Cal’s jaw simply dropped as he watched Sasha battling it out with one of the other dude’s in their joint class, he truly hadn’t expected it to erupt into an actual fight between them, after most of the group had been casually sparring with one another. The moment she looked to him for backup, he launched into a defensive stance, chest puffed out, shoulders squared and chin slightly tipped, an attempt to embody a tough guy stereotype as best he could. He’d been witness to plenty of fights in his time, even from the inner ring of some of them, he was no stranger to a punch up with the boys and apparently today, Sasha had suddenly become one of his boys, “Yeah, why don’t you get fucked, bro? You wanna hiding? I’ll cremate you, cunt,” he argued, beating his fist against his chest barbarically as he transformed into Sasha’s makeshift army, despite having never met the woman in his life.

It wasn’t long, however, before the two of them were swiftly instructed to get the hell out of the class and out of the building before security was called to make sure they did, on their own feet or otherwise. It was bullshit, Cal thought but he was young and he was naive. He didn’t how they were in the wrong when Sasha had simply been defending herself and Caleb had been defending her, wasn’t that was this class was supposed to be about anyway? Whatever. Not wanting to get into any further trouble, he raised his hands submissively, “Yeah, yeah, yeah, all good, all good, I’m not starting anything here ay, it was that dickhead,” he insisted, gesturing loosely at Sasha’s antagonist as he made his way out, unsure of whether Sasha would join him or have anything to say to him if she did.

Sasha’s lips curled nearly into a grin as the stranger came to her defense. There was a warmth in her chest that was familiar to her, similar to the warmth she felt back home when someone would speak up in solidarity during one of her many quarrels while using New York City’s public transit. There was an unspoken rule amongst New Yorkers, if someone is publicly being a dick, you band together to tell them off. It was somehow Sasha’s first time feeling that same sort of kinship in her six years living in Los Angeles. 

She had been so wrapped up in awe, she hardly noticed that she, and her makeshift bodyguard had been banished from the class. “Whatever, we don’t need this class anyway...” she rolled her eyes, turning to face her counterpart as she spoke. “...Clearly, we can kick ass on our own.” she boldly took hold of the stranger’s arm, tugging him away with her as she left the premises, as instructed. “I’m Sasha and you’ve gotta let me buy you a drink.”

”Whatever you say, cupcake.” He shot back, just as condescending. In fact he crossed his arms and made a face worthy of Dame Maggie Smith in Dowton Abbey as he heard the girl speak. He knew who she was because he was a frequent viewer of the E! Network, always looking at whatever they were saying about himself and by consequence learning something about other trainwrecks as well. “Although, I heard you’re deadlier with a car than with an arrow.” Pulling punches? Freddie doesn’t know her.

Sasha released her grip on the bow string, sending the arrow whizzing through the air, and finally to the target, millimeters away from the bullseye. She nearly flinched at the mention of her deadliest DUI. It had been years since anyone had brought that incident up, so the jab was jarring to say the least. “...Yeah, the archery incident didn’t quite make headlines. I’m sure I could fix that if I became a repeat offender.” Sasha averted her gaze as she prepared another arrow, although, the flustered manner in which she made her movements gave away just how bothered she was by the comment. “You ever seen someone get impaled by one of these bad boys? Less threatening than a bullet maybe, but...” She released the bow string again, closing her eyes momentarily as this one flew. It landed smack in the middle of the target, barely making the bullseye. “You’d probably bleed out before an ambulance could even get here, you know how LA traffic is... Then you’d be a pasty John Doe for months until anyone could figure out who you were... Who are you, again?”

August had heard them say that you were meant to use your hands to mix the dough, but that wasn’t going to happen. He had no interest in getting flour and egg stuck underneath his nails, it sounded disgusting. As soon as the person besides him started to speak however he realised that he wasn’t going to be getting much help from them. He looked at her bowl, now consisting of very little batter, and then back to her, and laughed softly, shaking his head. “Yeah, I don’t know why I even asked, Mary Jane.”

He went over to another table, quickly negotiating the release of their spoon and came back to mix his, glancing back at Sasha and nodding over to his left. “You wanna come share mine? Not really much of a cookie guy, just thought it’d be interesting to learn.” He pulled a tray over the counter, turning the oven on to preheat and dropping some chocolate chips into the mixture. “You got an actual name there, or should I stick to MJ?”

“Mary Jane?” Sasha’s nose crinkled as she screwed her face up in confusion. “What, is that supposed to be me?” Although it seemed like a rhetorical question, she asked it out of genuine curiosity. “Oh, oh no... I’m not a pothead, it’s just this AA thing, y’know.. Healthy coping ‘n such...” Sasha stopped herself before she went off on a tangent that would end with her talking herself in circles, and instead, decided to just join the man who actually had some cookie dough left to spare. “Sasha, Sasha Fitzpatrick.” She held out a hand politely, although she returned it to her side after realizing it was encrusted in cookie goo. “I promise I’m not usually like this.” Usually she was far bitchier, she supposed the edible had pried the chip off of her shoulder.

“Why did I sign up for this activity you wonder?” Probably not a single soul there wonders about it, but Freddie will tell them anyway. “Well, if that dimwit Jennifer Lawrence can do it on hunger games, so can I.” And there’s the fact that everybody knows non-famouses love celebrities with a weird hobby or quirk, or even a weird pet. Maybe archery could be his thing, since there was no way in hell Freddie would let a dirty animal into his home. He’d have to talk to Ned about it, depending on how this goes. “Now be a dear and hand me the bow.”

@thejunglestarters​

Sasha stared in awe, as the stranger went off on a tangent she didn’t quite recall initiating. To be fair, at this time of day, all speech to her sounded like the monotonous ‘womp womp’ of Charlie Brown’s teacher, but her ears perked up at the final sentence. “Oh, sweetie, I don’t do favors... But if you could, get out of my way so I don’t shoot an imaginary apple off of your head.” Sasha lifted her bow, getting the arrow in position so she could take aim at her target which for now, was the bullseye and not the arrogant stranger’s cranium. “That would be nice.”

When: Sunday, January 5th

Who: Open <3 @thejunglestarters​

“Yeah? And you fucking throw punches like a chick!” Sasha called after her latest victim as he rushed out of the self defense class. “Moron!” Whoever allowed her on the roster had made a massive mistake. Sasha was aggressive in general, and she could thank being born and raised in the big apple for that, but a relentless hangover, an empty flask, and a self defense class? Breeding grounds for full-blown has-been rage. It wasn’t her fault he’d struck a nerve mid-spar, or at least that’s what she told herself to justify the quick knee to the delicates she’d given him immediately afterwards. “Can you believe some people? We’re supposed to be sparring, and this idiot asks me about a fucking DUI. It was YEARS ago. TMZ forgot, why can’t that shithead?” her eyes darted to one of the onlookers with mouths agape for support, willing one of them with her stare to come to her defense.

She definitely didn’t just have one of those faces, but Romy appreciated that they didn’t feel the need to bring up where they probably did know her from. Which, given the reluctance, was almost definitely from one of the many less than poised photographs of her that tmz had snapped up. Her publicist had been successful in removing most pictures from the internet, or at least burying them deep in the search results, but nothing could ever really be deleted on the web. 

“Yeah, you don’t want some weird smudged mess so that’s for the best.” Romy considered it for a second and then got up, moving over so that she was sat on the ground near Sasha’s head, leaning back against a pillar and assuring the tattoo artist she wasn’t going to knock over their tray. “So what’re you getting done?”

“God, I’d hope not. I already have a few regrettable ones as is.” Sasha paused for a moment, grimacing as the tattoo artist went over one of the lines to touch it up. “A bunch of shitty nautical themed ones, too. It was a stupid inside joke with myself... I drink like a sailor.” she chuckled dryly at her own joke, shaking her head afterwards. “I’m getting a dragonfly.. ‘sposed to mean change or something. God knows I need fucking change.”

Where: Baking Class, LA Resolutions

When: Saturday 4th of January

Who: Open! @thejunglestarters​

A skills event really wasn’t August’s ideal choice of daytime entertainment, but the filmmaking panel he was headed to didn’t start until 3pm and he’d arrived early. Since he’d paid $15 to get in, he figured he should try and make the most of it. After perusing a few different options, he’d eventually wandered over to the where the baking class was about to start, donning an apron and pushing his sleeves up as he got the ingredients out as they were told to. He noticed his lack of spoon as everyone else started mixing their dough, looking around and eventually settling on the person sharing his bench. “Hey - sorry, do you have a spare spoon by any chance?” Worth a shot.

Sasha really didn't get people who smoked weed. She had always preferred binge drinking to bong hits, but as per her Alcoholics Anonymous assignment, Sasha found herself in her local dispensary a couple hours before LA Resolutions in search of her gross misinterpretation of a healthier coping mechanism. The cooking class wasn’t originally on Sasha’s roster, but with her tattoo finished and her flask empty (and a few too many milligrams of THC in her system), the smell of warm cookies wafting from the class was too good to pass up.

“H... Wha?” Sasha hardly noticed that someone had interrupted her shoveling cookie dough into her mouth in what she thought to be a discreet fashion. Now that she really thought of it, she had hardly noticed any of the instructions to begin with, or that with the amount of raw cookie-dough she had ingested, it’d be virtually impossible to get a decent batch of cookies into the oven. “Err... No. But I don’t seem to have any cookies either, so.”

“You think? Never thought therapy had so many needles.” Or at least, it never had in her experience. Maybe she’d been missing a trick all along. Or maybe she’d change her mind when she’d finally gotten hers. Do I know you? There’s less of a double-edged sword to that question now, for years that question could’ve meant anything from ‘didn’t you win that grammy?’ or ‘weren’t you on vamped?’ to ‘we did coke together last night, remember?’. These days, the latter was a lot less likely. “Uh, maybe? I’m Romy, have we met?”

“It’s like acupuncture... except these needles leave a mark.” Sasha’s memory wasn’t the most reliable. And that, paired with the fact that she had a few drinks (again, to the tattoo artist’s dismay) prior to her appointment, half-drunk, her memory wasn’t reliable at all. Her features screwed up in focus, studying the girls face for a moment as the lightbulb that was her memory flickered wildly and buzzed until it dimly lit up. 

It was on the internet, it had to be. Sasha searched her own name frequently, a compulsion that was as necessary to her well-being as breathing was and naturally, her face could be found plastered on the lower-half of more than a couple ‘Top Celebrity Mishap’ and ‘Best Actors Hitting Rock Bottom’ lists. This girl looked familiar, and it was probably because her mugshot had been on one a number of scrolls above hers. “You’ve probably just got one of those faces. My bad... I‘m Sasha. I’d shake your hand but he’ll probably kill me if I move again.”

Where: Rebel Angelz tattoo pop-up, Griffin Park

When: Saturday, January 4th

Who: Open! @thejunglestarters​

If you’d told Romy a year ago that her agent supported her getting a tattoo she would’ve scoffed. And yet, when she’d brought up the idea it had been instantly supported by her publicist, who’d decided she should get the tattoo done at the LA Resolutions event. It was nothing big, as it has to be suitable for hiding during filming, just the small script phrase Still I rise, a quotation from a Maya Angelou poem that had come to mean a lot to her whilst she’d been in rehab. She turned up at midday, and so has to wait for a chair to be free before she can get it, so she’s sat on one of the benches watching other people. “There’s something weird about all this, yeah? Paying someone to stab you.”

“Kinda therapeutic too, isn’t it?” Sasha was in a compromising position to say the least, topless as she lay face down on the tattoo table. She had already had a number of small symbols and words permanently embossed on her skin, so the buzzing of the dragonfly being pricked into her flesh hardly caused her to squirm. Sasha craned her neck, despite the tattoo artist’s obvious disapproval, in order to get a better look at the girl who had spoken up. “You look crazy familiar, do I know you?”

“sup?”