Hey, Darkfogfox here. I'm sorry about the mix up with the previous chapter. I'm pretty sure I fixed it. Thanks to all the people that let me know about. As always thank you to everyone whose been keeping up with my stuff, it really does mean a lot. Here's the next chapter, hope you enjoy.
X. Puzzle Pieces
Amanda shoved a strip of bacon into her mouth the next morning. After making peace with handing over Diana's diary and once again justifying her actions for the greater good, Amanda had slept well. Today she was even eating her favorite breakfast, bacon and eggs with hot sauce. The rest of her crew didn't look as happy, Jasminka ate slowly and Constanze poked at the eggs on her plate.
"On come, guys! I'm the leader, I'm supposed to be handling all the big, bad responsibility, kay?" Amanda said mockingly.
Constanze held up a sign that said 'Just not hungry'.
"Okay, I buy that from Constanze but not you Jasminka. You always down at least 3 plates of food, so what gives?" Amanda asked, leaning her elbows on the table.
Jasminka looked around. "Was that book important? The one we gave away?"
Amanda felt herself get fiercely defensive. She was the leader, they needed to respect her choices.
"Nnnnoooooo. It was just some… look don't worry about it. At lunch today I'll go through the magnizes and publish the story by the end of the week. Soon we'll all be heroes, trust me." Amanda finished downing the rest of her eggs.
Glancing around the dining hall everything seemed normal and at ease. Offhandedly, Amanda noticed a group of girls looking at their phones and chatting. One of them pulled something up and everyone leaned in to look. Afterwards they all looked over at the blue and red teams eating at the same table. Strange but whatever, Amanda thought as she gathered up her stuff.
"Okay well, you guys can sit around and mope, but honestly I got better shit to do." Amanda said, getting up to throw out her trash. As she walked she noticed a couple of the girls get up from their group of friends and walk over to Diana's table. Amanda decided that something didn't feel right and decided to take a detour.
"Hey, Diana." One of the girls said giggling.
"Yes? Something I can help you with?" Diana asked, eyeing them questioningly. Both of the girls just started giggling uncontrollably. Finally Hannah glared at them.
"Spit it out! What the hell do you want?" Hannah demanded.
"Diana's apparently got a lot to say about the girls that go to school here. Eheheheh." The first student divulged.
"Yeah, Mary, Blair, Avery, Heather I mean the list just goes on. Seriously, Diana how many people DO YOU have a hard on for? HAHAHA."
Diana rose up in a fiery aura as Hannah and Barbara looked over at the other girls' table and pulled out their phones. Amanda's jaw dropped. How the hell did the diary contents get out that soon? One look at the group back at their table laughing told Amanda her answer. The social media, of course.
"I don't know what you're implying but whatever it is, it's not true." Diana spat taking a dignified sip of her tea. Barbara tapped Diana on the shoulder.
"Um. Diana." The two students looked at each other smirking.
"Really, then why is it all over your cousins' - Barbara shook Diana's shoulder harder.
"Diana, you need to see this." Diana whipped around and snatched Barbara's phone.
"Barbara, what could possibly be so important, right now, in this very moment-" Diana froze and all the color drained from her face. She looked at the two girls who were both still giggling and trying to hold back their laughter. Diana steeled her face and managed to look down her nose at both of the girls.
"That's all just hearsay. Sorry to disappoint everyone but I don't have a private diary where I write every night about how pretty all of YOU are. I'm afraid I have better things to do." Afterwards Diana walked out of the dining hall, nose in the air with Hannah and Barbara scrambling to pick up theirs and Diana's things and follow after her.
Amanda threw away her trash and slyly followed after them. Yesterday, she had a feeling something like this might happen. The deal with Diana's cousins seemed too easy. She had just never expected it would reach Luna Nova so soon, before she could break the story. After poking her head around a few corners, she found the blue team inside one of the empty classrooms with two exits. Diana's face was buried in her hands as her teammates tried to comfort her.
"Diana's okay." Barbara said, pulling out a handkerchief and extending it to Diana. Hannah was pacing around but paused for a moment.
"Look, your cousins are just jealous of you. That's why they did that. People make up all kinds of rumors about others when they're bored with their own lives." Hannah reassured.
Diana pulled her hands away from her face, revealing her puffy and bloodshot eyes. Amanda was taken aback. She had never seen Diana cry, it brought her back to Hannah and Barbara's interview. It was just something that felt so real and personal that Amanda never expected to see it first hand.
"No, Just the rumors and whispers… I can't take all of this happening again." Diana said as her eyes grew glassy with tears. Both of her teammates looked at her and then looked away, eyes cast down. Amanda noticed a group of students coming down the hall loudly and decided to hurry to class. She had a lot to think about. Students sat down and class progressed around her. Even as Professor Croix entertained the class with a funny story about her and Ursula, Amanda was only half listening.
"So yeah, that's the story of me and Professor Ursula saving the whole school from sinking underground in quicksand. And in spite of whatever the other faculty will tell you, it's 100 percent true. " Professor Croix declared proudly.
Amanda pondered staring out the window. Happening again? Did something like this happen to Diana before? Were these previous rumors somehow related to her sexuality? And what was with Andrew being set up with Diana the other day? Was the answer inside those trashy tabloids that they had traded for Diana's diary? It didn't make sense at first glance. Amanda wasn't used to having to think about so many bits of broken down information all at once. All these stray puzzle pieces and occurrences that didn't add up, they all had fit together somehow.
At lunchtime Amanda burst into the News Club Room again and raced once more to the same whiteboard. It was empty with Wangari and her team out chasing other stories and following up on leads.
"Alright now's our chance. The News Teams' not here, they can't get pissy with us for moving their stuff around a little. Constanze start writing out what we have on Diana! Jasminka make us some coffee!" Amanda ordered as she sat down, swung her feet up on a table dug into the trashy tabloids.
Jasminka stood puzzled. "But you don't drink coffee." Amanda poked her head over a particularly large tabloid.
"No, but I will tonight! We gotta get this story ready to go ASAP. Everyone is already starting to catch on to us." Amanda said, licking her finger as she flipped the page.
Most of the tabloid seemed to be about rumors concerning rich local families like the Cavendishes. Stories about steamy love affairs, scandalous inheritances and hot romantic couples. On one of the pages there was a small sidebar about Diana Cavendish. It questioned why Diana, 'an accomplished beauty from a distinguished family' was still single despite being in her prime teenage years, hitting that there were rumors orbiting around her explaining why.
Amanda rubbed her chin, nope there was nothing solid in the sidebar to prove anything about Diana. She discarded that tabloid on the floor and rummaged through some of the other ones. It proved to be disappointing, there were only snippets of Diana here and there. In fact there seemed to be a lot of stories disproving Diana's gayness, showing her going to various galas and high society events with various guys. Even interviews talking about her hoping to find a guy with various accomplishments just like her. Amanda frowned as another tabloid turned out to be useless. Damn, she thought, had Diana's cousins slighted them?
As Amanda shuffled another one off the pile she stopped and let it fall to the floor. Right there in front of her as a tabloid with Diana's full face plastering the cover. It highlighted her scared expression complete with dilated pupils. With nervous hands Amanda picked it up and read the front page.
DIANA CAVENDISH, SECRET LESBIAN LIFE SHOCKS HER FAMILY.