SMOKE SIGNALS     /     OUTERBANKS
ੈ✩‧₊˚ written by catie . . . © vqnillascented
chapter five  ━━
' call me a bitch again, i dare you. '

THE SURPRISE THAT Alex felt when she saw Rafe's name light up on her phone screen was indescribable. She hadn't seen him since the night of the party, or since their "mistake" that felt so right.

She hid the screen from her sister's view so she could read his text in peace. The two sisters were sitting on the couch, watching a rerun of one of Jenna's favorite movies.

Alex should've known better than to simply turn the phone away, since Jenna was nothing short of the nosiest person she's ever met, and the younger girl was quick to climb on top of Alex, trying to get a glimpse of the message.

"Who's texting you?" She demanded, as if she had the right to know.

"Nobody!" Alex tried to shake her off, but her sister had a death grip. "Get off of me, you freak!"

"That's not very nice!" Jenna sang. "Wait until I tell mom! Now lemme see!"

Alex erupted to her feet, causing Jenna to fall back onto the cushions. "Oh my God, can't you just get your own life and stop being so obsessed with mine?"

Jenna fell quiet at this, looking hurt. Alex's annoyance allowed her to rush right out of the room, having no regard for her sister's feelings. She didn't stop walking until she had reached her bedroom, then she finally collapsed onto her bed, holding up her phone to finally read the message.

Hey

She couldn't help but to groan. That was it? Her fingers flew acorss her keyboard as she typed out a response.

What's up?

The typing bubble floated on the screen for a moment, followed by, thankfully, a longer message this time.

Going to an outdoor movie tonight w friends. You down?

Alex chewed on her lip, fighting a smile. She thought for a second, looking up at the ceiling until a second notification sound brought her gaze back down to the screen.

Sarah won't be there.

See you then.

"RAFE, YOUR GIRLFRIEND is here." Kelce laughed loudly at himself, being the first one to spot Alex walking down the dirt path towards the projector and the screen.

"She's not my girlfriend, man. Shut up." Rafe snapped at his friend before plastering on a smile for Alex. "Hey, I'm glad you came."

"Yeah, this should be fun." She took her place beside him, sinking into a lawn chair that had been provided for her.

"Oh, shit." Something caught Rafe's eye and he climbed to his feet. "I gotta, uh, go talk to someone, I'll be right back."

"Okay." Alex shrugged, looking around until she met Topper's eyes. She remembered what Sarah had said ━━ about how she wasn't ready to sleep with him and he had gotten upset. Her eyes narrowed involuntarily as she stared at him, and eventually he became so uncomfortable under her gaze that he moved away.

She set her purse on the ground beside her and as she was sitting up straight once again, she locked eyes with Rafe, who was talking with a familiar face by the concession stand.

Kiara Carrera. Alex knew her very well ━━ too well, she might say.

A few years ago, Sarah had befriended Kiara one day at school, and at first, Alex was fine with it. She thought Kiara was cool, and all three girls had a lot in common. But then, one day, everything just shifted. Sarah and Kiara refused to talk to each other, and Alex was the mediator between them until she moved away. It was a weird time, and Alex felt herself growing uneasy that Rafe was talking with her now. What could he possibly have to say to her?

Finally, he returned to his friends, sitting back down beside Alex. She smiled half-heartedly at him before she voiced her concerns, "Why did you want to talk to Kie?"

He shrugged her off. "Doesn't matter."

Alex was just about to protest to this, tell him that it did matter ━━ it mattered to her, but the screen had already started to light up with the movie and the crowd was shushing any lingering conversations. So, she bit her tongue and sunk into her seat, trying to enjoy the film.

The movie wasn't even halfway done before Rafe was tapping her on the arm. She looked over at him only to catch a devious smile on his face.

"We're gonna go to the bathroom." He told her, just before he and all his friends started to move away from their seats.

"All of you?" Alex questioned. She didn't get a response, and she resorted to shaking her head at the ground, just thinking that they were being ridiculous. But when she looked up again, she noticed that the boys were walking off in the opposite direction of the bathrooms.

Furrowing her brow, she got to her feet. The group disappeared behind the large screen, and she hurried after them. Rounding the corner of the canvas, Alex felt all of the air rush out of her lungs as she caught sight of the scene that was playing out behind the big screen.

There was a full blown fight going on, just out of sight of the crowd. Rafe, Topper and Kelce were swinging their fists into two other boys that were back there with them, each blow coming down harder than the last.

"What the hell?" Alex yelled, her voice grabbing the attention of Rafe. He stopped beating down on the boy, smiling at her like he was doing a good deed. "Alex," he panted. "Get out of here, you...you're not gonna wanna see this ━━ "

He was tackled to the ground by his counterpart, a blur of blonde hair flashing across Alex's vision. "JJ?" She called.

Of course, she didn't get a reply, but as the boys wrestled, she was able to confirm that it was, in fact, JJ ━━ and his friend from the night in the boneyard. Pope, she remembered his name was.

The punches were showing no signs of stopping, and Alex couldn't stop herself from intervening.

She ran over to Rafe, grabbing the back of his shirt collar and pulling down, briefly choking him. The momentum cause the tall boy to stumble to the ground, and Alex stood over him, giving JJ the chance to get away.

"What the hell?" Rafe clambered up onto his feet once again, rubbing his sore neck. "You little bi ━━ "

Alex cut him off with a harsh slap across his cheek. "Call me a bitch again, I dare you." She snarled, backing away from him slowly.

JJ whooped, overhearing her words. "Hey, Rafe!" He yelled. "How does it feel to get your ass kicked by ━━ "

He was cut off by Topper throwing a rough punch to his jaw. Alex sucked in a breath, wincing at how JJ's jaw crunched under the impact. She started to run over to stop the beating, but Rafe caught her arms and yanked her back, holding her in place.

"Let go of me!" Alex screamed and kicked, but Rafe had an iron grip on her wrists, surely leaving bruising in the sensitive skin. "You're psychotic!"

Rafe laughed loudly at her accusation. "You have no idea what you're talking about." He pulled her back in an especially rough tug. "They deserve it."

"Nobody deserve this!" Alex cried, swinging her leg back against Rafe's thigh. But even that wasn't enough to deterr him.

Suddenly, a blur of long, curly hair came around the corner, swinging her backpack down on Topper like it was a military grade weapon. "Let go of him, Topper, you fascist asshole!"

Alex watched, in awe, as Kiara continually slammed the bag against the boy that was three times her size. Eventually, however, Topper got a hold of the pack and threw it several feet away, leaving Kiara defenseless and JJ on the ground, weak from the beating.

Topper moved to Pope, getting him in a tight headlock, the Pogue grunted desperately as he gasped for air. "Just admit it!" He hissed, squeezing his forearm against Pope's throat impossibly tighter. "I know you did it, bitch!"

Kiara dropped to her knees, crawling acorss the grass until she reached the backpack. She stuck her hand inside, returning with a metel lighter. Her back was facing Kelce, who was rapidly approaching the defenseless girl.

Unable to sit back and watch any longer, Alex pushed against the ground with all her might, finally making Rafe stumble backwards. In his moment of weakness, Alex was able to slip out of his arms, ignoring how he desperately tried to keep a grip on her.

She sprinted across the grass until she was close enough to tackle Kelce from behind. The surprise attack stunned the larger boy and Alex was able to wrestle him to the ground.

This gave Kiara enough time to execute her plan. She army crawled her way to the large screen, pulling her fingers against the lighter until a small flame erupted from the top. Then, she held it against the canvas. The bottom of the screen went up in flames, grabbing the attention of the unassuming crowd. Screaming began to come from the other side as people began to run away from the danger.

Topper finally dropped his grip on Pope, staggering back as the reflection of the fire danced across his stunned face.

"Let's get out of here!" Rafe called to his friends, climbing up onto his feet. Getting his strength back, Kelce tossed Alex off of him, and she landed against the ground ━━ hard.

Seemingly unable to move, Topper hung back. He looked like he was horrified of what he had done. Rafe walked over to him, placing a firm hand on his shoulder, chuckling. "Holy shit, you almost killed him, man."

Alex let her head fall back against the cool grass as she listened to Rafe's manical laughter echo into the dark night. She felt the ground shift beside her and forced her tired eyes open to see Kiara peering down at her.

"Alex...?" She whispered, breathlessly. "Are you okay?"

The raven haired girl sat up quickly, motioning for Kiara to give her some space. "I'm fine." She coughed, her throat aching.

"Thanks for tackling Kelce." Kiara went on.

Alex forced herself the rest of the way to her feet. "Kie, I didn't do it for you."

Kiara leaned back, taken aback by Alex's words. She scoffed, pushing herself up to her feet roughly. "Fine. Whatever."

Hostility hung in the air even after they had parted. Kiara went over to check on JJ and Pope, and Alex watched Rafe, Topper and Kelce run off into the distance, unable to wipe the scowl off of her face. Her stomach churned, uncertainty rushing through her chest as everyone else disappeared into the night, leaving Alex alone in the cold grass, the only light sorce coming from the large fire.

ALEX HAD BEEN staring at her bedroom ceiling for over two hours now, thinking about the fight from earlier the entire time, but she still had no idea how she was supposed to feel.

On one hand, Rafe had physically put his hands on her, something that she knew she couldn't stand for. And all three of he and his friends had beaten up defenseless, unsuspecting boys.

On the other hand, Rafe had mentioned that they deserved it, and Alex was unsure if he was talking about that night at the boneyard or if they had done something else. JJ did have a gun pressed to the back of Topper's skull, which Alex was still teetering on whether that deserved a beating or not.

Suddenly, the sound of her window latch turning cut through the silence in her room, ad she sat bolt upright, her heart thumping loudy in her ears.

The glass pane slid up on its track, and Rafe's face came into view. Immediately, the same biting anger that she had felt earlier rushed back into her veins.

"Get the hell out, Rafe." She warned, holding out her palm to him.

He ignored her, instead climbing the rest of the way into her bedroom. He held his hands up in surrender, as if she had some kind of deadly weapon in her hands. Looking around the room, taking it all in, Rafe chuckled to himself.

"This is your room?" He asked, slowly lowering his arms. "It's cute."

"What do you want?" Alex didn't give him the satisfaction of a reaction, keeping her expression cold.

His playful smile fell. "I, uh, I came to tell you that I'm sorry." He said the words like a question, like they were things that he was unfamiliar with saying. "I didn't mean to...uh, to scare you or hurt you. You weren't supposed to see that."

Alex cross her arms, still glaring at him. "Well you weren't supposed to beat up unarmed pogues, Rafe."

Rafe scoffed, rolling his eyes up to the ceiling. "They held a gun to Topper's head, Alex. Did you forget that or something?"

"No," Alex furrowed her brow at his hostile tone. "How could I?"

"Exactly. How could you?" He nodded quickly. "And then...they sunk Topper's new boat."

"What?"

"Yeah, it sounds crazy, right?" Rafe scoffed again. "But they did, Alex. The pulled the damn drain plug right out. And where's Topper's new, expensive boat now, huh? At the bottom of the marsh, that's where. His mom is pissed, thinks he did it on accident cause he's stupid or something."

Rafe shook his head, scowling. He started to step closer to Alex's bed, and at this point, she was so confused that she didn't protest to the movement. "These goddamn Pogues, Alex. Their lives suck so they have to ruin ours. They love to ruin everything."

"I'm sorry about Topper's boat." Was all that Alex could think to say, acutely aware of how close the handsome boy was getting to her now. Rafe took a seat on her mattress, only inches away from her now. "And I'm sorry that I slapped you, it was unnecessary."

Rafe shook his head. "Nah, I liked it."

"You liked it?" Alex stifled a laugh. "What are you talking about?"

He only nodded, inching closer to her. "And the way that you snapped at me...man, you look so good when you're angry."

"Do I?" Alex felt her body shifted, letting Rafe move in impossibly closer to her side, their faces mere inches apart.

"Mhmm." He replied only with a hum before pressing his lips against hers, feeling the way that she opened her mouth slightly, giving him full access. Alex let him push her down onto the bed, her head now resting on her pillows. She broke the kiss, staring up at him through her lashes, her fingers clinging to the bottom hem of his shirt.

Rafe let out a shaky breath. "Let's get yours off first, yeah?" Alex nodded, and he began to work on the buttons of her blouse.

catie speaks!

hello my loves!! thanks so much for reading, i hope you enjoyed the chapter! sorry that it was a bit longer than usual.

make sure you follow me to be notified when i update. votes & comments are also highly appreciated! i have a tiktok which is the same user as here, i post edits and teasers for my fics, including this one. i would love if you'd check that out too 🫶

virtual hugs,
catie !