It had been two weeks since the first meeting for the Deb Ball. Things were progressing smoothly. Every single member of the committee was pretty much stressing to make sure everything worked out as planned. They were in the home stretch now. Exactly a week before the big day and lucky for them there had been no major mishaps.
"Well I guess that's it then people. Good work and I'll see you all back here on Monday after school" Rosie said at the meeting. It was Friday after school and they were meeting in the same place they had initially. Infact it had become their regular meting spot.
"Yeh, we're all done. But Rosie, you're still holding out on the entertainment" Cade said, while lazily stretching out.
Rosie stuck her tongue out at him and with an impish smile she said, "For the millionth time Cade, my brother said he'll arrange it. And even if you ask me every day, I'm still not going to tell you"
Scarlett watched the interaction between her ex boyfriend and new almost-best friend and grinned to herself. A lot of people thought Scarlett would throw a bitch fit when she realised that Cade and Rosie were flirting but had Scarlett surprised them. She just studied Rosie's outfit with a critical eye.
'Well, I can't really find fault with it. I did pick it' she thought to herself.
Over the past two weeks there had been a huge transformation in Rosemary Butler. Her first spa day with Scarlett and Cathleen had been painful in her opinion, fruitful in Scarlett's opinion.
Rosie now had neatly plucked eyebrows, something she had refused to have done until Scarlett bulldozed her into doing it. Her hair was cut in layers and it looked fuller and sexier than it had before. Cathy had been the one to convince her to get her hair done.
Next Rosie had had the requisite mani-pedi and then a relaxing facial and massage. Or what Scarlett and Cathy thought to be relaxing. Even though the other girls seemed to be enjoying themselves, Rosie had thought her first spa/beauty day to be torture!
But even Rosemary couldn't complain about the results, just the method. She looked and felt better than she had in years. After an exhausting trip to the mall where she put Rhett's credit card to good use, Rosie now had a wardrobe that rivalled even Scarlett's. Rosie's clothes had always been expensive and elegant, but they were never cutting edge. Nor was she ever hung up on designers. But Rosie knew better than to battle with Scarlett O'Hara and Cathleen Calvert over clothes.
And that was just one Saturday. Over the next few days, Scarlett and Cathy had introduced her to make up and had even convinced her to get her ears pierced. Slowly Rosie had lost her sullen irritated manner and had just accepted what was going on. She had even started to enjoy it although she swore she would never admit it to Scarlett.
Then the biggest shock had come. At the meeting at the Butler's, Cade who had become a huge player after he and Scarlett broke up, had taken one look at Rosie and had stopped mid stride. Recovering quickly, he had gone to her and whispered,
"What did you do? You don't look like you. You look like them" Then he had winked at her. "But you do look fine"
Rosie had blushed not knowing how to react. She had mumbled a thank you.
All through the meeting, Rosie knew she was getting looks from these boys who had never noticed her before. Cade, Brent, Stu even Phil had never so much as spared her a glance before but now that she had conformed to their sense of 'beautiful' she was suddenly worth their time. These thoughts made Rosie scowl even more than usual and her manner more abrupt. After the meeting when everyone was leaving Cade had come up to her again and before she could react he had said softly,
"Atleast you still act like you"
He had then walked away leaving a very confused Rosie behind.
Now after all this time, Rosie found that she and Cade had fallen into an easy camaraderie. They joked around and even flirted a little.
Scarlett had noticed this straight away but instead of being upset or annoyed, Scarlett had encouraged their friendship. She truly cared about Cade and now that she had her old best friend back, she could see that Rosie was still the same person she was before, still kind and generous, with a bit of a temper maybe but Scarlett, always the matchmaker, saw potential. While at first she had felt the slightest twinge of jealousy, she had ignored it.
'Cade and Scarlett, that story is so played out.' She thought. Their relationship had been amazing but they had had so much drama, the constant break ups and make ups. It had gotten to be so bad that by the time they ended it the once best friends-turned-couple hated each other. It had taken a lot of time and enormous effort of Cathy's part to patch them up. Both Scarlett and Cade knew they would never go down that road again but they both wanted to be friends like they used to be.
'And part of being a friend is not sabotaging the other person's prospective relationships' Scarlett thought to herself firmly.
The only person who didn't seem too thrilled at the new development was Cathy. She had always pictured her brother and best friend rediscovering their feelings for each other and falling back in love. Now with Rosie on the scene, the chances of that had reduced considerably.
Scarlett had tried to talk to Cathy and explain that she and Cade were not going to get back together, not now, not ever but the conversation had just escalated into an argument and Scarlett had decided to back off for the time being.
'I'll try again after the meeting' Scarlett thought to herself.
She then looked around and realised nearly everyone had left. Cathy was waiting for her impatiently at the door while Cade and Rosie spoke to each other.
"Are you coming Scarlett? We're supposed to be at out fittings in like twenty minutes" Cathy yelled.
"Yup. I'm there. Rosie, hurry up and say bye-bye to Cade here. We have to go make sure we look gorgeous at the Ball" Scarlett said while walking over and linking arms with Rosie.
"Aww Belle, you know you could turn up in a burlap sack and still be the hottest girl in the room" Cade said with a wink. Belle was the nickname Cade had given her when they were younger. Once when Scarlett, Cathy and Cade had watched a movie set before the Civil War, one of the characters was called the 'Belle of the Ball' because she was the prettiest, had the nicest dress and had most of everyone's attention on her. Cade had immediately likened that character to Scarlett and had since then called Scarlett 'Belle'.
"Oh I know. I just want to make everyone else knows it too." Scarlett said with a laugh then she gave Cade a quick hug and started to drag Rosie off with her.
"Bye Cade" Scarlett called as they walked out.
"Bye Belle. Bye Rosie" Cade yelled back.
"Bye Cade"
Later that evening while the girls were getting their measurements taken Rosie asked Scarlett suddenly,
"Why does Cade call you Belle?"
Scarlett laughed and told her the story.
"My brother and Scarlett have a really long history you know" Cathy said a little spitefully and then shot Scarlett an apologetic look.
"Yeah we do but that's all it is, History" Scarlett said. "Look Rosie, I'm not going to lie to you and say Cade and I had nothing together. We did but its so over and neither of us want to go back. So if you like him I say go for it!"
"Like him? I didn't say I like him. I was just curious about the nick name that's all" Rosie said quickly and then looked anywhere but Scarlett.
"Yeh Right. Rosemary Butler, you are a terrible liar. I know you like Cade. He's a really great guy and if you want Cathy and I can speak to him for you"
"No! Please don't!" Rosie practically shouted.
Cathy and Scarlett both burst out laughing when they heard her panicked tone.
"Don't worry. We won't say a word" Scarlett said, "Will We?"
Cathy just nodded along.
"Speaking of boys, do you have a date for the Ball yet?" Cathy asked Scarlett.
"Nope. I mean a couple of guys have asked me but I don't know. I mean this is so cool. For once there's like no competition from girls from other grades." Scarlett said.
"What do you mean? Cant the guys in our grade ask other girls?" Cathy asked.
"Jeez Cathy, did you not listen to any of the announcements regarding the Ball?" Scarlett asked with mild irritation.
"Uh, No, I didn't see why I had to since like my twin brother and best friend are both on the planning committee" Cathy said.
Sensing a fight Rosie butted in quickly, "Oh it's nothing bid Cathy. It's just that traditionally the Deb Ball was a chance for juniors from both the boys and girls academies to mingle. And no other grade kids were allowed. Now normally we would have changed the rules but this year all we did is tweak them a little. See there are more girls in our grade than boys, so we figured all the boys can get dates but those girls who can't or just didn't can ask boys from other grades. You see?"
"And just so there's no confusion once people have settled on their dates they have to register with us so we can make sure the lists are ready. You know, to announce the Deb's name and then her escort. The last day to register dates is Monday. The remaining people will be assigned dates at the latest by Thursday. We have some of the seniors who have volunteered to be escorts so it's going to be awesome" Scarlett said.
Cathy shot her a shrewd look, "Is Ashley one of the volunteers?"
Rosie turned to look at Scarlett too.
"I have no idea. Cade is handling that" Scarlett said with her most innocent expression.
"Uh huh. Sure" Cathy said.
Rosie snickered. She could tell that Scarlett was lying too and that Cathy clearly didn't believe her.
Scarlett quickly changed the subject,
"So anyways Rosie, do you like Cade?" Scarlett asked.
Rosie blushed but just shook her head. This time even Cathy just smiled knowingly.
"Ohmigod! You like loser too? What is it with my friends and my brother?" Cathy asked jokingly.
"Stop calling Cade loser. That's so not nice" Scarlett said with a tiny frown.
"Who are you, my mother?" Cathy asked annoyed. "Besides it's better than what you call him"
"What do you call Cade?" Rosie asked curiously.
Scarlett blushed and just said, "Oh that's one story we won't be getting into today"
Hey! Sorry it took me so long but while I already have most of the countess written up, this is a WIP. So here is a long update to make up for the long absence and as a thank you for all the reviews. I promise there will be Rhett in the next chap and the Rhett/Scarlett meeting will take place very soon. I'm just enjoying the high school stuff so much I had to write a little more.
Please Review. The more you do the more I write, the quicker and longer the updates get.