Free The North Pole Challenge (Flea's Five Christmases, #1) by Kevin George Page A

same.”
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    CHAPTER SEVEN
    Kidnapped!
     
    One more day of school remained before winter break but Miss Mabel refused to let Flea go, which was just fine with him. The weather had gotten worse overnight – the snow falling heavier, the wind blowing harder – so Miss Mabel decided they wouldn’t leave yet. Still, her paranoia had not eased the slightest bit. She didn’t even accept Flea’s offer to shovel the walkway, a task that he normally hated and avoided at all costs.
                  “It’s our turn to do it, though. The neighbors shoveled yesterday,” Flea said.
                  But Miss Mabel didn’t care, arguing that the neighbors would have to shovel every day once they left. As she scurried about packing up their few belongings, she continued to mutter that the weather would break soon and it couldn’t snow forever. However, one day of weather watching turned to two and two soon turned to three. Christmas Eve arrived and Flea had grown so bored with being stuck inside that he took every possible opportunity to peek out the curtains. Though the snow fell in sheets, Flea still thought he spotted several green-eyed snowmen staring in his direction, though he did not dare mention that to Miss Mabel.
                  “What did I tell you about keeping the curtains closed?” Miss Mabel yelled when she walked into the tiny living room. She hurried to shut them, overlapping the heavy fabric, ensuring that not a single beam of outside light invaded their apartment.
                  “Why are you so worried? There’s nothing out there but snow,” Flea said, conveniently leaving out the part about the strange snowmen.
                  “Snow is what I’m afraid of,” Miss Mabel said. “Now finish packing what’s on the table so we can escape when the snow stops.” Flea looked at the coffee table, which held nothing but their sad little Christmas tree, its pathetic branches bent. As if reading Flea’s mind, Miss Mabel added, “I’m sorry but we don’t have time for Christmas this year.”
                  “How will Santa know to come here if we don’t have a tree set up?” Flea asked.
                  Miss Mabel snorted. “You don’t have to worry about that .”
                  Still, Miss Mabel didn’t force the issue when Flea left the tree. After all, it was the last of their possessions left in the apartment that wasn’t packed in one of the boxes piled near the front door.
    When it became obvious that the snow wasn’t going to stop, Miss Mabel sent Flea to bed early in case they had to wake up and leave in the middle of the night. But once inside his room, Flea could not even think about going to sleep just yet, not if this would be the last night spent in this apartment. Besides, Christmas Eve was always the toughest night of the year for him to drift off to sleep. He cracked the heavy curtains in his bedroom and stared out at the white, nighttime world.
                  Now that he’d had several days to think about what happened with Mr. Strick and The Great Build-Off , Flea had cooled down to the point that he no longer hated his shop teacher. He never would’ve been able to fully trust Strick again but he had already forgiven and wished he could tell him so. But since he and Miss Mabel would soon be leaving, Flea knew his final interaction with his favorite teacher was the moment Strick had given him the strange ring.
                  The ring, Flea thought, I totally forgot about the ring .
                  The last few days, he’d been so busy packing, bickering with Miss Mabel and being bored that he hadn’t given his ‘parting gift’ a second thought. He reached into his pocket and found the shiny ring still