Author's Note: Ahh, SATs. I prepped and studied and took practice tests, got my test date, showed up at the test site and…
It was closed, the test was canceled (thanks Covid), and I never ended up taking my SATs.
I mean, I wouldn't say I'm mad at that, but it does make it rather harder to write the first scene of this realistically. Granted… I've never even been to high school so I doubt I'm writing any of this realistically.
After every dance or highly-anticipated event at AV High, there was always a palpable let down the day after, and the fact that SATs were fast approaching didn't help.
"Sometimes it really sucks to date a smart person," Iris grumbled one evening as she, Iris and Thea struggled to cram before their test that Saturday. "Barry and almost all of his nerd-squad friends already took their SATs and passed with well above flying colors."
"How can you pass above flying colors?" Sara mumbled, rubbing her itchy, tired eyes with one hand and peering at her test-prep booklet in the hopes that things would have gotten clearer. "Can you… pass blue instead of passing green?" She frowned deeper. "Which one's higher?"
"Shhhh…" Thea hissed, batting the air and then patting at the plate on the floor next to her. Her hand hit china and she lifted her eyes from her booklet to see that the plate of cookies Rasia had brought them was now empty. "Oh no. Did I really eat all these?"
"Yeah, I didn't have any," Sara deadpanned. Thea gave her a look of such abject horror that her poker-face cracked. "I'm kidding I had like six. Five. Three. I don't remember; the past two hours have kind of been a blur."
"I need to go home soon," Iris sighed, checking her phone. "We have to get to the test center so early tomorrow."
Thea squirmed, rolling onto her back and driving her fingers into her hair. "Guys I'm going to fail," she whimpered, sounding legitimately terrified. "I don't- I can't remember half this stuff now, and I know it's going to be 800 times worse once we're actually working on the clock."
"Look, Thea," Iris said calmly, reaching over to pull her hands out of her hair. "Whatever happens tomorrow happens. And besides, you can always retake your SAT if you hate the score."
Thea yanked her hands away and covered her face.
"Do you need me to call Roy?" Sara sighed, reaching for her phone. " 'Cause I'll call him."
"You don't need to call Roy," Thea mumbled from behind her hands. "I've already unloaded on him. Multiple times."
"Come on," Iris urged, grabbing Thea's arms and pulling her clumsily to her feet. She began to push her out the door. "Go brush your teeth and get ready for bed. Sara and I are gonna head out. And remember: It's going to be fine."
"Okay, okay," Thea sighed. She exchanged hugs with Sara and Iris and waited a whole five minutes until after they'd left before picking up her phone and calling Roy. It was time to unload on him.
Again.
"Wussup?" Roy mumbled sleepily when he picked up the phone. He was just barely lit by his bedside lamp and Thea smiled at how soft and rumpled he looked.
"You're not usually asleep now," she said suspiciously.
He shrugged. "I was tired. Long week. What's up?"
"I'm really scared about tomorrow," Thea murmured, picking at a piece of lint on her shirt. "I don't want to screw up."
"Thea, we've talked about thi-"
"I know, I know." Thea let out a deep sigh, walking towards her closet to find some pajamas. She really did need to get to bed soon. "I know. I'm not saying it's a rational fear."
She twisted her mouth around, sucking on her teeth. Roy rolled onto his back. "You want me to sneak out and come over?"
Did she ever. "No," Thea told him with a fond smile. "But thank you."
He shrugged, raising his forearm to his mouth to smother a yawn. Thea reached for her pajamas and her eyes fell on a plastic-bag-covered dress. Her bridesmaids dress, which she and her mom had purchased recently because the wedding was a month from Sunday. "Hey Roy?"
He suppressed a sigh. "Yes, Thea?"
"Will you be my date to my mom's wedding?"
Roy raised his eyebrows, surprised. "That's out of the blue. When is it?"
"June 12th," Thea said, reaching out and brushing her hand along the dress bag. "I know it's not going to be an easy day for me and… I really want you to be there."
"You're not looking forward to it, huh?" Roy pushed himself into a sitting position, seeming resigned to the fact that he wouldn't be allowed to go back to sleep anytime soon.
Thea shook her head, grabbing her pajamas and turning away from the closet. "Don't get me wrong: I'm happy for my mom. I guess. But I'm… not quite as happy for me. I don't know, I just feel like everything is happening so fast. We have SATs, the wedding, and then school ends which is nuts. Like, why couldn't things have spaced themselves out a bit? I feel like I barely get a chance to swallow something before the next flavor is stuffed in my mouth. Huh, that was kind of poetic."
Roy's lips quirked. "Yeah, not bad."
"So anyway, what do you say?" Thea redirected hopefully. "Will you come with me?"
"I'll have to ask my dad, but yeah, I'd like to," Roy told her. "You know I'll be there if you need me to support you, Thea."
Thea looked fondly at him again. "Yeah, I know," she said softly. "Thank you."
"There is one favor you could do me, actually," Roy said with a faint grin. "Let me go back to sleep."
Thea laughed, jumping onto her bed. "Okay, okay. I think I can do that much."
AV-High-AV-High-AV-High-AV-High-AV-High-AV-High-AV-High-AV-High-AV-High
"Well, I want to commend you all," Eliza said, staring around at the table. Seated about her were Kara, Alex, Mon-El and Maggie. "SATs are officially done and you've nearly made it to the end of school. Those are big accomplishments."
Kara bit back a giggle at how formal her mom was sounding, despite the fact that they were literally sitting around a table covered with pizza boxes. Still, this was a pretty big occasion. Despite the fact that both couples had been dating for awhile, this was the first time they'd all shared a dinner together in the Danvers home.
"Also," Alex added, reaching over and putting her hand on her girlfriend's knee. "Maggie's birthday is coming up."
"In like eleven days," Maggie said, squinting. "Or twelve, or… I dunno, I'm not keeping track."
"What did we do for your birthday?" Kara asked Mon-El, frowning quizzically. "I legitimately can't remember. The memorable-ness of my birthday must have outshone it."
Mon-El cringed faintly. "We don't talk about that," he said, only half kidding, before adding, "My birthday is the day after Valentine's Day, and you'd just gotten me a gift-"
"Or right, I went out to lunch with you and your parents instead of getting you another one," Kara finished, shaking her head and pushing her glasses up her nose. "Duh."
"I could have told you that," Eliza put in with a faint smile. "You came home all flustered because you dropped an entire salt shaker in your soup and were worried that Mon-El's mom thought you suffered from seizures."
Kara pursed her lips. "We don't talk about that," she echoed, not kidding in the least.
Alex was watching this exchange thoughtfully. "Hey," she spoke up, glancing over at Maggie. "You know what I just realized? I've never met your parents?"
Maggie went still, her hand wrapped around her glass of apple juice. "Uh, no," she said. "I guess you haven't."
"Why don't we take a page out of Mon-El and Kara's book?" Alex suggested eagerly. "We could all go out for dinner or lunch or brunch or something for your birthday! Then I could meet them and celebrate your special day with you without taking you away from your family."
"I don't think that's a great idea, Alex," Maggie said stiffly, giving her a tight smile.
The dining room became uncomfortably quiet. Kara and Mon-El exchanged glances and Kara was suddenly and forcibly reminded of Prom, when Maggie had gotten bent out of shape by a comment Alex had made about the pictures.
Either Alex didn't read the tension in the room, or she just didn't care. "Why not?" she asked bluntly. "Maggie, we've been dating for a few months now and I still haven't met your parents. Don't they want to meet me?"
"Alex, just drop it," Maggie said stonily.
"No!" Alex cried.
"Oooookay," Eliza broke in, standing up. "I'm going to break down these pizza boxes. Kara, do you and Mon-El want to go pick out some ice cream? I got a couple of cartons of Ben and Jerries; they should be in the downstairs fridge."
She hustled the young couple out of the kitchen, leaving Maggie and Alex facing off with each other across the dining room table.
"If you're going to refuse to let me to meet your mom and dad, I feel like I'm at least entitled to a reason," Alex said, trying not to let her annoyance get the best of her. "I feel like that's a reasonable request. Actually, asking to meet your mom and dad is pretty reasonable, too."
"Why can't you ever just drop things when I ask you to?" Maggie shot back, still avoiding the question. "Don't you trust me enough to think that I have a good reason for doing so?"
"Yeah, but if it's such a good reason then why can't you tell me what it is?" Alex demanded. Her heart was beating weirdly fast, but she wasn't sure if it was because of the confrontation or because this felt really serious all of the sudden or because she was actually scared to know what Maggie's reasoning was.
"Alex, just let it go," Maggie groaned, covering her face with her hands. "We were having a nice night-"
"Yeah, we were!" Alex cried. "With my mom! Who you know well! Don't I deserve that kind of familiarity, too? This is what happen when people get serious, Maggie, they meet each others families. They become a part of every part of each others lives. Why are you resisting that?"
"Because my parents don't even know we're dating!" Maggie exploded.
Eliza, who'd been trying to hustle herself and her pizza boxes out to the garage but had accidentally dropped them all in her haste and had been postponed with leaving, froze. Alex stared at Maggie, unblinking, for a moment before her eyes welled. "What?" she whispered, hurt. "Why not?"
"Because they-" Maggie sucked in a breath through her nose, her own eyes swimming. "Because they don't even know I'm gay, okay?"
Eliza finally made it out into the garage, and the sound of the door shutting broke Maggie and Alex out of their trances.
"I should go," Maggie mumbled, pushing back from the table. "Tell Eliza thanks for the pizza."
"Maggie, wait," Alex protested, standing and following her from the table. She felt like every time something went wrong with her and Maggie, one of them ran off or shut the other one out and it just made more misery for both of them. She caught at Maggie's arm and pulled her into a hug. "Just stop for a second, okay? I'm- I'm not mad, not now that you've explained. I just want to understand."
"My dad hates gay people," Maggie confessed, a sob catching in her throat. "And so I just- I never came out to him. I kind of… half came out to my mom, I don't know, she might know."
"What about your last girlfriend?" Alex asked as she rubbed her hand along Maggie's back. "They never knew about her?"
Maggie shook her head. "And her parents were the same way- she wasn't out them yet. But you… your mom is so cool with all of this. You have no idea how lucky you are."
"I do, actually," Alex said quietly. "I know how amazing my mom is. I didn't know how crummy your dad is, though, and I really wish you would have told me."
"I was just embarrassed, I guess," Maggie mumbled, pulling away from the hug and swiping at her face. "I've been hiding my sexuality from them for so long. I know I have a reason for it, but it still makes me feel like a coward. It makes me feel like- like I'm not proud of it. Like I'm not proud of you. Of us. And I am, Alex, I really am. I want the world to know I'm in the love with you, but… I'm terrified of my dad finding out. I'm not eighteen yet, and even once I am… what if he kicks me out? What am I supposed to do?"
Alex floundered. She was entirely out of her depth here. "I don't know," she admitted. "But I will not be the reason you get kicked out, if he would even do that. You shouldn't tell them just for me. If you tell them, it should be for you. Even if that means I don't meet them for a long time."
Maggie sniffled, then let out a shaky breath. "Alex," she whispered, reaching out to squeeze Alex's hand. "Thank you."
Author's Note: Sometimes I think about what I would do if I were to retry writing AV High. First off, I would chart out everyone's school schedules. I'd also pick all their prospective colleges and make plots off of that, and I would make it so that some of the ships were actually near-full-story slow burns, or that people had gotten rejected, or more breakups or…
Overall I just woulda planned better but dang I've already spent like five years on this so like-