I. 1.01 MOTHER - CHILD REUNION 1 / GIRL MEETS BOY
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Childhood can be akin to metamorphosis. Larva is the shielding binding of innocence. A cocooned protection that comes equipped with fears of the boogie man, leaving cookies out on the mantle on the eve before Christmas Day for Santa. Sitting curbside with chalk dusted fingers from homemade hopscotch rectangles rigidly etched onto asphalt. You're a small speck with an even smaller outlook at what life has to offer yet. A catipilar. 

Then the tweens years intrude and larva transforms to a messy arbitrary euphoric experience depending on the individual. New emotions, new prospects, new hardships...and a new boyfriend?

Emma swooned at the computer screen in-front of her with full admiration. She had been for the last 15 minutes from the moment a new message alert had popped across it boldly. Jordan was the culprit. A boy who was into all things wildlife conservation and saving the world from meeting the disastrous effects of pollution. A hiker, An animal love who resided in Yellowknife and apparently seemed to know Emma inside and out, right down to her favourite show on the Discovery Channel that she'd never told him about.

She'd called Jordan her soulmate at one point, and Arlee had let out the biggest heaving guffaw of her life till the expression on
Emma's  face hadn't changed. Truth be told, Arlee herself didn't really know all that much about what internet friendships entailed.

Her only knowledge, just like all the other things she had no idea about, stemmed mainly from what television had depicted. And according to the one episode of 'Smart Guy' she'd watched during a Disney Channel repeat, people who wanted to be your friend on the internet usually had sinister basements and made weird video games using choppy graphics and a surfboard.

Of course, this was reality. And Jordan didn't live in some basement hardwiring an 'ultra rare' video game that could only be tested be kids specifically. Or at least, she assumed so. There was no telling who was really behind the other side of that MSN wall.

"Read it again, Manny." Emma's voice fell in a lapse of mistiness, her head tilting and chin falling into the crook of her palm. She was one longing sigh away from snatching the keyboard and writing him a proposal for his hand in internet marriage.

Manny, for more than many appropriate reasons, groaned under her breath at the repeated request playfully. "Again? I've read it six times. Make Arlee do it."

"She's busy." mused Emma sardonically. Both girls promptly then turned in their chairs at the silence coming from Arlee's end on Emma's bed. Her head was buried in her newest camcorder, a Sony DCR-DVD with 16x zoom, and for one thing——she wasn't all that ready to fully engross herself in the mini swooning session that was currently ensuing at the computer bay.

The camera had been a gift from her Aunt. Bought from expense from her factory job, and taken away a day after by her father. She got it back eventually, but not without a stack of rules and regulations that she'd been swiftly told to abide by.

1. Don't waste the battery on things it shouldn't be wasted on
2. Handle it with care
3. Don't let JT anywhere near it.

Manny perched her elbow on top of the spine of her chair. "You've been trying to fix that camera all day, I'm sure it's okay now."

Arlee drew the camera away from her prepherial, then pointed it straight in the direction of Manny and Emma. Blur ensuing instantly. "The zoom's still weird."

Emma's impatience drew warily thin. Each minute meant another not being able to recount the saccharine words Jordan had sent her over email. "Please Manny, just one more time."

"Okay, okay, think I've fixed it now." That was a bold faced lie. The only thing Arlee had really done was temporarily stop the flashing red warning sign from continuously blinking on the bottom reader. She dropped her camera onto Emma's cluttered dresser drawer and rolled herself off of her bed, pulling up a spare chair and plucking herself inbetween both of her best friends. She cleared her throat for dramatic effect, and stalled for a bit just to push Emma's buttons. Luckily, she wasn't prone to blowing fuses.....yet. "Emma, you saved my heart and my project. If we protect the wildlife refuge I'll owe it all to you. Love you, Jordan."

Emma melted on the spot. Her cheeks turned to an opaque flush of bisque pink, an effect of her emotions, as well as  the blistering rays that were seeping through her navel orange curtains. Arlee had seen Emma gain crushes before. On a random generic boy in the grade below them last year. On Jett Jackson from the Famous Jett Jackson. But Jordan? He was in his own league. "Did you hear that? Love...Love me. He loves me."

Arlee still had a sliver of doubt. She'd seen his grainy icon picture. He seemed reasonable and friendly. Decked out in a puka shell, with slicked fawn hair, pearly whites. She couldn't blame Emma for falling head over heels, he was her type and more. Or at least, everything that a 12-year old with little providence of the real world would yearn to find in their first boyfriend. A topic that she for sure was not one to talk to anyone about. "Did he say how old he is?"

"A year older." Emma confirmed, the uncertainty in that answer was less then palpable.

"Which means he's also a year wiser." Manny further added in a stand of solidarity.

Emma took a hold of the mouse. "Let me see his picture again, he gets cuter every time."

"Doubt that's possible." Arlee leaned aback on her chair. She still didn't really get what the big deal was. But Jordan meant 'something' to Emma, so for her sake, she bit her tongue about any doubt and decided to cordially join in with her riveting rambles about how much of an amazing human being Jordan was. 13 years old, fighter of endangered species and captor or Emma Nelson's heart.

The crinkling of paper made Emma flit her eyes over to the source of the noise. When she realised that it was Manny absentmindedly  folding the corners of a magazine that had been on the desk, she took it off her hands. "Hey Manny, don't wreck that, I want Caitlin to autograph it."

Caitlin Ryan was a name Arlee had heard before. Another figure in the far and few between stories that her Aunt Araceli had told her right around the time going to Degrassi became a definite.

Inspired Journalist turned corespondent for a local broadcasting channel, now a gracing presence on one of their local magazines. They'd only met twice. Once during a time she couldn't remember and another during a time she wanted to forget. "Do you think she'll autograph my camcorder too?"

Manny arched a brow at that. Since for the most part, cameras weren't as easy to sign then physical paperback copies. "Where? On the lens?"

"No the side, she's on the tracks to becoming uber famous and I want her autograph before she blows up." Arlee also had questions for her too. Small ones really. Like how did she get into journalism, and what paths did she take throughout her career that eventually got her a spot on television.

From conversations she'd overheard, or rather eavesdropped on, Caitlin was recently engaged to a new man. That didn't really matter in hindsight till her Aunt had said something about 'telling Joey yet'

Now, Joey Jeremiah was a face she'd come to longing recognise in her life. Him and her aunt Araceli had been closely acquainted through Junior High and a little bit in High School. Something happened right around the last stretch of it that made them dissolve their friendship with one another. But eventually, a prenuptial wedding and Julia, Joey's late wife, helped in mending whatever leftover bruised scars had been made from their falling out.

Caitlin and Joey however, were a different story. The once upon and time, will they won't they kind.

"Emma! Ready to go?" Emma's mother called from the hallway.

"In a minute!"

The door creaked open and Emma's mom, Christine, popped her head into the room. "We don't have a minute, JT is waiting for us." When her gaze scanned the current state that Emma's room was in, she fully entered, a small sigh parting from her lips. "Em, your room is disaster. I thought you were gonna clean it."

"I will!" She huffed inwardly, an eye roll following suit.

"And turn off that computer."

Emma was quick to click off the emails with Jordan and open a browser she'd opened prior to today when her mom can into eyesight with the screen. "I was just showing Manny and Arlee your reunion site."

Emma's mom stopped in her tracks when the page displaying all the former alumni from her Graduating class came up. "I always knew she'd make it big." Her lips splintered into a small smile at Caitlin's picture, nostalgia flooding in without warning, and a whole heap of memories enveloping with it as she scrolled onto another old photo of herself sporting a bleach blonde mohawk. "How's that for a hairdo? Could I be any cooler?"

"Uh, yeah." Another eye roll. Only this time, it came equipped with Emma's sarcastic undertones. Manny and Arlee both suppressed their giggles, till Arlee caught a glimpse of her aunt Araceli's photograph on the screen and felt like she'd just experienced her first uncanny valley moment.

It was weird seeing a person she'd visually grown accustomed to forever looking older, look young. Flipping through old photo albums also brought the same feeling too. For the most part, her aunt hadn't really changed all the much. She had the same face, just without any definition around her cheekbones like she had now. And her style still remained...slick yet causal with a touch of hot pinks and baby blues. The only real noticeable difference was her voluminous spew of curls. "Is that my Aunt?"

Christine bent to eye level to get a better look of the picture they'd decided to put onto the reunion site. "I remember that, she was the Perm Queen. Nobody could keep their eyes off her, not even me if I've gotta be honest."

Emma's features were stumped with slight perplexity at her statement. "Don't you mean Prom Queen?"

"Nope, Perm, pretty sure she cultivated that look for a lot of girls in Degrassi." Christine affirmed. She grabbed onto the mouse and clicked on another one of the displayed pictures.

Araceli was wearing the same hot baby pink ripped jean jacket that was in her previous photo. This time, she was in a group. Another girl with wispier curls had an arm wrenched over her shoulder. She was tall in stature, and sported a summer frock. The hay blonde haired boy next to Araceli was wearing bottle lensed glasses and looked less then pleased to be posing. But he had a hand on her waist. Close but distant. Joey Jeremiah was there too, and he had hair.

Noticeably, Christine had pertained eye contact with the pixelated image of the blonde kid for a beat, finger tapping on the mouse, then immediately decided to click off it to one last photo of an even younger Araceli in a Lisa Turtle from Saved By The Bell styled outfit.

Arlee scrunched her nose in slight discernment at her aunt's peculiar fashion choices. And the hair——but there was probably going to be a day where she was sitting in a situation similar to Emma's mom and her Aunt. Reminiscing at the old days, with photographical evidence of the many many different fashion choices she'd decided to make over her formative years. The one thing she couldn't picture was ever getting asked back to Degrassi for a short spelled reunion like them.

Mostly all those who she was going to be sharing a classroom with were most surely going to disappear by the end of the 8th Grade, unless they decided to transfer to the shoddy high school a couple blocks over. And as for her friends, well, she was going to see them without the excuse of rehashing the good old days whilst sitting around some table drinking dollar store wine.

She didn't see herself leaving the area, and there wasn't a day where her, Emma and Manny weren't in constant communication with one another. JT too on selective days. And beyond the realms of instant messaging, they had always shared a close knit bond with one another. Tethered by past memories, and kept in tact by the new ones they were going to make.

"She looks like she skinned a poodle and put it on her head."

Christine spared a chuckle. Whether that was a response to Arlee's mundane commentary about her friend's perm or her excitement about reuniting with all her former classmates and friends was indistinguishable.

But one thing was for certain, she was more than ready to start clearing out the kitchen of all the boxes of reunion antiques and valuables. "My 10 year reunion, wow. It's gonna be great to see everyone again. I'm getting as bad as you guys." She reached to take the fedora off of Manny's head before exiting the room. "Come on, let's go."

Following instruction, both Manny and Arlee rose from their chairs to follow after her. Arlee remembering to carry her camera along just for security. When they'd both descended into the hallway, she flipped the screen of her new camcorder and aimed at a distant wall to check if the zoom was still jacked up. Christine halted at the foot of the steps. "C'mon, Tarantino, you can check if the focus is better outside."

Arlee swung the camera over to her direction, taking a step back to angle the framing. More blaring, more problems. "Taran-who?"

"Kill Bill? Pulp Fiction?" There was a lapse of genuine surprise on Christine's face. She glanced over to Manny, who more or less was just as stumped.

Arlee snapped shut the screen to persevere battery life on her device, as she did so, she was handed her first box of piling memorabilia from the Nelson's basement. "I think those are over 12's."

She handed the next box to Manny before grabbing ahold of the last one, that one seemingly being less durable in weight. "That's right, they are, good eye."

"That's some pretty cool stuff that you collected for the reunion."  Manny complimented as the three of them made their way down the stairs.

"Thanks." Christine cracked a small smile, then it faded when her head snapped back up to the stairs upon realizing that Emma still hadn't followed after them. The reason for her inept distraction made Arlee and Manny both give another a side glance. Jordan. "Emma, Now!"

On the ride to the new school, Arlee's stomach ached with butterflies. Wings rapid and nipping at the lining of her stomach. Feeling that way was stupid, she was aware. They still had awhile before they were obligated to be there, and once Monday had dawned and they were tossed into a new foreign schedule, Arlee was sure she was going to find something that she didn't like about it. But, it was still an odd adjustment to get used to so soon nonetheless.

The reality of it all only got more realer when Emma's mom finally pulled up onto the property and the translucent sign out front came into view. WELCOME TO DEGRASSI ——— HOME OF THE PANTHERS. At least the school had a decent mascot.

Spelt out in choppily cut out letters under that was a smaller tag line that also welcomed back all the returning alumni for an awarding trip down memory lane. Or as they so quintessentially put it, 'Party Like it's 89'

Degrassi didn't stick out like a sore thumb. Arlee didn't know why she'd expected it to in the first place. It was a regular school, in a regular town, and for the most part...produced regular people. Caitlin Ryan being the acceptation.

"Did you have to take up so much space at the back?" JT felt the need to instantly complain at Arlee when he stepped out of the back of Emma's mom's car first. They'd picked him up along the way at the curb of his Grandma's home, and she couldn't have been any happier to shoo him out of her house for a couple of hours tops.

Arlee scoffed, faking offence. "I was practically squished in."

He didn't take fondly to the accusation of him being the reason for the lack of legroom in the backseat. If this was like their other trillion bantered fuelled spats, someone was super close to getting flicked upside the head.
"No you weren't"

Arlee moved over to the boot, JT following suit, and both of them were immediately handed two out of the ten boxes that they needed to help move over into the school. "Was to."

"Probably didn't feel the difference because of your big butt." JT grumbled when he got another box stacked onto his already towering crate.

Purposefully, Arlee turned around with her box and bumped him against the shoulder without warning. He went jolting back, but still managed to keep his balance. "Shut up, Jellybean."

"JT, JT!" He scornfully corrected. Out of the large dictionary of nicknames that Arlee had for him, that was the one he disliked the most. Not like he was fond of any of the names she tended to call him regardless. But there was a backstory behind that one. And right before they'd broken for summer vacation, the pair  had made a pact to bury it in the sand for good. Till Arlee realised that there was no way she could go one day without not slipping it into her lingo whenever she addressed him.

"Whatever." She muttered. JT went in for the ultimate under taking and starting to copy her. And, as predicted, he fell prey to a mighty  forehead flick.

Manny shook her head in amusement from watching that entire 10 second debacle  happen. "JT and Arlee arguing? Yep, summer really is ending soon."

Christine closed hoisted the last set of boxes that were half empty and placed them onto the bonnet of her car. She would've given the rest of them to Emma if she wasn't already five steps ahead of her. "Thanks for dropping these off."

"No problem, Ms Nelson." Arlee tenderly smiled, trying her almighty best not to loose balance in her footing and send her camera flying off the top of her designated box in the process. Rule Number 1: Handle it with Care.

Manny centred herself at the entrance of the school, her gaze glossing over to the sign out front. "It gives us a chance to look at the school."

"Don't you think we'll be seeing enough of it over the next year?" JT commented sardonically.  He wasn't wrong either, they were going to walking in and out of those double glass doors all day every day to the point where they would collectively begin to grow tired of staring at the same interior. Being surrounded by a flood of kids in one patchwork hall trying to shuffle in and out of lessons as quick as they could after the bell chimed.

"No lucky hat?" Arlee questioned. There wasn't a day that went by where JT didn't wear it, or at least, a day since he'd been gifted the cap from his mom from some old vintage store.

"I wear it on special occasions."

Arlee set her two stacked boxes down and rifled through the contents till she came across the fedora that Manny had been previously wearing back at Emma's house. The material clung with dust particles, and the fabric was rather smooth on the outside. For some odd reason, she also felt like she'd seen it before in photos. "Well, here's another one that looks just as....old."

She went to place it right on the top of JT's head without properly securing it. The fedora tipped over and obstructed his peripheral, but luckily Christine was on the sidelines to fasten it onto his mop of locks. "You sure you can handle that?"

He was practically being crushed under the stacking weight. But not wanting to show how much he was struggling with handling the extra heavy load, JT puffed his chest out in sheer confidence. "I'm small, but strong—like
bull."

Arlee had to give it him, the fake Al Pacino accent wasn't all that terrible. But she still couldn't hesitate to drop her two cents into that statement. "A bull? More like a chinchilla on hind legs." she teased jokingly, causing a small pitter of giggles to come from both Emma and Manny as they made their way towards the stairs.

"Shut up, Bubble Butt." And here they were, back to square one. JT socked Arlee in the arm, how he managed to make the risky reach and not absolutely spill all the contents within the box he was carrying was an absolute miracle in itself.

Her camcorder had wobbled to the side of the box she had perched it on. And not wanting to risk breaking that number 2 golden rule, Arlee slyly put the first box she was carrying behind Christine's car and put the other under her arm. Clutching her beloved camera in her palm. "Long-head."

"Alright you two, settle down." Christine encouraged. She'd been in the gulf of their backhanded back and forths one to many times. Or at least, whenever the beginning of summer break would commence and then two, along with Manny, would spend the first day at the Nelson's gorging on ice pops and sitting outside on their porch. "Thanks again, guys, and Em—"

"Yes, I'll clean my room." She finished off without turning around. Her hand went to open the double doors, but before she could someone else Arlee was all too familiar with stepped through them.

"Christine, kids!"

Araceli, with a soothing voice like honeysuckle, came out of the school wearing tinted sunglasses and bell-bottoms with a bandana patterned crop tee. Her being at the school wasn't planned, infact, Arlee wasn't even all that aware that she was planning on attending the reunion to begin with. Leading up to today, she'd overheard her through the warily thin walls of their home on the phone with an old friend named Lucy.

Araceli expressed how much love and loathe she still had for the place, and the memories it held. But was only going because she hadn't talked to Caitlin in a full year.

Christine's brows deeply furrowed at her presence. Emma and Manny made their way indoors, muttering small hi's, whilst JT discreetly idled to passively stare at Araceli. When Arlee caught a glimpse of him gaping, she bumped him on the shoulder. A warning glare icing her own stare. They'd been here before. "Araceli, hey, what are you doing here I thought you had an urgent hair appointment?"

"Oh, I did, but the lady cancelled on my last minute." Araceli informed, descending down the steps, Christine following behind her. "Something about a termite infestation....I didn't ask for the gorey details. But then I thought about helping around here to make up for lost time, tie up a couple loose ends."

Her gaze then glossed over to JT and Arlee still talking at the front entrance. Her camera now loosely prompt and pointed in her hand. His attempts to dodge it failing and falling into laughter. "I see you've got a couple little helpers of your own already."

Christine folded her arms, beelining her line of vision to where Araceli's was. "I'm glad they actually agreed without the bribe I was planning"

"Arlena!" Araceli's soft tongue sharpened suddenly, tone sterning when she observed the  way in which Arlee was loosely handling her camcorder. " ¡No rompas eso, es valioso!"
( Don't break that, it's valuable! )

"No lo haré!" Arlee assured, before her and JT finally stepped foot in the building.

Once both the kids had left, Araceli serenely turned her attention over to Christine. "Did you bring it?"

She seemingly got what the latter had meant without questioning the 'it' Araceli was so vehement to see again. Opening the flaps to the box Arlee had left by her car, Christine slowly pulled out a jacket. Coated in pink, its purposeful rips and the distant smell of agave. "You mean, this?"

Araceli let a small gasp slip from her lips when she was handed her old jean jacket.  Her clutch firming as she held it to her chest. Call her dramatic, but having a physical representation of her teenhood...girlhood in the form of dyed denim and cheap bottled perfume was sentimentally emotional. "Oh my god, I feel like I just died and went to nostalgia heaven."

Christine sombrely chuckled at her reaction. She hadn't been super  close with Araceli within the hay-day of their youth, but she still got what that jacket meant to her. It was a garment. Memories everlasting. As was Joey's fedora, and their scuffed yearbooks. "Knew it'd put a smile on your face."

"More than. I thought I'd lost this for good, and all this time you kidnapped it and hit it in your basement for 20 years." Araceli draped the jacket on her shoulder, gaze averting back to the schools front doors. "I can't believe Arlee and Emma are already in Junior High, god that just made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up."

"And I'm greying as we speak."

"Can you still manage that? Looks like you're folding." Arlee observed from a distance whilst JT heaved small pants of breath clambering up the steps.

She yielded in her tracks to 'help out' just in case he needed it, whilst also trying her hardest not to loose her own balance and send her camera toppling to the floor beneath them. JT made it half way past the threshold of the main entrance door before nearly tripping through it. Luckily enough, he managed to catch himself. "Bull strength Arlee"

"Chinchilla form Jellybean!"

"JT!" He grumbled in protest. Making Arlee simply roll her eyes and quicken her pace to catch up with the other girls leading infront. But also slowing down just incase JT was still in need of someone to help him if he tripped on himself.

"That's sucks, about the email—" Manny consoled to Emma when Arlee finally reached her side. She didn't need context about what had started the discussion before, because most things that were related to instant messaging or getting spontaneous emails always centred back to Jordan when it came to Emma lately.

Sighing deeply, Emma held the box of memorabilia she was carrying closer to her frame. "I know, Jordan emailed me last night too."

Secretly, Arlee was hoping for the constant Jordan loophole to cease into existence. She was happy that her friend was happy, but she could only fake interest in the life and adventures of some pixilated internet dream boy for so long. And for her, that time was diminishing by the dot. "What'd he say?"

Emma's eyes welled shut as a means of trying to remember everything he'd said. Words of passion. Words of kind admiration. Words that almost seemed too good to be true. "I got over 6,000 names on my petition to keep the Polar Wildlife Refuge untouched. Thanks for all your help with this, Em, and for your great idea. Your the best—"

"Wow." Manny marvelled, a breathless small sigh trailing her lips.

Arlee adjusted the box in her hands when she felt it slip from her grip below. "Y'know, at first I thought he was a flook."

Emma shot a confused look at her. "Flook?"

"I mean, I've heard this thing about weirdos who pretend to be people on the net, like an old guy acting as a teen." She further explained.

Manny's face shrewd immensely with discomfort. "Why would anyone ever want to do that?"

"Sick thrills I guess, or they're just bored in their mom's basement." shrugged Arlee. She'd heard a couple stories on the news. Some good, most bad, and from what her father had practically preached religiously time after time from the moment they were able to afford a family computer——the internet wasn't something to mess with or on. Meet the wrong people? Trouble. Surf too deep? Further trouble and possible future scarring.

Her father was a chronic worrier. Which was ironic because he also did anything but worry around them. If it wasn't the 'net, then it would be other things. Other people. And that made Arlee take a lot of his distant warnings with a grain of salt.

"And you thought Jordan was one of these guys?" said Emma as they turned into a new hall. The main foyer, she could only guess. The smell of unfinished paint and wax was strongly present within the corridors. And the mural tattooed onto the brick base of the foreground stood prominent with the light peeking from outside. It only made her realise how much more bigger Degrassi was than she'd anticipated.

Arlee nodded half-heartedly. "Uh huh, for like, a split second. But from the emails he's been sending you, I can see he's the real deal"

"Oh, he is." Emma clarified serenely. "I suggested the petition, but Jordan did all the work. He's so committed."

"Too bad that he lives all the way in Yellowknife." Manny subtly reminded Emma, her natural soft tone prominent.

A crashing  thud suddenly concaved off the hard linoleum, making all three of the girls sharply turn. There, surrounded by the sacraments of memories and grainy old photographs, laid JT. "Help!"

"JT!" Both Manny and Emma immediately swivelled around to rush to his aid.

Arlee moved with sufficient pace too. But also couldn't help the ghost of a smirk that seriptiously lined the crevice of her upper lip when she offered him a hand, and took it with much protest. "Bull strength, huh?"

JT dusted off non-existent dirt from his shoulder, and then turned to shove her arm lightly in case of further teasing. That was how they operated, through the power of petty squabbling and baseless jabs. But, of course, all that was enthralled with the friendship that they shared. Days gorging on snacks with the serene sounds of parent approved movies bought from the video store. Impromptu super  soaker duels. JT was the excitement for her, for them all. "Don't."

They continued to pick up the rest of the items that had scattered across the ground. Emma paused midway when her hand grazed a matted old picture. She flipped it and her nose wrinkled at the sight before her eyes. Three teenagers, all decked out stereotypical 80s attire, were sat at a bench front showing off their pristine guitars. "People in the 80's were weird."

Everyone sputtered a quiet laugh in utmost agreement. The first pimply faced one, built with a thin frame and hair that was scorched with tints of red, looked somewhat familiar. Snake something? It would come back later. The other two though, they caught her attention briefly. 

Specifically, the kid with ashy blond hair and speckled glasses who'd had his arm wrapped around her aunt in her picture on their reunion site. The same one that Ms.Nelson had stared at with such a, frayed expression. Almost as if he was someone they'd all just collectively decided to leave in the past.

Joey was recognisable from the jump though. He'd always been a vast presence in her life, till he wasn't. Same with his wife, Julia Jeremiah. Once upon a time, she'd been friends with her mom too when her Aunt Araceli had introduced the pair. Her mother had helped pick baby clothes when she'd fallen pregnant with their daughter a little after getting married. More get-togethers, more Christmas parties around candlelight.

And then....quaint euphoria  turned into bleakness. Eyes stung with tears. Blur. Calm. Both.

What bliss.

Wandering around for a little longer, and they were able to finally ( hopefully ) find the person who they were supposed to be delivering everything to. Along the journey, Arlee had ever so kindly asked Manny to hold her box of goods whilst she pulled out her video camera to test its faults. Broken zoom meant a broken lens and a broken lens meant a lack of good stuff for a while on her end. She also wanted to take take in the sights, and there was no better way to do that then through a viewfinder.

"I really hope you're Mr Simpson." Emma asked with a lapse of unsureness, her grip on the box loosening slightly.

He looked shocked to see them trailing the halls during the middle of a school holiday.
"I am, and you must be Emma." A small glint of a smile screwed delightfully onto his face. It clicked superbly quickly for Arlee that the tall man with a thinning hairline was the same one from the picture they'd been laughing at moments prior. Snake. He didn't look like someone who'd go for a nickname like that. Her guesses where that it was his former alter ego. An image to match his band persona back in his youth. "Wow, wow, wow, Spike found all this stuff? That's amazing."

Both of Manny's brows practically jumped to the top of her hairline, a quietened chortle breaking from her lips. "Spike?"

"My mom's nickname, don't ask." Emma shook her head, before placing the boxes down, the rest following suit not to long after.

Mr.Simpson angled his gaze with Arlee and her camera when it slyly lingering from across his shoulder. "Uh, is this for some back to school project that I don't know about?"

Emma didn't give Arlee's antics a second glance. Choosing instead to try and find a polite way to exit the conversation. "No, she just films everything."

"Not everything, just important stuff." Arlee corrected, closing the lens cap and channeling her attention back to the real world. "I got it for my birthday, thought I might test it out."

He paused in his next train of thought, before bending to pick up a specific box. A little bit of extensive rummaging later, and Mr.Simpson carefully pulled out an old camera that was the size of half her arm. "Well how's this for an alternative?" He held it up with pride and Manny, JT and Emma faked interest. Arlee was intrigued, to a degree. "Lot of good videos were shot on this thing."

After placing the dusted camera back into the box, Mr.Simpson reached over to pluck the fedora off of JT's head. "I see fedora's are making a comeback." He then proceeded to place it atop his own head with a grin. "Thanks guys. Listen, go and enjoy your last few days of freedom."

"Seriously, Spike?" JT questioned again once Simpson had finally departed. Although, his ulterior motive was to obviously mock how obscure it sounded. Emma socked him in the upper arm for the snide remark.

Seconds of silence soon emerged amongst the group when they were left wondering what exactly to do next. They'd finished what they had volunteered for. And the rest of their collective days weren't jammed packed with much else besides going to the park later. Arlee glanced to JT, and then, a devious idea plagued her thoughts. "First one to catch the chinchilla gets ten bucks."

Emma looked to Manny, whose lips splintered into an amused smile, her dark cerulean eyes briefly glossing over to a less then appeased  JT before they then landed straight to Arlee again. "You're on."

"Not this again" JT sighed to himself. He didn't waste any time in backing up and making his getaway right for the adjacent hallway. The three girls all dashing down the same path with merry joy.

A fresh new computer lab brought Arlee and the others's elated fulled pursuit to a screeching halt. Emma approached the pristine window pane with ease, marvelment arising on her features prominently. Rows and rows of boxed gum-metal grey computers sat untouched, with prussian blue polyester chairs to match. There'd been discussion of a refurbishment to the school, something about the principal wanting to invest in steering Degrassi towards a 'new age of education excellence'. From the looks of things, he'd gone above and beyond with his promise.

"Holy, look at all those computers."

JT was already feigning to get out of there as soon as possible. "Emma, let's go."

She took a small step back, but her attention was still grappled to the room. To a computer set. And if Arlee knew Emma well ( which she did ) her intentions to check up on Jordan via her email was already set in stone. "Thinking about emailing your faceless love again?"

"He can read into my soul." JT teased in chorus, making Arlee let out a soft giggle and Emma flick him again for the second time in a row that day. He rolled his eyes, unamused, then pivoted on the heel of his foot to walk back out into the foyer. However, upon approaching the front desk area his eyes widened immensely. "Toby?"

  A young boy, no older than they were, swirled around with pinched brows at the sudden utterance of his name. "JT?"

What took place next was nothing short of a happy reunion with an impressively choreographed handshake between them. Well obviously they knew each other. But from where was still the question. "Is it me or does that kid kinda look like Mike Wazowski from a distance?"

Manny nudged Arlee's side discreetly. "You can't say that."

"What? I said from a distance." muttered Arlee back, crossing her arms whilst spectating.

Once their intricate handshake finally came to a drawing conclusion, JT motioned for the boy to follow him over to where they were all standing. He'd muttered a small 'bye' to a staunchly built man who she assumed was his father, and in return his dad had told him to stay with JT whilst he continued to discuss the different beneficials Degrassi gave to their students through their star quality curriculum with the principal.

Arlee had always heard Raditch was one to showboat alot. Guess her intel sources ( and by intel, she meant her brother ) were right. "Emma, Manny, Arlee, this is Toby. We were in Camp together."

Toby. It suited him, she didn't know how exactly but it did. Arlee sent over a small friendly smile. One in which he returned with a flustered shy one back. Emma faked disbelief at the revelation of them being prior acquaintances from summer camp. "Oh really?"

"Nice to meet you." Toby stuck his hand out towards her gleefully.

"Yeah." Emma passively greeted, making him awkwardly put his back down. She turned right back around again to make her way over to the front door of the computer lab again. "Okay, the coast is finally clear. Manny, Arlee you're coming in with me. You two can stand guard."

Doing as they were told, both JT and Toby stood their ground near the outskirts of the media immersion lab. Emma stealthily turned the latch to the door, and once it clicked open, she crept inside, leaving the door slightly ajar for Manny and Arlee to follow her in from behind.

Arlee stalled for a little just to kill an extra couple seconds before she had to sift through and listen in on a new Jordan email like she had been since he first connected with Emma back at the beginning of summer. However, when she saw Manny duck her head around the corner, she took that as her non-verbal cue to hurry up. "Later Jellybean, new guy."

"Jellybean?" Toby questioned in a not so-low whisper, a trickle of hilarity for the nickname seeped into his tone.

JT sighed heavily like he'd just had his darkest secret exposed out into the open without his consent. In his perspective, maybe he had. "I got a jellybean stuck up my nose in the 1st Grade and had to go to ER, she thought it was so funny that she started calling me Jellybean and has never stopped till right now."

"Till never." She called out without looking back in their direction, knowing full well that JT was probably mocking her voice in a crackly higher octave behind her back.

When Arlee finally shut the door and made her way over to the back row of the computer lab where Emma had already situated herself, she was greeted by an influx of messages that had popped up on her computer screen once she'd typed in her password.

Emma continuously scrolled her way through her past messages on the periled hunt for the new one she was expecting from Jordan. Manny, wracked with nerves, chose continuously peer back at the door just for safety. "Manny, would you calm down? If we're caught I'll say I forced you."

All of a sudden, Emma froze upon seeing a new message flash across her screen that had come in from Jordan. Excitement parlaying her function to react in any form. Manny and Arlee shared a confused glance, before the latter bent next to her shoulder to get a closer view.
"What'd he say?"

"Manny, Lee...Jordan is coming here and he wants to see me, tomorrow!"

Dappled flicks of the subs pulsating rays seeped through deoxidised cerulean as Emma, Manny, Arlee, JT and their newest addition Toby, all lazily clung onto different parts of the playground equipment that they'd invaded. Manny and Emma took up the tire swing, whilst JT and Arlee occupied the clustered mini jungle gym in awaitance for Toby with their complimentary freezies.

"I want to meet him, it's just, I told him I was in high school." Emma vehemently contemplated, worry stirring greatly. She'd talked to her mystery boyfriend for nearly over a month now. Grown to form a somewhat palpable bond with him, and he'd shared his interests with her that were so similar that it was starting to become a little eerily uncanny. But meeting him physically had never been something she'd thought about.

"You're almost there." Manny insisted with encouragement. "Jordan, he's coming here, and you have to meet him. It's fate."

Arlee's gut was still feverishly panging with her own doubts. Her own conclusive conspiracies. There was a very big difference between fate and a peculiar coincidence.

"Who's Jordan?" Toby queried from behind Emma, he handed her and everyone else the cheap freeze pops before he staggered up the jungle gym to sit one pillar below JT and above Arlee.

A brazen smirk flickered across JT's dewey sun-kissed complexion. "Some creep Emma met on the net. I bet he lives in Scarborough and works at a video store. I bet he's 40 and drools too."

Arlee peered up at him, lowering the blueberry flavoured freezie from her mouth to shield her eyes from the sun's permeating rays.  "You drool, wet the bed and sleep with a nightlight, and I'm still friends with you."

"Ha ha." JT sneered, leaning down to kick at Arlee's end of the tire swing so it would spin out of control a little faster.

"Okay, if you're meeting a stranger you met on the net, that could be really dangerous." warned Toby, his legs swinging two and fro from the wooding scaffolding.

"He's not a stranger, he emailed me his picture." lamented Emma. "And anyways, I've known Jordan a lot longer than I've known you."

"Guy's It's cool, Jordan's 16 and he's coming on a school trip." Manny swiftly assured to try and leverage out the support.

Both of JT's went crashing down to the centre of his forehead at that new piece of information. "School trip? It's summer."

It was one thing having doubts, but it was another having them expressed out loud without the words coming out your mouth. Arlee had been immensely skeptical at that part of Jordan's email. A school trip. He'd also mentioned in another one of his millions emails to Emma that he'd wished his school had the budget for a school trip they'd organised back in the fall, because it was closer to where she lived and he was dying to see her.

"It's probably a summer camp." Arlee tried her best to give as a probable explanation for his random trip right in the middle of the summer.

"No summer camp has the budget to go on a trip by airplane."

Emma was just about done with JT's rampant, and reasonable, denial. "It's a school trip that he organised back in the spring. He got to go at the last minute, so quit making it something into it's not."

"Oh, you poor baby." Toby cooed mockingly. Emma drew her mini-water gun from her backpocket and aimed it straight at his multi-coloured tee. In retaliation, both him and JT pulled out their own perfectly shielded water guns and started to fire them at all three of the girls at once.

Summer time warfare commenced soon enough. A joyous innocuous haze of laughter and never-ending fun

ronnie speaks !  hi hello welcome to the first ever chapter of young besties. hope you liked it <3 😍
i've always wanted to write a fic about degrassi since forever because i love it sm and it doesn't get much attention on here that much if at all, which is a crime bcz it's really good. prt 2's gonna be up the week after next probably idk...praying this doesn't flop lmao 🤞🏿