It had been over a month since anything strange or out of the ordinary had happened. No one had come flying through my window. No one had plundered through downtown. No one had shown up suddenly out of the blue.

            And I hated it.

            I had gotten so used to the strange events of the last couple of weeks that it seemed foreign to me that life was going about as normal around me.

            Musical practice got progressively closer to normal, and most of us stopped using our scripts. Archer only had to leave early once more from practice and actually managed to remember his lines without laughing at the more serious parts. The chorus was able to learn all the dance steps and sounded good most of the time. If you'd ask me, I'd say that things were going pretty okay.

            But it'd only be half the truth.

            Believe it or not, I was actually a little sad that The Marvel had stopped making it his lifelong mission to annoy the hell out of me. But it did feel nice to finally be out of the school paper.

            On that note, Caine Temple seemed to have moved on to a more interesting story. One of the more popular girls was just found out to be fooling around with one of the more younger teachers, though nothing could totally be proven. It seemed that the world had moved on from the whole Marvel fiasco.

            But I couldn't.

            My father started not to show up at home as often as he used to. It seemed that ever since I got home from the hospital that he spent more time at work. He claimed to be working a very high profile case, one that had everybody at the precinct stumped. It was the stolen item from Carlton laboratories that was stolen back during the battle at the festival. But I wasn't about to tell Lacey that. She didn't need encouragement to keep investigating.

            I was currently sitting outside of the dressing room in Delia's, waiting for Lacey to pop out wearing yet another outfit for me to judge. I honestly didn't know why she trusted my judgment, considering that I was the same girl who went to last year's homecoming in 'something my grandma would approve of', which apparently is a bad thing.

            "Alright, what about this one?" Lacey asks.

            This time she's walked out wearing a dress that I was sure her own grandmother wouldn't approve of. Her heels had to have been at least five inches tall. I could never understand what was so attractive about almost tripping in unreasonable heels and not being able to bend over unless you wanted to show off your underwear to the whole world.

            I opened my mouth to reply when Lacey answered for me, "No, you're right. This is a little too sparkly, it doesn't go well with the heels."And with that Lacey walked back to the dressing rooms without falling. How? I'll never know.

            I'd always been a little jealous of Lacey - I mean - who wouldn't be? Lacey wasn't just pretty, she was extremely smart too. What she lacked in athleticism she made up in her looks and her brains. She could have any guy she wanted - if she ever actually wanted to get with anyone.

            I had never known Lacey to stay with one guy for too long. Her excuse, she just didn't have anything in common with them. Lacey had never actually told me her real reason for never putting herself out there, but I thought it had something to do with Chase.

            As I've said before, Chase Carlton was a rich playboy two years older than Lacey and I. It was in our sophomore year when he went missing out in East Asia along with his father on a business trip. When he went missing, Lacey was worried. She'd been friends with him since they were children, even with the age difference. She'd always been the little angel on his shoulder, convincing him not to do the some of the many stupid ideas that would pop in his head. She also had to drive him home from parties whenever she got just a little too drunk.

            Lacey had only ever told me how she had felt about Chase two months after he went missing. She admitted her feelings for the rich playboy to me and then cried her heart out. It must've been agony having feelings for a guy you were certain that you'd never see again.

            "I think I've got everything that I'm goanna buy today." Lacey says as she walks out of the dressing room. This time she is dressed in the outfit that she came here in, a t-shirt and jean shorts.

            I got up from my spot on the couch and walked with her to the check out register, yawning from sitting on a fluffy couch with nothing better to do than to think about sleep.

            "I mean - can you believe it?" Lacey said with an exaggerated smile. "This would've cost almost double at my mother's normal place for shopping. What's this place called again?"

            "Delia's?"

            "Ahh, yes. Delia's" She says with a satisfied sigh.

            "Are you goanna be able to hold all of those bags without dropping?" I ask with a little humor in my voice. I was, of course, referring to the mountain of bags already in her arms.

            "Yes, I will, thank you very much. I didn't go shopping in Paris last summer without being strong enough to carry all those bags." She says.

            "Sure."

            "Anyway, I think it's time that we go and get lunch at that new burger place like we originally planned." Lacey says.

            "Finally. We would've been there ages ago if you hadn't decided to stop by the mall first because you 'needed some new clothes'." I tell her with a glare.

            "Well, it's never too late for food, am I right?"

            "Lacey," I said in a tired tone, "it's almost three in the afternoon. What sensible person eats lunch at three in the afternoon?"

            "Umm, obviously we do."

            Sometimes I need to resist the urge to point out the little things to Lacey.

            When we finally walk out of the shop, Lacey carrying two more bags, we head down the hall and towards the parking garage. I walked down to where my car was in the parking garage and jumped back in shock.

            "My car," I say in a quiet tone.

            "What is- Oh, no." Lacey repeats my tone.

            My precious green car is ruined. The tires are slashed, and the front window smashed in. From here I can see that somebody has stolen my car radio and rummaged through the compartments. Overall, my car had been trashed and everything of value besides the actual car had been stolen. My car looked like a rotten lime.

            Not a happy picture.

            "What are we goanna do now?" Lacey is obviously as shocked as I am.

            "I'll call the car company," I say with a sigh, "I can get them to tow the car away."

            "I know! I'll call my brother, Archer can drive us to the restaurant. I don't think he'd care much, he wouldn't want to leave his girlfriend stranded anyway." Lacey says as she taps wildly away at her phone, most likely asking Archer to come and pick us up.

            I can't believe my car was broken into. My car was the only one with any sort of damage, and considering the fact that it didn't look very pretty, I wasn't sure why a vandal would decide to break into it.

            Could my day get any worse?

            "Bad news," Lacey sighs, "It seems like it's goanna take about half an hour for Archer to get here. He says he's all the way across town, running another errand I suppose. He's been doing that much more often lately."

            "Yeah, he has."

            I sighed once again in defeat and sat down on the side of the sidewalk. I had spoken too soon. I took my phone out of my pocket, planning on playing some games while I wait for the time to pass, but as soon as I turn it on, it turns itself off.

            You've got to be kidding me, right?

            "Worse day ever." I grunt out.

            "Ohh, don't worry," Lacey sits down next to me, "At least we'll have food in our stomachs sometime soon."

            I smiled at her attempt to make me happier. "Sure."

            It was sometime later, after the tow truck came to pick up my broken car, when Archer finally pulled up to the curb in his beat up red pickup truck. He honked after barely missed splashing water over us. We wouldn't want today to get any worse, now would we?

            "Hey, you ladies need a ride? Because I got a distress call and I'm your designated runaway car. Though, if you ladies wanted some personal Archer time, you could've just said so." Archer smirked in his joking tone.

            "Yeah, sure," Lacey said, her voice dripping in sarcasm, "like we'd go anywhere with you willingly."

            "I'm pretty sure I know a couple places Arabella would willingly go-" Archer started, only to be interrupted by Lacey's laughing voice.

            "Alright, lover boy. That's enough talking. Now let us in your car." Lacey crossed her arms.

            Archer unlocked the doors and we both climbed in, Lacey squeezed in the backseat and I in the more comfortable front seat. I buckled in, and it was a good thing I did, because immediately afterwards the car went speeding forward.

            Who said jocks were safe drivers?

            "Now, where to ladies?"

            "That new burger joint near Arabella's place. I hear that it has the best super themed burgers in the city. I can't wait to try The Double Marvel Cheese Burger." Lacey said with a hungry expression.

            "What about The Spicy Avenger?" I ask in an amused tone.

            "Or maybe we can order a side of Cheesy Golden Eagle fries?" Archer improvised.

            And so the car ride went, naming all the possible super themed burger items we could think of. We came up with quite a lot of possible names, and there were many, in the time it took to get halfway there. All I could say is that the day had improved into something much better than it had been thirty minutes ago.

            Let's just hope that I could keep this winning streak going.