𓅨
Packing It Up, written by mads.
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Act One, Chapter One.
( Dallas. )

INSTAGRAM

dailymikefaist

♥︎ ✎ ➚
689 likes — liked by freddiekruegerscousin
dailymikefaist: Mike in new interview for @wired alongside co-stars Joshua O'Connor and Zendaya!
TAGGED — mikefaist, zendaya

Load comments...

username1 I'm SCREAMING why does he look so good

username2 what do y'all know about my man mike faist

username3 boyfriend

username4 the smileee

username5 where did my pants go...

username6 rewatching this interview for the rest of my life

username7 never knew i needed to hear mike talk about panic again until this interview dropped
          | username8 omg yes!! i gasped
          | username11 and his little smile when talking about the cast?? he's so cute
          | username12 need a panic reunion rn
          | freddiekruegerscousin same
          | load more replies...

username8 challengers press tour never stop challenge

username9 show me zendaya bc i just know she looked so good
          | username11 check the username, babes. this is a mike fan page

username10 sigh i've missed my man manifesting he's never unemployed again

username11 mike come home the kids miss you

IMESSAGES

p.s. do not open
(   miss cowgirl — dallas
june bug — junia
edward scissorhands — clarissa
songbird — rachel )

edward scissorhands
Instagram.com/dailymikefaist_post_dkajle.
shglkisn

songbird
Why am I looking at a post of Michael

edward scissorhands
for the comments!!
@dallas
the people are calling for a panic reunion

june bug
"the people" and it's one instagram comment
with like twenty likes and four replies

edward scissorhands
and i'm volunteering to be their leader
@dallas @dallas @dallas

songbird
😭😭
How did this even come up on your feed??

edward scissorhands
it was on my spam
the mention about panic and all that probably
brought it up

miss cowgirl
Your obsession with that show is unhealthy,
my love

edward scissorhands
no, it's my obsession with you
keep up

june bug
no no no
nuh uh
i asked for her hand in marriage first
get in line

edward scissorhands
NOT FAIR
i was here before you

songbird
kids, let's not fight
besides, we're probably all losing to hammer
guy

miss cowgirl
I really wish you wouldn't call him that

june bug
tell him not to show up to the apartment
with a hammer when you asked if he had a
screwdriver then

edward scissorhands
that was so humbling for him
can't believe you went on to date him

june bug
kinda embarrassing...

songbird
Nia!

june bug
oops
finger slip

songbird
Right...

miss cowgirl
Hahaha it's okay, Rach
She's right, and we all know it
Besides, it doesn't actually matter much now
I broke it off with him last night

june bug
HALLELUJAH
YES MA'AM 🥳

edward scissorhands
EVERYBODY STOOD UP AND APPLAUDED

songbird
Not everyone!!!
Jesus, you two

miss cowgirl
💀💀💀
I mean damn I knew y'all didn't like him
but lord almighty

songbird
Dal ignore them
What happened?
Do you need me to come home?

edward scissorhands
yeah
we might not have been corey's biggest fans,
but that doesn't mean we don't understand it
might've been hard

songbird
Camden

edward scissorhands
come again?

songbird
His name was Camden.

june bug
PLEASE 😭
oh i'm cackling
dallas, we're on the way with ben and jerry's

miss cowgirl
That's okay!
I'm honestly not too torn up about it

june bug
oh we know
but it's an excuse for ice cream

songbird
I'll be home in 20

edward scissorhands
we'll be there in 10

          The sound of a key grating against a decades-old lock, its replacement an idea passed through the mind so many times it's because a speck of nothing with wear and tear, pulls Dallas' head away from her phone and toward the hallway.

Despite their words, her roommate still managed to beat their best friends.

"Thing 1 and Thing 2 aren't here yet," she calls down the hall, throwing her phone on the bed. It bounces once on impact before settling, the screen lighting up and displaying the same photo she's had as her Home Screen for the past four years. Halloween, five girls dressed up in Power Ranger costumes that did nothing to protect them from the chill of the night, but did everything to make them warm inside knowing they were one of a set. It's a good memory. "They probably got distracted in the ice cream aisle."

Sitting up and leaning against her headboard, she snags the pillow closest to her and settles it in her lap. It presses against her chest as she curls her legs in, and her fingers twiddle with the strings pulling at the hem.

In the distance, she can hear the telltale signs of Rachel dropping her bags on the hardwood floor of the entryway, every previous thought abandoned now that she's made it her mission to make sure Dallas is okay.

She's seen this before and knows the pattern a little too well.

In a moment, Rachel will walk in holding a DVD in one hand—an old rom-com that the four of them never get tired of watching, no matter how scratched and old the disc grows—and a baseball bat in the other. She'll ask,

"Movie or murder?"

The movie is How To Lose a Guy in Ten Days, the baseball bat is wooden instead of metal. Rachel's eyes are comforting, her mouth is set in a determined line.

You get your heart broken as many times as Dallas Hughes does, and you thank your lucky stars you have a best friend like Rachel Zegler to piece it back together.

"I broke up with him," Dallas laughs, shaking her head and patting the seat next to her. A bed big enough for two, and this is the closest it's ever gotten to filling that role.

The brunette sighs before clicking her tongue. The bat clatters as it drops to the floor, the stretch of silence filled with its slow creak down the hall. Moving toward the bed, she tosses the movie case before doing the same to herself. Landing with a grunt, she crawls to her place beside Dallas. "Movie it is."

She nods. "Movie it is."

Rachel sighs again, arms taking her roommate into their hold. Despite being smaller, she manages to make Dallas fold into her chest almost perfectly, head on hers and arms holding just a bit too tight.

"It's really okay," the newly-single actress tries to convince the other. "We all knew it wasn't going to last."

"No, we didn't." Rachel, bless her, almost actually sounds like she's telling the truth.

"Rach," the deadpan of Dallas' voice speaks volumes past the words that spill from her lips. "He brought a hammer over when I asked for a screwdriver."

Like a bottle that's been shaken and cursed to be nothing but fizzy upon cracking, the other girl delves into sudden and uncontrollable giggles as her body folds over her friends.

"Oh my God," she cackles, laughs breaking the words up and into something almost inaudible. "A hammer! Why did he bring a hammer?"

As her laughs continue on, her shoulders lift and the room becomes a shade lighter in that impossible way Rachel's happiness controls, the door hinges creak as they're thrown open, and the outside rushes in.

"Sorry, we're late!" Clarissa calls into all the empty spaces of the house, making sure to cover all her bases. "This one couldn't decide what kind of ice cream she wanted!"

Junia, the only person she could've been talking about, gasps like someone confessed to murder right in front of her eyes. Dallas didn't have to be in front of her to know her eyes were wide and her hand was over her heart. "Ris! You aren't supposed to rat me out! What happened to blaming traffic?"

Sent into another fit of giggles at the two's bickering through the entirety of the house, Rachel presses her laugh into the open expanse of Dallas' shoulder. The strawberry lip gloss she always wears swipes onto her skin, sure to grow tacky and stiff in the upcoming hours.

"So?" Nia asks as the missing pieces of their foursome flop down on the edge of the bed. The plastic bag filled with melting ice cream rattles before settling in the dip of the bed caused by Clarissa's hips. "What happened with Corey?"

"Camden," Rachel corrects, sigh heavy with the attitude of a mother of three she likes to pretend she isn't.

Clary waves a hand. "Camden, Corey, whatever the fuck his name was. What'd he do?"

Nothing. Everything.

Dallas only shrugs.

"It's more like what he wanted," she finally admits, after it's clear they aren't going to let it go. "And a little about what I wanted. I wanted him to romance me, buy me flowers and dinner. He wanted me to keep his bed warm and answer his nightly sexts."

"Ew, for fuck's sake."

"Jesus, men."

"We passed the bat in the hallway. Are you sure you don't want me to get it?"

Everyone turns to look at Nia as the question registers, and it's not until she cracks a smile that they dissolve into laughter. One by one, like falling dominoes, always stuck in each other's paths. The same way it's been since some divine thing brought all of them together in one room that fateful evening five years ago.

Dallas recovers first, cheeks pink and aching with overused muscles that had sat stagnant during a day of doom scrolling and thoughts rushing to form into words that spill past her mouth to become something tangible. "No, no. Honestly, I'm not cut up about it. I think I was only trying something with him to try it, you know? Felt like I had to be dating someone, that it had been too long since I had, and then here he was: this guy falling over his feet to give me a hammer. Or a screwdriver. Tomayto, tomahto."

"Okay. But, Dal," Clary leans forward, hand clasping on her knee and making sure her attention has been captured before continuing, "You know it doesn't have to be like that, right? You don't have to be in a romantic relationship to be fulfilled. You're so much more than that."

"I do." After a quick call to Bethany, her therapist last night right after breaking up with Camden and having a breakdown about it, she did know that. Or, was starting to get it. (If only she'd known Clarissa was going to say the exact same thing, she would've been saved the arm and a leg disguised as a bill she had to shell out.) "No, yeah. I think that's why I'm going to try to put a pause on dating for a little while.

"I think it's time," she continues, ignoring Nia's raised eyebrow. Well, mostly. She deserved the glare she got for that. "I've almost always been in a relationship, or trying for one, during my adult years. Maybe it's time I put that on the back burner, and just focus on myself for a little while."

"That sounds nice." Rachel smiles, leaning her head on Dallas' shoulder again. "And very mature. I'm proud of you, darling."

"Thank you." She nods happily, clapping her hands lightly. "I'm proud of me, too."

The others laugh gently, amused with her statement and giddy with the serotonin that came from being with each other. Dallas smiles fondly, thinking again just how lucky she is to know them. To have not one, but three souls who matched hers so beautifully. Wonders what she did in a past life to deserve that. Thanks that version of herself.

Reaching past Nia, whose eyes were on her and speaking volumes of agreement with thoughts she wasn't voicing, her fingers curl around the hard shell of the DVD case.

Presenting it to the three, she smiles smugly when Clarissa produces the bag of ice cream that has shifted to a spot behind her back.

"First to quote the movie buys breakfast tomorrow?"

"Oh!" Nia squeals, limbs flying and body propelling itself toward the doorway before her words have even caught up. "I'll get the wine!"

Authors Notes.

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𓅨      I want to preface this by saying what I forgot to in the opening, and that's that I don't know these people. Everything that's happening in this fic is a very loose interpretation of these people, and that's all. Please don't take this to heart <3

𓅨      I love making fake instagram accounts for celebrities because somehow someway I always choose the celebrities who don't have instagram accounts to make fics for

𓅨      Am I the one writing this? Yes. Do I know why it started to read like it was a Rachel x Dallas fic? No. But here we are! (With a poorly edited chapter [because I'm too excited to edit it] that I love to pieces)