delicate.

      “yup, right here!” kody cheerfully confirms, holding up the notes app on his phone to showcase the list he’d comprised. there’s an order for him on there too, though he doesn’t need it. it’s important for him to keep up appearances, and for kody to go to mcdonalds and not order a smorgasbord of unhealthy items would probably be a like a giant neon sign alerting the others that something is up with him. he’ll suffer through eating it all, pretend he’s just as delighted to be scarfing down a box of twenty piece mcnuggets and an oreo mcflurry as he was almost a year ago. if the color gray were a flavor, that’s what everything tasted like now. insipid, off-putting, simply just bad, and no matter what he tries, it all tastes the same. gone are the cravings for an oversized chipotle burrito, or his dad’s homemade lasagne – and worst of all, it almost brings tears to his eyes when he thinks about the fact that he’ll never get to experience the joy of a disneyworld churro ever again. because now, all he craves now is the blood pumping beneath someones skin. 

      “hey now, no need to ruin the days of these minimum wage employees!” he insists, putting a gentle hand on his best friends shoulder. “how about insteaaaad, if the machine’s broken, you use your magic for good instead of evil and fix the machine?” kody suggests quietly just as the family ahead of them finishes ordering, and they step up to the counter. dramatically, the boy places his hands down on the counter, and gives the cashier in front of them a very serious look. “please, for the love of god – is the ice cream machine working right now?!” he asks with wide eyes. his fingers on the counter cross, like he’s praying for good news… but the cashier gives them an awkward look and shrugs their shoulders, mumbling: “sorry guys. it is broken.” disappointed and groaning, kody’s hands are thrown up into the air, and in a second they land on arabella’s shoulders, playfully shaking her a little bit. “bellaaaa!! you jinxed it!!! why did you jinx it??? we could’ve totally been having mcflurries if you hadn’t just said that!!!”

“absolutely heartbreaking. little me could barely take it, i wanted something to happen so badly… i was so convinced.” aj couldn’t help but laugh some more, truly finding nothing funnier than thinking back to when they were a childhood imitation of what they are now. once upon a time it was only the two of them… well, the two of them and jessica, but these days there are so many other people involved in it all. 

“and that’s what someone too nosy for her own good would say.” aj retorts immaturely, but they’re already moving on. the game is the focus of her attention now. she’s extremely competitive, which is just about the only reason she ever took up a sport in high school. if you could call track a sport. scoffing at arabella, she doesn’t take more than a second to hit her back. “do you really think the best mode of questioning going forward is ignorance?” she’s already teasing her choices. 

arabella couldn’t help but rolling her eyes amused at the blonde “my nosiness gave me magic powers, never forget that” she said patting her own shoulder a couple of times, pleased with herself. saying those words out loud still felt kind of ridiculous, no matter how true she knew them to be. besides, in order to be part of the scooby gang you had to be a little nosy and curious, they were after all, getting into everyone’s business looking for supernatural clues. textbook nosy.

jordana swallowed hard as she was told to stop and she did just that. she wasn’t sure what she had done to have doubt aimed her way but she figured that was what happened when someone wasn’t from the town. she might have been there a year but jordana couldn’t say her first year had been productive in terms of social interaction. “it’s okay, you haven’t made me feel unwelcome,” she murmured with a soft smile, not wanting arabella to feel bad when she probably shouldn’t have asked in the first place. “and i totally understand the whole opening up to people, i’m not expecting you to do that with me. i’d honestly just heard that you’re a good photographer and thought it would be a perfect way to get to know each other a little better.”

judgement was never going to come from jordana, especially when she refused to open up to anyone, even the ones she would consider friends at that point. she finally allowed herself to smile when arabella agreed to help her, thankful because she hoped that it would mean a good grade in the end. “not yet, that was going to be my next step.” it was the downfall of being new to the town even if she could give a different perspective being an outsider. “i know you’ve lived here a long time so maybe you could give me a few tips on good spots that people might not have heard about as much. i don’t want to report on the popular spots.”

that natural ability to put her foot on her mouth was something her mother always said she got from her father, probably meant as light banter, but it always carried that little hint of bitterness. according to her mother, there was a lot of him in arabella, but most notably the bright ginger hair and a mouth that moves faster than her brain at times. she smiled, grateful for jordana’s apparent understanding. “you’re right actually, it’ll be fun to hang out without...you know...death lingering over us” she half joked.

a séance. “you mean like the one we tried to do when we were ten in my parent’s attic? somehow i don’t trust our track record.” aj couldn’t help but tease the suggestion, though it wasn’t a bad one. disturbing the dead as she understood it came with consequences and though she didn’t hate the idea of contacting him, her gut feeling said it wouldn’t be that easy and arabella’s words confirmed that. “doesn’t mean it can’t happen ever, though… i guess.” instead of wallowing on that topic, they were going to have a little fun, if the blonde could help it. 

rolling her eyes at arabella’s protests, aj shook her head. “i’m hiding nothing, you dork. you know basically everything. everything you need to know anyway.” okay, maybe there was one thing she was hiding from her best friend, but she wasn’t exactly going to put a damper on the mood with laying out her family secrets. she wanted to play a game. “anyway, that’s not what i meant. i mean, in this version, it’s questions only. ask me anything, but if you answer, you lose.” she elaborated and then lifted her eyebrows, as if it was a challenge. “got it?”

arabella laughed “i’m still offended that no spirits wanted to talk to us, we even had a whole circle of flashlights and a glass of cranberry juice as dupes for candles and blood, there was effort behind it”. she smiled to herself, looking back at the stunts they used to pull as kids, it seemed almost logical that they ended up as part-time supernatural investigators. 

It was always odd seeing someone from the scooby gang in a place where they didn’t necessarily meet but it was a small town, it was bound to happen sometimes. she didn’t know much about Arabella, pretty much just the basics but she was trying with all the members of the gang, even if she was finding it a little difficult sometimes. What she had been hoping for was a simple yes so to say that she was surprised at the question was an understatement. “Uh okay…I can do that.” Pulling her leather jacket tighter around herself, she then shoved her hands back in her pockets, finding it colder than she’d expected. “So we’ve all been tasked with writing an article on the history of the college….we’ve had to pick an important part of it, or what we deem as important and then write about it.” Jordana knew that it sounded simple but she was determined to make her parents proud.

“Look, I understand if you don’t like me. I’m the newbie…the outsider…” She really did understand and it was why she was determined to make a little bit of an effort. “And if you don’t want to help me, then I’ll deal with it but I really want to do well on this assignment and I’ve heard you’re a very good photographer.” Sighing softly, she pulled out one of her hands so she could run her fingers through her hair, suddenly feeling stupid for asking. “It’s fine, I’m sorry for asking, I’ll just take some photos on my phone.”

the second those last words left her lips arabella regretted them. what the hell was she thinking? punishing jordana for being close to aj would not fix whatever was happening between them. she bit her lip as she explained the assignment, it honestly sounded like something she would absolutely love to do, for how small and weird of a town it was, there was something kind of magnetic about bridgemead, the buildings, the people, there was a story behind everything, that’s actually one of the reasons she chose photography as a major in the first place, to be able to immortalize all of it before i’ts gone.

STATUS: Open LOCATION: Bridgemead Library Basement a.k.a Scooby HQ

For most people, working with an audience is a little off-putting, but not for AJ. In the windowless space lit up by florescent bulbs, with a pair of eyes on her, she’s doing her best work. The red string she ties around the pin stuck into the photo of Bob Williams is tied to the spot on the map of Williams Cemetery where it was indicated that he died, some more information that has come in from Ava. Unfortunately, it’s nowhere near where the vial was found and the pendulum led Arabella to, but it’s something, at least. Every clue is a piece of the puzzle and AJ savours every single one, letting them slip around in her mind, considering the possibilities and consequences of each new fact. 

As she finishes, she stands back, hands on her hips and stares at her work, before turning around to peer at them. “Any luck with that?” She indicates what they’re working on by pointing the ball of red string in her hand towards it. They both know the answer is a likely no. Then, she’s walking over to the desk she’s claimed and putting it away, leaning against the back of the wooden structure. “As our unofficial leader, I’m going to insist on a break… let’s play ask me anything.” It’s not that she’s bored, she can just sense that this endless research is putting everyone on edge. They’re close to something, she can feel it… so why not take a second to themselves? 

arabella let out a bigh sigh looking up from her book of shadows and to her best friend “eh, i’m not sure yet. i mean, the very obvious answer would be to hold a seance, you know? so we can try and talk to mr. williams directly” she explained vaguely gesturing with her hands. “it’s just...something tells me he won’t come to us, at least not yet” she shrugged, most times she felt like an idiot trying to explain these nagging feelings she would get. it still amazed her how much someone like aj, who was all clues and evidence, would blindly trust arabella’s intuiton like that.

STATUS: closed LOCATION: town square TAGGING: @wickedbells​

holding her books against her chest, jordana was thankful to have some time to finally work on her paper. with how busy the scooby gang had been keeping her, she’d been struggling to work on anything for class but she couldn’t ignore it when she only had a couple of days to get it in. she probably could have left it until the night before and pulled an all-nighter but that was the last thing she wanted to do and she couldn’t chance falling asleep back at the library. heading for ivy hall, jordana stopped when she saw a familiar face, well if she could call her that. apart from dylan and aj, she didn’t know much about the rest of them but she knew enough arabella to know that they might be able to work on something together, at least if she was feeling helpful. for a second, she thought about walking in the opposite direction but she was trying to make an effort and it would show that. 

clearing her throat, she headed in the direction of arabella, a small smile on her face as she approached her. “hey! just the person i was looking for.” that might not have been true but it would have been eventually. “i know you don’t know me that well and you’re more than okay to say no but i’ve heard you’re a photographer and i wondered if maybe you would think about taking some photos for me some time.” furrowing her eyebrows, she realised how that might have sounded. “i mean, not of me, not those sort of photos, but i’m studying journalism and i’m in need of some photos for a paper i’m doing.”

arabella felt silly going back to class after their experience in the cemetery and even more so after the news that mr. rawley had been murdered broke. that one hit her specially hard, she’d been working at karma café since she was sixteen, old mr. rawley hired her on the spot the second she mentioned she was seraphina’s grandaughter. she couldn’t possibly imagine anyone wanting to murder him, besides, taking his heart? please, she didn’t have to be a witch to know that reeked of supernatural ritual. however, the focus of the group was currently in mr. williams, which of course brought her back to the cemetery and the pendulum...yes, it worked, but not exactly in the way it was supposed to. the magic behind pendula was fairly simple and effective, arabella was sure she performed it correctly, it wasn’t her first time doing it or anything, something went wrong, and she couldn’t put her finger on exactly what.