CHAPTER 13
⌗ 𓂃 𖥔༌ ᰷ ﹅new science, old friends﹅ ᰷ 𖥔༌ 𓂃⌗
it was a week after we'd returned home and finney had been adjusting back to home life surprisingly well. dora, his social worker, had been helping us with how we should treat finney and what behaviours from him we could expect. she'd also been working privately with him, giving us debriefs of how he feels generally as she was unable to disclose any specific words or statements due to the strict confidentiality rules.
finney himself had been chirpier than before his kidnapping, his confidence had skyrocketed and was even telling dad and I that he was ready to go back to school soon. I was happy that finney was happy and so were dad and gwen.
the three of us kids were also getting closer with dad. we learnt to fear him a little less and we even took family day trips some weekends. dad made the effort to find someone to cover him at work so he could be there for every one of finney's baseball games and took him to practice, he picked gwen up every saturday morning from susie's house and I finally felt comfortable with leaving the kids at home while I was at track on friday.
speaking of track, I had a track meet coming up the next wednesday after school and coach russo had been pushing us all harder to run faster. dad had vowed to be there to see me run my first track meet. I'd been chosen to run the 100m sprint — my specialty — with katy. vance had also been talking non-stop about how excited he was for us.
during practices, imani had been completely airing me the whole time. she and cameron had also been trying to freeze me out of the friend group, but everyone else refused to take sides and even tried to get us to rejoin friends. everytime I tried to talk to her, she would turn away from me or stalk off angrily. it hurt knowing one of my best friends was mad at me and I couldn't do anything about it without pissing her off further. vance had even tried to apologise to cameron and her, but neither of them were having any of it.
I mulled these thoughts over in my head as bruce, vance and I walked to our science classes, ignoring the frequent glances of fear from bruce to vance.
"you ok? you're real quiet. is everything with your dad still ok?" bruce asked me with a concerned look on his face.
"yeah, everything with dad's fine! I'm just thinking about imani..." I replied.
bruce slung an arm around my shoulder. I felt vance's grip on my hand tighten at his action and I squeezed briefly in response to tell him it was ok.
"I'm sure imani will come around." he said confidently before shrinking away from me in fear. "sorry..."
I looked up at vance in confusion to find the meanest glare on his face directed at bruce.
"vance! he was just being friendly." I scolded him.
"whatever. can you wait here a sec? I gotta grab something from my locker." he walked over to his locker and span the code.
"your boyfriend scares the crap outta me." bruce said, tucking his hands in his pockets.
"i'm sorry about him, he can get protective." I explained.
"didn't he hospitalise a guy for looking at you?" he asked.
"what?? when?"
"dunno, rumours have been circulating."
"well that's bullshit." I stated.
"no it isn't. and he wasn't hospitalised, just roughed up a little." I sighed at his response.
"to be honest, I was wearing quite a revealing top." I said.
"so?? you can wear whatever you want! I can fight." I sighed again as bruce laughed at vance's logic.
"don't encourage him," I said, trying to hold back my smile.
we reached 6S and said goodbye to bruce. walking into the classroom, we noticed there was all new tables and chairs. instead of the normal folding tables with plastic chairs, there were high, wooden desks with matching high stools, the seats made of green plastic. the desks could fit two people on there and were placed in a way that lined the side and back walls, all facing inward, and some filled the middle in rows. between some desks were narrow cabinet-like structures which held plastic drawers and some had sinks on them. those without the sinks held small gas taps facing the desks.
"what the fuck is this?" vance asked under his breath.
"ok, try and sit how you were before. y/n and vance, you were sat in that back corner, cheyenne and taylor, you were over here..." our teacher began directing us to roughly where our seats would've been before they were replaced.
vance and I took out seat at the back table, climbing awkwardly onto the high stools and struggling to pull ourselves towards the desk. my back was uncomfortably slouched as I had no backrest to lean back on while vance squirmed on the smooth plastic to try and get comfortable. once he found his position, he began to fiddle with the gas taps, turning the knobs and waving his fingers over the hole where the gas came out of to feel the rush.
"hopper. leave the gas taps alone, turn it off." miss came over and turned the tap off while giving him a stern glare.
"right! let's continue where we left off last lesson..."
***
"vance, stop pushing back on your stool or you're gonna fall." beside me, vance pushed his stool back, twisting it on one leg sometimes and other times trying to see how far back it would go. I watched his grip on the table anxiously, aware that any second he could fall.
"it's fine. look!" he grinned stupidly as he twisted it back on its very back leg, the stool precariously balanced on the smooth floor.
"brilliant, now sit properly." I said, pulling his sleeve slightly.
"just wait. shit!" vance's grip on the smooth wood slipped and the chair toppled back and sideways, sending vance sprawling on the ground. I gasped and my hands flew to my mouth.
"hopper!" our teacher hurried over to his groaning figure on the floor.
"I think I broke my back..." he croaked out. crouched beside him, miss let out a sigh. "is this heaven?..."
"y/n, take him to nurse o'hare. and take both your stuffs." miss said, trying to help vance off of the floor. I packed up mine and vance's things and took vance by the arm to lead him to the nurse's.
"I think this would be better," he flung his arm around me as we walked, a smug smile on his face. "for my support!"
"you and I both know I couldn't support your body weight if I tried," I scoffed.
"oh really?"
"vance!" I called out, almost collapsing under vance's weight as he stopped walking to lean all of his body mass on me. "walk normally- you prick."
"rude!" vance exclaimed, standing up straight and stalking off. I laughed at his over-dramatic-ness.
"vance! I didn't mean it, come back!" I jogged after him, laughing as he purposefully sped up his walk.
***
"I think the moral of the story is don't lean on your chair, mr hopper," nurse o'hare sat before us in her spinny-wheely-chair with a knowing smirk.
"ok, nurse." vance nodded with fake solemnity.
"you can both stay here until the end of class, there's only fifteen minutes left," she said with a smile and a wink before rolling herself back over to desk.
I turned to vance with an overly-sweet smile.
"what did I say?" I put on the most innocent voice I could muster.
"shut it." vance grumbled.
"so... was I right?" I placed my head on vance's shoulder, my overly-sweet voice and smile still plastered.
"I said to shut it if you know what's fucking good for you." vance said, but I didn't miss the adoring look he gave down to me as he took in the sight of my head resting in his shoulder. "this is a good view."
"oh really?" I smiled.
"oh, really." he nodded with a smirk.
"your hair's tickling me," I giggled.
"do you want me to tie it up?" he asked.
"no, it's fine," I said, readjusting my head's position on his shoulder and shuffling closer on the bench to him to get more comfortable. he took my hand in his larger one as we waited for the next bell to ring. sparks shot through my hand at his touch and I smiled.
***
"that's so cute!" cheyenne cooed as I retold the events of the nurses office to her and bruce. it was break and we were sat at the bleachers with the rest of the group.
"aww, how cute. you and the psychopath are all cuddling up." imani said from her seat on the row below me with a venomous expression on her face and dripping from her tone.
"oh, so you're speaking to me now?" my voice was a little harsher than intended but I was sick of how imani was treating me for vance's actions, even after his attempts at apologies which they'd blown off completely.
"oh, so you're still being a bitch?" imani imitated my words in an even harsher tone.
"look, I'm sorry you're pissed off at me, but both vance and I have tried to apologise and talk to you, but you refuse to hear us out!" I responded angrily.
"guys, let's take a breath..." arlo tried to mediate the interaction.
"shut it." imani pointed at him.
"don't speak to him like that!" I stuck up for my friend.
"or what?" she challenged, standing up. I noticed cameron get wary and try to pull her back down a little bit she shrugged him off with a glare.
"I'm not gonna fight you, imani."
"then explain yourself." she sat back down.
"oh you finally gonna let me? as i've been trying to say to you for the past few days, I'm sorry that vance beat up cameron. it was the complete wrong way to go about things, even with what cameron had said about me. vance gets protective, which you've probably guessed, and thought I was gonna be more upset about it than I was. and I understand you're mad at me for what my boyfriend did, but I can't control his actions! and I'm not saying he's gonna carry on this way, he's said he'll fight less... imani, I hate when we argue. and I hate when you're mad at me. if you'll let him, vance will apologise to cameron and you. if you'll let him..." I trailed off as I scanned imani's face for a response. she stood up again, and I sighed thinking she was gonna walk off.
"stand up then." she said. I quickly stood to my feet. once I had steadied myself on the bleachers, I looked back into her eyes. they were misty and glistening with tears.
"imani..."
"I'm sorry!" she wailed, clutching onto me in a tight hug. "I'm sorry I was a bitch, i've been so stressed out recently."
"why, what's happened?" I rubbed her back soothingly. she pulled away and sat herself beside me. cameron twisted his body and clasped her hand in his while the rest of the group listened in worriedly.
"my parents are getting a divorce..."
"oh, imani!"
"sweetie..."
"babe, it'll be ok."
we all comforted her as she explained what had happened between her parents and apologised endlessly for her slightly irrational behaviour. it was odd seeing imani cry; she'd never shed tears before. never when someone was talking about her behind her back, if they tried to beat her up, if they were openly throwing insults at her. she would never cry. and now she was...
"...and I don't wanna go home anymore." she sobbed.
"you can come back to mine afterwards?" I offered. everyone apart from bruce stared at me, shock evident on their faces. bruce's face, on the other hand, had a big smile plastered on his face.
"y/n... nobody's been to your house since your mom... y'know..." carter muttered.
"I know. things at home weren't great... but it's all fine now. you're all good to come over!" I smiled.
"I haven't been to your house in years!" arlo laughed.
"yeah... my dad was really abusive for a while. he was an alcoholic, but he's better now! he doesn't drink anymore and he's apologised loads. he hasn't hit any of us since finney went missing." I explained. the group was shocked, demanding answers and explanations. "I don't know what else you want me to say! that's it!" I laughed.
the bell rang, indicating the end of break was here. imani wiped her tears away and stood up. as we moved to walk down the bleachers steps, cameron tugged on my sleeve to hold me back.
"you good?" I asked him.
"yeah... I just wanted to say that I'm sorry. I had no right to say what I did about your siblings, I don't know why I did. I was out of line." cameron said.
"you were way out of line. but I'm over it."
"really?"
"really." we shared a smile and I slung my arm around his neck as we walked down the steps.
***
I walked down the hallway between imani and cheyenne with bruce and cameron lagging behind us a little as we headed to our classrooms. it was a wednesday in week 2 which meant double science for 11th graders. I didn't mind as I was sat next to vance and cheyenne was in the class, but without them... i'd go insane. we reached 6S and spotted vance stood outside.
"hey," I greeted him with a smile.
"hey, is everything between you and imani and cameron good now?" he muttered.
"yeah, and I think it's time you apologise." I replied, just as quiet. he sighed and turned to the rest of the group who were stood waiting.
"cameron, imani... I'm sorry. I overreacted." he said.
"you're good. I shouldn't have said what I said about y/n." cameron said. imani nodded along with him.
"great. shall we go in?" vance flicked his head to the door and I nodded, taking his hand as we walked in.
"see, they're so cute!" as I heard cheyenne gush over our relationship, I smiled up to vance who was chuckling to himself.
***
CUTIE BABIES WOOHOO
EVERYONE'S MATES AGAIN YAAY 😭