CHAPTER FOUR

On Tuesday, Rain ditches the leather for the sake of her body heat and heads off to her Grammar class, taught by Belle. It was strange to be surrounded by the 'heroes' Rain had heard so much about growing up, and quite frankly she was a bit intimidated.


She feels worse when she sees who runs the photography club - 'Ethan Fitzherbert'. Fairy Godmother had signed everyone up for at least one extracurricular activity, and so Rain had decided on Photography and Gymnastics, both run by previous Auradon prep students.


The Photography classroom is impressive, it's light and airy with frames covering the rooms, and a door leading to the darkroom. Ethan Fitzherbert is tall and in shape, and Rain finds him leaning against a desk casually, students scattered around.


All eyes are instantly on her and whispers fill the room when Rain takes a seat near the back of the class, Ethan raises an eyebrow but doesn't say much before drawing the attention back to him. As he starts to explain the day's activities, Rain gets out her sketchbook and starts drawing the Isle, starting with her tower.


Time passes much quicker than she thought because one minute Ethan is describing different camera shots and setting them their monthly assignment, the next, the rest of the class has left and she's stuck trying to quickly pack up her things.


"Hey," Ethan walks up to her "Gabrielle right?"


"Um yeah," Rain packs away her pencil case "Rain actually,"


"God sorry," he smiles "Ruby told me that,"


"Oh?" It takes Rain a second to understand "Oh, of course, you're Ruby's older brother...should have guessed I'd be a popular topic at family dinners," she mutters


"Hey," Ethan looks sympathetic "She just wanted to make sure you were comfortable," Rain gulps and swings her backpack over her shoulder, looking up at Ethan.


"I know...I'm just...not used to that," Ethan bites his lip, clearly holding back something.


"Look...I know it must be weird, rooming with Ruby and having me in photography, but mum just wanted me to make sure you were okay, she uh," he curses under his breath and Rain raises an eyebrow "She doesn't talk about her childhood but from what she's shared - I uh, I can't imagine yours was much better,"


"Oh," Rain has to look away, Rapunzel, the woman her mother tormented and stole, cared about her, made sure her children looked out for her...she understood her. Rain gulps again and blinks quickly "Thank you, uh, tell her I said thank you," then she's gone, rushing out of the room before he can see the tear running down her cheek. She didn't cry, at least not in front of others.


What was wrong with her? Rain rapidly rubs at her cheeks and storms along the hallway, what would her mother say? Why was she worrying about her when she was locked on an Island? It'd be okay, she had art next, and she could ignore everything Ethan said, she liked art.


She hated art. Ms Ducking was from Corona and was clearly a royal...enthusiast. Her classroom was filled to the brim with art, varying in style and size, but behind her desk, was where her art was, large drawings of Rapunzel were everywhere, and watercolours of the Corona crown jewels hung on the wall. There were even baby photos (of who? Ethan? Ruby?).


This woman was obviously insane, and she'd sat Rain right in front of her desk, always keeping her eyes on her.


"Let's all welcome our new student shall we?" Ms Duckling gestures to her chair "Rain Gothel, from the Isle," Rain awkwardly waves behind her "Today we'll just start with some watercolours,"

Half an hour later, Rain's hair is pinned up and she's in the zone, paintbrush in hand as she adds detail to the flowers on her page.

"Watercolours can be tricky, you may not -" Ms Duckling walks over but stops talking when she sees Rain's page "Oh wow," she practically shoes Rain away to look "This is really good Rain, I didn't expect this"


"Uh, thanks?"


"No like really good," The woman inspects the paper and then looks up at her walls "Huh,"Rain doesn't even want to ask, she just packs up her things and leaves her painting in the classroom to dry before going to the Gymnasium. Whoever Joanna Porter was, she'd better run a club better than Ms Ducking teaches.


Joanna introduced herself as 'Tilly' and explained that she was in university, and was teaching this club to get some extra credit. She was evidently talented at gymnastics and had asked Rain to show her what she could already do.


"I uh- I don't really know?" Tilly looks confused "I was kinda forced to sign up for something, so I chose this and photography,"


"Oh, my boyfriend runs that one!" she says excitedly "He didn't get too nerdy, right?"Rain smiles "No, he was actually really nice. Anyway, on the Isle, I live in a tower - shocking I know," Tilly grins "And I just sort of slide down the side of the wall on a rope, and it's quicker to get across the island when you're on rooftops?"


"I think you're gonna be better at this than you think,"


She was. After getting changed and doing some stretches, Rain was finding the tasks Tilly was setting for the class relatively easy, and it was nice to get her limbs active again, at the end of the session, Tilly gives her a proud smile before Rain heads to the locker room.


Rain's free period happened to collide with Tourney tryouts, so she heads to the sports field and sees Ben give Jay a little pep talk before the whistle is blown. Jay starts running and just pushes everyone out of the way, his teammates included, every cheerleader is cheering bar Audrey so Rain starts not so enthusiastically joining in.


"Go, Jay!" He waves at her as he practically tramples Carlos and scores a goal.


As he dances, the whole sports field watches him, the Coach whistles "You! Get over here!" the cheerleaders keep going and Rain smirks as Audrey glares "What do you call that?!" Rain bites her lip expecting Jay to get screamed at "I call that raw talent. Come and find me later, I'll show you something you haven't seen before, it's called a rule book," Coach laughs "Welcome to the ream son!" he turns to Carlos "You ever thought about band?" Jay laughs


Ben speaks up "I'll work with him, Coach,"

"Alright, let's run that again!"


Rain watches Ben walk back to the pitch with Carlos, she catches him watching her and winks, turning to go back to her dorm to shower. Before that though, she sees Audrey glare at her, so she winks as her as well, entering the school building again.

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