Becoming the Luna

I gasp and reach out to try and hold onto the delicate material, knowing very well what it covered.

As soon as my neck is exposed, Elise let out a high scream and goes so pale that Mia and Addison behind her have to hold on to her so she wouldn't go over.

"W-What…" She stutters, looking at Virgil to Dale and Virgil again. "I-I c-ca-can't believe…" she trails off, looking lost and I blink furiously.

What the hell is happening??

Why is Elise stuttering like she has the hiccups?

"Y-You…" she points at me, her words coming out stilted like she can't breathe.

Shana just scoffs. "Don't be an idiot Elise, now get out before I make you." She says darkly and realization dawns on Elise and I wish I also had that kind of revelation.

"W-What just happened?" I ask softly, looking up at Virgil who had picked up my scarf, dusted the material, and started wrapping it around my neck.

Elise's hench girls had practically carried her off and the lingering icy look she shoots at me isn't comforting at all.

"Just Elise being her nutty self," Shana reassures me, a smug smirk on her face.

We walk on to class and while Shana keeps complaining about the entire school system, I wrack my head trying to come up with an explanation of why Elise would react so excessively to a hickey.

Okay, fine, I can agree that it's much bigger than an average hickey but still… I had expected her to be furious not devastated and the way she recovered so fast too and looked so relieved didn't make much sense either.

We got to class and I'm too busy trying to convince Shana not to murder the examiner or herself and somehow concentrate enough to process the questions, they actually aren't hard but I end up getting lost in an engaging imagination halfway through a question.

"I never want to see another printed paper for the rest of my life." Shana wails dramatically as we make our way over to Dale's car.

"It's just the first day." I tell her blankly, getting in after Virgil holds the door open for me, Dale's the one driving this time.

She just collapses against the back seat to mimic a dead faint and Virgil chuckles.

"Don't stress it, Hay, Shana always complains our ears out, and yet she comes out top of the class."

"Because I literally die every day just to keep up." She retorts.

"I don't know Shana, if you spent half the time you spend on complaining to actually try to read, you wouldn't die so much." Dale shrugs patronizingly, already pulling out of the school.

Shana glares darkly at him then shoots forward, using on hand to grab his hair and the other to hold tightly to his collar, then she starts to drag him backwards.

"Shana! What the fuck! We're going to fucking crash." Dale panics, unable to drive or even see the road from Shana's antics.

Virgil just calmly leans forward and takes the abandoned wheel, like a mini catfight wasn't going on directly beside him.

"How were your exams, Hay?" He asks seriously, somehow managing to maneuver the car right.

I blink at this, we literally wrote it together. "It was fineeeee….. aaaaaaargh!" I end on a scream as the car swerves dangerously, we were going to get pulled over by the police or worse, die.

I pull off my scarf and start to use it to try to break up their struggle but somehow I get pulled into the fray, Shana yanks me forward and keeps me there.

Virgil manages to park the car without killing us and I'm hoping that he'll come to save me from my uncomfortable position but instead he jumps into the back and Dale follows suit, making us a tangled pile of bodies in the back seats.

"Whose idea was this again?" I ask in a muffled voice, trying to keep track of where my arms and legs are.

"I don't know." Shana huffs. "But I don't like it, Dale your knee is in my side." She complains.

"That's not me." Dale denies.

"Then who else could it be, it feels like a bar of rusty iron poking me." She retorts.

A short silence which is Dale most likely glaring at her. "I'm not the only one with knees Shana, stop picking on me." He finally says.

I can't see much, my vision is obscured by, a… chest?

I think my face is resting on someone.

"We aren't spending the whole day like this, are we?"  Dale asks after another quiet lapse.

"I don't see you making a move to get up…" Shana starts to say.

"Oof!" I huff out a breath, starting to wiggle uncontrollably. "Someone's tickling me, whoever it is stop before I kick your face in." I threaten believably.

"Why isn't Virgil saying anything?" Dale notes.

"Maybe he's dead, died of suffocation." Shana says nonchalantly.

"Because you sat on him right?" Dale teases and I feel Shana take in a sharp breath.

Uh oh! Her comeback is going to hurt.

"Aaaaaaargh!" I let out a short scream, cutting Shana off before she could even get started.

"What is it?" Shana asks in a slight panic.

"S-Someone tickled me again." I wail slightly, trying to escape the body cages to no avail.

"It's Dale." She pronounces gravely, dead serious.

"Why the fuck would you think it's me?" He questions incredulously. "What happened to Virgil??"

Shana makes a non-committal sound.

I make a strangled noise as someone wraps their arms around me. "Who is that now?" I complain in exasperation. "I don't remember signing up to have all of you all over me, so let me up." I try to act angry but I just hear sighs all around me.

"It's been a while since we all just laid around like this." Shana says and Dale and Virgil give hums of support.

I frown. "What?"We do this every night." I point out pettishly. "But at least then no one is rubbing or tickling me."

"We're going on another family weekend trip to the cabins this weekend." Shana says vaguely, finally letting out the reason they're all so touchy-feely.

Unconsciously I try to sit up but I just bump into warm bodies. "Oh, I hope our summer holidays won't affect your family time." I say, worriedly.

"It won't." Virgil assures me, in a serious tone of voice.

"Can you let me up now? It's just two days and it's not even the weekend yet." I remind them, exams would end early next week so that there would be adequate time to prepare for the Spring Dance.

They just all seem to simultaneously shrug but at least, there are movements made to get off me.

Dale and Virgil take their time extricating themselves from the pile but soon we're all back on our seats.

"Let's never do that again." I say seriously, heaving a bit.

The rest just shrug like they aren't really in support of my words.

The car falls silent for a while and I start to get lost in thought, there were a lot of thoughts to be lost in.

"What are you wearing to the dance." Shana whispers to me, dragging me out of my head.

I blink, not having thought about it at all. "I don't know, maybe a tux, isn't that the theme?" I reply vaguely.

"The theme is the regency and don't worry about what you're going to wear." She reassures me and I start to breathe a sigh of relief before I remember that it's Shana we're talking about here.

"That sounds suspicious." I narrow my eyes at her. "How do I know you won't show up that day with a dress or something equally as embarrassing?" I accuse.

Shana places a hand over her heart and actually looks mortified. "I can't believe you don't trust me." She says sadly, trying to elicit sympathy.

I just give her a blank look. 

"Okay, okay fine, I'll show your mom first, how does that sound?" She asks. "And it's Maggie that'll get it for me anyway."

"I'm not sure if I'm to be even more terrified or not after you've listed out those people that are going to be in charge of my outfit, why can't I just rent a tux? Like a normal person."

Shana gives me a look like I told her that Elise and I became friends. "Rent a what?" She asks in an expression full of disgust. "Only barbarians do that."

I glance at the boys in front as she says these words. Were they also going to suffer through this? Because it couldn't just be only me.

"Fine, do whatever you want, as long as it's not a dress," I reply. "Or a skirt." I correct quickly when an evil light comes into her eyes.

"Oh, of course not." She says with a faint smile on her face, the car was already pulling up to my house. "Of course not."