I got a long on for ya. (That's what he said. ;))
Chapter 10
Mr. Cosman slammed two paint buckets onto the table and sighed.
"Yelling solves nothing but who can scream the loudest," he told them. After guiding the two girls out of the auditorium and into his small, cluttered art room, he decided the only therapy they needed was art therapy. "When in doubt, brush it out."
Before leaving the room, he pressed play on a nearby stereo. Colbie Caillat sounded from the speakers and Mr. Cosman waltzed out of the room, humming along with the soft tune and closed the door behind him. The two girls looked at one another before picking up their brushes and beginning on their separate projects in silence.
For half an hour, the only sounds were the paint brushes splattering onto their canvases- and occasionally the floor- and Colbie Caillat's relaxing voice on repeat. As much as Lacey hated to admit it, whether it was the 'art therapy' or the music, she was beginning to feel less and less angry and more and more apologetic. It took a few stolen glances in Jo's direction for her to finally stop mulling over whether or not she'd apologize. Pushing her pride aside, she rose from her seat and grabbed the hairspray she kept on hand and made her way towards Jo.
"Here," she said, holding the hairspray towards her. "I heard it helps get paint out of most fabrics, so..." she let her sentence and her offering linger.
Jo glanced between the hairspray and Lacey's apologetic face. Like Lacey, she too was much less heated than when they first arrived into the room. Mumbling a 'thanks', she accepted the hairspray, spraying the sticky sheen onto her shirt in thick layers.
"Here," Lacey offered. "Let me help you." Grabbing the hairspray, she began spraying the areas Jo couldn't reach as well. Soon, the ill-ventilated room was filled with a thick fog of the sickly sweet hairspray and sent both girls into a coughing fit, and eventually a laughing fit.
"I'm so sticky," Lacey laughed at the sticky residue on her arms and hands."My fingers are sticking together."
"How dumb are we?" Jo asked joking, as she finally opened the only window in the tiny room.
Lacey nodded. "Very."
Once the hysterics were over, the mood turned somber with the awkward silence that laid between them.
Jo was the first to talk.
"I'm sorry by the way," she apologized. "I didn't mean to go off the way I did. I kinda overreacted."
Lacey snorted and gave her a playful smug look. "Kinda?" She didn't want to start another fight, but Jo accusing her of being deceitful was more than 'kinda overreacting'. Luckily, it only earned a smirk from Jo.
"Okay, maybe a lot more than I thought," she surrendered. "I know you didn't mean it. I was just... having a rough day."
"I'm sorry too. I shouldn't have yelled like that. I get defensive when I feel attacked."
"Attacked?" Jo asked awkwardly, wringing her fingers together. "Was I really that bad?"
"Yeah," Lacey laughed, trying to lighten the mood. Lacey mulled over what she said about having a bad day, remembering the video that Regina sent her earlier. With Jo be practically invisible for the past five years, Lacey was sure that the sudden change was different for her. "I, uh, heard about what happened earlier today in Ms. Cates' class." From behind, Lacey could see Jo's ears burn bright red in embarrassment. "Are you okay?"
Jo shrugged her shoulders. "I'm fine. You know how I get about my school work," she said shrugging it off. Lacey stared at her. Problem was, she really did know how obsessed she was with her school work, but she really didn't know much of anything else. She barely knew anything about Jo anymore. She may have said some things in the heat of the moment, but she wasn't lying when she said Jo didn't know her.
Both girls had quickly grown apart in the past five years and couldn't be more opposite. They were like day and night. Realizing that they were always like this, Lacey wondered what made their friendship last. Until she did remember what -or who- contributed to it. The very same person that tore them apart.
When they were younger, Danny was the glue of the trio; keeping them together. Having been brought into the clique later on through a mutual friendship between Karen and Judy, Lacey clung more to Danny. But as the years went on, the three of them bonded equally; the girls even having sleepovers. Ones that Danny often skillfully crashed.
Thinking of Danny and what happened in Ms. Cates' class, Lacey remembered the current rumor that was circulating the halls of Green Grove High.
"Hey... Don't you have that class with... Danny?" Lacey asked. She tried to sound as casual as possible, but there was really no way to casually bring up Danny Desai; especially not when these two were in the room.
Jo slowly turned to face her. "Yeah... Why?" Lacey quickly shrugged her shoulders, trying to seem bored of the entire situation. There was no need for anyone, especially not Jo, to think -or know, rather- that she had a current obsession with the most talked about person in town.
"Just asking," she lied, picking invisible lint from off her shirt. Jo mumbled a 'Oh' before getting back to her painting.
The silence stretched for several minutes with both girls thinking of their own way to bring up the subject everyone's been talking about about.
"Did Ms. Cates-"
"Did Regina-"
Stopping when they heard the other start, they laughed awkwardly.
"You first," Lacey insisted and Jo willingly accepted her offer. If she had to wait any longer for an explanation on Danny and Regina, she was going to lose her shit. And what better person than Regina's best friend.
"Did, uh, Regina and Danny... Are the rumors true?" she asked finally. Lacey wanted to smirk. She felt better knowing that Jo wanted to know just as much as she did, but when she remembered the answer, she couldn't find it in her to smile the slightest bit.
"Umm, yeah. I guess so," she told her, looking down at her shoes. She felt a ping of jealousy towards her best friend. And although she was good at putting up a front when she felt vulnerable, she wasn't sure what emotion Jo might find in her eyes. "I mean that's what she told me," she added when she realized how vague her answer sound.
The silence return, until Lacey asked the question she'd been dying to know.
"So did Danny and Ms. Cates...?" Jo set her brush down and shrugged defeated. She had no idea and that's exactly what she told Lacey.
"I mean, I talked to her and she didn't out-right say it, but she did tell me how he made her 'feel special' and how he 'helped her a lot'." She made a show of using finger quotations in all the right places. "Now with that, do what you will but it sounds pretty inappropriate to me." Lacey didn't make a show to hide her shock and interest this time.
"She told you that?" she asked. Jo nodded, but she quickly cleaned up her word vomit by justifying what she'd heard.
"It was more like a heart to heart. It wasn't like she was bragging or anything." Even to herself, Jo couldn't believe how stupid her words sound. Even more so, she couldn't believe she was defending Ms. Cates for her behavior. But her words fell on deaf ears anyways, because Lacey was too wrapped up in her own conversation with herself to pay attention.
"I can't believe he fucked a teacher. Is no one investigating this?" Jo's eyes widened. Investigating? Investigations included the police and inevitability, her father. And at the end of those investigations, someone was usually arrested. She wasn't happy with what Ms. Cates had probably done, but she didn't want her to get into trouble. Worst of all, legal trouble. Especially since, if the she really did have sex with Danny, he was a more-than-willing participant. She'd just admitted that her life was just turning for the better and the last thing Jo wanted to do was ruin someone's life.
Not only that, but the attention and outcome of the situation would rest completely on Jo herself. She was the one Ms. Cates had confined to and she would, no doubt, be the one being interviewed by none other than her father. Being a tattletale would in no way benefit her in the end.
"You're not going to tell are you?" Jo asked. Lacey looked at her in amusement.
"Of course not Jo. I'm not a tattletale," she laughed. "I was just wondering if anyone really believed the rumors, or if people just want something to talk about."
"Well from what you've told me and what I've heard from Ms. Cates, it seems like the rumors have been true." Jo pointed out. Lacey shook her head, thinking again.
"It's just weird ya know? How everyone hated him and didn't want to talk to him," she explained. "and now they can't stop talking about him. I mean, I never would've thought Regina would be screwing him first two days he's back. Crazy."
Jo nodded in agreement. "I know what you mean," she added. "If you would've known Ms. Cates, you know, like before her 'big transformation', you wouldn't think she, of all people, would slept with a student. Let alone Danny." She laughed, thinking back to his first day in her class when he shocked everyone with his fluent Spanish. "You should've seen her face when he spoke Spanish to her. It was like in the cartoons! She had these hearts in her eyes like she was lovestruck and her jaw was nearly on the floor."
A chill ran though Lacey's spine. She felt for poor, unsuspecting Ms. Cates and now herself, wishing that Jo hadn't told her that story. It was only going to fuel the midnight fantasies she tried to keep at bay.
"Yeah. He must've made quite an impact on her." Lacey forced out a laugh.
"I'll say!" Jo agreed, also laughing awkwardly. "It's how he gets all his prey." This earned a real laugh from Lacey, who decided to play along.
"Maybe he puts them under some sort of spell by whispering sweet nothings in their ear."
"I wouldn't be surprised," Jo admitted, picking up her paint brush once again. "He was always whispering something to Ms. Cates when I saw them."
Lacey repositioned herself in her seat and stared at Jo. "Funny, he whispered something to Regina too his first day here." Jo stopped painting and turned to look at Lacey. Both girls sat staring at each other for several moments before bursting into laughter.
"Nah!" they said in unison, shaking their heads and resuming painting.
"I mean, he's good, but he's not that good," Lacey said. Jo's laughing halted.
"What do you mean he's good?" she asked, eying her suspiciously. Lacey looked at her in confusion before realizing that Jo thought she meant she knew first hand how good he was.
"Oh! No! No, no, no." I wish, She thought. "I meant cause, you know, Regina. She told me... With us being best friends and all," Lacey stammered. "It's not like I would know, like, personally. I mean, ew. Come on. Sex with Danny? Yuck." Jo stared at her. Lacey stared back. She hoped the nervousness wasn't visible in her eyes because, honestly, sex with Danny? Hell Yeah!
At that moment, Lacey felt like Jo could see every fantasy she'd ever had about Danny in her eyes. Luckily, the next question that left Jo's lips weren't 'You wanna hit that don't you?'
Instead they were, "She told you he was good?" Relieve flooded Lacey's senses. She nodded.
"She said he was the best she'd ever had," she recalled.
For once, Jo looked impressed. "Wow. And that says something." Jo was quiet until she thought about what she'd just said. "I mean, no offense or anything," she quickly added.
Lacey laughed. "It's okay. I know what you mean." Lacey would have to be in denial to not know how big a slut Regina is.
Another silence filled the room.
"How is he doing that though?... And getting away with it," Jo said, mostly to herself. But Lacey had heard her.
"What's what I wanna know." Both girls stopped painting and turned to look at each other before smiling.
"Detective Time!" they shouted, falling into laughter. They haven't done Detective Time since they were kids. It always started out with the three of them curious about something they had no business sticking their noses into and ended with them wishing they hadn't. Example one: Lacey's parents. They began their own investigation when Lacey noticed her father being suspiciously sneaky around the time of her tenth birthday. Late nights phone calls and coming and going at odd hours of the night.
In her naive mind, she thought he was planning something spectacular for her and when she took her investigation to the next level and started snooping through his phone, she'd thought she hit the jackpot when she found a text message about hiding the bathroom on the day of her birthday party. She thought it was an odd place to hide presents, but was excited enough to over look that fact.
The three of them were scarred for life when what they'd discovered wasn't nearly as innocent as presents. And they were even more confused since they thought only women could kiss other men.
Having discovered her father's secret, Lacey was convinced she was the reason behind her parents divorce but looking back on it, she felt that her mom had known all along and chose to ignore it. If she, at ten, noticed his strange behavior, surely she did too. And if her mother, at thirty, knew what said strange behaviors implied, she would've known how find out what Lacey herself did. But then again, what woman wants to find her husband making out with the hired entertainment. The clown's surprised face wasn't painted on with his makeup.
"God, we haven't played Detective Time in years," Jo said, thinking back. She felt kind of odd with it just being the two of them and that instead of Danny being detectives with them, he was the subject they were investigating this time around.
"I know," Lacey agreed. "I don't even know if I remember how to play." The incident ending with outing her father to everyone at her tenth birthday party resulted in them never playing the game again. But it also caused a few rules to be made for if they ever did decide to play again. The number one rule was no investigating "grown folks business". Ultimately, the rule was made up for them by Judy. But the second rule, they agreed upon themselves, which was: if it seemed like they were going to regret what they found, to not investigate at all. That was at far as the rules went, but if this investigation ended with her in bed with Danny, Lacey knew she wasn't going to regret this one bit.
"There isn't much to it," Jo explained. "We just have to pay attention to detail and keep our ears open. Who knows what the rumors will be tomorrow."
"Give me your number. We'll have to keep in touch for if we find out anything." Lacey pulled out her cellphone. Unlocking it to the home screen, she saw that she hadn't exited from the video Regina sent her earlier that day. She shook her head and deleted it.
After exchanging phone numbers, the two girls went into farther detail of their plans.
"You have to talk to Ms. Cates again," Lacey told her. "See what else you can find out about what happened between them." Jo sighed. She wasn't looking forward to all the work she was going to have to put it to get Ms. Cates to open up again. She wasn't sure if she confessed to her about her ex-husband and connection with Danny because she felt bad for Jo or if it was because she was hoping it was enough to get her to keep her mouth shut, but Jo was sure she wasn't going to get her in that position again anytime soon. She wasn't a good enough actress to play a good sob story.
Maybe I could try the apples again. She thought.
"You'll have to find out more from Regina," Jo insisted. "There's no way they had sex on campus without the principal finding out." Lacey nodded but internally grimaced. Having to hear Regina gloat about having sex with Danny wasn't exactly what she called fun. But if everything ended the way she planned, she'd be the one gloating. At least, she hoped.
Down the hall, Mr. Cosman stood listening to the girls' chatter and laugh. Smiling to himself, he bit into his apple. "Who says art therapy doesn't work?"
I can't wait to get your feedback on this one. I had a lot of fun writing it and I have so much more that I think you'll enjoy. I'd love to hear what you think will happen next.