sitting in the office after getting herself in trouble for arguing with of all people Ms Tran. He had been nice to her back then but now he like everyone else at the school saw her as one of those teachers that he disliked. “Thank you, Peter.” She replied as she turned back to Lonna.
“Are you going to be ok I have to go.” She said to the disheveled figure sitting in front of her. “I suppose there is not much we can do about this tonight. I have to go home.” Lonna replied in such a way that you could feel the heartbreak in her voice. Lauren picked up her bag from behind her desk, she wanted to help Lonna but knew as did she that they needed to keep up their pretense of being each other for the rest of the day at least. They had managed it so far, they should be ok for the evening besides she knew that her Mom would treat her well. She always had treated her well when she had lived that life.
A minute after Lauren had left the room Peter walked in. “You ok kid?” He asked her in a kind voice that Lonna had never heard him use towards her before. “Yes, Mr Jones I just got some bad news that Ms Rodriguez is helping me understand,” Lonna told him. It took her a minute or two to realize that he was talking to her as he talked to any of the students at the school. She remembered that it was only the teachers he did not like and to him, at that moment she was not one of them. This made her feel a little bit better as this man that she had seen around the school for the last five years was being kind to her which was what she needed at that moment.
Lauren sat in the Uber that Mary had arranged for her to take her to what had once been Lonnas’. That was a good thing as she had no idea how to get to the address that she had found in the school records. The records . she thought about the records and then it hit her. When she had looked at her ID in that bathroom it had said she had been teaching at the school for three years but the records had said five years. Why would they say something different? She reached into the bag on her lap and pulled out the ID card to look at it once more. This time she noticed it had changed. It now matches the details in the records database. This matched what Lonna told her before she had got into the Uber. How had it changed she thought to herself? As the car pulled into the curb.
“Here we are Ms.” The driver told her. Shaking Lauren from her thoughts “Oh thank you.” Lauren replied smiling to the driver. She removed the keys to Lonnas’ front door and walked inside. Once inside she finally expressed out loud what she had realized in the back of the car. “However this stone thing had changed them that morning it had not finished with them yet. What did this mean how much more would things change? She was not sure but the one thing she did know at that moment was that she could not let Lonna know. Not because she thought she shouldn’t know but because she had noticed how Lonna had taken it when she found out that she now lived with Laurens's old family as a part of it. She did not want to upset her anymore. Besides she would have Lonnas’ aunt to deal with shortly and she would need all of her energy to deal with her.
