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MACS Part 2

Emma ran upstairs as soon as the St. Francis girls returned and followed Betty as she showed them to their locker room. Emma smiled as she heard their reactions to the writing on the board, and Betty looked at her. "Did you do that?" she mouthed, and Emma nodded proudly.

Betty smiled. "Nice, " she mouthed, walking into the locker room to see for herself.

Sunny stepped into the school and followed the rest of her team up to the auditorium for chapel. She sat down with her team and watched as the other teams entered. She saw Emma, and Emma came over and hugged her before leaving to sit somewhere else. Sunny sat next to Olga and the other girls on her team.

Lilly was sitting alone in the pew behind her teammates on her phone when Emma slipped in to sit beside her. "Now you're not alone anymore." Emma said and hugged her. Lilly hugged Emma back.

"Thank you, at least someone cares about me." she joked.

"I got a hold of one of them. It won't take much to let me completely control her." The figure bowed to his king.

"Good job." the king said. "You've finally done something useful with your life. Which one?"

"The one who is aware of everything that happened. Emma. The seer wiped the memories of the others, and with the abilities of one of them, we can freeze the other four easily. They'll never even realize what's going on."

"Excellent. Proceed as planned."

"It's strange; I feel like I've interacted with this girl before."

"You're hallucinating. This girl has never had anything to do with you." the king replied.

Emma felt sadness stirring inside her and bit her lip. She couldn't cry, not now. This was MACS, and besides, it wasn't a big deal. So, someone wasn't talking to her. So what? She's been through worse, right? And she clearly didn't mean anything by it. Emma sighed and leaned against Lilly. Lilly wrapped her arm around her, and Emma closed her eyes. She took a breath and relaxed. Someone was with her. She was okay. Emma felt her sadness fading away quickly.

Later that day, Emma pulled Stella to the side and handed her a friendship bracelet, a pattern Emma had worked on for hours to get perfect.

Stella took it and smiled. "It's so pretty!"

Emma smiled and felt like jumping for joy. She had just won her game against Prior Lake and was very happy about it. And she was glad that Stella liked the bracelet as well.

"Oh my word, it smells like nostalgia!" Katie, the middle hitter on Emma's school's volleyball team and Emma's classmate, randomly said from her position by her locker.

"No, it doesn't," Amy, Katie's best friend, said. "It smells like the taco salad from concessions."

"Do you even know what that word means?" Emma asked. Stella was doubled over, laughing.

"Nostalgia is like... nostalgia!" Katie said. Emma sighed and laughed.

"I love this atmosphere." Stella said.

An hour later, Emma watched as St. Francis played Woodcrest. "Please let them win." Emma whispered as Woodcrest won the first set. Emma stood near the door and cheered for the team as they won the following three sets, except for a short time when she quickly returned to the locker room to write a new message on the board. As soon as the game was over, Emma ran over to Stella. "Great job! You did so well!"

"Thanks," Stella said. "But I was so scared, I think I had an anxiety attack on the bench."

"You did amazing," Emma said. "You're going to do great tomorrow."