It's Argent, It's Strife {4}

chapter one

After she finished eating, she sat at her table and stared into space. Pickett barked loudly at her, snapping her out of her reverie, the time glowing on the oven,
"Shit!"

The brunette jumped from her seat and rushed into her room, rapidly changing out of her pyjamas - silently thanking herself for showering the night before - she pulled on a high waisted red plaid skirt, tucking in a black singlet and then pulling on a black cropped sweater that had the words, 'I'll be nicer, if you be smarter' in red stitching on the left breast. She hopped on one foot as she pulled on her converse before she bent down and kissed Pickett's head.

"Bye kiddo" Rory called out before rushing down to her car.

Allison Argent was in a complete daze as she entered the school, the doors flinging open and the girl stumbling. Her two best friends approached her with concerned looks on their faces, although the strawberry blonde was the first to say anything.

"Allison" Lydia greeted,
"Are you okay?"

Allison's chest heaved as she looked between the pair, although then quickly glanced behind her as if she were looking for something.

"Allison" Rory called out to the girl, catching her attention.

Lydia and Rory exchanged a look before the former nodded sternly and stated,
"All right, let's find the boys"

"You're seeing things, aren't you?" Stiles questioned his best friend as the trio of girls approached them.

"How'd you know?" Scott asked in surprise.

"Because it's happening to all three of you" Lydia informed them nonchalantly.

Scott and Stiles whipped around to face them in surprise, Rory smiled slightly before they all headed towards the building. Rory shoved the doors open with a half-satisfied, half-amused smirked on her face,
"Well, well, well, look who's no longer the crazy ones"

"We're not crazy" Allison told her cousin sternly.

"Hallucinating? Sleep paralysis?" Rory listed as she spun around on the spot, coming to a stop with a raised eyebrow,
"Yeah, you guys are fine"

"We did die and come back to life" Scott pointed out with a small shrug,
"That's gotta have some side effects, right?"

"We keep an eye on each other. Okay?" Stiles said as the bell rang above them, his hand gravitating towards Rory's shoulder as he spoke to her,
"And Rory, stop enjoying this so much"

"What?" Rory questioned with an innocent shrug as he and Scott walked past them, the boy sending her a look while she turned to face her cousin and best friend, the former of which was sending her a similar look.

Black strokes of paint flew across the page, joining the grey and white strokes that were already there. The person who was painting was in some sort of trance as the landscape was appearing on the page was being finished with the addition of black iron gates. Beside the painter, were her two best friends, one whose hand was shaking and the other was observing the pair like a hawk.

"Not the steadiest hand for a superb marksman" Lydia pointed out to Allison.

Allison huffed harshly, slamming her paintbrush down, it landing in the pool of red paint causing it to splatter up onto Rory's page and arm, snapping her out of her daze. Although, her eye didn't leave the canvas, why did all the weird things happen to her?

A tearing noise caused her head to snap to the side to see Lydia pulling the page off of Allison's book,
"Start over"

Lydia and Allison glanced over to their unusually silent third counterpart, their eyes widening upon seeing what she had painted.