CHAPTER TWO
[ this is not a drill ]
❝ i'm so glad you're not
'joan of arc'ing it, right now, ❞
"I'M COMING out," Rory announced, having strutted into the diner and up to the corner table where Hartley, Kanan, and Willow resided.
Kanan immediately began choking on his tea, his eyes practically popping out of his head.
"I knew that Paris chick wasn't just a frenemy," Hartley shook her head, completely unfazed by Rory's confession, "ooh, can I be there when you tell Dean?"
"No, god, not that kind of coming out!" Rory stressed, pressing a hand to her forehead.
"She's coming out to society," Willow explained, causing her friends to send her strange looks, "what? Before my parents fell from it, I came out to society too."
Rory let out a sigh of relief, pulling up a fourth chair to the far-too-small table and plopping down in it. There was so little room that her shoulder brushed Kanan's, making his face turn a deep red. Hartley made a mental note to tease him about it later.
"Please explain to me how you got a guy to wear gloves," Rory begged, the desperation on her face clear as day as she looked at Willow like she was her last salvation.
Willow shifted uncomfortably, but nobody paid any mind to it, "I don't know, I had a pretty good friend who volunteered, I guess."
"Ugh, Dean is being so stubborn about this," Rory groaned, leaning a little too far to the right and almost causing Kanan to faint, "I feel bad for him, though. For some reason Mr. Martin thinks he was the one who stole Fernando, and won't stop pestering him about it. So, he's been in a bad mood lately."
Two different barks of laughter echoed in the small diner. One came from Hartley, who at least tried to cover it up, and the other came from Jess, who was only a table down, pouring Miss Patty her coffee. Willow and Kanan gave the two suspicious looks, before looking towards each other.
They were known around town to be a dangerous duo when working together. Kanan's almost superhuman ability to know every scandalous piece of gossip, paired with Willow's 'follow the rules or die' attitude made for an invincible team.
And there newest mission was to figure out what exactly happened to Fernando the Flamingo.
They had noticed how Hartley had been acting different, an alarming thing for the predictable girl, so they had already been tipped off that something had changed. However, they assumed, just like the rest of the town, that Jess 'Bad Boy' Mariano had done it. But now, with the addition of their perfectly synced laughter—that most people wouldn't notice (Kanan and Willow weren't most people)—and Hartley's failed attempt to cover it up, they had a new theory.
Their best friend directly contributed to the murder of Fernando.
"Hello? Willow, are you listening?" Rory questioned, her perfectly shaped eyebrows turning downwards.
"Yeah, of course," Willow nodded, sharing one last fleeting glance at Kanan, before giving her full attention to Rory.
✎
HARTLEY WAS sat in the back of math class drawing a rather unflattering picture of Madame LaMontagne when the fire alarm went off. She had jumped and her pencil shot across the paper, a sickening crack sounding out as the tip of it snapped. With her drawing ruined and her pencil out of commission, she was thoroughly pissed off.
And having to stand out in the town square with the cold Autumn air nipping at her bare arms definitely didn't help.
Willow and Kanan were quick to find her—the lucky bastards had second period psychology together—the former immediately pulling Hartley into a hug.
"I'm so glad you're not 'Joan of Arc'ing it, right now," Willow huffed, pulling away just long enough to grab Hartley's face. They could hear the sirens of the fire truck quickly coming closer.
Hartley swatted her hands away, "what do you mean? Isn't it a false alarm?"
"I don't know, but everyone was saying that the math room caught fire," Willow babbled.
"Actually, one person said that and they were very clear that they weren't sure," Kanan corrected, sending a glare Willow's way. She ignored his clear agitation, reaching down to grab Hartley's hand.
The Morales girl allowed this, knowing physical touch was the only thing that grounded Willow when she went on one of her crazy spiels.
"Well, considering there's no smoke coming from the school, I'd say it's just a drill," Hartley stated.
"This is not a drill!" Kirk's shrill voice shouted over the crowd of students. He was wearing a fireman's outfit—which was comically big on him—and he was violently waving his arms in the air, while the other firemen actually did their job.
Willow let out a breath of relief, "well, if Kirk thinks it's not a drill then everything is definitely okay."
"I would say that's a fair assumption," another voice cut in.
Lane Kim had approached them, Dean Forrester following behind. Their height difference was laughable, though, every height difference was when Dean was in the equation. In truth, the only person there who was even remotely close to him, was Kanan, who came in at a whopping five foot eight—only one inch taller than Hartley.
"Bean," she greeted with a glare, causing the boy to scoff.
See, Hartley hadn't been fond of Dean—whom she'd nicknamed 'Bean' because he was built like a string bean— since he threw a hissy fit about Rory not saying 'I love you' back. Of course, Rory was almost completely unaware of their rivalry, thinking quote, 'you two just don't know each other well enough,' end quote.
"Bart," he said back, straightening his posture.
"I hate you," she deadpanned, crossing her arms.
"Same here," Dean retorted, causing Hartley to snort.
"You hate you?"
"You know what I meant,"
"I'm not so sure I do,"
"Cut it out, Rocky and Apollo," Lane scolded, giving them both a look.
"Sorry," Dean mumbled.
"Suck up," Hartley muttered, rolling her eyes.
"You know what, Bartley-"
"Enough, one of you walk away now," Lane ordered, pointing off in a random direction. Dean looked at Hartley expectantly, causing her jaw to drop.
"I was here first!" She whined, looking at her friends for back up.
"Yeah, well you started it," Dean argued.
"They're like children," Willow whispered to Kanan.
"Trust me, I have four younger siblings, they're worse than children."
"Fine!" Hartley threw her hands up in the air, "I'll go."
Although, Hartley had put on an angry front for the group, the second she turned around an amused smile fought its way onto her face. She in no way hated dean, but there was something about the way his eyebrows furrowed, and his lips screwed up when he was mad that brought her an incomprehensible amount of joy.
It then donned on her that she might just be a bitch.
She walked until she made it to the nearby bench, taking a seat so she was facing the 'Welcome to Stars Hallow' sign. She instantly regretted not breaking the rules and sneaking her sketch pad out with her, but 'drop everything and get in a single file line' had been burned (no pun intended) into her brain since her first day of kindergarten.
"Hey, Hart,"
She jumped at the feeling of hands clasping onto her shoulder's from behind, Jess's voice catching her completely off guard. However, as soon as his hands were there they were gone, so he could jump over the bench and sink into the seat beside her.
"Hey, Mariano," she smiled lightly, her lips pressed together. The pair hadn't said a word to each other in the two days since they dumped Fernando's body, creating an air of uncertainty around them.
"What? I tell you my last name and suddenly I'm not 'Jess' anymore?" He queried, quirking a brow.
"Yeah, sounds about right," she nodded.
"Do you find it fun to completely ignore when someone's being sarcastic?" He asked, a lopsided smile pulling at his otherwise expressionless features.
"Incredibly," she confessed, biting her lip.
"So, did your groupies replace you with Rory's friends?" he questioned, nodding over to where Willow and Kanan were trying to subtly sneak glances at her and Jess, while simultaneously holding a conversation with Dean and Lane.
"No, I just can't stand Rory's boyfriend," she admitted, "but don't tell Rory that."
"Rory's got a boyfriend?" Jess inquired, tilting his head ever-so-slightly.
"Why, you interested?" she teased, raising her eyebrows up and down.
"In Rory? Nah," he shook his head.
"Oh, I meant in Dean," she uttered nonchalantly. She expected Jess to splutter out in his own defence, but surprisingly he replied immediately.
"I mean, he's tall but he doesn't have the dark and handsome I look for in a man," he joked, causing a laugh to bubble from Hartley's throat.
"Yeah, he's got the one thing you're missing," she retorted, causing Jess's grin to widen.
"I'm going to ignore that you just called me short, and focus on the fact that you called me handsome," he commented.
She scoffed, "I'm not blind, Jess. In fact, I would consider myself a connoisseur of male beauty."
"Well then, where do I fall on a scale from Dean to Callum?"
"Uh... definitely a Ponyboy," she decided, watching as Jess rolled his eyes.
There was a lull in conversation after that, something neither one wanted. Hartley noted that they now had two things in common: One, they murdered a flamingo together; two, they hated shared silences.
"I was the one who pulled the fire alarm," Jess blurted, and he immediately wished he could take it back at the shocked look that crossed her face.
"Why?" She queried, keeping her voice low so only they could hear.
"I don't know," he shrugged, "seemed like a good idea at the time."
"You're moral compass is a mess," she told him, her tone surprising the boy.
She didn't sound disappointed or upset, she wasn't scolding him or rushing to tell a teacher. She just brushed it off with an insult that she only half meant and she was ready to move on. He thought at first, that maybe, it was because she didn't care. However, after a split second of contemplation, he realized it was because she didn't really expect anything more from him. And he couldn't blame her. After all, during the first real conversation they had ever had, he was in midst of stealing Pierpoe the Garden Gnome.
"The school's clear!" Kirk declared, now waving his arms in the direction of the school, "everyone back inside!"
"Well, talk to you later." She waved, skipping off to meet up with her friends.
He sighed, "see ya."
-
MEG TALKS !
another short one, and i completely hate it. i hope i'm doing a good job of showing hartley's character though, because i have a bad habit of putting too much focus on side characters.
1839 words