Chapter 47: Lily white hands

Jeffrey found himself once again standing in a courtyard for lunch. He can't seem to recall anything he learned in the last four classes. The smell of chicken tenders had already occupied his mind.

Jeffrey soon received his serving of school lunch and just before he was about to take a bite, Samantha and Preston were busy talking to a group of Orchestra and band kids. Preston was the class monitor for the orchestra section and a decent Celloist, while Samantha was the first chair trumpet and head of the brass section.

Jeffrey was just a nobody eating his lunch quietly.

Quickly finishing his lunch he whispered to the two of them that they had an interview with Mrs. Shelley Benoit. The teacher advisor for journalism and their deputy editor, Liam Carson.

"Hey guys, a teacher asked me that they wanted to meet with us about this science project of ours. They've got something set up for us in the broadcast room", Jeffrey told them.

Preston grabbed his bag, while Samantha asked back.

"What do you mean we're meeting in the broadcast room? What's going on Jeffrey?", Samantha was a little concerned that she wasn't fully prepared.

"Don't worry so much Samantha", Preston stepped in.

"If anything goes wrong we blame Jeffrey here", Preston started heading off first.

"Hey what do you mean by that Preston?", Jeffrey ran to catch up. However Preston's long strides naturally made him walk faster.

Samantha had no objections to the suggestion and the three of them marched to the broadcast room.

Arriving at the red door, Jeffrey tried the handle.

"It's locked", he informed his friends.

Samantha and Preston tried the door handle as well. It wouldn't move whether they pulled on it or pushed it.

Samantha tried knocking on the door a few times.

*Knock* *Knock* *Knock*

There was no response. After a brief moment the door creaked open and the journalism advisor waved them to come inside.

"Hello there", Mrs. Benoit said with a smile.

"Thanks for taking the time to come meet with me. We're really curious on what you guys have been working on", Mrs. Benoit had them sit down on a few plastic school chairs.

Sitting in the room were a few writers including Liam. Jeffrey felt like he had stepped into the lions den. Their pencils were like menacing claws ready to strike onto the empty college-ruled lined paper.

"So we're just doing a quick interview and article to prepare for a recording next week. Is that ok with you guys?", Mrs. Benoit asked for their permission.

Samantha looked at Preston and Jeffrey slowly figuring out who was going to be the leader and take the initiative to respond.

Preston and Jeffrey stared at each other and communicated silently. Samantha stared at them to make a decision. In the staring contest, Jeffrey clearly lost and spoke up.

"Yeah, next week is fine. Is there anything special we'd have to do?", Jeffrey asked.

Liam stepped in, "All we need would be for you guys to sign a few forms saying that you guys don't mind being broadcasted on the school news. We're just going to ask you three a few questions and that's it."

"That sounds good", Samantha commented.

Preston had pulled out his own notebook blending into the background.

For a brief moment Jeffrey thought he was going to counter the tense atmosphere by pretending to face off against the other writers in the room. Jeffrey soon realized that Preston had perfectly blended in making friends with the other journalism club members and making offers about their Art slime and Tanoshi Oobleck.

Jeffrey and Samantha were own their own to figure out how to deal with the fame and notoriety of their science project.

Samantha was busy answering questions while Jeffrey was lost in thought.

"So how long have you guys been working on this project?", Miley the reporter asked Samantha.

"Well actually, Jeffrey asked me and Preston to work on it together 2 weeks ago. So we've been running various tests and measurements these past couple weekends", Samantha responded.

"Oh that's cool", Jeffrey heard Miley comment.

"So Jeffrey did you come up with this idea?", Miley asked him while writing various notes and questions.

Jeffrey a little uncomfortable squeezed out a few sentences, "I guess you can say that, but Samantha and Preston have really been the ones pushing for our projects success. Without them, it wouldn't nearly be as thorough or as popular as it is right now"

Meanwhile Preston was being grilled, albeit in a much gentler manner by some of the other journalists.

"Do you have any fun stories to tell about your experience on this project?", they asked Preston.

Preston with the grace of having suffered numerous public performances, speeches, talent show recitals, and the wrath of an angered piano teacher said, "There's been quite a few unexpected moments of accomplishment when we were working on our project. There was one particular issue with trying to measure our liquids with metric units, but all we had was a pencil and a conversion table."

"Jeffrey, Samantha and I argued forever about what the correct number was until Jeffrey's little sister pulled out a Pyrex measuring cup. That was definitely an embarrassing but memorable moment", Preston concluded with a flourish of his hands.

Jeffrey looked at his friend with a hint of jealousy, he looked so comfortable talking to other people.

Although he also remembered the numerous times Preston told him about the butterflies in his stomach whenever he preformed, he always did so well under pressure.

Eventually they were taken outside behind some bushes to record a video of their answers. They all took out their favorite jars of Oobleck and Slime. Jeffrey made sure to showcase the Slime Factory logo clearly to the camera.

The school interview ended up quite well and Jeffrey was looking forward to the free advertising. The one thing Jeffrey did notice though was that they were pointing at something on the screen and laughed for a moment.

When Jeffrey went over to take a peak, he saw it as well. He was definitely going to tell his friend Preston on Thursday so that he wouldn't forget it.

Preston's hands had a bright white glow when he was holding the jar of dark red Oobleck.