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"No one is going anywhere."
The door opens and Fabian, Alfie, and I fall through into Victor's office now that we don't have anything to lean on. We're caught like deer in headlights, staring up at Victor as he looks down at us with a glare. So this probably isn't good.
"What are you three doing there?" he asks harshly.
We scramble to stand, and I'm unable to come up with an explanation. Fabian saves us, though. He reaches forward to grab flowers off of one of the cabinets, throwing them at Alfie. Alfie seems to get what he's playing at (and here I am still clueless) because he grabs my arm and pulls us over to Fabian, saying, "W-we heard you were on a date, and, um..." Fabian pats his guitar. "And we're here to serenade you in the language of love."
Okay...I'm just gonna go with it. Laughing nervously, I elbow Fabian, stammering, "Yes, um... give us a note, Fabian. Or—or something."
Fabian awkwardly plays some notes on his guitar, while we're trying to move to the rhythm. This isn't the worst excuse we've ever come up with, but it's definitely up there. The song we manage to come up with is also horrible—Alfie takes the lead, thank God, with Fabian and I trying to repeat some of the things he's singing flatly.
"Although his is kind of wrinkly," Alfie sings awkwardly, waving his hand around Victor's face, and that's where our song ends.
"Alfred Lewis," Victor states sharply, "this is not a date."
"Oh," Trudy says shortly, hastily leaving the office. I can barely hear quiet sobs coming from her. Uhhh...not sure what to do about that.
"Trudy!" Victor calls.
"Any tips for the band?" Alfie asks. Victor looks back at us and within a second, we run out of the room and down the stairs. "Well, that was, uh..."
"Not our brightest moment," I finish.
Fabian's eyebrows furrow. "What is our brightest moment?"
"Saving the world?" Alfie suggests. "Twice?"
"Maybe," Fabian chuckles lightly. "I'm—I'm going to bed. I've had enough excitement for one night." He says good night to us and goes to his room.
Alfie's about to go to his own room when I grab the back of his shirt, pulling him back. "You're mine right now, Alfred."
"I don't think Jerome would like that very much," Alfie responds.
"The business ed project," I tell him. "I know Jerome roped you into helping him with his side."
He laughs nervously. "You didn't—you didn't say you were okay with me helping him?"
"Oh, is that what he told you?"
"Maybe. I shall neither confirm nor deny."
"You've already confirmed it," I respond with an eye-roll. "But I'll tell you what—you help me get back at Jerome, I'll help you get back into Amber's good graces. You know, for lying to her about fashion school."
Alfie narrows his eyes, but sighs. "Okay, fine. What do you mean get back at Jerome?"
"Be my double-agent, tell me what ideas he comes up with so I can come up with something better."
"I don't know, Ash. I don't want to be the thing that comes between Jashley—"
"Oh, please, this is right out of the Jerome Clarke playbook," I retort. "I'm not asking you to give me your ideas. I'm asking you to maybe give me a hint about what he decides on. Just give me a word. A text. An emoji."
"An emoji," Alfie repeats. "And you'll help me get back into Amber's good graces?"
"I'll try."
"All right. I'm in. But if Jerome finds out and confronts me, I'm going to throw you under the bus."
"I wouldn't expect anything less."
Alfie high-fives me before we go our separate ways for the night.
—
The next morning, before we leave for school, Victor slapped Alfie, Fabian, and I with a list of chores we're to complete as punishment for what we did last night. It's an exhaustive list, one that Alfie reads out loud as the three of us walk into the hallway at school.
"Scrape the ovens, scoop out the drains. It's going to take us over a year to do all this stuff."
"Yeah, well, it's better than Victor getting that bracelet," Fabian says. "I just wish I knew why he wanted it so badly."
We almost run into Amber, who stares at the three of us with a weird expression. "This," she states sharply, "is my angry face. It's also deep-wash exfoliated, but focus on the angry. Now, what happened last night? And don't lie to me."
Fabian briefly stammers over an explanation and says, "Look, it's Victor. He threatened Trudy. He thinks she took the bracelet."
"We didn't want you to panic," Alfie adds.
"Or get in trouble," I say.
Amber keeps the same expression. "FYI, panicky face!"
"No, look, relax," Fabian tells her. "We'll protect you and Trudy."
"Really?" she asks skeptically.
"Yeah."
"Oh, I can't wait to hear your big plan," Amber says. "I take it you have a plan."
"Of course," Alfie says.
"Absolutely," Fabian adds.
"Why wouldn't we?" I ask with a nervous laugh.
Yeah, we don't have a plan. We don't even have a 'pla.'
"Great," Amber says with a smile, walking past us. Alfie, Fabian, and I share a look before going our separate ways again.
—
"Now," Denby starts the day's business ed class, "I hope you've all decided who you'll do your business projects with."
I look over at Jerome, who's sitting with Alfie. He's whispering to him and gives me a thumbs-up when he notices I'm looking. I roll my eyes, looking back to my still-blank page of snack ideas.
Willow raises her hand high. "Amber and I can work together."
"Actually," Amber says from beside me, "I kind of wanted to do this on my own."
"Oh," Willow says, disappointed. "Well, Ashley?"
"Got a partner," I respond without looking up. "He's an idiot, but he's my partner."
"Love you, too, babe," Jerome's voice says.
Willow frowns as I glance at her side of the room, saying, "Mara, then?"
Mara looks up from her own notebook, probably looking at her fruit-and-vegetable bar idea. "Sure," she says slowly. Willow grins, clapping her hands together.
"So, come on then," Denby says. "Let's hear your ideas."
Fabian says with a motion to Joy, "Um, well, we thought we'd do ancient Egyptian food."
"Yeah, it was Fabes' idea," Joy adds, "making Anubis into a brand." I raise an eyebrow, leaning forward to look at her curiously. She mouths to me, 'No offense.' I shrug in response. I am looking forward to seeing what comes of their project though.
"Great," Denby compliments, but her voice is oddly small. "Exotic, mysterious... I like it."
—
In the lounge after class ends, Alfie sits down in front of me, staring with his head on his hand. I glance up at him from writing down the words 'cupcake bar' in my notebook, asking dryly, "Yes, Alfred?"
"So you have something then?" Alfie asks quickly.
"He sent you to spy on me, then?"
"No, no, he would never," Alfie says over-dramatically. I just blink, tilting my head. "Okay, fine, he wants to know what you have."
"Tell me what he has and maybe I'll tell you what I have."
"I don't like this double-agent thing," he says, pointing an accusing finger at me. "I didn't spend four years trying to get you two together only for me to be stuck in the middle—"
"Alfie."
"—and to think of the little junior versions of you two I won't be godfather to if I end up breaking you up and they won't even exist!" Alfie continues. My eyebrows raise at him. That's...a lot of stuff I don't know how to respond to, but admittedly this is kind of funny. "I won't do it. I just won't."
I smile calmly at him. "Tell Jerome my idea is an uber-healthy granola bar but everything is artificially flavored."
"Is that your idea?"
"No, it's Willow's," I say. "I overheard her talking about it to Mara. My idea is way better."
Alfie leans over to see what I have written down, and I try to throw my hand over it so he doesn't see. "Cupcake bar?" he questions, eyebrows furrowed. "Cupcake bar! Chocolate chip cookie bar, ooh!"
"Don't tell Jerome!" I exclaim, grabbing his arm. "And chocolate chip cookie bar—I didn't think of that and I'm stealing it."
"I don't care as long as it happens!"
Joy and Fabian walk in, the former asking as they sit down, "As long as what happens?"
"Nothing," I tell her quickly. "How's the decoding going?"
Fabian sighs, shrugging, but before he can answer, Amber walks in. Joy says, "Hey, Amber, guess who's decoded some more of the message."
"Got another symbol," Fabian adds now that we're all—well, except Patricia—here. He turns his notebook around to show us all of the scribbles, and in the middle is the symbol for pi.
"Hmm, I know that symbol," Alfie says. "We've done it in math. That's the symbol for pi."
"Trust you to remember something called pi," Joy remarks.
"He was so disappointed when he found out it wasn't actually pie," I recall.
"I thought it was pi, too," Fabian agrees, "but look. At the top, there's a crescent moon, sometimes it has a figure of a man inside, either that or a cow." I frown. What does that mean? "And look, it's like two walls and a roof. The shelter from the sky like a house or a barn."
"That's a cow?" Amber asks skeptically. "These people really need to learn how to draw."