Spoilers:  After cattle incident and snippets of future episodes

Disclaimer:  I own none of these characters.  They are the property of Nickelodeon.

Pairings: C/E, snippets of C/W

 

Chapter Twelve

 

“Griffin!” Caitlin yelled as she continued her whirlwind search.  “Where did you put my backpack?”  Caitlin allowed Griffin and Eric to use the backpack as they trekked out into the woods that Sunday morning, anything to get Eric out of her and Will’s hair.

 

“What do you mean?” Griffin yelled from the living room.

 

Caitlin stormed out of her room and down the stairs.  “It’s not in my room.  When you borrow something, you return it from where you got it!”

 

Griffin rolled her eyes at her.  She growled and continued her search.  Caitlin had been in the same grumpy, crabby mood after Will’s encounter with Eric in the stables.  “Caitlin, stop being such a grouch.  I put it where I found it.  On your bed.”  Griffin returned to finishing the homework he had forgotten to do that weekend.  “Stop interrupting me!  If I hand this assignment in late at the beginning of our senior year, Mr. Peters will have my head!”  Caitlin stuck her tongue out at Griffin who wasn’t looking, continued to scour the house in an attempt to find her backpack.

 

What the heck was Eric thinking?  I can’t believe he thought he could butt into my life! 

 

Caitlin finally stomped back up the stairs and attempted to once again find her missing backpack in her room.  “Yeah, I would have seen it if it were sitting on my bed,” she mumbled to herself.  “What am I blind?”  As she pushed her door open, Caitlin gazed at her disheveled bed.  “I don’t see it!”

 

Caitlin bellyflopped onto her bed.  She peered underneath the sheets of her bed and under the mounds of dirty clothes.  “Come on!  Where are you, you stupid backpack?”  Caitlin rolled over onto her back and sat up ready to look between her knees and look under the other side of the bed, just in case she missed something.

 

“Are you looking for this?” Dor asked from the doorway.

 

Caitlin looked up and found her backpack hanging from one hand, in Dori’s possession.  “Yes!” she exclaimed jumping from her bed and grabbing the enigmatic bag.  “Where’d you find it!”

 

Dori shook her head and smiled.  “They left it in the foyer.” 

 

Caitlin clenched her fist and closed her eyes.  I knew it!  “Griffin!” she screamed from her room.  Caitlin was all prepared to tell him what she thought of him when Dori put her hand on her shoulder.

 

“Caitlin?” she said firmly.  Caitlin turned to look at Dori, dropping her shoulders and prepared for a lecture.  Instead Dori asked her a question.  “Is there something wrong?”

 

Caitlin rolled her eyes.  ‘Is something wrong?’  The question rolled around in her head for a few seconds.  When isn’t there something wrong?

 

“Dori, we have to get going!  We’re gonna be late,” she sighed and tried to sneak past the ‘mother-figure’ in her life.

 

“You’ve got 15 minutes to talk,” Dori coaxed.  “Besides with the way Griffin drives, you’ll be there in five!”  Dori motioned for Caitlin to sit on her bed.  “You’ve been in a bad mood ever since Sunday.  What’s the matter?”

 

“Nothing!” she exclaimed.  Caitlin sighed loudly and plopped herself onto the bed.  From the look in Dori’s eye, she wasn’t going to take that as an answer.

 

Dori eyed her, tilted her head for a moment and then shook it in disagreement.  “I don’t think so.  Did you have a fight with Will?”

 

Caitlin rolled her eyes again.  She felt Dori’s eyes boring into her and Caitlin couldn’t help but feel uneasy talking about her boyfriend, with her almost mother.  “Dori,” she whined.  “Do we have to talk about this now?”

 

“I think so,” she stated.  “Besides, I don’t think it’s a good thing for you to keep it bottled up.  I know having a boyfriend for the first time is a stressful thing.  Especially when it’s your first fight.”

 

“It’s not our first fight!” Caitlin protested.  “We’ve fought a lot.”

 

“But it’s your first one as boyfriend and girlfriend.  Ever since the new school year started, you’ve been very quiet and subdued Caitlin.  A lot different from the summer!” she explained.  “Does this have anything to do with Eric coming back?”

 

Caitlin was in shock.  Why would she say that?  Why does everyone keep asking that?

 

“NO!” she exclaimed, upset.  “No.  Oh my gosh no!”  Caitlin chewed her lip.  Maybe she was being a little to adamant about it.  Caitlin could tell by the look in Dori’s eye that she thought differently on the subject.

 

“Caitlin,” Dori drawled.  “It’s not unusual to find someone you’ve known forever, you know.” She paused awkwardly, searching for the ‘hip’ word. “Cute.”

 

“Dori,” Caitlin began to speak when Griffin’s voice echoed from the kitchen.  “Caitlin, let’s go!  We’re gonna be late!  I have to pick up Eric too!” he yelled.

 

Caitlin closed her eyes, thanking God that the conversation was ended so abruptly.  “I have to go!” she rambled.  Caitlin grabbed her backpack and ran down the stairs.  She could see out of the corner of her eye, Dori was shaking her head.

 

Caitlin ran down the stairs and gave Griffin a quick pat on the shoulder and said, “Thank you!” as they ran out the door.

 

***

 

Griffin pulled up to Eric’s driveway and honked the horn.  He glanced at an anxious Caitlin in the rearview mirror.  “What’s wrong with you?” he asked.

 

“What?” Caitlin glared at him in the mirror.

 

“Well first you were grouchy and now you’re all so twitchy.”

 

Caitlin rolled her eyes at him.  Griffin never understood his ‘sister’.  She was always so moody, more so now that the school year had started.  ‘Boy, she still hasn’t gotten over yesterday!’ he thought to himself.  Griffin sighed.  Girls!  Always so moody’

 

He honked again and just as he released the pressure off the horn, Eric came exploding out the door.  Eric waved his hands as he ran in front of the car and mouthed ‘sorry’.

 

~~~

 

Griffin, Caitlin and Brett had been sitting in English for 30 minutes now.  Griffin was slumped over, his head on his desk.  He hated English.  They were working on dossier assignments that had been assigned to them last week.  Actually they were rewrites, but Griffin didn’t understand the purpose of them.  “It’s fine the way it is,’ Griffin whispered to Caitlin.  She rolled her eyes at him like she always did.  ‘She would,’ he thought to himself.

 

Caitlin was a whiz at English.  She really liked it.  Griffin wasn’t a writer himself.  He worked better with numbers and computers.  “Hey,” Brett whispered, throwing a pencil at Griffin.  Brett was sitting behind him, with Lenny Cardner in between them.  Griffin turned around in his desk.  ‘What?’ he mouthed.

 

He pointed to Caitlin and passed Lenny a note, which he in turn passed to Griffin.  Griffin was confused.  Was he just about to pass anote to Caitlin from Brett?  ‘Why?’ Griffin mouthed.

 

Brett just smiled and motioned with his hand to give it to Caitlin.  She was sitting in the desk beside Griffin and he quickly and stealthily slipped the note onto her desk.  Caitlin snapped her head around when she noticed the piece of paper land on her desk.  She looked at Griffin curiously.  He shrugged at her and pointed back to Brett, who in turned grinned widely at Caitlin as she scrunched her face at him questioningly.

 

Griffin watched as Caitlin read the short note.  Her eyes began to bug out and she turned around and glared menacingly at Brett.  Griffin tried to read what she mouthed at Brett, but couldn’t quite get the gist of it.  What…something…who…something…you…’

 

This was irritating.

 

***

 

“What the heck?  Who told you that?” Caitlin mouthed the question back to Brett.  He just shrugged and smiled crookedly.

 

Hey Caitlin!

 

Is it true that you and Will broke up this Sunday?

 

                                                            Brett

 

Caitlin turned around in her desk and began to stew about the factless rumor.

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