𝑾𝑰𝑻𝑯 𝒀𝑶𝑼 • 𝐒𝐇𝐀𝐖𝐍 𝐇𝐔𝐍𝐓𝐄𝐑

𝐏𝐈𝐋𝐎𝐓

she rolled her eyes, despite herself she felt her cheeks heat up, before mouthing, 'not gonna happen, hunter'. feeny's lecture was cut short by bornihay's girlish screams for help, dina had him pinned on the table and was trying to stab him.

the class laughed, "well, shakespeare just got a lot more interesting." jodie commented over the laughs of the sixth grade class.

"miss. kincaid, thank you!" feeny said as he held dina back from bornihay. "thank you for that rather.. rigorous interpretation."

"mr. matthews, you do not listen to the ball game in the middle of my class." feeny said.

"mr. feeny, who cares about some guy who killed himself over some dumb girl?"

valerie coughed loudly and jodie made a surprised noise, both girls raising an eyebrow at cory, "n-not that my friends, brooke or jodie would be placed in that female category.." cory shuddered.

"oh, so if the bet was if you don't kill yourself they would kill all of the philadelphia phillies. would you?" jodie asked.

"yes, of course."

"well then, who cares about some kid who killed himself over some game?" valerie questioned.

"that would be a tragedy though wouldn't it?" cory said, putting his hand to his chest, mocking a sarcastic gasp.

jodie sighed, and looked up to feeny "he's a lost cause, feeny."

"the tragedy here mr. matthews is not about a dumb girl, or the boy who kills himself because of her," feeny said to cory. "it's about the all consuming power of love, and the inevitability of its influence on each of our lives." 

then, shawn stood up, catching everyone's attention, he cleared his throat, "mr. feeny, cory, jodie, val and i have an all consuming love for baseball. so shouldn't that be enough reason for us to be allowed to listen to the game in class?"

valerie shook her head at shawn before saying, " i'm not apart of this."

"all have you know brookie, we're always in this together." jodie smiled.

valerie sighed, shaking her head. she had given up arguing with jodie in second grade. jodie was good at getting what she wanted and she knew it, and used it to her advantage when she needed. it was waste of breath to decline the idea.

"are you aware i'm only eleven years old?" cory remarked, ignoring jodie, shawn, and valerie's commentary before.

"are you aware you have detention friday afternoon?" feeny sassed back.

"no, actually, i did not know that."

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"see ya, cory and jo." valerie smiled, as her and shawn walked the opposite direction.

this was regular for the four, they would go to the comic book store together from school then get kicked out of said comic book store for not buying anything.

shawn insisted on walking valerie home before going home himself since it would buy him more time to talk with her alone. shawn swung his arm around valerie's shoulders as they walked beside each other, "so, how was your day, princess valerie?" shawn inquired with a smile.

"i'm not a princess, shawn." she smiled, shaking her head and looking at her shoes.

shawn's smile did not falter, "of course you are." shawn exclaimed, joyfully. "you have a nice house, you have pretty hair, you're really pretty, and you can sing."

valerie smiled wided and looked at shawn, "you think i'm pretty?"

"of course i do." shawn answered. "you're my girl."

valerie began to play with her hair while they continued to walk. while they walked, they talked about a bunch of random things like usual. it was easy to talk about things around each other no matter how stupid or weird they were.

༻✧༺

"i think mine is breathing " jodie said as she poked her so-called 'food' with a spoon. valerie looked at it from beside her, her face twist with disgust.

"mine's got lips," cory said, also prodding at his

"it is breathing" valerie commented, then the two girls made eye-contact and shuddered.

cory and jodie pushed their trays away from them into the middle of the table. shawn chuckled at the disgust on jodie's and cory's face before scooting his chair closer— if that was even possible—to valerie.

"don't worry, val. i'll protect you." shawn said, making jodie scoff.

"oh please, shawn, you saw my dog and used her as a human shield." jodie snorted, leaning over the table on her forearms to look at him. 

shawn blushed, "i wasn't using her as a human shield. i-i just wanted to make sure she got past first so if you dog decided to attack, she'd be safe..."

"nice save, " jodie said, sarcastically.

the four friends turned to see what bornihay's frankstein food looked like, only to see him pull out a nice piece of chocolate cake. 

"hey bag man, rough life being an only child, huh?" shawn asked, sarcastically.

"yeah. tougher life being an orphan, which is what i am as of last night." cory added, making jodie , valerie, and shawn look at him confused.

"what happened?" valerie asked, suddenly feeling slightly uncomfortable.

"i dumped my family and my family dumped me, it was mutual; they're keeping the house."

jodie put her hand on cory's shoulder, and mocked seriousness, "are you okay? do we need to talk about it?" 

"well, we're here for you cory." shawn smiled from beside valerie.

"thanks, you're my new family now," cory beamed. he looked at valerie and gave her a more reassuring smile, which she smiled back at him. her demeanor changing  back to normal.

"hey, how about we go to the game on friday?" cory suggested with a shrug.

"isn't the game sold out?" shawn asked.

"it is, so we go down early. there's always guys with extra tickets." cory explained confidently.

"so is this happening before or after your detention with feeny?" valerie inquired, leaning her head on her hand.

"don't worry about detention. i can handle feeny, feeny loves." cory smirked.

"feeny hates you." shawn immediately clarified, the girls agreed.

"well, it's one of the two. we'll see who's right." cory shrugged, stood up and went to feeny's table.

"mr. feeny, may i sit down?" cory said, smiling innocently.

"i rather you didn't."

"hates me!"

"told ya so!"

༻✧༺