"Was that. . ."
"Yep."
"So we're. . ."
"Yep."
"This is bad."
"Yep."
I shoved my hands into the pockets of my jeans, looking for anything that would be of use here. My fingers closed around a box of Certs. In my other pocket, I had a five dollar bill and keys, neither of which would be any help. Luckily, Rachel and I had not been in our morphing outfits, so we were both wearing normal clothes. Well, normal for our time. Here, in what must have been about 1775, I was pretty sure they would not appreciate Rachel's flowered mini dress and knee-high boots, and my baggy jeans and sweater.
"What have you got in you purse?" I asked Rachel.
She glared at me. "None of your business."
"Yeesh, Rachel, I just wanted to know if you have anything useful. I mean, you take everything so personally, what could possibly be in there that you wouldn't want me--Oh!" I exclaimed, finally getting it. "Oh, ew! I did not need to. . .EW!"
Rachel kicked me. "Just find a way to get us out of here." She growled. "My boots are getting muddy."
"What am I supposed to do?"
"I don't know," Rachel tapped her mud-free boots impatiently. "You're supposed to be the smart one."
"Me?"
"Yeah. You do all the boring thinking stuff, and I do the fighting."
"Boring?"
"Well, what do you call it?"
"Thrilling? Exhilarating? Excit--yeah, you're right, it's boring."
Rachel sort of smirked.
"We know where we are," I said, trying to sound smart, now that I realized Rachel must not be the only one with that opinion. "We even know how we got here."
"We just don't know how to get back," Rachel finished.
"Yeah. And if that guy was Paul Revere, like I think it was, then we're probably somewhere near Lexington, or Concord, which means--"
"Which means," Rachel said with her classic smile, the one I've come to call the "let's-do-it-butt-kicking" smile. "War is about to break out."
"Rachel, we cannot get involved in that war."
"Who said anything about getting involved?" she said, this time with a "lay off, pal, girls gotta have some fun" smile. "Now come on, I'm hungry."
"And where are you planning on. . ." I shrugged and followed her to the nearest house.
Rachel straightened her hair, which wasn't messed up, and tried to lengthen her skirt, which didn't work too well, then knocked on the door.
"I don't think these people are going to appreciate two weirdly dressed kids showing up at their doorstep in the middle of the night."
The door opened.
A middle-aged woman in a long white nightgown and a white nightcap holding a candle stared out at us. "Have you more news on the British?" she asked with a faint British accent.
"Well, um, you see, we're lost, and hungry, and it's cold. . ."
The lady eyed warily. She searched the two of us up and down with her sharp looking eyes. "Very well," she finally said, opening the door further and letting us in.
We followed her into the kitchen of the house. She got out the end of a loaf of homemade bread, and sort of tossed it at us. Rachel caught it. "Sorry it's a bit stale," she said, taking out and pouring us glasses of milk. "Tomorrow we'll bake new. You can help." She added to Rachel, making sure we knew if we were going to stay, we were going to work.
"Wherever did you get those clothes?" she said.
Rachel, with a look of absolute terror on her face, acted as though she hadn't heard the question. "Bake. . .bread?" she said, as if it were a thought too horrible to even consider.
The woman and I both stared at her.
I had a feeling it was not going to be easy to introduce Rachel to the 18th century.
