DENOUEMENT
vi. house of cheats
❝BLACKMAIL MATERIAL, I PRESUME?❞

"AND, LAST, BUT not least, it must be completed in silence." Miss Andrews stated, writing those exact words in capitals on the whiteboard to prove an even further point, and making it even clearer as she sent a glare towards the three pranksters in the class, who were known to make a lot of noise whilst talking to one another.

Unfortunately, the class were faced with a French listening test and had headphones around their necks, about to begin the dreaded test that Sydney had not spent a single second to revise, despite her being grounded all weekend – she should have regretted that decision, but she really didn't.

Afterall, she'd take watching films with her best friends and throwing popcorn at them until the entire room was covered with it, over revising for a stupid test any day.

"Is everyone ready?" Miss Andrews questioned, but before she could start the test, Fabian and Nina quickly rushed into the class, arriving late to their lessons for some reason that was unknown - it was peculiar.

Fabian Rutter was never late for a lesson.

Luckily, the two had ran in just in time for the test (Sydney would have definitely skipped the entire lesson and not come to the test at all), although that didn't stop Miss Andrews from scolding them, "You're late."

A worried and apologetic look on their faces, the two shared a brief glance with one another, before looking back over at their teacher and apologising to her simultaneously, "Sorry."

"Get to your places. We're about to start." She instructed them, and the two hurriedly sat together and got ready for the test, covering their ears with the headphones, "Have you seen Patricia on your travels?"

Whilst getting ready for the test, the pair of them lifted their head up to look at their teacher and shook their head, answering their teacher with a small, "No."

"Right, she'll be getting an 'F' then." Mrs Andrews stated, and that was also quite odd - not as odd as Fabian being late, but also still odd - Patricia was a brat, but she never skipped class, "We'll start the test."

With that being said, Sydney pulled the headphones over her ears, and within seconds heard a sentence being said in the French language pressing play and the voice came through the headphones instantly, Sydney understanding some of it and clicking her pen, hastily marking the correct answer before the next sentence was spoken.

Fortunately enough for Sydney, as much as she hated school and all subjects within it, she was naturally smart and could easily pass her tests without revision, hence why she wasn't particularly worried about not studying for this test - she knew that she'd at least get a C, which was good enough for her.

"Uh, Miss?" Sydney heard Mick speak up, causing everyone to lift their eyes up to look at who had spoken, wondering what exactly he wanted, as everyone knew that it was against the rules to speak during a French listening test - it interrupted everyone; it was literally written on the board saying that the test had to be completed in silence.

What part of that couldn't Mick Campbell understand?

"Yes, the test's already started, Mick. Quiet, please." Miss Andrews told him, not even glancing up from her desk as she repeated the instruction that she had drilled into their heads numerous times at the beginning of the lesson.

"Yeah, I know, I'm sorry, but it's just... I didn't catch the last bit of the first question." Mick stammered out awkwardly – as said previously, the jock was not so good at many subjects within school with the exception of sports, and he particularly struggled in French, "Can you start it again please?"

At that, a few people snickered – notably, Jerome – but Mrs Andrews hardly payed attention to it, shaking her head as she told the boy, "You know the rules."

And with that, Sydney began to pay attention to her test once again, like most of the other students. However, her attention was soon diverted once again, as whilst she brushed her hair out of her face, her head lifted up and she noticed that a smirk was plastered on Jerome's lips, seeming rather devious, and that expression also matched the look in his eyes, which seemed to be paying particular attention to something. Thus, Sydney followed his eyeline and noticed that his eyes were locked on Mara's desk, more specifically, what she had on it – two tests, and she was writing on both.

Was she really cheating for Mick Campbell?

That was low.

However, the sound of French in her ears drew her out of her thoughts and made her glance back at her test paper, checking the boxes that she thought were correct and simply praying that they were – she didn't particularly want extra lessons or to be forced to do extra work to help get her grades up. She'd deal with whatever Mara was up to after the lesson, probably with the help of Jerome Clarke, knowing that he'd be rather intrigued with the situation and would most likely use it for something in his favour – for now, she had to use a little bit of focus in her French test, despite how bored it made her.

And it definitely did make her bored, and she'd zoned out numerous times within the test before realising that she did actually have to pay attention and listen to what was being said to pass, and thus, she was more than delighted when the test finally finished, the bell ringing throughout the room as Mrs Andrews stood up from her seat.

"Okay, time's up!"

At that, Sydney practically slammed her pen down onto the desk, taking the headphones away from her ears and placing them on the desk as well, before she leapt out of her seat and began to pack away her belongings. Sydney thought that her happiness and energy were at their peak at the end of a lesson, and this was evident as she now had a small smile on her lips and seemed like a big ball of energy. With this grin, she made her way over to Jerome's desk, giving Alfie a high-five as he left the room to who knows where, whilst she waited for the blonde-haired prankster to finish packing away his things, and it seemed like he was taking much longer than normal. Although, Sydney was well aware of why.

Mara Jaffray, who had been cheating for Mick Campbell the entire time, was still in the room.

The two blonde pranksters watched her like a hawk, noticing that she approached the pile of test papers at the front of the room once the jock she had cheated for left the room. Carefully, she glanced around before slipping both of the tests that she had completed into the pile, taking Mick's genuine test and throwing it into the bin on her way out of the room – a rookie mistake; anyone could pick it up – it was better to burn those things, or at least throw them in a bin far away from where you did the test.

However, Mara Jaffray did not burn it or throw it far away, and due to that error, she had managed to let the test that Mick Campbell did fall into the hands of the pranksters in Anubis House, who had large smirks creeping up onto their lips as they noticed her mistake.

Once the nerd had left the classroom, Jerome had finally finished packing up his belongings and pulled the strap of his bag over his shoulder, before the pair of pranksters approached the bin and took out the test that Mara had thrown into it – Mick Campbell's French test. Getting onto her tip toes, Sydney peered over her friend's shoulder to do a brief glance of the test, and her eyes widened upon seeing how much the jock got wrong; he really did not do good in any academic subjects.

"Blackmail material, I presume?" Sydney questioned the male, a smirk on her lips as she knew exactly what was running through his mind – afterall, they had been friends for ten years; she knew everything about him.

"You know it." Jerome responded, a similar smirk to Sydney's on his own lips as he put the test paper in his bag, slinging his arm around the blonde girl as they made their way out of the classroom – Sydney didn't exactly know where they were going, but she knew that they'd probably try to find Mara.

However, as the pair of pranksters left the classroom, they overheard Mick Campbell complaining about the test to his girlfriend, talking about how he flunked it and knew nothing – which, wasn't wrong; most, if not all, of his answers were wrong on his real test, but he apparently had some super smart guardian angel over his shoulder to protect him from failure for this test.

Loving to stir trouble, the two blondes approached the jock with knowing smirks on their lips, with Jerome placing his free hand on the shoulder of the jock's and telling him, "Wouldn't worry about it, mate. Something tells me you're going to do a little bit better than you think you will."

With that being said, and not leaving anytime for him to question it, Jerome and Sydney quickly left with chuckles leaving their lips, amused at how much power they held and the entire situation, and it seemed like that amusement wasn't going to stop anytime soon as they turned the corner of the hallway, about to continue on with their day like normal until they caught sight of Patricia and Mara, their arms wrapped around one another as they made their way down the corridor.

Weird – Patricia skipped the test, but now she was in the school.

However, they didn't particularly care much about why the goth skipped the test and cared a lot more about the cheater in the test and were about to confront her until Mara and Patricia went into the girl's bathroom – a place where Jerome Clarke couldn't go. Due to this, Sydney halted in her tracks, but the boy still continued to walk which made Sydney's eyebrow quirk up in confusion at him, eventually pulling him to a stop.

"What are you doing?" Sydney questioned him, not really understanding that he didn't exactly care about being in the girl's bathroom.

As if it was easy to figure out, a look of confusion was on his face, wondering why Sydney was being odd and had pulled him back, as he replied to the girl in a matter-of-fact tone, "Going to confront Mara."

"That's the girl's bathroom, you idiot." Sydney pointed out to him, although the boy shrugged and simply slid out of the girl's grip and went anyways, entering the girl's bathroom, causing the girl to look extremely confused as she watched him, becoming a stuttering mess as she tried to figure out what she had just witnessed, "I... What? I- Okay?"

Releasing a sigh, Sydney hastily jogged to the girl's bathroom, pushing open the door and seeing Jerome about to enter a stall, him noticing the girl's presence and motioning for the girl to get into a stall whilst pressing a finger to his lips. Following his demands (although, she made sure that she rolled her eyes and shook her head at him, to tell him that she did not approve of him being in the girl's bathroom), the girl entered the stall opposite of the one that he had entered, shutting the door behind her and tuning into the conversation that Mara and Patricia were having.

The pair of them were in the same stall – the one next to Jerome's – and the four of them were the only people in the toilets, and thus, considering that Mara and/or Patricia were not aware of the pranksters in the bathroom, they talked at a normal voice, allowing them to hear everything.

"Do you seriously think she's dead?" Mara's voice was heard, and Sydney's eyes widened in shock and horror at what conversation she had just tuned into, wondering who the heck was dead whilst her mind tried to taunt her.

She could taste something cold and metallic within her mouth – blood, of course – which grazed her teeth and soaked her tongue, tainting it. She could feel the aches and cracks in her bones, as it felt like her entire body was being crumbled and smashed into a tiny box which even contortionists wouldn't be able to fit into.

"'Joy's buried'? What else could that mean?" Patricia asked, snapping the girl out of her thoughts for a split second until she another memory flashed in her head, plaguing her with the sights she never wished to see.

Honestly, Sydney didn't know if her eyes were devoid of any life or if everyone could see the despair within them, the tears threatening to fall out of them as she stared at the coffins, hoping – no, praying – that a miracle would happen and they would both rise again and come back to the world – come back to her... but nothing happened. They were gone.

The girl found it crazy how things managed to turn upside down for her so quickly. She was in contact with them every day, whether she saw them through her screen or in person, but suddenly, they were gone – and when they went, a part of her went with them too.

"Buried in her work?" Mara suggested, her voice causing the blonde-haired girl to snap out of her thoughts, realising that her hands were pressing against her skull tightly as she tried to supress her own thoughts, her eyes stinging as tears threatened to spill.

Taking a deep breath, Sydney decided to focus more on the conversation to calm herself down, listening to Patricia dismissing the suggestion that had been made, "We're talking Joy, not you, Mara. I spoke to my mum and she said that Joy's parents have phoned her and told her they're taking her to some international school or something, and they didn't want me to get in touch. Why would they do that?"

At that, Sydney grew confused, considering that Joy Mercer had been declared not missing a few days ago when she had sent an email to Patricia which stated that she was fine, but now Patricia thought that she was dead – a rather shocking, and quite overdramatic, twist. Personally, Sydney thought that the purple-haired girl had been watching way too many murder mysteries recently and decided to turn her life into one by changing a simple event into something much more and blowing it out of proportion.

"Well, have you called the police?" Mara asked, being the sensible one out of the two of them – afterall, if Patricia thought that Joy was dead, then the authorities would have to get involved as this went far past teenagers.

"They're in on it! Everyone's in on it! I don't know what to do!" Patricia cried out, and the pain she felt was evident in her voice and it seemed as though she was on the tears, desperate for somebody to listen to her and help her, which became even more prominent as she said, "You do believe me, don't you?"

"Of course." Mara hesitantly replied, her tone as fake as ever – she was lying; she didn't believe her friend and thought that she was being dramatic – then again, Sydney didn't blame her, because so did she.

As Sydney heard their purple-haired friend let out an annoyed scoff, it was evident that she was about to leave the stall after being made aware that nobody believed her, and this assumption was proved to be heard true as the sound of the stall door was heard and her footsteps faded away. Upon hearing this, Sydney unlocked the cubicle door and stepped outside, seeing that Jerome had done the same thing, the pair of them stepping out from their hiding spot to see the nerd about to chase after her friend.

"Patricia!"

"Oh dear, Mara, losing friends left, right and centre, aren't you?" Jerome spoke up, announcing his and Sydney's presence to the nerd and causing her to spin around on her heel, shocked that somebody else (especially a boy) had been in the girls' toilets the entire time and had heard the entire conversation, and her face became even more shocked as he lifted up the test paper they had taken from the bin, "Although, I will give you ten out of ten for trying to win Mick round."

With a confused expression on her face, and also a mildly worried one at the mention of the jock, Mara attempted to divert the topic, questioning the male, "What are you even doing in the girls' toilets, creep?"

"Just for the record: I did not agree with this." Sydney stated, putting her hands up in the air as she defended herself and also sent a glare to the boy beside her as she did so, knowing that the situation looked incredibly wrong in many ways.

"Tell me," Jerome began, a smirk on his lips whilst Sydney moved her hands back down to her side, a similar smirk forming on her own lips as the boy continued, "What is the French for 'cheat'?"

"Tricher, I think – don't quote me on that though, I'm barely passing French." Sydney informed the boy, causing the pair of them to chuckle until Sydney turned back to face the nerd, who seemed rather flabbergasted, whilst the blonde-haired girl placed her hand on her hip and told the nerd, "You know, you made so many rookie mistakes there – next time, hide the tests better and then get rid of the real test away from the classroom; I mean, what if Mrs Andrews saw it in the bin?"

"You wouldn't say anything." Mara responded, glancing between the two with worry plastered across her face, although her statement caused the two blondes to laugh, wondering if Mara even knew the two pranksters.

Still chuckling, Jerome spoke up once again, "'Mrs Andrews, Mara cheated in the French test so she could steal Mick from Amber. Oh, and by the way, Victor, Mara and Patricia think that you killed Joy.'"

Realising that the two pranksters most definitely would not hesitate in saying something – especially Jerome – the girl released a large sigh before she nodded, "Okay, fine. What do you want?"

"I don't want anything." Sydney simply stated, which made a look of relief appear on Mara's face until the blonde-haired girl pointed towards the boy beside her, who had a large grin on his face, "Although, he does."

The grin still on his lips, the boy finally spoke up, "Very good answer."

And that's exactly how Jerome and Alfie got out of doing their chores that night, with the former having made an agreement with Mara that he would stay quiet if she did the chores for him (among other things, which he told her that he'd write a list for her to do). Due to this, Jerome and Alfie, instead of doing their chores, were wrestling on the floor, the pair of them letting out screams whilst Sydney sat on the sofa, watching them with an amused look on her face, as Mara cleaned up all the dishes.

Nobody had noticed anything thus far (people hardly kept track of the timetable anyways) – that was, until Fabian Rutter walked in, his face contorting into one of confusion as he noticed the nerd cleaning up the dishes, whilst the pranksters were screaming and messing around on the floor, "I thought Alfie and Jerome were on chores tonight."

"No, it's my night." Mara lied, glancing over at the trio of pranksters and noticing that Jerome and Sydney had their eyes on her, a smirk on both of their lips as she continued, "They're... busy, anyway."

At that, the boy's eyebrows furrowed as he glanced between the pranksters and Mara, before shaking his head and mumbling sarcastically, just before he went over to Nina, "Yeah, really busy."

"Sydney, help!" Alfie cried out from where he lay on the floor, causing the girl to glance down at the floor to see that Jerome had managed to get the boy in a headlock, and was presumably about to win the wrestling fight they had started.

Releasing a sigh, Sydney rolled her eyes as she stretched her leg forward and kicked Jerome's back (not harshly, but just with enough power for him to be moved), causing him to let go of their friend and fall to the ground, rolling onto a back whilst a chuckle escaped his lips.

As he lifted his eyes up to look at Sydney, the girl simply shrugged with an innocent look plastered on her lips, "Whoops?"

"Oh, you're in for it now, Anderson." Jerome declared, quickly pushing himself up from the ground and grabbing the girl, picking her up from off the back of the sofa and placing her entire body over his shoulder as they went over to the sofa (which Fabian and Nina had just moved from, having left the room).

"Jerome, put me down!"

"Okay." Jerome agreed, although his tone was filled with slyness, which made the female prankster aware that he most likely had a plan up his sleeve, which soon became apparent as he let the girl fall from his shoulder onto the sofa, and rushed over before she had the chance to escape and began to tickle her furiously.

"No! Jerome!" Sydney cried out, hysterically laughing as she kicked her feet around, using her arms to weakly try to push the boy away from her, although he was relentless and a lot stronger than her.

"This is what happens when you betray me, Anderson." Jerome told her with chuckles falling out of his lips, before he pulled away for a second and allowed the girl to catch her breath, and he became very much aware of all the eyes watching the pair, causing him to awkwardly cough, "Hope you learnt your lesson."

"Shut it." Sydney mumbled, playfully slapping the boy's arm as she sat up on the sofa, shaking her head at him before she patted the space next to her, motioning for the boy to sit next to her, which he soon did and allowed Sydney to rest her head on his shoulders.

After a few seconds of silence, Jerome leaned forward in the chair and spoke up, his eyes on Patricia Williamson, who was on the sofa opposite them, "I heard about Joy."

"What have you heard?" Patricia questioned, an irritated expression on her face as she lifted her glance to see the prankster, who Sydney noticed had already began to act, seeming glum.

"Friend of mine died-."

The world stopped flickering its figurative light switch.

"-but his ghost lives on."

The blinding white light slowly turned into bitter darkness as a blanket of darkness took over her vision.

"Oh yeah, right, I've seen that episode of Haunted High Schools too." Patricia scoffed, her words snapping the female prankster out of her thoughts as she took a deep breath, trying to compose herself, which thankfully, Jerome didn't notice as he let out a chuckle at the purple-haired girl's words.

"All I'm saying is, you need to get in contact with Joy – I can help you, unless you're too scared." Jerome informed the girl, adding a little challenge at the end which both of them knew would encourage the girl to participate – afterall, Patricia didn't want to show that she was scared of anything and that she could take on any challenge anybody threw at her – that was the reputation that she had built up during her entire time at the school, and she was not going to let Jerome Clarke, of all people, ruin that.

"I can't believe I'm about to say this, but..." Patricia began, causing the boy to gain a grin on his lips as he leant further forward, intrigued, "...tell me more, Jerome."

"Come to my room, midnight – all will become clear."

And thus, Sydney spent all night in Jerome and Alfie's room, watching a movie with the pair of them until it was half an hour before midnight, and Jerome stated that they had to set everything up before Patricia arrived. Sydney, not exactly being fond of the idea of messing with the dead, remained on his bed, laying back on it as she went on her phone.

However, as she heard Alfie mumbling under her breath, she glanced up and noticed that he had a cape around him and was waving his hand around a glowing magic ball, seeming to be getting in character, and the girl had to supress her laugh as she subtly lifted her phone up, taking a small five-second video of the boy before a knock was heard at the door – Patricia.

"She's going to leave as soon as she sees this." Sydney mumbled, causing Jerome to shake his head at her before he sat up from his seat, going towards the door and opening it to reveal the purple-haired girl, motioning for her to enter.

Hesitantly and slowly, the girl entered the room – however, as soon as she saw Alfie and what he was doing, she quickly spun on her heel and went to leave the room, only to be blocked by Jerome.

"Told you she'd leave." Sydney spoke up, shaking her head at the ridiculous idea – she thought it was dumb to encourage Patricia's stupid theory of Joy being dead, or to mess with the dead at all.

Nodding at what the prankster had said, Patricia went to step around Jerome to leave the room, but he blocked her once again, telling the girl, "Wait, it won't work if you don't believe."

"Yeah, well, the goth-vamp look is a bit last year." Patricia replied, glancing over at Alfie, and more specifically, the cape that he was wearing – it was overdramatic, but when was the boy ever a fan of being subtle?

"You think Joy's dead, yeah?" Jerome asked, causing the purple-haired girl to turn to face him once more as he motioned towards the table they had set up with the magical ball, "Well, there's one way to find out."

It took a few moments of hesitance, but then the goth girl slowly lowered herself into the chair – a surprise to Sydney, who Jerome also motioned to join them around the table.

Of course, she did. With a huff, she stood up from Jerome's bed and sat next to the boy, resting her head on his shoulder as she hardly paid attention to what was being said, considering that she didn't exactly agree with what they were doing – she would have much rather them to continue watching movies, but instead they were messing with the one thing that she never wanted to hear about – the dead. That's exactly why she zoned out, until Patricia shot up out of her chair, a look of annoyance on her face.

"Oh, this is ridiculous! I'm leaving!"

"Wait! Alright, alright, relax." Jerome instructed her, causing her to glance over at him and the blonde beside him, before sitting back down in her chair whilst the prankster turned to his friend, asking, "Alfonzo, what about Joy? Joy, can you hear us?"

Suddenly, Alfie straightened up in his chair, his eyes wide and his mouth ajar before he faked a high-pitched voice, acting as though Joy had possessed his body as he said, "Patricia? I didn't want you to call me, Patricia. Why couldn't you just leave me alone?"

Suddenly, a screech was heard from above them, causing the four of them to leap up from their seats with their eyes wide, clouding over with fright as Sydney found herself backed into Jerome, who placed a comforting hand on her shoulder as his eyes darted around his room. However, Sydney's simply remained wide, glazing over with tears.

The sound of pained and agonised screeches coming from those whom she loved with a mix of her own thrown in there, although she couldn't really distinguish them properly.

"What was that?!" Patricia questioned, her voice causing the memory to quickly fade from Sydney's vision as she hastily wiped the tear away from her eye before anyone noticed that she was on the verge of tears, and she somehow managed to back herself into Jerome more, his presence being comforting.

Abruptly, the screeches came to a halt, as though they'd been cut off.

After a few seconds of silence, the four people in the room began to look around at one another, with the two boys sharing a glance before they began to laugh among themselves, figuring that the screech had just been someone from another room or something outside and that it worked perfectly in their favour.

"Well, I think we've pestered Joy enough for one night." Jerome declared, a grin on his lips whilst he took his hand away from Sydney's shoulders and stretched his hands above his head.

"Yeah, she did always get grouchy after ten." Alfie agreed with the boy, his statement causing Jerome to let out another chuckle whilst Patricia shook her head at the two boys.

"Stop talking about her like she's-!" Patricia cried out but eventually cut herself off as she didn't want to admit that her best friend could be dead, and as she did that, Sydney's eyes fell to the floor, glazed over with sadness, "Good night, weasels. Sydney, are you coming to bed?"

"No, I'm sleeping here - it's too much hassle to sneak past Victor." Sydney informed the girl with a very faint smile, which was true – despite how good the girl was at sneaking past their housekeeper, she didn't like to do it a lot and, if she could, she avoided it – although, the main reason she wanted to stay in the room was because of Alfie and Jerome.

The purple-haired girl sent a nod towards Sydney, before she left the room to sneak back to her bedroom. As soon as the door closed, the two boys burst out into laughter once more, whilst Sydney rolled her eyes and went over to Jerome's bed, getting into it and making sure she left enough space for him to fit.

Soon enough, and just as she was about to fall asleep, she felt the bed sink down behind her as the boy slipped in under the covers, lazily putting an arm around Sydney's waist, like normal, and then the girl's eyes closed, falling into a peaceful sleep.

Despite the craziness that had occurred, she was not plagued with nightmares that night.

However, it seemed as though the craziness followed her into the next day – which, in fairness, made school a lot more entertaining. Whilst the trio stood in their small group, awaiting for their drama teacher to arrive and making small jokes, Patricia Williamson made her way up to them, a look of worry on her face as she tapped Sydney's arm, causing them all to turn to her in confusion.

"Did you figure out what that scream was?" Patricia questioned, causing the blonde to shake her head – in all honesty, she figured that it was probably just an animal outside or something; there were a few woods nearby the school, so it wasn't an unlikely theory, "I couldn't sleep. What if we've woken some sort of evil spirit?"

"Yeah, and what if it comes and possesses you in the night?" Jerome questioned overdramatically, causing Sydney to chuckle at him as she shook her head – it was funny, but clearly Patricia was scared, so she wanted him to stop encouraging it.

"Okay, as far out as this may be, Trixie, I was making it up." Alfie informed her, clearly having the same idea as Sydney – they loved pranks, but they didn't want anybody to be hurt over them or to lose sleep over it.

"Uh, I know, your acting stinks." Patricia told him in a matter-of-fact tone, rolling her eyes as Alfie's face deflated at the insult – he believed that his acting was amazing, hence why he always volunteered in drama class due to his confidence in it, "But you didn't make up that screeching noise, did you?"

However, before anybody could respond to her, their teacher made an appearance and called out to the four, telling them to go into pairs. Of course, Sydney and Jerome stayed attached to the hip, whilst Patricia grabbed Alfie and forced him to stay with her.

Glancing around, Sydney took notice of who was with who from Anubis House. Nina and Amber were together, which wasn't a surprise considering that they were now roommates, and they seemed to be getting along a lot better than Nina and Patricia ever did. Mick and Fabian were also paired together – also, not a surprise, as the pair were best friends and roommates, despite their differences in hobbies. That left Mara, who seemed to be paired up with some guy from Hathor House – poor girl.

"Three little words: I love you." Mr Winkler stated, causing the blonde-haired girl to glance over at their teacher with a weird and confused look plastered upon her face, wondering where this was going, "See, it's not what you say, it's how you say it. In your pairs, I want you to tell a story, but you can only do it having a conversation using those three words: I love you, okay?"

"Oh, yeah." Jerome started, pulling out a list and offering it to the girl, making her eyebrow quirk with suspicion but taking it anyways, "Tell your roommate Cinderella to get her scrubbing brush out. I've done her a little chore list... come to think of it, it's not that little."

"I can tell." Sydney mumbled, taking a glance over the list; she had seen him writing it that morning, but she thought that it was late-minute homework – turns out, she was very much wrong, and some of the chores on the list were plain disgusting, causing her to wince before glancing up at Jerome, "This is terrible."

"Did you want me to make it worse?" Jerome questioned sarcastically, knowing exactly what the girl meant and thus earning him a small glare from her, making him chuckle as a grin appeared on his lips, folding the list up into her hand so she'd definitely take it as he said, "I love you."

"I love you." Sydney responded for the acting exercise, although she made sure that she rolled her eyes whilst she put the list into her pocket, making a mental note to give it to her roommate once the lesson had finished.

"Sydney and Jerome," Mr Winkler started, having come around to the pair of blonde pranksters to check on their performance, "Great acting, yeah. You can almost feel how irritated you are, Sydney, but also how both of you are in love. Keep it up!"

With that, the teacher made his way around to some other pairs, whilst Sydney chuckled, turning back to face her partner with an amused look on her face, "Well, looks like we're in love, Clarke."

"I mean, I don't blame you. How couldn't you fall for a guy like me?" Jerome questioned sarcastically, brushing his fingers through his hair in a "sexy" manner, as he would have described it, whilst Sydney gave him a look, raising both of her eyebrows up at him.

With a shake of her head and a very faint laugh falling through her lips, the girl playfully slapped his arm as she told him, "I think the narcissism is a part of it."

"I think I preferred it when you said that you love me." Jerome said flatly, before the pair burst out into laughter at one another, with Sydney about to say something until she was interrupted by a cry.

"Did anyone see that?" Patricia shouted out frantically, her eyes darting between the window and the rest of the classroom as everyone snapped their heads towards her, confusion on their features as they wondered what she was talking about and why she seemed so scared.

"What?"

Seeing that she kept looking out of the window, all of the class eventually made their way over there to glance outside, but they only saw the trees and nothing out of the ordinary whilst Patricia continued, attempting to convince them, "That man, he was staring at me! I saw him, I did!"

However, considering that there was nothing there, nobody believed her and thus dispersed, moving away from the window and back to their previous positions. However, Sydney briefly tore away from the group, moving towards Mara and subtly passing her the list, nodding towards the man who had written it for her and causing the nerd to let out a sigh, before Sydney returned back next to the prankster, resuming the rest of their drama lesson.

Despite that, it seemed as though whatever Patricia had seen in the drama class had been ingrained in her mind, taunting her even whilst she slept – Sydney knew what that was like.

That night, the three girls were tucked away in their own bed, with only one of them peacefully sleeping. Mara's night was pleasant, and she was the only girl who remained still in her bed. Patricia and Sydney were both plagued with nightmares, tossing and turning in their sleep until Patricia eventually shot up, her screech piercing the air and causing Mara and Sydney to both shoot up themselves, the screech having awoken them and their wide eyes now glancing over to the purple-haired roommate.

"Can you see him?!"

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[03.05.2020]

NOTE: the update schedule for this is that one chapter will be posted every monday, wednesday, friday, and sunday (this could change at a later date, obviously, but i don't intend on it changing).

anyways, i love jerome and syd