they'll say that i was clever;

@alcxandersays

Haphazardly juggling his Trig textbook, two notebooks, and his trumpet case, Ben experienced an intense case of déjà vu. It was like a throwback to freshman year, when everyone stuffed the shit out of their backpacks and always had two to three books in their hands—just in case. Though Ben’s current clumsy display was less an example of overpreparedness and more a lesson in totally fucking up what day of the week it was. Not only showing up to the wrong class first period, but forgetting about orchestra rehearsal, his meeting with the guidance counselor, and a phone interview with BU later that afternoon. Ben was actually the antithesis of overprepared. Tucking his textbook under his arm, he did his best to swing his backpack around to stuff his notebooks into the mess of worksheets and spare pens, only to knock directly into another body as his head was momentarily ducked. His steps unexpectedly misdirected, his grip on the bottom of his backpack slipped and the strap slid down his shoulder to the crook of his elbow, the zipper wide open and allowing an avalanche of shit to slip out.

“Ah, shit,” Ben swore, crouching and dropping everything else to the ground as he righted his bag, looking across the mess with narrowed, exasperated eyes. His gaze caught on the shoes of the person he walked into, then flicked up to the guy’s face: Alex Spencer. It was a relief in that Ben figured he was one of the people in the school who wasn’t already on Ben’s case about some bullshit. “Sorry about that, man. Just one of those fuckin’ days, you know?” Ben nodded at the calculator that skidded Alex’s way, just out of Ben’s reach, as he carelessly tossed a pack of charcoals for his shitty Drawing class back into his bag. Current Ben wanted to strangle beginning-of-the-year Ben for choosing it over napping his afternoons away as a library volunteer. “You mind kicking that my way?”

“Fuck, there are quicker ways to assassinate somebody, you know,” Alex noted aloud, reacting out of an impulse to the fact that he’d almost had his head taken off by Ben’s backpack and then he’d almost been knocked over by the male moments later. The kid was a mess but he’d always been kinda questionably stable, Alexander thought.

Alexander was recognizably amused by Ben’s appearance, despite the fact that he looked a little worse for wear upon his arrival. “Well if it isn’t Judas fuckin’ Iscariot himself,” he teased facetiously, “No harm no, foul. What’s up, man?” he asked casually as he picked up the calculator and tossed it to Ben. “Yeah- one of those weeks for me, I feel you,” he assured him with a casual chuckle chasing his words. “I heard you’re in the doghouse with Prescott, welcome to the club,” he mused as he folded his arms across his chest, “She’s been up my ass since I got back,” oh, he had not missed Gwen Prescott while he had been away, studying abroad, he hadn’t even thought about her once. “What did you do? Tell her she looked fat in her skirt?” 

Despite what pristine vision some underprivileged kids had of them, Eric, like Alex, and any other teen with a dowry to their name knew just how much worse things could actually be. It might not have been normal fall-backs like an F on a Spanish exam, or not enough money in the account to pay for those concert tickets you wanted, but for Eric, there was always a much worse option. Especially when he was wrapped up in the likes of Spencer and his chaotic antics. Never a dull moment, the saying went. Yeah, well, whoever invented that phrase had no idea.

Eric gave a side-nod, teeth grit and eyes glancing away as if to say; fair enough. Alex was made up of glossy duck feathers, Eric swore because everything that seemed to come at him only rolled off him like he was untouchable. Must have been nice, Eric found himself wondering a hundred times a day. “Has yours?” He snorted, folding thick arms in amusement at the question before shaking his head. “I’m paired with Fredrick, your mini hustler.” A BBC brawler, in other words, so not a terrible arrangement Eric had found. At least it was one less thing Eric had to keep a secret about. 

Listening to the threat, Eric remained stoic but accepted the fate of whoever was under Alex’s tyranny this week. “Your dorm mate?” He questioned, “I think you’ll be fine. The staff seem pretty involved in getting the new kids settled in, there’s no need to keep their eyes on you. Besides, the blackout’s old news and the new season starts up in like, a week.”

“If he had the balls to actually talk to me, I’m sure it’d be the next thing on his to-do list,” he mused, unimpressed by the idea even if it was mostly in jest. “Oh fuck me,” he enthused, “That’s a fuckin’ match made in heaven, what kind of an asshole let that happen? Probably the same one that put Gwen and Louisa together- the accommodation admin is a madman,” he thought about it for a few seconds, “If he doesn’t beat you to death in your sleep for snoring too loudly, this could actually be a pretty sweet set up,” he noted, “Just make sure you don’t get caught up in his bullshit if he flips his lid on anybody- otherwise you’ll end up traumatized like Ben over the whole Danger Damo incident,” Alexander hadn’t been there for Damian’s outburst, he’d still be on exchange. He’d heard about it though, oh had he heard about it. Every gory detail. Not from Damian himself, of course. His cousin had remained largely silent on the matter, embarrassed or something like that.

“Good,” he was pleased to hear that the blackout was old news, “I think Ella’s about one extra mention away from a full blow mental breakdown- I told her not to give a shit, I don’t know if she listened,” he shrugged, “If she knew what people say behind her back in the locker room, she’d have more to worry about than what people say to her face,” he laughed at the fact, “God, girls are so fucking dramatic,” he complained, despite the fact that his exaggerations were arguably more dramatic than anybody else’s. “So, what’s new news then? I’m bored,” he announced, perhaps another party was in order, another occasion for the students of Broadripple to humiliate themselves and conjure a fresh onslaught of cheap gossip for everybody else to buzz about.

“Trust me,” Eric repeated with an up-beat turn to his voice, “I’ll take my chances. Can’t be worse than when you dislocated my shoulder, a black eye sounds like a dream.” An accident, of course. The guys played rough and shit happened sometimes, Eric hadn’t held it against Alex. Or he’d tried not to, he only did a little bit when the aching did what aching does and no painkillers seemed to help. Now, though, he barely thought about it.

He also approached his friend regardless of the way Alex’s shoulders grew taut with yet another blow to the hockey ball, scoring something perfect, despite the fact Eric wasn’t there to block it. “Shitty day?” He asked lightly, squinting in the sun. The dorm changes weren’t great, he’d admit, but he wasn’t overly aware of much that could have been bugging Alex either. Since that last Barn Party, Eric figured most of the guys were just trying to keep low profiles. Not Alex, though, never Alex.

“Never say never, Hendo, it could always be worse,” Alexander mused philosophically, flipping the hockey stick skilfully in the palm of his hand as he did so. He never did take responsibility for Eric’s shoulder, he’d blamed it on the teenager’s long limbs. Eric had a good few inches on Alex, much like Damian did and though he never admitted to it out loud, he didn’t like it much. Instead of expressing that, however, he blamed weak joints for Eric’s injuries and made his height out to be somewhat of a curse. 

“Nah,” he dismissed the claim casually, “I don’t believe in shitty days, just shitty people fucking with good ones,” he corrected, it was a little more positively angled than his previous statement and the male was flip-flopping between optimistic and cynical as quickly as he was firing hockey balls into the net. “What about you? Your roommate try to suck your dick yet?” he spoke off the cuff without truly putting any thought into what he was saying, simply speaking in vulgarities for the sake of doing so, “Wait- who are you rooming with again? I don’t think I even saw- it’s a fuckin’ full-time job trying to build an immunity against fa-” he stopped himself, reminded that he was trying his darn best not to use the f-word anymore, “Loser disease,” he opted for instead, using his hockey stick to childishly stab at a divot in the ground. “-He’s a total narc but I think I’ve made my stance pretty clear and if even thinks about tattling on me, I’ll pull him inside out,” he had made his decision on his dorky roommate and that was that.

“It’s a good one.” Ella couldn’t help feeling proud. She’d found the word in one of the books she was reading and highlighted it so she would remember to use it more. All of her books were like that–dog eared, marked by pens, pencils, highlighters, and sticky notes. A good book was infinitely more informative than any textbook in her experience. “Dude, we should watch it sometime,” Ella replied eagerly. Perhaps a bit too eagerly. She looked away and forced the smile off her face, even lifting her shoulders in a way she hoped looked nonchalant. “If you’re not too busy. I know your schedule is probably super full of training for Team USA,” she nodded towards the hockey stick with a grin.

“For real?” Ella asked. She’d never so much as swung a baseball bat, much less a hockey stick, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t eager to try. “Sure. Sounds fun.” She took the stick from him, turning to mirror his position. She took a mock swing, trying to imitate how she’d seen him do it moments before. “What’s your technique, Captian?”

“Cool,” Ella replied with a nod. She felt like she should be relieved. At least Alex didn’t have to deal with anything bad. But people were still talking and that was still an annoyance. She briefly wondered if Nico heard about it. Even more, she was curious if he’d said anything to Alexander about it. She hoped not. That just seemed like it would make things even messier than they already were. “Maybe you’re in the wrong business then,” Ella said, lifting up the hockey-stick. “I think architecture would be a career path that is very suited to your talents.” She wished she could have seent the spetcacle of it. Still, she couldn’t shake the thought that it was pretty shitty to lock someone out of their room.  “Think it hurt their feelings?” Ella asked. “Like as funny as the concept of it is,” at least in regards to giving the school staff a hard time.“It kinda depends on the person, right?” She wasn’t even sure who his roommate was. If it was someone like Dylan…it was definitely more funny. Even if it were Damian she could at least get a laugh out of it. They were guys who could handle that sort of thing, brush it off. But someone else? That could be really hurtful.

“Dude,” he repeated playfully matching her tone, infinitely entertained by the way she’d chosen to address him on this particular occasion, “We should, I’m in,” he agreed more sincerely this time, no longer mocking her but accepting the invitation humbly. “Like a hang out in the common room and fight for the TV type screening or a laptop and private blankets screening?” there was a monumental difference between the two in Alexander’s opinion and he was interested to know what she envisioned.

“Watch the ball, not the net,” he advised, “That’s a rookie mistake- people watch the spot they want to hit the ball, not where the ball actually is and by the time they take a swing at it, they’re hitting the air and the ball isn’t going anywhere,” there was something like a metaphor for life in there somewhere, he was sure of it. People like Alex watched the ball, not the net, he took each day one at a time and though he expected success for himself later in life he wasn’t focused on the future, he was focused on the present, second by second. 

He furrowed his brow slightly at Ella’s question, attempting to decipher whether she was being genuine or facetious about hurting his new roommate’s feelings. “I think it probably pissed him off for about two seconds and then he got over it,” he wasn’t sure if that was the case, it wasn’t as if he had bothered to actually ask Jace how he felt about their new accommodation and it wasn’t as if he ever would either. “Some people are oversensitive,” she more Ella went on about it, the more he got the sense that perhaps she was one of them or was more empathetic toward them than Alexander was at the very least, “- if nothing bad ever happens to you, you never learn how to deal with it when shit really goes downhill,” he spoke as if he was doing Jace a favor by making life difficult for them. Alexander had learned early on in life just how downhill things could go and how quickly they could go that way, he was still dealing with the demons that plagued his family history, jealousy, and spite but he liked to think that he’d developed an iron exterior as a result, something he could be proud of if nothing else.

for now, libby had decided to really play into the mysterious new girl thing. even a little bit of a girl next door vibe with a no-make-up make up look. innocently getting to know the students around her and deciding whose friendship would protect her. she paused when she walked by someone on one of the fields, observing for a moment. if her own experience and a million high school movies had taught her anything it was that jocks were popular. and this guy seemed kind of jock-like. well, he was practising a sport in his free time and was attractive, that was enough to convince libby he was as close to a jock as broadripple had. but before she could decide what to do, he saw her. corners of her lips pulled up into small smile, “ well, if you’re any good with that stick i think i should be fine, ” she retorted, teasing tone to her voice. from what little she’d observed, he was good, and she wasn’t that close. she didn’t feel like she was at risk of a hockey ball to the face. unless he was some psycho, which honestly would be just her luck. “ isn’t hockey supposed to be a team sport? ” she questioned, same friendly teasing to her voice. “ where are your teammates? ” a polite, casual way of asking why the hell he was out here alone. was he just blowing off some steam or were people avoiding him? libby needed to know.

Alexander was rather amused by the comment as it passed Libby’s lips, though he was more focused on the fact that had he absolutely no idea who the fuck this girl was. With a rack like that, he was certain beyond a reasonable doubt that he would have learned her name if he’d ever been told it, thus he deduced, she was new or visiting at the very least, “I’m good with my  hands,” he promised her, giving the stick a skilfull flick in his hand to demonstrate, “- can’t account for the stick though- wind direction, pull of gravity,” he suggested facetiously, he could account for all of those things, in fact, and knew perfectly well that he wouldn’t risk knocking the front teeth out of another student unless they really deserved it. He was already on thin ice with the faculty for an abundance of reasons without adding aggravated assault to his list of missteps. “Can’t always rally the troops when you need ‘em, especially not after a big weekend,” he admitted with a casual shrug of his shoulders, “I guess I’m just more dedicated to self-improvement than the average hockey player,” he suggested in addition, a little compliment to his own resolve that he most certainly hadn’t earned. “What about you? No friends?” he asked, raising an eyebrow, it was equally as strange that she was wandering the campus alone, he decided. They were both in an odd position. 

alcxandersays·:

“Not if you’re still planning on letting me shave your head,” he mused in response, smiling as she teased him so easily. They fell into a rhythm without much prompting at all, it seemed. Rarely taking each other seriously but learning things about one another at a steady pace all the same. It intrigued him, worried him slightly.

“The ones that matter,” he tacked onto the end of her sentence as if the only people that mattered in the world were the people that found him attractive. Maybe he did think that was true. “Hey, sun still up,” he repeated himself, pointing at the sky above them, “Still time,” he added, a stripped-down, more caveman-esque version of his previous statement. She grinned boyishly at the bump to the shoulder, glad that she’d taken his words lightly and with humor, instead of sourly like a lot of the girls did. With good reason, of course, not that Alex would ever admit that. 

“Since?” he asked before he’d actually taken an adequate amount of time to digest what’d she’d said and figure out what she was eluding to. He nodded his head in understanding a moment later, however, once the penny had dropped, “People talk, let them,” he announced dismissively, “Whether you want ‘em to or not, they will, so pretend you’re in control and say- yeah, I don’t care, go for it,” he advised, though he wasn’t sure whether the rumors were in fact troubling her or not. He knocked a weedy flower off of its stem with the hook of his stick, looking down for a moment before looking back at Ella, “-and you? Sleeping at night alright?” he asked, pretending he wasn’t as interested as he was, “Who are you rooming with these days? Post dorm-pocalypse,” 

“Only if you let me shave yours, oh magnanimous leader,” Ella quipped, offering him a wry smile. She smoothed her hair back, as if doing so could emulate the seamless curve of a bald head. “If that’s the case, I’ll definitely need my nose. I’m hoping for a Natalie Portman in V For Vendetta kind of look and I don’t want to jeopardize that.”

Ella tried not to feel a little proud to be included in the grouping of girls who mattered. As far as she was concerned, ‘not being like the other girls,’ was a pretty lame sentiment. Girls were cool. Not all of them, of course. Some girls were like Gwen Prescott. But most of them were worthy of admiration in their own way. But it wasn’t like Alex meant it in a shitty way, at least in Ella’s point of view. It was just a joke. And being someone who supposedly mattered tempted Ella to hold her tongue. But that felt too easy. It made her too keenly aware that it was getting hard to stop smiling and her cheeks were warmer ( and not because she was getting a sunburn ). So instead she fell back on their banter, “how humble of you,” she mused, tucking one of the balls laying on the grass beneath her toe and rolling it forward and back.

Ella was impressed that Alex could be so completely unbothered by the situation. Then again, stuff like this did tend to be different for boys than girls. Her father had been a few degrees away from calling her a slut, and that didn’t include what other students said behind her back. “You make it sound easy,” Ella laughed but couldn’t mask the momentary lapse in her playful demeanor. “Has anyone said anything to you about it?” she asked, trying not to sound upset. She definitely wasn’t. At all. Just curious. The mention of the shifting room assignments is enough to broaden Ella’s smile again. Di, at least, was a constant. “Like a baby,” she said lightly, “Diana and I escaped Dorm-Doomsday unscathed. How about you? Heard you tried to barricade your door.” 

“Magnanimous,” he repeated, enjoying the way it sounded rolling off of his own tongue as much as he’d enjoyed hearing it from Ella first. “Hell of a word,” he added, in case there was any doubt as to why he was repeating her so promptly. He smiled approvingly at her reference, “God, I need to watch that again- fucking good movie,” he enthused emphatically, it was right up his alley in terms of cinema, in fact.

“It’s all a part of being a magnanimous leader- it’s in the introductory manual and all,” he gushed facetiously, with a shrug of one shoulder in a casual manner. His eyes drifted downward, his attention captivated by the movement of the hockey ball beneath Ella’s shoe. “You want to take a shot?” he offered, holding the stick out for her.

“Nothing important,” he offered and that much was true at least. The BBC boys had joked about it, they’d managed to sling a few vulgarities in Alexander’s direction but they hadn’t said anything particularly life-changing, at least he didn’t think so. “Correction; I did barricade my door,” he informed her with an upward-pointing index finger raised, “So successfully in fact that I was threatened with even more afternoons in detention if I didn’t deconstruct it straight away,” he rolled his eyes, “Apparently my roomie can’t take a joke,” it had not been a joke it had been a blatant attempt to lock his roommate out of their shared space and the supervising staff were well aware of that.

Ella smiled, watching him swing the hockey stick back and forth, blades of grass whipping beneath the force of the motion. He looked good. Not that Ella knew much about hockey other than it was usually played on ice and involved a lot of fistfights. Still, she wouldn’t be opposed to learning more about it. Maybe even attending a game or two. She blushed at his compliment, an eager grin pulling at her lips. But she masked it with a teasing smirk. He was only joking around. It wasn’t like he meant anything by it. “Don’t think I could pull off the Owen Wilson look?” She tapped the tip of her nose playfully. “I’m hurt.”

“Some girls,” Ella admitted. Herself included. As cliche as it was, she’d always had a weak spot for them, alongside cigarettes, overworn converse sneakers, and crooked grins. Ella giggled, folding her arms. “Well, he’s seriously missing out. Without you, I’m sure Team USA is royally screwed,” she said with facetious sincerity. “Me? A pervert? You wish.” Ella bumped his shoulder, although her chest tightened at the thought that he might have caught her staring at him earlier. God, she probably seemed like a massive creep. Especially after the closet incident. But the smirk that quirked at the corner of his mouth dispelled her fears. Seemed like Alex couldn’t even pretend to be serious for long. “Just came to see how you were. We haven’t really talked since, y’know,” she gave a nervous laugh and pushed her hair behind her ear. “I know there’s been a ton of rumors and I just wanted to make sure you were doing okay.” And make sure things between them were okay. But it wasn’t like she could just say that.

“Not if you’re still planning on letting me shave your head,” he mused in response, smiling as she teased him so easily. They fell into a rhythm without much prompting at all, it seemed. Rarely taking each other seriously but learning things about one another at a steady pace all the same. It intrigued him, worried him slightly.

“The ones that matter,” he tacked onto the end of her sentence as if the only people that mattered in the world were the people that found him attractive. Maybe he did think that was true. “Hey, sun still up,” he repeated himself, pointing at the sky above them, “Still time,” he added, a stripped-down, more caveman-esque version of his previous statement. She grinned boyishly at the bump to the shoulder, glad that she’d taken his words lightly and with humor, instead of sourly like a lot of the girls did. With good reason, of course, not that Alex would ever admit that. 

“Since?” he asked before he’d actually taken an adequate amount of time to digest what’d she’d said and figure out what she was eluding to. He nodded his head in understanding a moment later, however, once the penny had dropped, “People talk, let them,” he announced dismissively, “Whether you want ‘em to or not, they will, so pretend you’re in control and say- yeah, I don’t care, go for it,” he advised, though he wasn’t sure whether the rumors were in fact troubling her or not. He knocked a weedy flower off of its stem with the hook of his stick, looking down for a moment before looking back at Ella, “-and you? Sleeping at night alright?” he asked, pretending he wasn’t as interested as he was, “Who are you rooming with these days? Post dorm-pocalypse,” 

One eyebrow lifted at the comment, but it actually managed to pull a slight smirk out of her. She did her best to wipe it away as quickly as possibly, not wanting to feed any kind of ego in the slightest. “Surprising, I know. I happened to find my daylight ring…” She lifted her hand and flashed a campy, way too big ring that she’d found on a mall trip when she’d last been home. “…and decided that it would be fun to come out of my coffin for the day.” To prove her point, she went as far to let her lips pull back just slightly to show off her front teeth, not nearly sharp enough, but she would never go so far as to actually sharpen her teeth or wear fake fangs. Still, it was fun enough to play along. Her arms folded across her chest, however, eyebrow lifting a bit more. “Elevator eyes? Really?”

She hated the way that she winced slightly at his words, teeth biting down hard on the edge of her tongue in an attempt to keep any kind of comment coming out of her mouth. It hurt, sure, being called out so blatantly, but it wasn’t as if she wasn’t used to it. Being invisible, though… that was better than being a punching bag, like she’d been back at her old school. A slight shrug of her shoulders. “Suppose we all value different things, hmm? Being invisible, is that really the worst thing in the world? Pretty sure invisible people get away with a lot more shit than loudmouths.”

“Impressive-” he mused sarcastically, eyeing the ring that adorned his classmate’s finger, “Does it change color with your mood too? Like when you go from horribly depressed to just kind of tragic?” he teased, taking a shot at her apparently persistent sourness. “-and does it play a role in the curses and shit you put on other girls in our class? Excuse my ignorance, I’m trying to become more acquainted on the nuances of life as a walking freakshow- there just aren’t enough Wiki pages to fully elucidate the whole,” he waved a hand vaguely in the girl’s direction, “-Thing,” he added for lack of a better way to describe her whole persona, general aesthetic included. He chuckled loosely as she showed off her gnashers, evidently lacking the sharpened fangs he’d come to expect but when she called him out so blatantly, his demeanor shifted. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he played the role of innocence unconvincingly with a hand pressed to his chest, “I’m not wearing my glasses, I can barely see you,” he offered as a remedy, which was partially true. He wasn’t wearing his glasses but he rarely did when he was outside the classroom and he could see her just fine.

“I think we can agree on that,” he confirmed, maintaining some semblance of civility before the comment that followed, “I value social integration, for example, and being a contributing member of our community,” not entirely true but it was worth stating for the sake of another jab. “...and you value....Pete Wentz?” he suggested, his tone lifting with a questioning inflection.

“I trust your aim,” Ella called back, shading her eyes to see Alexander more clearly as she crossed the field towards him. It had been a while since she’d seen him. Well, outside of detention at least. Their botched attempt to sneak into the school during the blackout had resulted in some serious backlash from the principle, and although she couldn’t bring herself to regret sneaking out, she was definitely wishing they’d been a little more covert. Would’ve saved her a particularly venomous voicemail from her dad. The words disappointment, disgraceful and immodest had been his words of choice this time around. Not that Ella cared. She definitely didn’t. Like, at all. It wasn’t even like she and Alex were really hooking up in the closet. They’d just tried to duck from the view of one of the sisters and the closet was way, way more cramped than she’d expected. Sure the situation looked bad, but Ella honestly felt like she deserved a little more credit. If she’d really been trying to sleep with him, she would have gone somewhere they wouldn’t get caught. 

“Ooh, tough guy,” Ella teased as he lifted his chin to show the scar underneath. She folded her arms across her chest. She hoped it wasn’t weird that she was here talking to him. It almost felt a little weird, at least with the rumors from the blackout still circulating. Ella Dawson was totally found hooking up with Alexander Spencer in a closet during the blackout. Mostly she just hoped he didn’t feel awkward about it. She’d had fun with him that night, at the party, during the blackout that followed. Amongst the shitshow that was the Nico and Kit situation, he’d been the only…break. “Hows the practice going?” she asked, stepping to the side of him so he could continue to take swings.

“Risky,” he announced as she swung the hockey stick over his shoulder and offered Ella his full attention, wandering gaze included. “I mean, you’re more than welcome to step into the goal, give me a real challenge but if you want my opinion, you look great without a broken nose,” he suggested, lifting the stick from his shoulder and taking a lazy swing at the air, more like a golf put than a shot at goal.

“Chicks dig scars right? I read a peer-reviewed paper about it in Scientific American once,”  he joked, obviously lying through his teeth as he lowered his chin again. He cleared his throat and shrugged his shoulders, “Funnily enough the director of Team USA hasn’t shown up to recruit me yet but the sun’s still out so I figure there’s still some time left this afternoon,” he mused instead of answering the question sincerely. Admittedly, he wasn’t quite sure where he stood with Ella. In part, he was annoyed with her, or annoyed by the rumors that involved her at least. Another part of him, a more reasonable part, knew she couldn’t be blamed, however. It put him in a strange position, cognitive dissonance nibbling away at his prefrontal cortex. “What are you doing out here? Aside from being a total pervert,” he teased, attempting to disguise a cheeky smirk with a sort of serious expression for a moment or so before it broke.

“Perhaps.” Ivy was almost amused as she walked past, not quite paying attention to the boy and his clearly pent-up frustration coming out in the form of, in his own words ‘waving a hockey stick around as hard as he could’. She adjusted the bag that hung loosely on her shoulder, head tilting slightly as she watched him for a moment. The familiar itch under her skin and her brain was screaming at her to simply go on about her business, but she ignored it as she considered his words.

“One man’s pain is another’s pleasure. Don’t make assumptions about what I want to the face.” Ivy offered, tone almost teasing as she considered the shot he was lining up. She knew next to nothing about sports as a general rule, but she was fascinated by the physics of it all. “Did someone hit you on purpose, or was it during one of your…” Her hand waved toward him, the stick, the next, in general. “…games. No offence, but… You do come off as rather punchable.” 

Alexander raised an eyebrow at Ivy’s comments, he could think of at least one other thing he’d like to see her take to the face but he was pretty sure he’d risk suspension if he brought it up and she decided to share his suggestion with a member of the faculty. “Didn’t know you were allowed out in the sun, Lassiter,” he commented dryly as he rested the hockey stick in a leisurely manner over his shoulder, making absolutely no attempt to disguise the way his eyes wandered her form, inspecting her from top to bottom, “Is it a special occasion?” he asked, his tongue darting over the front of his teeth.

“None taken,” she chimed, he wasn’t offended by the comment in the least, “I’ve heard that once or twice before,” he conceded and he’d even been punched in the face once or twice before but he didn’t feel like revealing that to the girl. “I’d rather be punchable than fly under the radar,” he commented, “Invisible,” he added with emphasis on the syllables of the word. In his opinion, Ivy might as well have been invisible. If they weren’t in the same house and if she wasn’t kind of hot, he doubted that he’d even have remembered her name.

When he saw color and movement from the corner of his eye, his focus was no longer exclusively consumed by the dimensions of the net in front of him, “Does the fact that I’m waving a hockey stick around as hard as I can not scream ‘watch out’ to you?” he asked the student lingering nearby, whether they were simply passing through or coming to see him or none of the above. “Trust me, you don’t want one of these to the face,” he expressed, tapping one of the hockey balls he’d lined up lightly with the hook of his stick, “I’m speaking from experience,” he added, tipping his chin to reveal a scar on the underside of it.

Operating under the assumption that everyone was out to get you was, in a sense, not worth it. After all, it seemed to fail her now — she was still caught red handed. Literally, with the tiny burn still making her pointer finger throb. Expression hardens at his first statement, and only gets increasingly annoyed as he continues. “ Not tobacco, actually, but I’m starting a little pyre for my ritual sacrifice. You showed up just in time to go up in smoke. ” She speaks sweetly, words sugar-coated enough to give even the most proactive brusher a toothache; but it’s all fake and they both know it. The bite behind saccharine tone, and the deadpan expression across pale features is more than enough to tell that story. Part of her — the larger part, actually — wants to flick attention back to her journal and ignore him entirely. But the sinking feeling in her stomach reminds her threats of tattling might not exactly be empty, and she falters in steely measure for a split second before it returns. 

“ That’s what happens to snitches, Alexander. Or was the school yard rhyme scheme a little above you. ” She gestures above her head with one hand, making a whooshing sound to add a childish nature to the mocking. “ But … speaking of elementary years, I did also learn that sharing is caring. ” As if it’s out of the kindness of her heart. She reaches into bag, plucking out two packs of cigarettes. Lucky Strikes, with two loose Marlboro Reds tucked inside, and the companions of the Newport currently smoldering in the grass. Usually people had a favorite brand, but she wasn’t in a position to be picky when she had to bat her eyelashes outside of drug stores to convince someone to buy them for her. Too much of a scaredy cat even after six months to use the fake ID that was neatly tucked inside a pair of socks she never wore in a new place. She needed to get better at that. “ Pick your poison. Like a special kind of prisoner’s last meal. ”

“Lucky me. I always thought I’d die of alcohol poisoning or in a really badass car accident, driving like an asshole,” he offered cooly as he brushed his hair back off of his forehead and offered her somewhat of a smile, despite the macabre nature of his words. 

“Does that mean you care about something? Could have had me fooled,” he noted. He didn’t know Diana particularly well but anybody with a pair of eyes could identify a rebel when they saw one. If he had to guess, which he did, he would have said that her cares started and ended by looking like she was permanent en route to see The 1975 in concert and being too cool for school in a general, more abstract sense.

 “Yeah- there’s no whiskey,” he noted, “If I was on death row, there’d be a lot more whiskey- maybe some lobster- no actually, Moreton Bay bugs” he corrected himself with his index finger in the air momentarily, just before he actually accepted the cigarette “It’s an Australian thing, I think it’s still a type of lobster but it’s different, it’s fucking good- can’t get it here, well- probably,” he hadn’t actually checked, “- I assume if you could it would be like, fuckin’- a couple of hundred bucks a plate,” he had no evidence to base this theory on but he was confident about it regardless. With that, he decided to blindly select one of the random cigarettes from his options and tucked it into his mouth, “I let the Lord guide me,” he teased with a smirk behind the butt of the cigarette as he accepted Diana’s lighter and ignited it. “-What about you?” he asked, a call back to their previous discussion, or his at the very least, “What would youd last meal be? Surely more impressive than this- John Wayne Gacy had a bucket of KFC and a pound of strawberries,” he added, just in case she needed inspiration. 

As much as Alexander claimed she’d look ‘cool’ with a shaved head, Ella couldn’t help feeling rocking the no-hair look suited Millie Bobby Brown better than it would ever suit her. She’d had long hair all her life. At this point, cutting it off would be like cutting off her own arms in terms of aesthetic disturbance. Not that it mattered though. They were just joking around. “She is pretty badass,” Ella conceded. She flashed him a grin, flicking the light of the flashlight into his eyes for an instant. “Hey, don’t get too cocky. Don’t celebrities need the most enlightenment? To keep them down to earth and…in the zen or something? She thought she’d seen that on a magazine cover somewhere. How to Find and Stay in Your Zen.

Ella glanced Alexander over. Admittedly he was probably right. As fit as swimming made her, she’d never been the best at heavy-weight exercise. Her strength was in cardio, and even if she could probably handle heaving her own bodyweight around ( at least for a while ) a teenage boy who dwarfed her by several inches was something else entirely. “Sounds good,” she said, moving down the stairs. As much as she didn’t like the idea of leaving him down there alone, especially with the dead bear still lingering in her memory, the potential threat of him being caught, she knew it was logically the best option. Still, she worried. “Alley-oop Superstar?” She asked, words punctuated by incredulous laughter. “I should put that on my resume.” In all honesty, she loved it. Even if it was more than a little ridiculous. “What does that make you? Future Cult Leader/Movie Star Champion?”

She made her way down the steps, crossing the front of the building as she counted off each window. She pointed up for Alexander to see. “The third one from the left is the one I see open the most. It’s probably our best bet.” She approached the window, but as she reached the wall, she found herself hesitating. It was getting chillier out. The wind kept creeping through the fibers of her sweater. Besides, the more she thought about Alexander being out here alone, the darker the woods seemed. Plus there was that creepy legend about Edith Lynch. “Hey,” she said softly, serious for seemingly the first time that evening. “Are you going to be okay out here by yourself?” She glanced over her shoulder, as though Sister Michael would somehow be summoned by the mention of her name alone. “Like obviously I know you can handle yourself,” she clarified, “but like…if stuff gets shitty, I’ll understand if you need to bail,” She clarified. Just because she wouldn’t do it didn’t mean she’d force him to get caught with her.

“Depends on what kind of celebrity I want to be- Have you ever heard Gwenyth Paltrow trying to give advice to people?” he asked with an eyebrow raised. He’d seen it on Instagram once, a video of the actress giving people self-proclaimed expert advice on how to shop organically and eat healthily for something ridiculous like one hundred and forty bucks a week, as if the information was useful to anybody but her elite pals. Alexander could see himself having similarly useless information to share with the world should ever find himself in the limelight but it was unlikely he’d ever see that day, “- I think she thinks that enlightenment comes from the rays of sunshine that radiate from out of her butt,” he added, clearly not a particularly dedicated fan of Gwenyth’s. 

He chuckled at her repetition of his words and smiled, “If you get your butt up there and through a window, you can do whatever you want with it- I’ll even give you a glowing recommendation regarding your B&E skills, signed by Alexander Montgomery Spencer; local celebrity and the president of...whatever I’m gonna call my cult,” he agreed, folding his arms across his chest as Ella shifted again.

“Want me to hold the flashlight while you climb and then toss it up to you?” he suggested, he didn’t want her to break her neck, to be fair and clambering up the side of a building without any form of safety net aside from falling onto Alex himself was arguably a dangerous feat already, without the assistance of any objects she needed to carry with her.

He quirked an eyebrow curiously at her question, taking a moment in silence to assess whether or not she was being sincere. When her expression remained unchanged, he accepted her words as a genuine concern and offered a smile, “I’m gonna be just fine, I’m not on the one playing Spider-Man,” he reminded her, glancing up at the window she’d mentioned moments before. “If stuff gets shitty, it gets shitty. You hide out, I can take the heat, Sister Michael already thinks I’m a shit head anyway- what’s the worst that can happen?” he promised, though there remained a slim chance that he would leg it if there was a sudden code red. 

Ella’s gaze flicked towards him, appraising the honesty of his response. His hasty backpedaling gave her doubts, but it didn’t seem worth it to get into it. Not when they had a much larger project at hand. She cast him a wry smile, lifting the flashlight up like a dumbbell. “Don’t worry, I’ve got swimmer’s arms.” It just didn’t seem worth it to make a ‘thing’ out of it. At least not outside in the middle of the night when he was her only ally in the situation. Better to tease instead. For them, it seemed to come easily enough.

“I might have to count on that,” she giggled, raising the flashlight so the illuminating beam crawled along the stone walls. She was careful to keep it from shining directly into any windows while simultaneously looking for another entrance. Even if she felt certain most of the nuns were asleep in Clary House, she didn’t want to be too risky.

“I’ll consider it,” she mused with a peaked brow. She had to admit there was something about the idea that made her feel giddy, even if they were only joking around. “It would take a lot for me to be willing to shave off my hair.” She ran her fingers through the strands. In all honesty, it was probably her favorite feature, the thing that made her feel the prettiest. “I’d have to make sure it was for a good cause,” she playfully bumped into his shoulder. Besides, if anyone really had to shave her head, it would probably be fitting that Alexander would be the one to do it. “Woah, woah, woah,” Ella put her hands up in mock defense of his accusation. “Let’s not get crazy here. I’m just saying we could have a totally sick documentary about our new lifestyle.” Besides, what could be more interesting than a docuseries about an elite, private boarding school going toe-to-toe with a student-led cult? Honestly, it could be the next season of American Horror Story.

“I mean, I wouldn’t be opposed,” she joked. “After all, you said you were blessed with like, super good genes, right?” Even if he would look completely ridiculous, he’d probably still find some way to make it look good. Alexander seemed like the kind of person who could spin any circumstance to make himself look better, even if that included wearing tights. “But the jeans are nice, too,” she added, almost without thinking. Her cheeks warmed and she turned away from him. Even in the context of their banter, it felt a little too like she’d revealed a secret she didn’t even know she was keeping. Him talking about liking long walks at night under the stars didn’t help either, not when that was exactly what they were doing. Well, almost. It almost made her feel…excited?God, what was wrong with her? 

Ella nodded along. She wasn’t sure how they’d get in from above. Maybe through an entrance to the roof, but that would require scaling the building safely first and relying on the entrance being open. Given what Alexander said about electronic access, the chances of that working felt slim to none. “Okay…” Ella said thoughtfully, shifting her weight onto one leg and folding her arms. The building was lined with windows–definitely too high for her to climb through on her own. Odds were that they were locked, but with the temperatures climbing, she’d seen more people leaving their windows open for the balm of fresh air during the day. If she remembered correctly, the third one from the left. She quickly relayed her plan to Alexander, “so sometimes these windows get left open in the day when it gets too hot. If you give me a boost, I can climb up and see if the window is unlocked? Then I’ll pull you up after me.” She wasn’t entirely sure she could heave him up on her own, but maybe if he used his feet to scrape up the wall while she pulled, it could work. Maybe.

At the mention, he couldn’t help but take the opportunity to check her arms out, though admittedly he was a little put off by the fleeting but pervasive thought of his cousin that intruded at that moment. “Two of ‘em, I can see that,” he noted in jest, attempting to move past the topic as swiftly as he could manage.

“I think you’d look cool,” he decided, though he also happened to think she’d look pretty funny and he was on board for that too. “- and people might start thinking you have superpowers like the weirdo on Stranger Things- Eleven, that’s a good cause, right?” he hadn’t caught up on the latest season yet and he probably wouldn’t admit that he planned on doing so to anybody that asked. “A documentary, a lead role in a book-to-movie adaption- are you sure I need school or enlightenment if I’m going to be this famous?” he questioned playfully, confident that his father would knock him out if he ever even joked about dropping out of school to pursue something as foolish as that. 

“Obviously,” he assured her, weren’t his good genes on display? He thought, opening his arms a little and widening his stance slightly as if to put himself on show for a moment or so. He smiled at the compliment that followed, trying not to seem too chuffed about it, though it was definitely getting to his head. “Just wait until you see my robes,” he mused, dampening the sincerity of the moment with characteristic humor. He couldn’t help himself, he simply couldn’t handle the stirring of emotions, particularly in a one on one situation with a girl.

He raised an eyebrow when Ella suggested pulling him up. Even with her apparent swimmer’s arms, it was going to be a feat...and admittedly, Alex had maybe put on a couple of pounds recently. “Better idea,” he announced, “I can give you the boost but you go up and if you get through, come down to here and open that door for me,” he pointed to the door that they had just established was locked, “That’ll also give me a few extra minutes on guard duty, just in case any alarms go off or any teachers start snooping around, I can distract them,” he added, though it was more about not ripping Ella’s arms from their sockets as Alex tried to haul his chunky ass up the side of the building. Some side-kick he turned out to be.

“Come on, alley-oop superstar,” he encouraged, the more time they spent out in the open, making decisions, the more likely they were to get caught red-handed, “Let’s scout these windows before Sister Michael starts cracking skulls- she can smell mischief, you know? Even in her sleep,” he was joking, of course, but there was some truth to his words. He’d learned the hard way that Sister Michael had a knack for sensing the conception of bad ideas from trouble-making boys and she was particularly ruthless when it came to dealing with them, slinging detentions left, right and center without any semblance of hesitation.

It’s eighty-whatever degrees out, and for some ungodly ( ha ! ) reason, she’s found herself outside. She’s tucked in between a tree and the brick wall it’s nearest to, worn leather satchel sitting next to her. It’s quiet and it’s calm and she appreciates it more than ever with the headache that constantly having to be on brings her. She’s not used to it, she’s used to being able to flop on her bed at home — rather a home, whatever flavor of the month that be — and actually be. Nowadays, she’s stuck in the land of vinyl records and black coffee, when she’s always preferred mp3s and cream, no sugar. Popular opinion digs a pit in her stomach, starting debate that’s not wholly good-natured brings her out of it. It’s a never-ending cycle of change, spinning and spinning and only making her mixed up and dizzy. Is she self loathing, or is she better than everyone? Is she silent, or does she speak her mind? Beyond stereotypes and caricatures, it’s almost impossible for her to find herself. And thus: solitude seems a much more reasonable suggestion. 

Her journal is rested carefully on her knees, the inky black pen scratching words into unlined paper, bound with leather. She writes in cursive chicken scratch, perhaps the only remnant of her that is wholly Diana. There’s lines of poetry and doodles in the margins, pressed flowers between cream toned pages and movie tickets plastered to the front of the book, a makeshift scrapbook of memories. She has at least a dozen tucked away in her suitcase, with the newest edition always tucked under her mattress in a lame attempt at secrecy. Now, however, she isn’t entirely engrossed, blue eyes darting upwards over and over again to make sure no one was coming — nun or teacher becoming the worst of her nightmares, with cigarette smoke tumbling from her lips. Though she’s been lost in la-la-land for the past page of her writings, and it’s only when she hears the pressure of footsteps behind her. Shit. Quickly, cigarette is discarded into the grass, burning her thumbtip in the process, to which an expletive is uttered as she nervously stares up at her new companion. Thankfully — another student. Wide eyed and feeling mighty guilt but not showing it, through squared jaw and steely silence, she waits in challenging them to question her presence so tucked away from the rest of the student body. And the smoldering Newport in the grass. 

“Busted,” Alexander announced with a shit-eating grin decorating his features, his words dripping with self-satisfaction as he folded his arms across his chest, taking a wide stance in front of the underclassmen. “I always wondered where you did your witchcraft, Archibald, is this it?” he asked facetiously, eyebrows raised as if he was awaiting a sincere answer from the blonde. “Needs more effigies, you could probably hang one or two from-” he gestured loosely to the boughs of a tree above them, “Maybe a couple of pentagrams, one there, one there,” he kept pointing around, feeling as if he could have had quite a knack for satanic decorating in another life.

“Kidding,” he offered, waving a hand dismissively. He didn’t have any particular qualms about the existence of Diana Archibald, she wasn’t consistently an asshole and she was Ella’s roomie, that gave her a free pass of sorts, he supposed...something like that anyway. He sniffed at the air lightly, as if he’d noticed the lingering scent of tobacco for the first time, though he’d actually been following it exclusively up until the moment he found Diana and presumed her responsible for it, “Jesus, it smells like an ashtray...you weren’t sinning were you, Diana?” he tried his best to embody his cousin Damian’s abundant levels of killjoy energy as he spoke but his words remained tarnished by his cheeky schoolboy nature. “I won’t sell you out if you share with the class,” he was the class, of course, “What do you say?” he offered with an eyebrow raised as he delivered the ultimatum, not in the mood for any further negotiation beyond that point and hoping that she wouldn’t protest too boisterously.