When the final bell of the day rang, it was utter mayhem. Everyone burst out of the classrooms, some running straight to their lockers and out the door, or remaining in the halls to group up with their friends. Either way, Naomi had never heard the hallways so noisy. She was among the people who wanted out of the school as quick as possible, and made a beeline for her car.
Usually, she wouldn't need to pick up Momoko because of her photography classes. But since today was Halloween, all afterschool activities were canceled, and Momoko was waiting for Naomi by the school sign. When Naomi pulled up to the school, she honked her horn to catch her sister's attention. Momoko recognized the crappy car and approached it without question. When she slipped inside of the front seat, she buckled her seat belt and Naomi was gone as quickly as she came.
"How was school?" she asked.
"Fine," Momoko answered, which was the stationary response that she always gave her sister.
"Can you elaborate?"
"I don't know, school is school. It wasn't bad, but there's nothing fun about it."
"Yeah, I get it." They drove home without another word said; a comfortable silence. But as soon as Naomi parked her car in the driveway of their house, it was like a switch went off in her sister.
Momoko jumped out of the car and ran up to the front door, waiting impatiently for her sister to catch up with her and unlock the door. When she finally did, Momoko rocketed up the stairs, and Naomi could hear her feet thundering into her bedroom, and the door slam shut. Naomi chuckled to herself, then went into the kitchen.
She set her bag onto one of the barstools, then went to the fridge to look for a snack. She grabbed a bottle of water and washed some strawberries then put them into a bowl. She slipped into the second barstool beside her bag, put her food and drink off to the side, then pulled out her homework. She had a little over two hours until she needed to start getting ready for the party, so she figured that she could finish the little bit of homework that she had to do beforehand.
At 5:47, Naomi put her books back into her backpack, then stood up with her bowl to wash in the sink. As she was rinsing the dish, she heard footsteps running down the stairs and come into the kitchen. Naomi craned her neck to look at the doorway, where Momoko was standing there dressed as Alice from Alice in Wonderland.
"Aw, you look cute," she said, then looked back to the sink.
"I'm thirteen, Nao, I don't want to look cute," she said, and sulked into the barstool.
"Oh, I mean you look really... cool," Naomi corrected herself. "Why are you in your costume already? Are you going trick-or-treating right now?"
"No, I'm just really impatient." Momoko twirled the ends of her hair around her finger. "Nao, can you curl my hair for me? Pretty please?" Momoko asked, clasping her hands together and giving her sister puppy-dog eyes.
Naomi smiled and wiped her hands on the dish towel. "Sure. Go sit at my desk, I'll be there in a second," she told her. Momoko squealed out in joy and hopped off of the stool to retrace her steps back upstairs. Naomi grabbed her backpack, tossing it into the armchair next to the front door, then followed up the stairs.
When she got to her room, Momoko was twirling in Naomi's desk chair, humming loudly. Naomi backtracked into the hallway to fetch her curling iron, then went back to her desk where she plugged in the iron, and set it down to wait for it to heat up. While she waited, she grabbed a comb and began brushing through her sister's soft hair. She pulled the chair to the left of her desk so that Momoko could see herself in the mirror. While Naomi was untangling her already smooth hair, Momoko studied her own face, then her sisters.
"Do you think it's sad that we don't look alike?" she asked.
"We do look alike," Naomi answered, not looking into the mirror as she grabbed the curling iron off the desk and wrapped a piece of Momoko's hair around it.
"Not really."
"Well not all siblings look alike, Momo. We're similar enough to look like sisters."
"Yeah, but I sort of wish that we looked a lot alike."
"Well maybe if I had doll-eyes and lighter hair, we would." Naomi said, brushing through the curls she had just made with her fingers.
"I think you look like mom," Momoko said. They both smiled sadly at the memory of their late mother. "Are you excited for your party?" Momoko asked to change the subject.
"Yeah, I guess."
"Who's throwing it again?"
"Sakura and Ino."
"Oh, yeah," Momoko said and smiled. "I like your friends, they're cool."
"Mhm."
"They're better than your old friends," Momoko said, and tried to turn around to look at her sister. Naomi just moved her head back to looking at the mirror.
"Keep your head still," she told her, and Momoko knew that the topic was going to be dropped.
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Fifteen minutes later, and Momoko's head was full of soft curls. She hopped out of the desk chair to look closer at herself in the mirror, and smiled when she ran her fingers through her hair.
"Thanks, Nao!" she said, and hugged her sister tightly. "Have fun at your party!" she said, then ran out of the room and into her own. Naomi only sighed, and unplugged her curling iron from the outlet. She set it aside to cool, then decided that it was about time that she got into her own costume. It was after 6 o'clock, which meant that she had less than an hour before Naruto came to pick her up.
Naomi opened her closet door, where her red riding hood costume was hanging. She pulled out the hanger, laid the outfit on the bed, and stared at it for a couple of minutes before she sprang into action. She pulled out her makeup and hair tools, and went into the bathroom. She leaned over the bathroom counter, looking into the mirror as applied her makeup, which was light and neutral, then fixed her hair into thick loose curls. She hurried back into her room, knowing that she had spent longer in the bathroom than thought, and slipped into her costume. She ran her fingers over the soft material of her dress. She pulled up her stockings and slipped on her dress, then buckled her mary jane heels and fixed the cape around her shoulders.
Naomi thought that she looked nice, but just to make sure, she knocked on her sister's room for a second opinion. Not that she could do anything about it if there was something wrong, since she only had a few minutes until Naruto would pull into the driveway, but it was better for Naomi to be told that she looked like a potato bag now, than later from someone at the party.
Momoko answered the door a millisecond after Naomi knocked, and smiled cutely when she observed her older sister.
"You look so pretty! She squealed, then tilted her head slightly to the side. "What are you?"
"Little red riding hood," Naomi said defensively. "Can't you tell?"
The doorbell rang, and both girls' eyes widened. Momoko was the first to get down the stairs and open the door, hoping that her friends were finally here and that they would begin trick-or-treating. She was incredibly disappointed when she saw that it was only Naruto at the front door.
"Oh, hi, Naruto," she said.
"Geez, Momoko. It's nice to see you too." The boy chuckled and scratched the back of his head. Naomi came down the stairs shortly after her sister, and smiled when she saw that Naruto was dressed in a pirate costume.
"Hi, Naruto," she said, her smile playing through her words. Naruto returned her expression, and let out a breath when he caught sight of her.
"Hi," he said, and cleared his throat. "You look great. Should we get going?" Naomi nodded, then remembered that she had forgotten her phone in her room.
"Yeah, I just need to get my phone. I'll be right back," she said, and rushed back up the stairs. She did a quick look-over of her room to search for her phone, and spotted it on her bed, tucked under a pillow. She turned it on for a second to see if she had received any missed calls or texts, and felt her heart stop when there was one new notification that had been sent only a minute ago.
It was from an unknown number, and they had sent an image.
With shaky breaths, Naomi swiped right and unlocked her phone to see what the person had sent her. It was a picture of someone posing in front of the bathroom mirror, with a paper taped to their chest. On the paper, they had drawn two circles with dots in the middle of them. Half of their face was cut out of it, but Naomi could tell who it was. One of her ex-boyfriend's idiot friends.
Naomi thought that the picture was the end of it, until to her horror, she saw three littles dots inside of a speech bubble appear in the bottom left corner of the screen. Like an idiot, instead of immediately blocking their number, she waited for what they had to say. She didn't have to wait long, before they had finished typing, and the text popped up below the picture.
Look, Naomi. I dressed up as you for Halloween. A slut.
Naomi took in a shaky breath, and shut off her phone. She wanted to throw it out the window, and hide under bed. But Naruto was waiting for her downstairs, and she wasn't going to let some stupid joke ruin her night. She sucked up every bit of courage she had, and pushed herself downstairs. She had to grip the railing to keep her knees from buckling out underneath her, but Naruto, who was still waiting in the doorway, didn't seem to notice her struggle.
"Momoko's just left with her friends a second ago," Naruto said when Naomi had successfully dismounted from the staircase.
"Oh. Okay," she answered.
Naruto narrowed his eyes at her and scanned her face. Now he knew that something was up. "Are you okay? Your face is kind of flushed."
"Yeah, I'm fine," she said dismissively. "Let's just go."