[Rose's POV]
I woke up to the sound of my phone chiming. Letting out a slight groan, I rolled over and grabbed said phone, unlocked it and checked what could possibly be spamming me at seven in the morning.
"Wait...Dallas did what?!" I asked aloud in surprise, clicking on a news article and skimming it. Dallas Dixon had set a fire and almost burned down Jade Smithwell's house. "Holy shit," I murmured. "This...oh my God, everyone needs to see this." I then closed the article, immediately tapping Tempest's contact photo and putting my phone to my ear, tapping impatiently on the backside of the case. The call went straight to voicemail, and I let out a soft groan.
"O-M-G, Temp, answer me!" I yelled into the receiver. "Look, wait until I tell you what I heard!" I stood up, nearly jumped out of bed, and started pacing back and forth. "It's too fucked to type! This shit is ripe! Call back! I'll yell you every word." I said, then hung up, satisfied that I was at least able to send her a voicemail...only to tap the 'call' button again and proceed to attempt another call. After chatting with her and Hope about the situation, I jumped out of bed and got dressed. Red flannel, MCR shirt, ripped jeans, sneakers...I looked good to go. I scampered out of my house and down to the nearest bus stop. Tempest said to meet her at the mall so that we - and by we, she meant Hope, herself, and me. - could spread the word.
(Timeskip)
As soon as I got off the bus and into the mall courtyard, I heard Hope's voice call my nickname.
"Rosie!" She bounded at me and almost crushed me in a hug.
"Heya, Hope. Is Tempest with you?" I asked, playfully ruffling her hair. She looked behind her, then shook her head.
"Nope. She said to meet her here so that we all could spread the word." She said.
"I heard my name?" Tempest asked, walking out from inside the mall with a group of girls in tow. I raised an eyebrow.
"Uh, yeah. Who are these lovely ladies?" I asked, gesturing to the group.
"This is the cavalry," She replied proudly. "They're going to help us get this out to everyone." She then stepped to the side. "Introduce yourselves!" She said cheerfully. The first girl to step forward had messy brown hair, brown eyes, the most confident posture I had ever seen on a teenager, and wore an outfit in various shades of blue.
"I'm Star," She said, giving me a slight smile. I gave her a polite smile back as she walked over to my side, Hope eagerly introducing herself. The next girl to walk up had black hair, electric blue eyes, and was dressed like a punk rocker.
"Name's Thalia. Nice to meetcha, Rose." She said, and I shivered slightly at how cold her voice was, managing to give her a nod. She walked to stand next to Star as the next girl walked forward. She had blondish brown hair, blue-green eyes, and was wearing a checkered flannel over a grey shirt and a pair of jeans.
"My name's Zoe." She said softly. I don't know why, but I felt compelled to pull her into a hug. So, I did. Zoe immediately relaxed into my arms, both of us pulling away after a moment.
"Nice to meet you, Zoe," I said softly. She gave me a smile, then stepped over to the side. The last girl walked up with confidence and a little bit of a pep in her step. She had black hair, green eyes, and wore all black from head to toe.
"My name's Emily," She said cheerily. "Nice to meet you!" She gave me a smile, and I pulled her into a hug as well.
"Nice to meet you too, Emily," I said, then looked at Tempest. "So, this is it? This is our social media army?" Tempest nodded proudly.
"Mmhm!" She then addressed the entire group. "Hey, everybody! Have you heard? Dallas Dixon set a fire, now go spread the word!" She said like a cheerleader. Everyone, myself included, pulled out their phones and each went onto a different app. I opened Twitter, Star and Emily opened Tumblr, Hope opened Instagram, Thalia opened YouTube for some bizarre reason, Zoe opened up Snapchat, and Tempest opened Facebook.
"Sending a text!" Zoe said simply.
"Sending a tweet!" I called. We all then started speaking in counterpoint with each other.
"Sending a text!" Star and Emily called, Star tossing her phone to Thalia, who caught it with ease.
"Text!" Thalia shot back, typing a message and throwing the phone back to Star.
"Sending a tweet!" I shouted, then tossed my phone to Zoe, who fumbled, caught it, and typed out a tweet of her own.
"Tweet!" She chirped, tossing my phone back to me.
"Release the information, step, and repeat!" Tempest cheered.
"I'll spread the word that Dallas is flecked!" Hope said, receiving a multitude of confused looks in response.
"Flecked?" We all asked. She tilted her head.
"No, I meant fucked!" She clarified.
"Ohhh." The group made a sound of agreement.
"Wait, did I say flecked?" She asked, looking from her phone to us.
"Yeah," I admitted, laughing slightly. She let out a slight giggle.
"Sorry, guys! That's just my autocorrect." She apologized.
"Always be aware of autocorrect!" Heather chirped. We all began to sing-speak in unison, the excitement getting us all hyped up.
"Dallas Dixon, can't you see? Just how much I care about your tragedy! Changed my profile pic to you, now I fully understand what you're going through! Dallas Dixon, it's a drag. I read, she read, they read you're in a body bag! Dallas Dixon, can't you see just how much I love your tragedy!" We cheered. A few people walked out of the mall, looking at us with slight confusion.
"Hi!" Hope chirped, bounding over to them with Tempest in tow. I recognized a few of them, too, and I pointed them out to the others.
"That's Katherine Kelly," I said, gesturing to a girl with long brown hair and grey eyes. "She's part of the school's newspaper." I then gestured to a girl with long, dyed purple hair and blueish grey eyes. "That's Mimi. No one knows her last name, but she's probably one of the most creative people I know." I said rather proudly. Zoe suddenly pointed to another girl. This one had short black hair and brown eyes.
"I know her! Her name's Danielle, formerly Damien. She's one of the cheerleaders." She said excitedly. Danielle looked over at us and smiled, sauntering over after a moment.
"Yo! Zoe and Rose, right?" She chirped.
"Yo! That's us." Zoe and I replied.
"Did you hear about that fire?" Danielle asked, and I couldn't help but smile.
"How could we not?" I replied, laughing. She gave me a smile, then waved Katherine over.
"Sup, Kathy!" She shouted. Katherine flushed red but hurried over.
"Sup. I thought I told you never to call me that!" She hissed. Danielle shrugged slightly.
"Hey, it's a good nickname. It suits ya." She said simply.
"Yo, this shit's FIRE! Uh, no pun intended." Mimi laughed, bouncing up to us and grabbing us all in a hug, much to my surprise. I squeaked slightly as Tempest grabbed my shoulder and everyone else surrounded me, forming a sort of circle.
"Talk it, text it, pass it, talk it!" We shouted, passing our phones to each other in a very wonderball way. After everyone got their phone back, the circle erupted into incoherent chattering about the whole incident.
My head was spinning. I was admittedly too overwhelmed to think straight, and I pulled out of the circle and collapsed onto my ass on the pavement, squinting up at everyone's backs. The circle quickly filled my open space and didn't seem to notice I had disappeared.
I sighed quietly, stood up, brushed myself off, and debated my options. I could either leave everyone and just go back home so that I could make this incident less of a production, or stay and be potentially roped into something that I might regret. I slowly began pacing back and forth, looking down at my phone. This whole situation was insane.
Why did Dallas do what he did?
It wasn't alcohol, it wasn't pot...so what was it?
What drove him to want to burn someone's house down?
I bit my lip as I stopped pacing, noticing my Twitter feed being spammed with people sending prayers, the mob sending their mass texts...and then I noticed a lone tweet from Christine Harpsong. It only read three simple words:
"Oh my God."
It was in response to Zoe's tweet about the fire. I shook my head and closed the app, tucking my phone into my pocket and staring at the still-chattering group. Hell, they were practically singing at this point.
"Dallas set a fire and he burned down the house! Woah, Dallas set a fire and he burned down the house. It was so terribly gory, I got the whole bloody story! Yeah, I wasn't quite there, but I know what happened, I swear! When Dallas set a fire and he burned the house down, when Dallas set a fire and he leveled the town. When Dallas set a fire and he fled to Bombay, when Dallas set a fire 'cause he knew he was gay," everyone sang, giggling slightly. I backed up slowly, not wanting to get involved. With every passing second, everyone's versions of the story got more and more ridiculous.
"When Dallas set a fire and he melted his head, when Dallas set a fire and he's totally dead! When Dallas set a fire and he burned down the house! Burned! It! Down! Woah! Yeah! Yeah! Yeah! Did ya hear? Did ya hear? Burned! It! Down! Woah! Did ya hear? Did ya hear? Yeah, yeah, yeah! Burned! It! Down! Woah! Did ya hear? Did ya hear?" Suddenly, I felt someone's hand on my arm. Tempest practically dragged me into the circle again.
"That Dallas set a fire and he burned down the-" She started to sing, but was cut off by Hope jumping in.
"Dallas set a fire and he burned down the-!" I was the one to cut her off, both with my voice and a wave of my hand.
"Dallas set a fire and he burned down the house." I sang, but it was clear my heart wasn't really in it. Tempest and Hope moved into the middle of the circle.
"He told me 'cause he's my best friend!" They chirped. I had to resist the urge to roll my eyes.
"Dallas set a fire and he burned down the house!" Everyone - save for myself - sang. I pulled out my phone, typed up a short message, and proclaimed one word:
"Send!"