IV cont. 1.04. FRIDAY NIGHT FEVER
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The pre-prep for the dance had been nothing short of an eventful extravaganza. After school had thankfully officially wrapped for the day, and everyone in her small harmonious group of friends had parted ways for the weekend at the foot of the school steps, Arlee had more or less invited herself over to Emma's place to help in her varied selection of casual yet spontainously eye catching attire she could wear out.

No clumped butterfly clips or blocky bobby pins that looked like they were fresh out of the under 10's section at some choppy retail store.

Something that didn't alert the masses that this was their first real dance with a curfew that, 5 to 6 years ago, was later then their bedtime. They were playing it cool, calm, and collected.

Well Arlee was anyway. She didn't exactly know what Emma's game plan for the spiralling events to come were yet. All she'd really revealed was that, unsurprisingly, she wanted to just experience what it was like. To mingle, to be out in the open interrogating with kids who were a year old without the invisible line that made it hard to even look in their direction on any given school day.

And most of all, if she was lucky, end the night in a way that she'd remember. Good. Goose-Bump Inducing. Everything in between. But most importantly, she was there for the fun.

Arlee's objectives were simple and one note. Freebies. If all else failed, she'd be attached to that snack table like it was her only life source.

Ms. Nelson had volunteered herself to help give the girls a lift to the school once they'd both completed primping one another's hair in the fogged blur of Emma's bathroom window. Emma choosing to clasp her mid-length locks into a spindled half-up-half down do, whilst Arlee went with two front pleats that fell perfectly in frame with her face.

Right before they could get into the car, Federico, in his best flamed polo and 'real' iced out chain, came peddling in at high pursuit on his bike up onto the Nelson's front lawn all the way from their place muttering something about being left in the dust by Spinner and his mom's janky Volvo.

He knew Arlee was at Emma's, and didn't want to take the bus or bike his way through the thicket of darkness that was pitching heavily across the sky and turn up at the dance in a spluttering sweaty mess, so he'd gone with the most logical option. In his eyes.

Ms. Nelson didn't object, understandly. Emma on the other hand wasn't as keen. Unlike Manny, she found Federico a bit aggravating. A guy with a bloated ego who happened to be related to her best friend. And he also couldn't stop calling her World Peace, a nickname that had first derived from a place she didn't know nor wanted to find out where it came from either.

Luckily for Emma, he wasn't in bunched in the car with her for that long though. 15 minutes into the ride, and Federico had kindly asked to be dropped off a block away from the school when he spotted a girl with flowing blonde hair and slim built nose idiling near the sidewalk. Emma's mom was confused, but didn't feel the need to further question it and unlocked the back car door for him.

Arlee could only watch and wander what went on in her brother's head at times. The answer was simple really. Hormones. Teen Boy Intuition, or lack thereof.

Eventually, through the many minimal trials and tribulations they'd faced, they finally managed to pull up to the front of the school right on time. From the inside out, it already looked like nice. When Arlee and Emma stepped out of the passenger's side of the car, nice turned to perfectly put together.

Ms. Nelson rolled down her window once she spotted the girls beginning to make their way up the stairs. "Call me when you want me to pick you guys up!"

Her voice had projected a little too loudly for Emma's liking, it was clear enough by the way she'd sharply turned. "We're fine, Mom."

"Don't walk the rest of the way home alone."

Her second warning caused a couple kids within ear shot to chuckle amongst eachother whilst they walked past. Emma, slowly becoming consumed with a feverish sense of embarrassment, folded her arms in dismay. "Mom....please."

"Oh Arlee, honey, you nearly forgot this!" Ms.Nelson stuck her hand out and waved her flamingo pink wallet in Arlee's peripheral.

Pacefully, Arlee made her way down the steps and kindly took her wallet off Emma's mom with a courteous smile. "Thanks Ms.Nelson."

In a split of light, Emma was already approaching her and peacefully hurrying her back up the other way, linking her arm around Arlee's own. "C'mon, before she remembers to tell me something else"

As Arlee had wistfully expected, the interior of Degrassi's foyer and gymnasium was strung by dewey blue and twinkling white lights. Music followed loudly from a hidden speaker within the main centre stage, along with the varied amalgamation of kids that were either spilling out of the gym, or begrudgingly waiting in line whilst Liberty and Ashley argued at the collections table over their differences in designing decorum.

"Now you can't even read them. They're covered in glitter, squiggles, and sparkles."

"It's called marketing."

"—It's called messy"

And apparently, they were supposed to be an excellent dream team of like-minded individuals according to Liberty's campaign speech.

From the corner of her eye, whilst both her and Emma were scoping for a perfect opportunity to get in line, Arlee spotted Sean impatiently in the middle of it. She instantly went to nudge Emma to grab her attention. "Look who's here."

Arlee surreptitiously moved to approach Sean, but Emma was rapidly quick to yield her movements by dragging her back to her side again. "Don't."

There wasn't much of an open window to really have a conversation with Sean anyway, because before either of them knew it, he'd frustratingly cut his way further up the line and slammed his cash down.

And soon enough, with a more nicer approach, Arlee found an opening and wheeled herself and Emma into it. Ashley's frustrated mood over Liberty's need to question her simmered instantly at their presence. "5 dollars please." She sat up gleefully, her arms folding against the table. "It goes towards the Degrassi Community Food Bank, although you wouldn't know that from the sign."

Her leering eyes peered over at Liberty briefly, who dished out a similar unamused glower right back. Arlee gave Emma her own little look over having to spectate their gruelling passive aggressive back and forth before pulling out a crisp 5 dollar bill and placing it within the tiny decorated bucket Ashley had slyly pushed in between them both. Emma followed willingly in pursuit adding in 4 coins as an act of extra charity.

"Hey ! It's little Miss Big Mouth, and look, she's got a heart on."

As if things couldn't get anymore eventful, an all too recognisable voice sprung forth from the ether just to twist the knife and up the anty of swarming razor butterflies a little further.

Spinner was decked out in a dark blue collar shirt with another more bleak grey one under it, nothing too fancy. He, along with Jimmy and of course, Federico, had all taken up residency just outside the gym doors with their cups of punch.

A coiling smirk made its introductory presence all over Frederico's smarmy features. He'd kept his gaze retained on Emma for a little while longer. "Should replace the heart with a planet though, couple koala's...stay true to character, right World Peace?"

Becoming quickly fed up with their random cliche taunting, Arlee let her abhorrent short fuse get the better of her. "Go drown in the punch bowl."

It was harsh, she was completely aware. But when it came to her brother, the scales of harsh she went didn't really exist.

Federico placed a hand to his chest mockingly, a jutting gasp enveloping. "Whoa! That was totally uncalled for."

"So cruel Federina." Spinner tutted right beside him, his smile forming a little more softer yet taunting all the same.

Emma made her way through the part between Jimmy and Spinner without saying a word through that entire exchange, and  manoeuvred her way through the crowd and further into gymnasium.

Arlee, unfazed, started to head on after her, but was quickly stopped when Federico grabbed a hold of her shoulder for a beat. "Hold up, How'd you get the five dollars to get in here? Dad's still holding out on us."

Arlee stood in place briefly.  "Emma's mom. She would've given you the cash too if you didn't tell her to drop you off a block away from school because you saw that girl called Heather Sinclair on the sidewalk. Practically did a barrel roll out of the car door."

Her brash statement made both Spinner and Jimmy let out stifled chuckles from behind Federico. Oops.

She didn't wait long to bear witness to his annoyance, or their reaction to his annoyance and her slip of tounge. Arlee simply moved along and wandered inside till she found Emma again standing rather aimlessly at the snacks table staring at celery sticks.  "Don't listen to him."

Emma peered up, snapping out of her second long state of translucency. "Spinner or your brother?"

"Both, but mainly Spinner." Arlee replied as she began to make her way around what was up to offer. So far, what she was seeing was the most appealing visually besides the mini-pizza bites and small collection of sodas fanned out around the table. "He may have the looks, but there's absolutely nothing going on up there."

Emma was quick to catch onto that last fragment of Arlee's sentence. Whether it was an accident or not, she couldn't tell. But for all intents and purposes, she decided not to bring up her superstition. "I can agree with the second part."

Inwardly sighing, Arlee approached a tinfoiled trail and scrunched her nose at the contents messily plopped all over it. "Pigs in a Blanket?"

She picked one up and similarly, Emma didn't find much appeal in the culinary dish before her eyes. "Kinda glad I don't eat meat."

It was safe to say that Arlee's first impressions of the dance she'd imagined vs what it had turned out to be were completely and utterly difference. But then again, this was phase one. The settling. After the third she was sure everything was going to work itself out.

Emma picked up a plate a put down a couple sweet treats before migrating over into the distance to perpetually stay out of the way of anybody else who'd be at risk of ruining her night.

Arlee chose to stick by the table just to check things out. For what exact purpose? She had no clue. It was food. Plain, loaded in a million one calories that would send a dentist into overdriving disappointment, and varied all the same.

In the time that she'd taken out to carefully make her choice right behind Paige Michealchck, Ashley and a noticeably distant Terri, Arlee spotted Spinner making his way over to Terri in slight suprise. Her instant knee jerk reaction was to blend in with the walls or book it right out of there. Not over him, obviously. "Hey, I thought you weren't coming."

"Oh, you know, changed my mind." Terri's  smirk outstretched to the point where the apples of her cheeks started to brim in brushed over peony.

"Cool."

Paige, with her batting lashes, and ever graceful air of perfect grace, politely tapped Spinner's shoulder from behind him. He turned at her touched, completely unaware of her presence up until that moment. "Hi Spinner."

"Hi." was all Spinner could muster, his concentration swooping straight back to Terri and her hiked up skirt. "Uh, Terri, you look, wow."

Her response to that however, was a little more indifferent to what he could've expected.

"Ashley, my friend, I love you." Terri did a complete 180 when Ashley descended upon the unravelling dysphoric mess of a scene that was currently happening. Her arms slumped around Ashley's bare shoulder, smile twining allusively and balance starting to falter.

It didn't take long for her to be immediately dragged to a corner by Ashley in an attempt to get her away before things went from bad to indefinitely worse. Paige trudged along behind them with a little less urgency than Ashley, and an overall demeanour that almost, in some weird way, seemed like she was getting a horrid shrill out of seeing Terri slowly become disorientated.

Arlee wasn't an expert when it came to psychological behaviour, but it didn't take a genius to realise that Terri obviously wasn't completely there. Or there could've possibly been a bit too much sugar in the punch that they were all currently fuelling up on, high adrenaline coupled with impending nerves. "Is she okay?"

Spinner, now sporting the beginnings of a slightly disappointed scowl from being swung in all confusing directions, kept his attention on anyone else but Arlee when she muttered that query. "Did she look okay to you?"

"Jeez, sorry." Arlee's nails dug a little deeper into the paper plate of rock hard cookies she was holding, before she set the plate down entirely and put one back on the plastic tray bake it'd originated from. "Didn't mean to get up in your business."

He sighed and chose to dismember his cold wall of sheer deflection. "No, it's not...." He tried to choose his next words carefully. "I'm just confused about——"

"Terri?"

Spinner shrugged his shoulders a little stiffly as he grabbed a can of pop. "Kinda, I guess. Don't know."

"I get it." Arlee most definitely did not get it. How could she? She'd never been in a scenario in her life so far where she had to be yet. From where she was currently standing, she probably never would be. "You're trying to play your cards right. You're into Terri, and she's obviously into you."

"Into?" He let a small patten of breath that could be akin to a scoff sharply roll off his tounge.

Arlee instantly recognised that attempt as a way of saying maybe without actually saying it. It was part of the basic gruelling boy playbook. Say what you're feeling upfront, and that sheaths any sense of 'coolness' that you still exude to some capacity. Deflect and deny unless it's unecessary, and your suave distilled demeanour stays in tact.

At least that's how she perceived it anyways. Girls and guys in the pinnical of adolescence felt everything but both had their ways of never outwardly expressing it.

Sometimes they taunt

Sometimes they cower away to walls and shut their eyes when emotions run to high 

And sometimes, they drink. As was the case with a clearly tipsy Terri.

"But you do like her, right?"

Spinner wasn't as quick to give an initial answer to Arlee's sudden question. "I dunno, maybe."

"Then what're you waiting for?" She rhetorically remarked. A plinth of quiet commenced, and Arlee took that as her cue to leave their little convo where it was, short, not so sweet and mudded in an assortment of unhelpful advice from her end. She'd barely moved three steps before she was already swivelling right back around to muscle out the lingering ramped thought that had been circling her mind since she'd first entered the dance. Since she'd first seen him standing there all giddy with his stupid little drink and scrunched polo.

"Hey Spinner"

At times, Arlee had this habit of forgetting that life didn't work like a glittered down teen dramedy on cable. Taking the plunge and it actually working out in their favour by the end when the guy they like says yes. Dancing under shoddy darkened green and blue blistered lights, then it snowballing into something more.

That wasn't how she felt about Spinner though. She never could. Spinner was Spinner and he was——

Oh god

She didn't know.

Nearly over 8 years of having every textbook description for a guy that she'd grown to discern merely when they were a lot younger, and now, in the height of their informative years, and she didn't freaking know.

"Uhm, do you...know where Emma went?"

Silently, his gaze beelined over to the corner of the gym where the stacked dusty mats and Emma were hidden away in. Clambering down the heinous bad decision her impulsivity was about to make her act on. "Cool, thanks."

The start of girlhood was like the drop right before a plunge on a rollercoaster. Except, ocassionaly ( all the time ) the fall never ceased to end.

And Arlee was just going to have to get used to that, no matter how much it bugged her to no end.

Meanwhile on the other side of the dance, Federico's triumphant quest to get Heather's hand on the dance floor had pretty much fell flat on its face before he could even muster the words.

He'd brought up what Paige had said to him a couple hours earlier about his looks changing over the summer, playing it suave, but her response had been an objectively high eyebrow raise and a light scoff like he was the scum beneath her high dollar priced shoe. 

Guess that's what he got for listening to Paige of all people.

"No luck?"

Federico shook his head with a huff, as Jimmy handed him his third cup of sugar infested punch back. "Boy wonder got there first."

Both their eyes scaled over to another guy, more staunchly built and decked out in Janko's and a striped shirt, wrap his arm tentivly around Heather and wipe his other hand down the side of his outdated trousers.

"Look man, why don't you just go for the one girl who you really have a thing for." Jimmy outwardly exclaimed, placing a hand on Federico's shoulder.

He didn't completly comprehend what Jimmy was trying to hint at till he saw him start to subtly leer his gaze over to Paige standing a few feet away from Terri. Federico didn't hesistate to shoot down whatever theory he'd started to conjur up in his head. "Paige? I don't have a thing for Paige."

"No, you think you don't have a thing for Paige." He affirmed with a sheer amount of confidence. "And it's getting weird to watch at this point."

Federico scrunched his nose in thought. The thing was, he did see Paige in a different light to a degree since the new school year had started.

But underneath all that foundation and those thinly bedazzled trimmed crop-tops that she seemingly had a lifetime supply of, was the same girl who he'd grown to know since Paige had first laughed at him struggling to read his  book report back when they were in Grade School. She had two sides. One sweet, and one viciously spicy. When combined, it concocted something mean most times.

"You know what I do have a thing for? Eating." Federico approached the side of the small table draped in a stained hollowed out blue tablecloth and stuck his hand straight into a stray helping of chips. "Unlike the concept of dating, food can never let you down."

Unamused, Jimmy leaned against the wall nearest to the table. "You've still got an opportunity at my after party, so, don't sweat it."

The last fragment of his unwarranted jab for Federico to pursue his feelings for Paige that he didn't have completely flew over his head.  "Your parents are still letting you throw that?"

"They're not in, Dad's working late, Mom too." said Jimmy. "And even if he wasn't he doesn't really care what I do."

"Lucky." sighed Federico. "I have to rehearse what I'm gonna say whenever I ask my dad for anything. And he still ends up saying no."

"Does that include the party?"

An overbearing swell of realisation suddenly crashed over Federico. The party. Of all the things he'd remembered to do before leaving his home for the dance, trying to woefully convince his dad to let him hang around Jimmy's after hours wasn't one of them. "I could cover and say I'm like, studying late at your place."

"You haven't opened a textbook since Grade 6." Jimmy jokingly reminded him. "Also, it's Friday. Nobody studies on Friday."

Now enthralled with enthusiasm over the new idea he'd just concocted in his mind, Federico took a step closer to his friend and softly patted his shoulder, which made Jimmy mildly confused. "Well, tonight I'm gonna speed through the curriculum in parental mind games."

"Where are you going?"

"Bathroom" Federico called out once he spun right back around. Once Jimmy was out of war shot, he pulled out his phone, dialled in his dad's number and pushed open the double doors to the west hallway. "Dad! Hey. No, yeah, everything's cool." He reeled the phone closer to his ear and attempted to hide it when Mr. Raditch moved closer to the doors he'd just walked out of. "Arlee's cool too, having a good time with Emma. You remember when I said I wanted to take my education more seriously?"

Meanwhile, for Arlee and Emma, the tenacious excitement to go out there and try to be centre stage on the dance floor had more or less died out. Well they had for Emma anyway. She'd found comfort in resorting to wallflower tactics and watching everyone from the shadowy realms that existed just under the large stack of dusty old gym mats. She wasn't completly dejected, just, a little disappointed that her night had completely and utterly subceeded her expectations. 

As for Arlee, she didn't exactly feel the same way...yet. The food was okay, and the music was just as squeaky and clean as she'd expected. The downside was that sitting around and lullesly gaping at people wasn't something she'd exactly signed up for.
"Hey."

"Hey." replied Emma, adjusting her posture on the wall and pushing down any evidence of her boredom that was currently glimmering over her features.

"Cookie for your thoughts?" Arlee offered. Emma shook her head and she shrugged took a small bite out of the last chocolate chip cookie left discarded atop her plate.

A beat of silence dawned between the pair before Emma spoke again. "Do you think he'd be the type to willingly dance with a person?"

At first, Arlee quirked a brow. Then she aligned her gaze with the particular person in particular Emma was vaguely talking about and dusted the crumbs off her hands once she'd finished eating. "Don't know that till you ask him."

"What would you do?"

"Probably find an opportunity to say will you dance with me without out right saying it to his face." answered Arlee earnestly. She would've also probably not found the gall to go up to him in the first place, but, considering the fact that she was trying to currently encourage Emma to follow through with her obvious intentions to ask Sean to dance with her, bringing that up wouldn't exactly help.

Emma bit at her lower lip a little as a provable coping mechanisim to disparage her oncoming nerves. "When do you know when a good opportunity presents itself?"

There was a flat pause between Arlee's next words of sage advice. Luck, that was the antidote. Sheer luck and a happenstance that played right into making the situation way easier to get through. And luckily for Emma, the perfect momentary dire interaction had presented itself in the form of Sean being cornered by Jimmy for a conversation that most definitely didn't look friendly. "Like that."

In a tail of stealthy hot pursuit, Arlee encouragingly nudged Emma onward to stand within a vicinity of the pair. She was obviously hesitant at first, seeing her interrupting as some big unwarranted invasion of privacy, but knowing her friend's habit of never backing down once she got an idea, she went along with it...just in her own terms and at a much slower pace.

Jimmy didn't waste anytime in turning his unnecessarily boistreious cocky attitude  up about 500 decibels, especially when he noticed Sean tense at his presence. "Hey man, after party at my place—" He smirked mirthlessly and folded his arms like he'd already won at whatever ulterior motive he'd come with when he approached Sean to begin with. "It's Grade 8's only, but we'll make an exception just for you"

Swiftly becoming consumed by an amass amount of annoyance, Sean took a cloth full of Jimmy's shirt and pinned him against the wall. His eyes widened and the sheer embivillant amount of confidence that he'd once exuded diminished on the spot. "Hey, what're you doing?!"

"Just stop reminding me, okay?" sniped Sean begrudgingly. "It sucks about having to repeat the 7th Grade, and I don't need you rubbing it in my face."

Out of the corner of her eye, Emma had spotted Raditch slowly gaining in on the unfolding scene, and wanting to act quickly, she approached Sean's side. "Do you wanna dance?"

Sean kept his eye contact souly glued to Jimmy at first, and a duel choice between finishing what he started and avoiding further consequences for the actions he took ruminated in his head. He chose wisely and ultimately let go. "Yeah."

His sullen expression softened, a little and hand in hand, him and Emma departed towards the other side of the gymnasium. Arlee couldn't help but smile a little at the sight, but also couldn't deny that Jimmy looming around right next to her didn't make the aftermath of that all a little more tenser then they needed to be.

Overly smitten over something, Federico ascended back into the gymnasium and headed over to where Jimmy and Arlee were to hopefully break the lapse of quiet that had brewed between them both. She would've filled it with a query in regards to why he'd found it so necessary to rile up Sean Cameron that badly again, but doing that would mean actually knowing the right way to start the conversation, and with Jimmy nonetheless.

Past a couple passing greetings whenever he'd come to their home, Arlee had never really talked to him all that much. 

"If anybody asks, you're my new Math tutor named Johnny Banks."

Jimmy blinked at Federico blankly."—What?"

"Your after party, remember?" Federico's smile only outstretched the more. "I'm in the clear."

Arlee folded her arms from behind him. "Don't you think Dad's gonna question why your math tutor wanted to coincidentally start his first lesson at night right after a school dance on a Friday?"

Federico slowly turned to her rather coldly and Arlee didn't waste any time in getting the memo of him wanting her to disappear. "I know....I know, goodbye, get lost, shoo——"

"What was all that with Sean earlier about?" said Federico quizzically once Arlee wasn't within earshot.

"Nothing." Jimmy shut down his curiosity. "Just wanted to talk, invite him to the after party, but he snapped for nothing."

Federico craned his head over to  where Sean had taken Emma to dance and scoffed. "Yeah, not surprised."

The prissy pop music that had been looping repetitively on repeat simmered and mellowed into a slow song. And slow songs were usually the catalyst to most, if not every awkward encounter in existence since the beginning of mankind.

At least, that's what Arlee had been versed on by more than a couple plausible sources in her extensive 12 and a half years of life.

Emma was, though rather riggidly, dancing with Sean. Her first dance. That alone made Arlee more than happy as her undesignated wing-girl. Ashley was clunkily trying to sway to the beat of the music with a slightly miffed off Jimmy, who was still trying to work through his annoyance over Sean manhandling him against a wall and putting him in his place for the constant mocking about his inability to make it past the 7th Grade. Spinner had finally plucked up the willpower to get Terri on that dance floor, and there was no doubt in her mind that Federico had probably managed to be annoying and sweated through asking Heather to dance.

Everyone was dancing with everyone and Arlee was standing next to Mr Raditch and some other teacher chaperon watching everything unfold. A galleria of lasting memories that she couldn't make cause, a lack of knowledge on basic communication with anyone who wasn't Emma or one of the less snipeish Grade 8's prevented her from getting the experience.

But that was the exact issue of it all. What was the benefit of it anyway? Slow dancing.

Someone to hold hands with in-between two periods for thirty minutes and an emblem of something to pridefully talk about? A boyfriend?

Maybe she was simply just overanalysing something that didn't need that much attention to detail. 

Arlee's mismatched thoughts were yielded instantaneously when the harsh footsteps of Terri McGregor's holographic silver high heels came clicking at full force in her pathway. With her peony complexion now drained to a yellowish pale sheen, she rapidly backed away from Spinner and didn't look back. Ashley abandoned Jimmy to go check on her, and Paige didn't move a muscle till Spinner was completly alone and clueless as to what any of that was about.

"I told Terri not to drink that much." Paige's doleful tone cut through the music.

After seeing Terri leave with her hand shielded over her mouth and shock horror envelop her face whole, Arlee's abhorrent instinct to eavesdrop kicked into full throttle. Her helpful tactic in achieving that  being trudging around the outer circumstance of the dance floor and pretending she had a pacing problem. "—But she's just a stickler for not listening, going beyond her limits.

"So, did you save me that dance?" Her hand bristly ran against his arm with a strenuous grin.

There were about fifty million ways that encounter should've gone, and all signs pointed to the same answer. Yes, Yes, a million times yes.

"I, uhm....didn't."

Paige's smile fell flat in record time.

"I totally forgot you asked, and I asked Arlee to dance after the first song instead."

And suddenly, so did Arlee's entire surroundings too.

"What?"

"Her?" Paige exclaimed simultaneously, taking a mighty step back from him.

"Yeah, promised." He was bluntly quick to explain away, his eye contact drifting. "Sorry."

Paige moved closer to Spinner once more like the mere connection of her icy gaze would snap him out of whatever trance that the blue stage lights had put him under. "Spin, she's like...a Grade 7."

Arlee didn't know what was happening. But she could only hope that it didn't end in her being brutally annihilated and left marred and maimed right in the middle of the dance floor by Paige's seething glare.

That was it. She was eternally doomed. Marked by whatever treachery target cool girls put on people who crossed their backs.

"Maybe next time?" Spinner shrugged. Paige look between both him and Arlee with a scoff, rolled her eyes in disbelief over being shot down, and walked away scornfully.

When she'd fully vacated the little darkened corner of the dance floor they'd been idling in, Arlee shot her attention straight to Spinner with an immeasurable sense of perplexity and a high need for more then a couple plausible explanations about why he'd gone with the play hard to get approach with Paige. "She's gonna claw my eyes out with her acrylic nails, why did you do that?"

Spinner's hand fell behind his neck, a puff expelling from his lips. "I caved, okay?"

Her brow immediately quirked as he started to walk towards a more open area of the gym. A couple of kids had started to stream out in twos bound with the person who they'd no doubtfully nervously asked to accompany them. "You...caved?"

Spinner Mason caving about anything was only a suprise to Arlee because she'd mostly always seen him as someone who basked in an eternal sense of hubris over everything that he chose to do or partake in. Granted, none of those things had ever involved girls and relationships, but, she'd always thought he'd be the last person to clam up.

"Yeah, caved." He repeated. "Didn't really know how to, you know, walk away....say I wasn't feeling it."

Neither one of them made the move to place a hand on top the others shoulders, which was pretty awkward considering the fact that there were people actively dancing around them to avoid stumbling atop their already uncoordinated feet. It was a trivial game, really. Seeing who would bite the bullet first and actually do what they were supposed to be doing...dancing.

Arlee folded her arms and stepped forward, closing the gap between them. "So instead, you resigned me to eternal Paige Michealchck wrath because you didn't know how to say no to her offer to dance with you?"

In attempt to try and relinquish her string of unwarranted queries, Spinner took her hand once her arms had fallen back down to her side. Her reaction changed at that. Especially when those carnivorous swarm of egregious butterflies that she'd sworn she had killed within the pit of her stomach ages ago came back in full force. All of this felt rushed. No, it was rushed.

She felt a little flush and the hardwood floor beneath her feet was caving in on itself. Spinner didn't seem to be suffering from any signs of chronic on-set awkwardness though. "Not really, just not really into her like that...I guess. You ask too many questions."

Arlee's hands went a little limp on his shoulder once they managed to fall into step. They took it in a 1-2-1 kind of rhythm along with the languid murmur of a slow song that was still playing from the loud speaker. "Well, you're just a really questionable person. Sorry."

"Gee, thanks Federina." He took her hand off his shoulder and, to Arlee's protests initially, prompted her to let him twirl her around because the other two kids right next to them had done the exact same thing.

She gave in and let him only for posterity, before she reeled herself back in again. In the moment, Arlee had caught Emma stare their way whilst her and Sean were still dancing and gave her a look, to which Arlee gave her one right back. "So, if you're not into Paige Michealchck, and you're still on the fence about Terri...then who are you into?"

Understandably, Spinner didn't disclose that to Arlee in any calamity. They were friends, acquaintances, not best friends. "None of your business."

Sat glum and aghast on a lone bench, Paige awaited for the lights to return and for the environment to restore back to its former mellowed state. Anything but having to witness   all of her plans unfurl before their eyes due to reasons that she still couldn't pinpoint.

"You okay?"

Her eyes flittered upwards to meet the dimly lit face of Federico, who still was slowly finishing the remnants of soda that lined his plastic cup. "Fabulous."

He cleared his throat in a suave manner, almost as if he were trying to find the motivation that had brought him over in her way in the first place. Conversation. Jimmy had been dragged onto the dance floor by Ashley after he'd gotten into heated argument with Sean over an invite, as per his recounting. And Spinner was somewhere in amongst the small cesspool of kids that had invaded the middle of the gymnasium. In all honesty, Federico was kind of surprised that he hadn't asked Paige after Terri bolted out all flustered and nauseous. "The song ends in 2 minutes."

Great.

Silence reigned at his more than subtle hint. Paige took it as misplaced pity, and Federico immediately blew out a breath and turned to start heading off to his own designated corner, coasting the sidelines idling at everyone with the least bit of glee. It was part of the experience after all, observing your friends slow dance till they were done.

"Wait."

Federico halted in his footing just 3 steps away from the bench. With a prolonged sigh, Paige got up from where she sat and bergrudingly took his hand without waiting for him to offer it.
She chose a spot closest to the protruding flooded blue lights shooting from high above. Everything happened gradually, methodically, and if Federico wasn't so enamoured with trying to not draw himself closer to where Heather Sinclair was so she could see him and by some miracle, like him, then he would've noticed how distant Paige herself was being whilst her hands were bountifully clung to the back of his neck. The space between them just as distant. "Did Spinner say no?"

"To me?" scoffed Paige. She dialled it down a notch when her sternness didn't feel as richeous. "No."

Amused, Federico let a small smirk coyly form on the surface of his features. "Course not, who could say no to Paige Michealchck."

Surprisingly, she didn't have a ghastly jab for his remark. Instead Paige leniently peered over his shoulder and beelined her glance towards someone off to the corner. "Someone else got there first."

Confused, Federico did a quick swoop across the room as they turned in tune with the music, till his eyes landed upon a sight that he earnestly thought he'd never see. Spinner and Arlee, dancing. And not him doing everything in his power to push every one of her buttons till she fell prey to the action he'd been looking for. It was odd and Paige noted and strategically planned out a way to use that to her own eventual gain. "Gotta bug you a little, huh? Your friend making moves on your own little sister. Doesn't that go against some type of unspoken loyalty pack?"

Federico snapped back to reality quickly. Him caring at all would've been weird in itself. "You're saying that like we have the time or the patience to make those."

"True." agreed Paige. "I'd just....keep an eye on that if I were you."

ronnie speaks ! heyyyyy hope y'all liked this chapter <3 sorry for the massive ass gaps with my updates, I've just had a lot on in my personal life recently + i'm geninuly trying to cut down on being chronically online. actually thinking of making it my New Year's resolution for 2024 lmao. what're we thinking ships wise so far? any dislikes/likes?

just a heads up, i got tired halfway through writing ( I'm a little lazy lmao, but I wanted to put at least a good portion of it out first  ) and there's a final part that i still need to write so I will be taking that to put this up like, literally tomorrow or in a couple hours of me writing this. so if this gets deleted and reuploaded that's why :))

this'll probably be my last update for this year considering my rate, so, uhm, happy new year in advance 💥💥🎉🎉🎉