Weeks go by, and school goes on, making it difficult for our favourite five to hangout with each other.
However, they still managed to plan something.
[Rayna: HEY, WE SHOULD HAVE A SLEEPOVER!]
The girls had an unspoken rule that in their group chat on Messenger (currently called 'Queens'), they had to speak in CAPS LOCK and ONLY in CAPS LOCK. Lower Caps seemed boring to them- and a sin, because it seemed like you were typing on the screen with a very dull expression on your face, and that isn't very fun. So, to show enthusiasm, they all conversed with caps and caps only. This resulted in heaps of "HAHAHAHA"s and over exaggerated stories.
[Astra: OMG! DEFINITELY! ITS BEEN FOR. EVER.]
[Grace: YEAH, HOW ABOUT TOMORROW?]
[Tayla: SOUNDS PERFECT! WE CAN DO IT AT MINE?]
[Ollie: IM SORRY GUYS I CAN'T MAKE IT :( I'VE ALREADY GOT SOMETHING PLANNED]
[Rayna: AW. BUT WE CAN PLAN SOMETHING NEXT TIME? WITH ALL OF US!]
[Astra: YEAH! WE'LL MISS YOU OLLIE :( ]
[Grace: OLLIE THERE WILL BE A NEXT TIME :( BUT YEAH, AT TAYLA'S SOUNDS GOOD]
[Ollie: HAVE FUN GUYS! WISH I COULD HAVE MADE IT]
[Tayla: GREAT! COME AROUND 5. AND WE'LL MISS YOU OLLIE!]
[Rayna: WE WILL MISS YOUUUUU]
Tayla stood in her bedroom waiting for the rest of the group to arrive. She tied her hair up and paced around the room a little, full of excitement for the night to come. Suddenly, a knock on the door pulled her out of her thoughts. She opened the door and there stood Astra.
"Hey Astra!" called Tayla, excitedly.
"Tayla! Its been a while." Astra smiled whilst entering Tayla's house.
They walked to her guest room, where two beds and two mattresses were set up.
"Ooh. I like what I'm seeing." Astra proclaimed. "I bags the bed next to the window!"
Astra quickly kicked off her shoes and threw her stuff onto the bed. Tayla sat on the next bed over.
"So. When is Rayna and Grace getting here?" Astra asked.
"I think somewhere around 6:30. That gives us some time. What should we do before then?"
"I don't know. Maybe watch a movie?"
"What about High School Musical?"
"Oh my god! Perfect." Astra smiled.
Whilst waiting for the other girls to come, they watched the whole of High School Musical and sang through the songs.
'We're soooarrinn... flyyyyinnn...'
Soon after the movie was finished, they heard another knock on the door. Rayna arrived and then Grace, not shortly after.
"We're all here!" Astra grinned, pulling down her jacket.
"Almost all," Rayna answered. "Ollie couldn't make it."
"At least she'll be here by spirit." Tayla stated, and Rayna and Grace smiled. Astra nodded.
"So, what do you guys want to do?" Grace asked and sat on one of the beds.
"Ooh! We should go buy some lollies, since Grace can drive now." Rayna suggested.
"Sounds good!" Grace said. "We should also drive around, and watch the sunset on the cliffs!"
"Yes. We are SO doing that." exclaimed Tayla with a happy sigh.
"I'll bring my polaroid! So we can take some photos for memories" Astra excitedly exclaimed. "But hold on, let me put on some makeup first. I look like a mess."
"Astra, you look fine!" Rayna sighed, whilst Astra shook her head in disagreement.
"No I don't. I need a little makeup. Just a little." she said.
"You don't, really, but alright." Tayla calmly said.
Once Astra was done applying her black eyeliner under her eyes and a little mascara, off the girls went.
They drove to the nearest IGA, and grabbed some lollies. After they took some photos and watched the sunset gracefully fall over the faraway cities and buildings, they started to head home. Grace switched on her phone and plugged it into the aux port of her car. She played some music by Twenty One Pilots quietly whilst they all drove back home. As Rayna looked out the window, she noticed these huge white trucks drive past. Possibly around 6, they followed one another down the same road.
"Hey, What are those trucks doing?" She asked, breaking the short silence.
"I'm not sure..." Tayla said.
"Wait... I think I recognise them." Grace said, driving with two hands on the wheel, watching the road in front of her, but eyeing the trucks carefully with her side mirrors.
"They look so suspicious. It's like 7:30 and they're driving around in the dark!" Astra noticed, looking outside as she sat in the backseat with Tayla.
"They're a film crew. They're filming King Kong: Skull Islands here. My friend told me that they were filming somewhere in Australia, and it turns out they've been around this general area. We actually followed them once and snuck onto the set!" Grace told the girls.
"Wait." Astra paused, "Seriously?"
"Yeah, and Samuel L. Jackson is probably in one of those trucks right now!" Grace replied.
"Oh my god! That is so cool!" Tayla said, turning her head from the window to look at Grace sitting in the front.
"Can we follow them?" Rayna asked and Astra gasped excitedly, nodding furiously.
"Can we actually?" she added.
"Pleeeassee?" Tayla asked.
Grace hesitated, but agreed. "Okay. But as long as we don't get caught. I kinda don't want to do it, but okay." She smiled slightly.
"Yes!" The trio shouted, excitedly.
As the girls sneakily followed the movie trucks off of the main road and into a more quiet road, The trucks dimmed their headlights and seemed to slow down. "I think they're on to us" Rayna worriedly whispered.
"What do we do? What If we get caught?" Tayla added.
Grace looked around and then grinned. "I know this road. I remember this from last time. They're going to the same location. Lets make a turn and make it look like we're actually going somewhere else, and then do a full circle around the block, and follow them from a bit further away."
"Thats so smart. Lets do it." Astra agreed.
The trucks drove further along the straight road, and Grace turned into a left road.
"We should be fine now." She smiled, turning up the volume of the radio. It was playing 'Ride' by Twenty One Pilots.
Rayna giggled. "This is so exciting!"
"I know right? I haven't had this much fun in a while." Tayla grinned.
Astra smiled and sang along to the lyrics of the song. "I'm falling, so I'm taking my time on my riiiiiiiiideee" and Tayla joined in.
Shortly after, They were behind the trucks again. About a kilometre away from them. The girls watched as the trucks turned right, into their destination, and decided that if they followed the trucks and parked right next to them, it would be obvious and they would be caught immediately. So Grace turned off the headlights, and parked the car to the opposite side of someone's house. The girls slowly snuck out of the car and Grace shushed them, even though they probably wouldn't be heard from this distance. The road that was perpendicular to where the trucks were parked, was quite wide and there was large bushes and trees on the right side of it.
"Hey, we should go hide in those bushes! And try to get closer. If we just walk down the path it will be more obvious that we're here because of them and we might get caught." Rayna whispered.
"Good idea" Tayla replied quietly, as the girls all nodded and slowly crept into the dark bushes. Astra didn't know how they would get close to the trucks as there were heaps of trees and no obvious way to get through to the trucks. They weren't getting that far in, a loud and angry "Oi", made itself heard nearby. However the girls didn't notice and carried on their shenanigans.
"OI!" The voice shouted again.
"Shhh!" Grace urgently whispered, suddenly noticing a light switching on in a house nearby.
The girls fell silent and stood extremely still, half their bodies encased in the tree's shadows.
"What was that?" Astra asked, a few seconds after their shared silence.
"I'm not sure." Rayna answered.
They all looked towards the light and saw a silhouette standing there, with an arm raised up to the general area of their head.
"Hold on." Tayla started, a thought forming in her mind.
"Wait..." Grace looked at Tayla, catching on to the shared thought. "Is he calling the cops?"
Another short silence fell upon the girls until-
"Run" Rayna whispered.
At those words, the girls all fled, running frantically out of the bushes. Their adrenaline picked up really quickly as they rushed to the car, almost tripping in the process. As soon as they got in the car, Grace turned on the ignition and drove her car the heck out of there, as the girls quickly clicked in their seat belts.
As they drove away, everyone nervously fell into fits of giggles but Rayna asked "Did he see our number plate? He could have been looking at our number plate."
The giggles stopped and everyone took a second to think back. "Hopefully he didn't!" Astra worried.
"Guys we shouldn't have done that." Grace said.
"We're fine. Its fine. We didn't even get on the set, and that guy probably didn't see anything." Rayna replied.
"I'm sure he didn't, guys." Tayla answered, reducing the girls stress levels dramatically.
Rayna laughed and the girls followed on quite quickly, as Rayna's laugh was very contagious.
Silence fell between the girls once more, and the only sound was Grace's music which was now playing Arctic Monkeys.
"Hold on. Guys, I think that Ute is tailing us." Tayla spoke, looking behind her.
Astra looked at her, and then looked at the Ute behind them, through the back window of the car. "Oh my god I think he actually is."
"WHAT?" Rayna answered.
"Is that the police?" Grace worried, watching the road ahead of her.
"They don't have the police lights on top of the car... so I'm not sure." Tayla replied.
"Maybe they're undercover?" Astra asked.
"Guys okay, calm down. He's probably not tailing us. Lets just watch him and see what he does." Rayna stated.
"Alright." Grace agreed, turning left.
The car turned left.
"Guys I think he actually is" Astra worried. "He turned left too! And It's happened three times now."
"Maybe its just because we're going on the main road?" Tayla calmly stated. Tayla was probably always the most calm in situations like these, always looking for a valid and reasonable answer to the situation at hand.
"Okay last time. We can check if he follows us this last turn, and then judge him then, if he's actually tailing us or not." Astra said.
"Okay. Okay." Rayna exhaled.
Grace turned right, heading towards Tayla's home. The Ute behind them turned left. "Phew" Grace replied.
A huge outburst of laughter escaped from Rayna and the girls again, laughed along with her. "We are so lame!" Rayna exclaimed.
"I know right? He wasn't tailing us all along." Tayla laughed.
"Guuyyyyyssss! We should just go home now." Grace whined, not wanting to get herself into another sticky situation.
"But I want to still do something fun! This was actually kinda fun" Astra grinned and the others agreed.
"Yeah. I actually feel like a rebel!" Rayna giggled.
"Same!" Tayla and Astra said at the same time.
"We should go explore a school! Its dark and I always wanted to go to a school at night." Astra stated.
"No!" Grace reluctantly said.
"Yes!" Rayna sassily said back.
"I really want to but my mum did just call before wanting us to come back..." Tayla frowned.
"Alright. Lets just go back..." Astra replied a little sadly.
The girls entered the house.
"So.. Now what?" Astra asked as the girls sat in Tayla's room.
"I don't know..." Rayna said as she looked through her bag to find her hairbrush.
Grace picked up her phone and checked her Snapchat,whilst Tayla checked her messages.
"Hey guys... My kind-of ex just messaged me!" she said.
"Wait, you have an ex?" Grace asked.
"Yeah, Elliot? I think? They were sort of a thing in Grade 5, or so Tayla tells me.." Astra grinned and wiggled her eyebrows.
Tayla blushed as the girls leaned in, trying to hear more.
"Ooh! Lets message him back." Rayna dared to say.
"No!" Tayla cried, but agreed shortly after.
As the girls messaged this so-called 'Elliot', after stalking his Facebook profile, they found out that he was 18, but looked 40. As the girls shared a silent cringe moment, they decided to message Elliot and pretend to be Tayla.
Elliot: Hey Tayla.
Tayla: Hey!
Elliot: What are you up to? It's been a while since we've talked.
The last time Elliot and Tayla apparently messaged each other, was when Tayla started to be attracted to him for a little while. However, she was also into a new boy she met at her Drama class, called Davis. She got into a relationship with Davis however, and Elliot stopped talking to her almost immediately.
Tayla: I'm just hanging out with my friends at a sleepover.
Elliot: Sounds fun.
Tayla: It is :)
Rayna was leading the conversation mostly, pretending to be Tayla. But once it got boring, she decided to make things more interesting.
Tayla: We're kinda bored. Do you want to meet at Coles?
Of course, they were never planning to go to Coles. They were only testing to see how gullible he was.
Elliot: Uh, Why?
Tayla: Just to hang out. We're already there!
Elliot: Okay, Im on my way.
The conversation resulted in Tayla taking back the phone and Rayna sending a picture of a pear and saying 'jk' and everyone found this was only funny because Elliot clearly had a crush on Tayla but was jealous of her ex-boyfriend Davis, and he even messaged her in jealousy saying that they were never a 'thing' in the first place. So hearing this, the girls had to do something, because that was clearly mean and Tayla didn't deserve that nonsense from anyone. Since then, Elliot has been an inside joke in the group, and Tayla grew over her crush and realised that he wasn't that nice to begin with, as everyone laughed at the 'Coles' joke and the pear, which was later named 'Ollie' the Pear, in memory of Ollie who couldn't attend this specific sleepover.
After the girls got bored again, they decided to end the night on 'tumblr-esque' inspired images that were taken in the middle of the road just outside Tayla's house. They often did photoshoots so they could upload them onto their Instagram to remember the crazy memories that they had experienced together. The group settled down once again, in the early hours of the morning-night, and had their almost ritualistic D&M time. (Deep and Meaningful conversations).
"I love you guys so much! This sleepover was amazing." Tayla smiled, her voice cracking from overuse.
"We have to do another one soon." Grace stated.
"Definitely! Its so fun hanging out" said Rayna.
"But it's been a while since we've had a full sleepover! Haven't you guys noticed?" Astra piped up, noticing an almost unnoticed pattern occurring each time they had a 'choir sleepover'.
"It's because of Grace. She put a curse on us that one night, ages ago! That was almost a year ago, and ever since then we haven't had a full sleepover" Tayla added.
"Graaacceee! Why did you put a curse on us?" Rayna frowned, joking a little because it was clearly coincidental.
"I'm sorry guys I didn't even know what happened... I'm sure it's just a coincidence." She shrugged.
"It's almost 3:00am. We should probably sleep." Astra exclaimed.
"Alright, goodnight guys! I love you all so much." Tayla yawned.
Grace tucked herself into the blankets and replied a cheery but sleepy "Goodnight".
"Goodnight! See you in the morning." Astra said.
"It already is morning, but goodnight" Rayna smiled.
"Goodnight." They all whispered, their thoughts drifting away as they all fell into a deep and easy sleep.
