chapter two: the whole damn world

"Okay, I know why we're running late but why are you guys running late?!" Lil said aghast, pointing to the pair of step-siblings as they all ran up to meet with The Pickles and Susie.

Kimi and Phil exchanged knowing looks. They sat next to each other laughing.

"Come on, sis," Phil laughs, "You're telling me you've never been in the car with Chuck and his snail driving?"

"I think snail driving is a welcome change from the several road laws being broken driving with this one," Susie retorts pointing to Angelica.

Tommy enthusiastically agrees, even mumbles to himself something about being so young and not wanting to die this soon.

The mentioned girl simply lifts up her shades to rest on top of her headband completely unbothered.

"No one is forcing you guys to ride with me. Toughen up or shut up,"

"I'll take option three," Susie laughed, "carpooling saves the earth but I think it's time to take my shot with driver's ed. You and Buster are just….not it."

Angelica shrugs, "I'm still surprised you've waited this long. I was at the DMV right on the morning of my sweet sixteen."

"We remember," everyone retorts in unison.

Tommy shivers at the memory, he swore she only passed because her parents slid some cash under the door.

Oh well, never mind that now he supposed that was just how some with money and connections operated. He'd make a note of who to call if he ever needed bail money. Angelica owed that to him at the very least.

"Hey Tommy," they instantly realized Nicole and her two friends Sharon and Shannon walking towards them in greeting.

The two girls greeted him and then Phil as an afterthought in unison.

Not one to be rude Tommy instantly greeted them back acquiring on how their morning was going,

"Chuckie," Nicole was quick to hug Chuckie's arm and it wasn't long before those two were lost in their own world as they walked into the building.

Sharon and Shannon quickly grab each of Tommy's arms but somehow in a more awkward manner on the male's part dragging him behind his best friend and said best friend's girlfriend.

Dil whistled well because he supposed his brother always had it like that.

"Man," Phil whistled, "Two girls at once? Can't say I envy them, those chicks are known as crazy squared."

"They're just being friendly," Susie suggested as they also followed behind their friends a little further behind.

Dil smiled as one of the eldest in their group; she could still be so naive.

As the group ahead was walking a little faster for some reason.

"Yeah as friendly as a lion would be to its prey just to make it feel comfortable enough till the point it gets ready to sink its teeth into it," Lil muttered looking dead at Tommy longingly, whose being chatted up by two semi-popular girls.

Kimi and Susie laugh but Angelica merely nods. She knows how some around here operate. Susie would know too if she bothered to care about the most crucial thing to survive high school, popularity.

"He'll be fine if anything he's not quite on their radar yet, he'd have to make a varsity sports team or win another junior director's award or something," Angelica says, checking her makeup in her hot pink compact mirror for the third time.

She decides to touch it up one more time as they enter the building.

"You say that like he doesn't already have that award in the bag," Kimi laughs, "he's improved quite a bit since middle school not that any of us are surprised."

There was almost a bit too much admiration in her voice, Susie really hoped this wouldn't cause any conflict between her and Lil. Though she supposes Tommy and Kimi always had chemistry but she wasn't sure if that mattered at the end of the day.

Neither girl outwardly confessed to having feelings for their long-time friend but they both sure would show some signs here and there, and Kimi had begrudgingly told her about the whole "TP + KF '' debacle.

No matter what she said Susie knew her friend and knew for a fact there was no way that Kimi Watanabe-Finster was completely over Tommy Pickles.

"Yeah yeah Tommy's going to get an Oscar or something in the future, I'm going to make the pros, Chuck's probably going to make a living as an engineer or something and you guys will uh do whatever girls do right," Phil shrugged, "and Dil the man over here, skipping a grade...he's practically a prodigy, he can do anything he sets his mind to in the future."

"Phil," the girls complained in unison.

"You could've at least said that I'm going to be a famous singer, while we're dreaming big," Susie nudged him giggling.

"Or that I was going to be a world-famous artist and comic writer," Kimi laughed. In the summer before the last year of middle school, she spent it with her dad and Japan and she really started to embrace her love of manga.

Before it was the main thing her biological dad would send her from Japan, always the age-appropriate ones of course. It made her feel more connected to a part of her culture that sometimes felt so far away.

Her younger sister on her dad's side also loved to read with her and she'd never admitted it but learning Japanese as her baby sister learned to speak in general really helped her improve in speaking her mother's native language.

"Or said I make the women's team. We both know I can dribble a soccer ball light years better than you, Phillip,"

"Whatever you have to tell yourself to make yourself feel better, Lillian,"

"Or you could've said I'm going to be a simply marvelous fashion designer in Paris," Angelica rolled her eyes but then suddenly thought back to the last time they went to Paris and a chill went down her spine.

"On second thought maybe not Paris, why not London or good ol NYC…"

The rest of the former rugrats couldn't help but laugh as they all remember the crazy adventures they use to get into in the past. Now they dreamed up big futures for themselves.

Thinking well no matter what happens at least we'll be together. Oh, how naive we were.

Xoxo

Tommy made a mad dash to avoid Nicole's friends ending up in a random classroom, locking the door. It was just too much, they were just too much especially when they started to ask him who he thought to be prettier between the two of them.

They're freaking identical twins. And average at best as far as he was concerned not that he'd admit it to them. They were known as crazy.

Tommy liked the attention, especially girl attention but damn.

"We haven't even made it to lunchtime and you're already hiding out, Pickles?"

"Kimi," Tommy sighed walking over to her, "boy I don't think I could be any happier that it's you and not another one of my fangirls."

"Fangirls? Cocky much," she laughs softly continuing on with her painting,

"I call them as I see them. Those girls don't really like me; they only like the idea of me," Tommy rolls his eyes, "So, yeah fangirl behavior."

"Can't argue with you there,"

"What are you doing,"

"Needed some time alone. I have a study hall so I decided to come here instead and get some painting done. Ms. Joy said it was cool as long as I didn't throw a party in here."

"Study hall? Same here," Tommy nodded, "it's crazy we all have very different schedules this year I thought I'd never run into any of you guys so easily."

"Untrue you and Lil have similar classes together right? And you, me, her in Phil all have gym and Algebra I together,"

"Like either of the twins will actually be present for math class," Tommy laughed.

"Oh they'll be there alright," she chuckles, "at least their bodies anyway who knows where their heads will be probably wandering unto the soccer field."

"Right,"

She continues painting as Tommy gets a good look at it.

"Whoa, Kim that's amazing,"

Kimi painted a deeply detailed painting of two koi fish, one swimming in a carefully flower-adorned pond. One of the fishes is white with a significant black splotch on its head while the other is black with an almost glowing white splotch on its head.

The water looks so hyper-realistic that if Tommy didn't know better he'd swear he was looking at a photograph taken with a very expensive professional camera.

He says as much to the girl with who he always wondered what it would've been like to take a chance and get with but never crossed that line due to fear of hurting their long-time platonic relationship and his friendship with his best friend and her brother.

Still, he couldn't help it when the girl invaded his sweetest dreams and was present for his most precious memories.

Kimi tries not to blush but fails miserably.

"Thanks, it's actually something I've been working on for a while now so that means a lot coming from you, Tommy."

Okay here he could do two things, the first being to ease the slight tension that began to penetrate the air or make a sly joke that both annoyed the girl yet caused her to laugh and relax the tension and try to never speak on it again after all he was perfectly content having Kimi as a friend.

The second option was to say something equally as sweet to her and bring up ever so shyly the whole "TP + KF" situation in the hopes that Chuckie would be too concerned with his girlfriend to worry about his best friend and sister possibly dating.

Of course, they'd eventually just tell him...eventually.

"Yeah...Kimi would you mind if one day...you and I…,"

However, whatever he's about to say gets interrupted as the warning bell rings loudly and disrupts every thought process he's ever had.

"Shit, I have to get to my language course," Kimi said dashing to put her art supplies away, used brushes in the sink, hands washed thoroughly "whatever you were about to say, Tommy, you'll have to tell me later okay promise."

With that, she's out the door as soon as it's unlocked.

"Yeah," Tommy replies to an empty room, "catch you later."

Xoxo

Phil chucked noticing the younger Pickles brother looking lost as hell interring the classroom. The boy looked almost spooked in a way and Phil couldn't help but be concerned.

Dil was like his own little brother in a way he even tried to replace Lil as his twin at one point. He didn't find it funny at all back then but now he just saw it as...wholesome the boy always tried to help a friend in his own weird way of thinking.

Phil got the curly redhead's attention and motioned for him to sit at the empty chair next to his own.

The workstation was the only one that was empty; everyone else probably knew each other from summer clubs and the recreation center.

Dil sighed in relief when he noticed him.

"Dylan the man, the myth, the legend," Phil nodded at him, "how's operation: sunrise going?"

If anything Dil seemed to deflate even more at the mention of said operation.

"Horrible she won't even look at me as potential boyfriend material. Susie only sees me as a kid!"

"Chill bro I told you that can be expected, besides who knows...if you're so interested in pursuing her maybe you should give it a couple of years maybe date someone else your own age in the meantime preferably someone from the middle school,"

"What do you mean?"

"It's just-,"

The teacher walked in talking about how they would be making blueprints for birdhouses today. Jumping right on into it.

Phil couldn't even explain to Dil all he wanted to explain about high school girls heck he was still learning about high school girls himself but he knew Dil was nowhere near ready for that.

He doubted Susie would ever see Dil that way anyway and would hate to see either of his friends get hurt due to that so his true objective of operation: sunrise was to get Dil to wake up and realize the age gap was just a bit too much for right now and hopefully hanging out with more girls his own age would erase the crush he had on Susie for the sake of keeping the friend group drama free.

But they could talk about that after woodshop.

Xoxo

"Oh my gosh Lil I wish I could dress like you but I really have to bounce to go into skinny jeans these days," Carla Cortez sighed.

"That's because you decided to spend more time at the mall than going with us swimming over the summer. Everyone knows swimming is one of the best exercises," Elizabeth Daniels replied almost snarky.

"Couldn't help it you know Johnny got a job at the Pizza Shack and he's just the cutest!"

"All that time put into stalking him and nothing to show for it,"

"I'm playing the long game just wait until Shawn's party,"

It was silent neither of the four hopefuls had even gotten an invite yet. Lil said as much until Elizabeth also known as Liz said she already got hers from giving Shawn's best friend's younger sister a makeover for her band recital.

"She's going to be a total nerd once she makes it to high school though, all those connections perfectly wasted on her part,"

"Like oh my gosh you totally have the cutest sneakers I think I saw Angelica Pickles with the same ones and everyone knows her family is loaded," Jennifer Davis says effectively changing the subject as they made their way to their lockers.

"Yeah…how about that" Lil smiled, she's glad a group of semi-popular girls has basically taken her under their wing. Two of them even being soccer team hopefuls just like her. She didn't mention the fact that she often raids Angelica's closet not that the girl would miss an item or two. She has enough designers to fit a luxury outlet mall.

"About that we are kind of close really we're almost cousins at this point," Lil rolls her eyes good-naturedly oblivious to the sudden stiffness of her companions.

She's never given much thought to how long she's known Tommy and the rest of her friends before. As much as Angelica use to torture them as babies they really all do act like a family. Not to mention if she and Tommy were to get married then they would really be cousins.

"Lil oh my gosh Shawn and Angelica or practically dating now! You're so in there you have to get the rest of us invited when you do!" Carla declares.

"Yeah, totally," Liz nodded an almost crazed look in her eyes, "you got the connection, girl...don't let it go to waste."

"Oh, totally," Lil nodded, "I'll chat with Angelica at lunch. We've got this in the bag, girls!"