Mark My Words

31 | Bi-Bros

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The lights overhead shot out, and a flash of lightning illuminated every corner of the room through those foggy tiled windows. Everyone seemed to gasp, breaths held until Maguire ordered everyone to calm down and relocate to the main gymnasium. Rosalie stood from the seat where she was doing leg workouts, and in the dark of the gym, she could make out the outline of Joanna's frizzy hair, and Brynn coming their way with frantic haste. Joanna reached into her pocket as Brynn latched onto her side, hooking her arm through Joanna's.

"I take it storms scare you," Joanna commented dully.

"Yeah, just a little bit," Brynn squeaked.

Joanna's phone lit up the doorway as they walked through, gathering in the corridor outside of the gym where the kickball match was put on hold. The gym door opened, and Rosalie saw the emergency red lights glowing from opposite corners of the gym. It looked eerie, but with all of the commotion, it was hardly terrifying. Excited chatter filled the hallway in a matter of seconds.

Joanna shut off her phone and tugged Rosalie by the arm. "C'mon, let's move," she said, and started towards the locker rooms.

"What? Where are we going?" Brynn asked. They stumbled up the steps to the locker room in a hot mess of not being able to see aside from the emergency lights posted high above their heads.

Joanna tried to shake Brynn's arm off, but Brynn whined and complained until Joanna relented and said, "We—and by we, I mean Rosalie and I—are going on a stakeout."

"We are?" Rosalie said, unimpressed. "For what?"

"Jamie organized a coffee date with Blake, but Blake doesn't know it's a date so I have to throttle him before Jamie shows up," she explained, and before Rosalie could fully process that train of thought, Brynn interrupted.

"Wait—how do you know Adams isn't in practice right now?"

"Because they actually check the fucking weather," Joanna said. "Now shoo! We're on a mission!"

Rosalie dug her heels into the tiles and pulled both Joanna and Brynn to a halt. "Guys—shouldn't we stick around until Maguire calls practice off?" she said, whispering. Their voices carried in the locker room, and the prospect of Maguire's wrath left a cold chill down her spine.

"Jamie's already on his way to the locker rooms. I saw the little shit start running the instant we were in the hallway, so we gotta move," Joanna said.

As much as Rosalie yearned to stay with the team—despite knowing that practice would end in a few minutes—she understood Joanna's concern. She didn't know Blake too well, but with Jamie-Lee's heart on the line... She worried about the consequences of Blake acting like Blake and leading Jamie on. Joanna knew Blake Miles better than her, though, and given the speed at which Joanna changed and pranced on her feet waiting for Rosalie, she knew the scope of the issue here at its full scale.

By the time they finished changing, the lights blinked back on, and the rest of the team started filing into the locker room. Joanna and Rosalie snuck around them and bolted for the cafeteria, their backpacks jostling on their backs. Rosalie produced her umbrella at the door and held it over them as they ran.

"Please tell me you didn't bring the Vespa," Rosalie said, sneakers already soaked from running through puddles.

"The Lieutenant gave me car privileges," she said, shaking the set of keys out in front of her.

They slowed at the rows of cars, sneaking between two in the front row of the parking lot, and emerging at the next aisle. She clicked the key fob and Lieutenant Spencer's vehicle headlights blinked on. Rosalie closed her umbrella and ducked into the passenger's seat, shuddering at the chill in her bones from her soaked-through slacks and sneakers. Once closing the doors, the muffled patter of raindrops encircled the car in their own little bubble of quiet.