#& threads.

Great, just... great. “I think the hospital should probably be open and letting people in, if you want to head over there and dry off,” Nina crosses her arms and steps in front of the door under the small awning, looking back at the shop. With the huge rain coming, the manager asked her to close it early for the day and cancel the evening shift because no one was going to show up anyway-- and yeah okay, she could probably open the whole thing again for herself, but that’d mean letting Edith in with her and she does not trust her anywhere near an empty shop where she can steal or break anything and get her in trouble. No way. “It’s not even that far, really.”

“Of course I’m drinking, I don’t hate myself enough to go through party sober,” Thea sips on her glass and turns to look at the person sitting next to her, “I have some of the stronger stuff, if you want to spike yours.” Sure her father is around, her mother might be somewhere in the building as well unless she decided to wear those shoes that always make her uncomfortable enough to have to drive back home after 10 minutes standing, but neither of them will find out either. She’s spent months now going to work high and her record is still impeccable, keeping up her image for their sake is one of the things she knows how to do best by now. “I mean--- I know the Mayor&CO would never let hard alcohol in a party like this but they don’t need to know, right?”

“Oh, sorry! I can get up for a picture if you want one... just give me a second, this dress is stupid  heavy for what it is,” Nina chuckles and picks her phone off her lap. “You can’t take a selfie here darling, the lighting is terrible. Closer to the dance floor is better, and turn on the flash, nobody wants to deal with ugly grainy pictures.”

“Whoever said swimming at night is terrifying was... well, probably right, but this wasn’t the worst idea I guess,” Nina takes off her dress and kicks off her shoes, looking around. What if there’s bugs or something? What if there’s jellyfish and she gets stung? What if someone steals their outfits? Those shoes were pretty expensive. She takes a deep breath in and starts walking into the sea to meet Pietro. “You know I’m going to scream if literally anything brushes my legs, right? And, like, run on the other direction. As fast as I can. While still screaming, probably.” She shakes her head. “I guess it wouldn’t hurt me to scream right now, though, but I’m still going to be traumatized and I’d rather not be.”

“Oh... my... god...” Thea whispers to herself, running closer to the girl crying. Who the hell cries in public? Let alone in a supermarket. Let alone at this hour. The only reason why she’s here at all is because Dera insisted that she needed stuff for another one of their ghost hunting adventures. Garlic, salt, batteries for their flashlights, whatever else she asked for. Isn’t garlic for vampires anyway? Whatever. She has a list somewhere in her phone. “Are you okay?” She frowns and looks around confused, patting Naia’s shoulder lightly, “Should I, um, call someone? Did you get robbed or something?”

“Ugh what did he do now?” She frowns, watching her window open and Rhiannon’s hair peek at first. It would probably be scary to other people, but a lot of her friends know Nina hid a ladder behind the bushes downstairs in case they needed an escape. It’s usually mostly Denna, honestly, but others too depending on what’s going on in their lives. Ben sometimes, even, if he feels adventurous. Which doesn’t happen very often. “It’s either a Zac thing, or a got possessed by a demon and somehow broke my perfect record and the police are chasing me please hide me thing, which I think you only did, like, once about five years ago.”

“Aren’t you supposed to be doing homework or something?” She shows up running behind Denna and hugging her before she can say anything, “The band isn’t even playing tonight so you can’t tell me Zac told you to come, because I would know if they were. Pietro sends those ad tweets non-stop when they play, I almost reported him for spam once so he’d learn his lesson. But then I felt bad so I didn’t do it.” Nina whispers the last information like it’s a secret, for some reason, then chuckles and gives her best friend a squeeze, then lets her go. “Aren’t you glad I changed your mom’s name contact to a bunch of police sirens? Imagine if you accidentally called her instead.”