Yay! It's finally Wednesday again! I hope you guys all had a great week last week!

I want to thank all of my reviewers so far. You guy really help me out!

Not much to say about this chapter, except that it's the girls' night from last chapter.

Warning: some swear words.

Disclaimer: I do not own Yu Gi Oh or any of its characters...I only own Erin.

Enjoy!

Chapter 6

Tea, Serenity, and I spent much of the day Friday in a group text message, planning what was going on later, where we were going to meet up, and what movie we were going to see. Tea suggested that we just meet up at the theater and see what tickets were available when we got there, and Serenity and I agreed. I had feeling that Serenity was as happy as I was that Tea was taking charge in this situation, since she was sort of a mediator between the two of us. We hadn't really talked directly to each other in the past week, so it was a little awkward for the us both.

Tea waited for me in the lobby of the theater, Serenity next to her. I had never seen either of them wearing anything besides their school uniform, and their outfits seemed to match their personalities to the tee. Serenity was decked out in a pink t-shirt and chaste jean shorts, the pink-and purple sneakers she wore to school still showcasing on her feet. Tea's yellow crop top, white jacket, and pink skirt wouldn't have gone together without her tri-colored boots, which reached the middle of her shins. Both had their hair down, and I was glad that I had decided to leave mine the way it was. I hooked my thumbs in the side pockets of my skinny jeans and thanked my lucky stars that I had decided to wear my green, empire-waisted top, which gave me the casual look that Serenity and Tea were sporting.

"Erin, you look so cute!" Tea said as I stopped in front of them.

I grinned. "Thanks. You guys don't look too shabby yourselves."

Both emitted a small "thanks," and then Tea clapped her hands together. "So, let's go decide what we're going to see!"

"Ooh," Serenity piped up, the first time I had ever heard her speak of her own accord, "there's that new movie with the dragons...and, um, what's-his-name in it."

As we approached the ticket booth, Tea pointed to a title up on the screen that read The Legend of Freida. "That one? Oh yeah, that's the one with Brad Pitt!"

I stifled a laugh at Tea's sudden enthusiasm with Serenity's choice.

"What do you think, Erin?" Tea asked excitedly, remembering I had a say in the movie too. Serenity looked at me, big eyes pleading.

"Go for it." I shrugged. I hadn't really planned on objecting anyway, since I had been invited and not vice-versa, and they both seemed all-too-eager to see Brad Pitt in action. The two girls squealed and bought the tickets using the money we had pooled together, as if they were getting the chance to actually meet the Hollywood stud.

The next stop was the snack counter, at which we all spent at least ten dollars each on large sodas, a jumbo popcorn to share, and small packages of candy and chocolate in case the popcorn got boring. We found out that we all liked the extra-buttery popcorn without any toppings, and Serenity and I shared a favorite soda: Dr. Pepper. By the time we headed into the theater, we were giggling like middle-schoolers whenever we saw a cute guy. It was like we were suddenly best friends.

Since we were early, we had free range of seats, and chose the ones all the way at the back of the theater. With our feet propped up on the seats in front of us, we joked about the picture ads on the screen, and made ridiculous (and sometimes immature) guesses on the trivia questions that popped up occasionally. Suffice to say, none of us could take a "Which of these is the largest" question seriously.

We had been in the middle of a conversation about the last movie of the Fallen trilogy when Serenity suddenly slouched into her seat and ducked her head. "Oh my gosh, guys. Look who's here." Her eyes were fixed on the entrance to the theater.

"Who?" Tea and I asked simultaneously, our heads turning in the direction she was staring.

"Oh, crap." I muttered, watching as the trio of terror – namely, Astrid, Reece, and Diana – strode into the room, hips swaying like over-exaggerating supermodels and bottles of water in their hands. I facepalmed as I remembered Astrid's attempt to get Atem to go on a date with her: "I have two tickets to see that new Brad Pitt movie." And it seemed she had bought a third so her posse could go with her instead. How could I have forgotten that she was going to see this movie tonight, too?

"I get the feeling that you know those three as well as we do." Tea whispered to me as we mimicked Serenity and slunk lower into our seats.

I nodded. "Not very well, but yeah, she hits on Atem all the time in art class."

Serenity grabbed a handful of popcorn and shoved it in her mouth while we silently observed the real-life Plastics begin to descend the stairs.

Please don't look around, please keep looking straight ahead. I pleaded in my head. Something about the thought of having to speak to the brunette and her minions again made my stomach twist in dread.

Luck, it seemed, was not on my side today. In the middle of scanning the rows of seats for those deemed suitable enough to contain her ego for the duration of the movie, Astrid's eyes landed on our feet, and then on our faces. And then, with a hard frown, on me.

Oh crap.

"Oh god." Tea murmured as Astrid began making her way up the steps towards us. "What does miss Queen B want from us now?"

"Maybe if we stay still, she won't see us." Serenity said hopefully.

"She's not an owl, Serenity. Besides, she's already looking at us."

Astrid's glare was so sharp and menacing that if looks could kill, I would have died of a stroke. "What do you think you're doing here?" She asked, her voice pinched. She stopped two rows down from us and crossed her arms over her chest. We were still the only people in the theater.

Feeling Tea and Serenity's gazes turn to me, I rolled my eyes and sat up to glare back at her. "Hunting elephants. What about you?"

Astrid's lip curled up slightly. "You think you're so funny. I'm going to ask you again, Stephenson: what the hell are you doing in my territory?"

"What, are you a dog?" I asked, unable to stop myself. "Did you pee on some of these seats? Is that why it smells like rotten cheese in here?"

Her eyes narrowed at my sarcasm. "You knew I was going to see this movie tonight. I had first dibs. Therefore, this showing of the movie is my territory. And you and your gang of nobodies are sitting in my seats."

"That's immature." Tea said, sitting up next to me. Serenity followed suit, but stayed silent. "How old are you? Five?"

"Stay out of this, anthills." Astrid said, angry stare turned to Tea.

Serenity gasped. Tea's eyes widened as she looked down at her chest and then back to Astrid, whose smirk was begging to be smacked off her face.

I felt my glare turn to daggers. "Just go sit down, Astrid. No one wants to hear your assortment of clichéd movie insults."

Astrid's face whipped back to me. "I would, but it seems there's a trinity of stupidity sitting in our seats."

"For the love of god," I said, rolling my eyes exaggeratedly, "they're seats. They all look the same." Did she often make big deals over nothing just so she could argue over them with people she hated?

"Then you won't have a problem picking new ones."

So, she was turning my own words against me. Clever, but not intimidating. "Well, that's too bad, because we're not moving." I said, reclining back into my chair and putting a few pieces of popcorn in my mouth to emphasize just how comfortable I was.

Chatter erupted from the doorway, and a new group of people entered the theater, laughing and talking excitedly about the movie. I smirked at Astrid and took a long, drawn-out slurp of my soda. If there was one thing I had learned about her from our little disagreement on Tuesday, it was that she didn't like it when people witnessed her ugly moments. It was all about image, and when someone defied her, that didn't look good on her reputation. She wouldn't get into an argument she knew she would lose with witnesses around.

I batted my eyelashes at her and curled my fingers in a little wave.

With fists clenched, she gave me one last glare before rejoining her posse and sitting in an undignified middle row.

I bit my lip, grinning, and held my hands out for Tea and Serenity to high-five. They complied with triumphant giggles.

This get-together was fulfilling in more ways than one.

"Oh, man, my butt was killing me!" Tea said as we got up from our seats. Serenity and I laughed and agreed. The movie, though it had been great, with tons of action and a little romance, had been longer than I thought it would be.

"Yeah, but those abs!" Serenity marveled, stretching, a big grin on her face.

"They could have grated cheese." Tea giggled. I snorted. We had all but forgotten about our little run-in with Astrid, who had already left the theater, luckily. If we were fortunate, maybe we would get out of the movie house without another one.

"I see a sequel in our future!" Serenity continued. "And we are so gonna go see it when it comes out!"

I smiled. "I am in no way opposed to more shots of Brad Pitt without a shirt."

"Is anyone?" Tea asked, throwing out our trash as we passed the trash bin on the way out.

The lobby was crowded when we emerged from the screening room. The conversations all around us grew in volume as people tried to communicate over each other. It was refreshing to walk in the bright lights again after the long movie, but everything was so loud. We tried to worm our way through the crowd to get to the doors, but the throng kept growing thicker.

"You would think someone famous was here or something!" Tea shouted over the steady roar of voices.

"What?" Serenity yelled back.

The doors slowly got closer. I lost count of how many people I had apologized to for bumping into them. Tea and Serenity were fighting just to stay close to me.

Just as I spotted an opening in the crowd that lead to the exit, something wrapped around my forearm and yanked me to the left, out of the main throng. Expecting it to be Tea or Serenity, I began to say, "Thank you," but I stopped myself. Instead of either of my friends' friendly faces, I stared into the cold green eyes of none other than Astrid. My thanks quickly turned to a, "What do you want now?"

Astrid's smile was fake and looked to be extremely painful. "I have a little surprise for you."

I made a disgusted face. "Are you coming on to me?" I asked, sarcasm dripping from my words.

Her smile slipped slightly, but regained its flimsy composure in a flash. "Come with me." Without giving me a chance to reply, her grip on my arm tightened and she pulled me away from the main lobby, and off to a side room, one that erupted with flashing lights and booming sound effects.

Why in the world was Astrid dragging me to the arcade?

"Let go of me!" I said, attempting to get away. Her long, blue-painted nails dug into my skin, and I clenched my teeth.

"Don't worry, Erin," she was using the same sickly-sweet voice she had used on Tuesday, when I had interrupted her. "This will be worth your while."

As we completely separated from the crowd in the lobby and entered the multicolored glow of the arcade, I looked over my shoulder for Tea and Serenity. I thought I glanced a flash of auburn hair near the doors, but it was gone in an instant. They probably thought we had just gotten separated and I would meet them outside.

In other words, I was fifty shades of screwed.

I turned back to the scene before us, and my eyes bugged out. A large group of gamers and people I recognized from school had gathered around a raised platform with TV screens and speakers half my size, from which loud, obnoxious hip hop music boomed. The people were all staring at Astrid and me, some of them cheering.

"Wh-what's going on?" I stuttered. Astrid didn't reply, only continued to pull me through the gathering of onlookers, which parted for the two of us.

"Ooh, the new girl's going down!" A boy shouted from somewhere to my right. I swiveled my head around, trying to figure out what exactly Astrid was getting me into. Some people from school laughed at the look of shock on my face.

"She's terrified!"

"Astrid's gonna eat her alive!"

We reached the front of the crowd, and now I could clearly see that the raised platforms and TV screens and speakers were their own game. Dance Dance Revolution, to be exact.

Oh, crap.

In my state of horror, Astrid dragged me up the steps to the platform. Once she had situated me on one of the dancing stations, she finally released her grip on my arm.

"Oh, no," I said, my head shaking violently, recovering from my speechlessness, "you are not challenging me to a game of DDR."

Astrid's cruel laugh rose above the crowd. "You don't have a choice, Erin."

I glared at her, my composure completely back. "Who do you think you are? I don't have to play this game. I have nothing to prove!"

Shouts of, "just shut up and dance!" and "ha-ha, she thinks she has a choice!" came from the mob.

Astrid sneered at me. "As you can tell, everyone here wants a dance-off. I've already told them you would play against me." She batted her eyelashes like I had in the theater. "Do you really want to let our fellow classmates down?"

I glanced back at the crowd of students. Like I had noticed before, most of them were in our grade at school. Anger bubbled up inside of me. Somehow, Astrid just as I had noticed that Astrid needed to keep her top-dog reputation, she noticed that I deeply cared about being the brave, no-crap-from-anyone personality in the halls. "You set me up!" I growled.

"Well, you don't have to play, I guess." Astrid said, tapping her chin with her finger. "But then I guess that since you didn't give the people what they wanted, you would have to tell that camera" – she pointed to Reece, who stood off to the side, holding her phone up to film us – "that you are a fake, lying loser whose bark is worse than her bite."

I clenched my fists. "This is so ridiculous! I don't owe anyone anything." I said, turning to go down the stairs.

Diana blocked my path. "I wouldn't do that if I were you."

"What in the world could you possibly threaten me with that would stop me from leaving right now?" I seethed.

Diana's mocking grin matched Astrid's perfectly. She pulled a purple iPhone out of her pocket. My eyes widened.

That was Tea's phone. How had Diana gotten a hold of it?

"I'm good at pickpocketing in big crowds." Diana said, in answer to my unspoken question. "Poor Tea didn't even notice it was gone."

I whirled back on Astrid. "Are you freaking kidding me? All this just to beat me in a stupid game of DDR? Are you really so insecure about yourself that you need to put me down to feel better?" Even as I said the words, I knew that arguing was going to get me nowhere. They had Tea's phone, and I knew for a fact that she didn't keep it locked with a passcode. They could do whatever they wanted with her contacts and messages. And that wasn't fair to Tea.

But it wasn't fair to me, either. Why was Astrid even doing this? She was blowing our "disagreement" way out of proportion.

"So, what's it going to be, Erin?" Astrid asked, smirking in triumph. She had every advantage on me; I couldn't back down now without losing something.

I clenched my teeth and stepped back onto my dancing platform. "Just get it over with."

The crowd cheered again. I mentally cursed them all. Just like during the fight Monday morning, they were simply spectators.

Astrid got to choose the song and the level. You know, since she was Astrid. I bit back a growl as she chose "Temperature" by Sean Paul and set it on expert mode.

"Are you ready to lose, new girl?" Astrid called over to me.

I didn't reply. The song was starting, and I had to prepare myself for my inevitable defeat. It began simple enough, with some side-steps and jumps, but as soon as the chorus came on, I lost all hope for myself.

I had, how you say, two left feet when it came to dancing.

As I took another dizzying spin during the second chorus, I spotted Tea and Serenity at the front of the crowd. They must have realized I hadn't made it outside and come in to look for me, only to discover the scene in the arcade. Serenity's hands were clasped in front of her, as if she were praying that I would win, and Tea's face was worried. I didn't blame either of them. I was a thousand points behind Astrid with only a minute left in the song. I could hear people in the crowd laughing at me.

My face was burning, not only from exhaustion and embarrassment, but also from anger. Astrid's game wasn't DDR – it was humiliation. And that was exactly what she was doing to me right now. I didn't like being humiliated.

With one last beat, the song ended. The words YOU LOSE screamed at me in all caps on my screen.

"Gee, I didn't notice." I muttered halfheartedly.

Astrid crossed her arms over her chest. "Well, I guess we all know that you suck at dancing."

I glared daggers at her. "Congratulations. Do you feel better about yourself now? Oh, and before you start gloating, tell your minion over there to give Tea her phone back."

"Feisty." Astrid laughed with some of our classmates. "It's not my fault you lost a bet you made. Diana, give Tea her phone."

"With pleasure." Diana grinned evilly. Instead of walking over to the expectant Tea, she tossed the phone way out of Tea's reach. Tea scrambled to catch it, but her efforts were in vain. The phone fell to the floor with a small crack.

I made my way off the platform and over to Tea. She was crouching on the floor, her phone held tightly in one hand. All I could see was that there was a long, thick crack down her screen.

I knelt down next to her. "Tea, I'm so sorr – "

Before I knew what was going on, Tea had shot back to her full height. Her kind blue eyes had hardened to a cold, heart-shattering stare, aimed right at Astrid. "You bitch."

My eyes widened in surprise. "Uh, Tea," Serenity began, "Diana was the one who threw – "

"First you act like a three-year-old in the theater, then you humiliate my friend for no apparent reason, and now your little helper just effing cracked my phone. You know what I think, Astrid? I think you're a coward." As Tea made her speech, she walked around to the stairs leading up to the platform I had just lost my pride on. "And for that," she said when she reached the top step, and pointed at Astrid, "I demand a rematch. This time, against me."

People in the crowd around us gasped. I rolled my eyes at them. "Tea, you don't have to do this." I told her. "She's not worth it."

Tea didn't reply. Her determined stare stayed locked on Astrid.

"You're the one who beat Johnny Stepps, aren't you?" Astrid asked, her bored stare becoming much more interested.

I looked at Serenity. "Johnny Stepps?" I asked her.

"I have no idea." Serenity replied, shrugging.

"Yup." Tea said, her normally-friendly smile dark and cruel. "So how about it? If you win, you can be reigning DDR champ."

"Easy enough. Stepps was an amateur." Astrid said with a scoff.

Tea wasn't finished. She stepped onto the dance mat, oozing confidence. "But if I win, you forget that the dance with Erin ever happened. That means that you tell Reece over there" – she pointed to Reece, who was still filming with her phone, and I mentally kicked myself for not remembering that she was recording the entire thing – "to delete the video."

The crowd had gone silent. This had been unexpected, and it was exciting.

Astrid's grin could only be compared to that of the Cheshire Cat. "Fine. You're on."

Tea turned to the screen. "Pick the song and the level. You'll lose no matter what." I had never heard sweet, kind Tea talk to anyone like that before, no matter how rude they were. This was a new side of her that Serenity and I had never witnessed before.

And it was downright terrifying.

Astrid smirked and scrolled down the song list until she found one that she decided would be the beat to which she would defeat the confident girl. "Pluto Relinquish on expert." She announced to the crowd. "Get ready to join Erin in the losers' circle, Tea."

I clenched my fists at Astrid's prod at my humiliating defeat, but kept my mouth shut. This was Tea's battle now.

The song began, and right from the get-go, you could tell the two would be neck-in-neck with each other the entire song. Every time Astrid took the lead, Tea pulled a move that tied them again, and vise versa. It was mesmerizing and horrifying at once to watch as their feet moved faster and faster over the boards. I had no idea that Tea could dance so well.

With only thirty seconds left in the song, Astrid had taken a slight lead. I took in a sharp breath, my heart pounding. I prayed to whoever might be listening that Tea would co,e out victorious.

As the last few steps of the song went by on the screen, Tea hit an arrow that Astrid couldn't get to in time. The screens turned black for a moment before the scores and declarations flashed onto them. The crowd broke into a roar.

Tea had won.

The first thing Tea did was turn her intimidating glare to Reece, who pressed the delete button on her camera. Satisfied, the victor turned on her heels and strode back down the steps, leaving a shocked Astrid in her wake.

"Tea, that was amazing!" Serenity said, jumping up and down. The ice in her soda slushed around inside its styrofoam cup.

"Thanks." She beamed, letting her face loosen up for the first time since she had gotten to the arcade. She looked at me. "I hate it when my friends are hurt."

I wasn't the hugging-type person, but I felt I needed some way to express how grateful I was. Tea stiffened as I embraced her. "Thank you so much." I said. "This means so much to me. I owe you big time."

"Please," Tea snorted as I released her, "you don't owe me anything."

"But I do." I said. The crowd around us had begun to disperse. Only a few people still lingered. I glanced up to the platform to see Diana and Reece trying to usher a ashen-faced Astrid down the steps. I really wanted to give her a snide remark, but decided she wasn't worth it.

Tea hooked her arms in mine and Serenity's. "Come on, guys. Let's get out of here."

I had never been so happy to leave a movie theater in my life.

We spent most of the night at Tea's house recollecting the shocked faces of the terrible trio, and making over-exaggerated renditions of their expressions. We laughed so hard that our stomachs hurt and tears fell from our eyes. I had mostly recovered from my shame, partly because of the fun we were having, and partly because of the ice cream we gorged on as we talked.

Then we got around to taking stupid personality quizzes on the internet, and binge-watching YouTube videos. We swapped our favorite YouTubers and checked out all of their channels. There was even a point where we were comparing the pros and cons of dating the guys from Smosh.

The cons were that there were no cons.

However, this lead to more online quizzes, this time about relationships. There was a compatibility test for you and your crush, and chances of you two ever getting married. I was almost definitely sure that Tea took the with Yugi in mind, and Serenity with Duke. When they asked if I wanted to take them, I politely declined, saying that I didn't have a crush to begin with, so it would be redundant.

Because, to be honest, I still had no idea what exactly I felt for Atem.

Afterwards, Serenity opened up her suitcase and pulled out one of the biggest makeup bags I had ever seen, completely filled with nail polish in a rainbow of colors. Tea then proceeded to open a bag of actual makeup. They determined we were going to be giving each other makeovers.

"Um, no offense, but isn't this kind of a middle school thing to do?" I asked.

The girls did not look offended. I fact, they laughed at my hesitation. "Come on, Erin," Tea said encouragingly, "we won't make you look ugly, we promise. Right, Serenity?"

"Ditto." Serenity answered.

I took a deep breath and allowed them to dust my face with varying degrees of makeup, from concealer to foundation to blush to eyeliner, mascara, and eyeshadow, and then to lipstick.

"Oh my god!" Tea said. "We are amazing!"

And they were. When I checked my reflection in the mirror, I looked nothing like myself. They had gone heavy on the eyeliner, making long, drawn-out cat-eyes at the ends of my lids, and painted my lips with a blood red color that contrasted with my darker skin.

"Holy crap, you guys are good." I said, picking up a makeup brush. "But are you as good as moi?" I dove into Tea and Serenity's makeovers with a little too much enthusiasm.

The rest of the night flew by. With our newly-painted faces and our exhausted bodies, we finally collapsed on the pull-out bed in Tea's living room.

The last thing I remembered was falling asleep to the ending credits of Pitch Perfect. My first real sleepover had been the best night of my life.

This was so much fun to write! I was super excited about making a chapter that just featured the girls. Because let's be honest – Tea and Serenity don't get enough alone time from the guys!

And yes, this chapter was inspired by the "date" episode with Tea and Yami.

Something about writing intimidating Tea was strangely amusing...

And what will Astrid do now that she's been humiliated by Tea? Will she continue to go after Erin, or will she have a new target?

Okay, just something I thought I should add: I think there's been some confusion over Devon's character. If I'm correct, I believe that there is a character on Zexal that goes by the same name. I forgot to mention in previous chapters that he is NOT the Devon from Zexal. The Devon in the story is an OC from my own brain. Just to make sure no one's confused ;)

Please leave a review if you liked it! Even if you didn't like it, tell me what you didn't like! I look forward to hearing from all of you!

Until next week,

-creativelybored