Chapter 2

CHAPTER 2 Nothing bothered Justin more than being late. If he wasn't at least 30 minutes early to school, he started to sweat. Inside of 15 minutes, he broke out into hives. The one time he was five minutes tardy, he nearly exploded. Running toward the cave entrance in danger of being late for dinner the second night in a row, Justin was in complete panic mode. That's probably why he ran straight past the turn he should have made. Michael, jogging carelessly behind his friend and digging cave pebbles out of his nose, assumed Justin knew where he was going.

After a number of minutes of running past unrecognizable cave features, the panicked late feeling in Justin's stomach gave way to a different kind of horror. He stopped cold. Michael, whose right pinky was reaching for the very last pebble lodged deep in his right nostril, ran right into Justin, hitting his elbow against Justin's back and forcing the pebble even deeper up his nose. "UGH!" He grunted with the impact, which forced him to swallow the pebble. "Oh. Thanks!" he said. "We're lost," Justin whispered. "We're what?" Michael asked. "We're lost. I don't know where we are. I must have missed the turn!" "That's not good," Michael said casually. The boys looked at each other. "AHHHHH!" they screamed in unison. Being lost in a cave, whether it's in the Middle East or the middle of Tennessee, is most certainly not good.

"Fortunately," they would tell their friends when they were back at school later that year, "we had two years of Junior Ranger Patrol training!" In reality, Michael just happened to remember the story of Hansel and Gretel. "Why don't we just follow our footsteps back to where we're supposed to turn?" Michael said. "Like breadcrumbs." "Oh. Yeah. Good idea," Justin said, looking slightly calmer. Thirty minutes later, and one hour late for dinner, the boys spotted daylight.