Nodus Tollens

LXX.

"A little bit more up...no, no that's too up! Down a bit. Down, down...that's too down! Up! Up! No, no, no not that up! Down! Down, down...okay perfect!"

I took a step back and beamed at the sign that hung above the stage.

"Juliet," James gave me an exceptionally annoyed look from where he stood on the ladder. "This is where it was to begin with."

"Nooo, it was crooked."

"It was not crooked!"

"Yes, it was," I insisted. "You wouldn't know! I have a better view of it then you."

"I have to agree with James," Mason chuckled, climbing down from his own ladder that stood on the other side of the banner I had enlisted both of them to hang for me. "I don't think it was crooked."

"Well, then it's a good thing I don't pay you to think," I looked down at my plastic clipboard I had been clinging to for the past couple of hours.

"Juliet, unless there's something you would like to tell us," Mason crossed his arms across his chest. "You aren't paying us at all."

"Yeah, you're completely taking advantage of the fact that coach handed us over to be your bitches," James said, stepping off the ladder.

"That I cannot deny," I smiled and checked off decorating stage from the long list of things that had to be done before noon. "Be dolls and put those ladders back where you got them will you?"

"You're welcome," James called to my retreating back to which I replied with a simple wave of my hand.

I slowly walked the perimeter of the room making sure every little thing was in place from the chairs lined up in rows to the podiums in the front of the room to the newly decorated stage. A satisfied smile graced my lips.

As soon as the principal had given us the okay to use for the auditorium for our event I had put my girls as well as the football team, whose coach had very generously lent to me, to work. It had taken every day after school for close to a week to set everything up, but the results were definitely worth all the hard labor I had everyone put in.

It was a known fact that the more visually pleasing a place looked, the more money a person was bound to spend, so I wouldn't settle for a room that was less than perfect. The stage looked absolutely brilliant decked out in its fresh back drop, fairy lights, and floral arrangements.

"This place looks amazing," Jade sang, skipping into the room with Additri trailing close behind her. "We did such a good job!"

"You guys didn't do a thing," Rick, one of the football players enlisted to help, said scathingly as he gathered a box of what looked like pretty heavy equipment into his arms before starting toward the door. "You just sat around giving us orders like you were the Queens of Sheba."

"Which would qualify as doing something, no?" Jade asked. "Everyone needs a supervisor."

Jade quickly sidestepped Rick who attempted to knock into her with his shoulder on his way by.

"We appreciate all your help, Rick," Additri smiled, running a hand down his arm. "We couldn't possibly have done it without you. Any of guys."

"Anytime, cutie," he smiled, softening quite a bit for someone who was so irritated just seconds ago.

I watched him walk out before raising my eyebrows at Additri.