Hello! I'm back from my holiday and back with another chapter!
I'm so sorry about being gone for so long, but I'm back now! I apologise for not being able to write any more of this story whilst I was away, I just really didn't have enough spare time. I barely got the things I posted on my Tumblr done. XD Hopefully, now that I'm back home and I'm on my summer break I can start updating more regularly. Knowing me though, I can't promise anything. I hope that you enjoy this chapter I finally finished though!
The first day of a new school year brought many challenges on its own. So having to drag ten teens from half a century ago through it as well as themselves proved to be quite the challenge for Mack and Brady. And it didn't really help that the first issue they had run into came about before they'd even set foot outside the house: what were the Wet Side Story characters supposed to wear? They couldn't just wear their usual clothes because they'd all stick out, it'd be picked up on in a heartbeat. But trying out different styles on them really wasn't working.
"I ain't walkin' 'round lookin' like a princess," CheeChee grumbled, flouncing out of Mack's bedroom. She was practically being swallowed by pink chiffon and glitter and she was tottering around in the tallest high heels you've ever seen. And on top of all that she was trying to balance some sort of tiara on top of her head, which was, much to her immense disappointment, beehive free.
"What are you wearing?" Seacat asked in disbelief.
"You tell me!" she shot back.
"CheeChee, come back in and change," Mack said, stepping over to the doorway to haul the biker girl back inside. She had no idea where CheeChee had found that dress in her closet; in fact she had no idea where any of the Wet Side Story girls had found their outfits because she was positive that she didn't own a single item of clothing they were wearing. They had all just disappeared behind the changing screen with one thing and had come out dressed in something completely different. It was like the movie gods were playing tricks on her. But as she went over to the door, she laid eyes on the Tanner and Seacat and nearly fainted. They looked so unfamiliar, so…normal. Before long she found herself just staring at the five guys from the sixties in utter amazement. It looked like they'd never even heard of the 1960s.
"Do they look ok?" Brady asked, snapping Mack out of her daze as he walked over to her.
"Are you kidding? This is crazy. How did you get them to look so…not them?" Mack asked.
"Probably a miracle," Brady answered with a small laugh. "I see a miracle hasn't been so kind to you yet."
"No, it's more like a nightmare in there," Mack sighed. "I give them one thing to put on and they change into something completely different. I don't even know where it comes from; I certainly don't have any of that stuff."
"I feel like a storm cloud," Giggles whined from behind Mack. She turned to see Giggles pouting at her reflection in the mirror.
"You look fine," CheeChee said, brushing off the surfer girl's comment as she marched back over to the changing screen. Her puffy pink dress billowed out behind her, throwing up a cloud of glitter with every step she took.
"No I don't," Giggles argued. And it was true. Giggles' mess of ill-fitting black clothes in every fabric possible looked horrendous on the normally perky blonde. And the horrific heavy black makeup really didn't help the outfit's popularity with the girl.
"I don't like my outfit either, it looks like I'm tryin' to be Mother Nature," Struts complained, stepping up beside Giggles to scrutinise her outfit, which was made up of a lot of floral patterns, floaty pants, sunglasses and flowers in her hair.
"Hey, I think you look nice," Coral said after shooting her a quick glance. "I on the other hand hate this," she added before motioning to her own outfit.
"Why? You look cute!" Lela said, obviously approving of Coral's outfit considering that she'd more or less picked it. "What don't you like about it?"
"Do you want me to make a list?" Coral asked, the tone of her voice showing how unhappy she was about her preppy, teal jumper, blouse and plaid skirt combo.
"Ok, now's when I really need that miracle to happen," Mack said to Brady, watching the scene unfold from the doorway. "How did you get the guys done so quickly?" Bearing in mind 'quickly' had still been forty minutes.
"I showed them some photos online of stuff people wear now and just let them pick their own outfits based on that. I mean, I still had to help them but it certainly made things a lot easier," Brady explained.
"You think that's going to work for them?" Mack asked, motioning to the 60s girls.
"At this point I think that you just need to try anything," Brady said. "We've only got half an hour until the bus arrives and honestly, knowing them, it could take that long, even with help."
"Ok, wish me luck," Mack sighed before walking back into the storm. Luckily for her, the storm soon dispersed after the girls became entranced with Mack's laptop and the various pictures of outfits. Soon enough, after many minutes of helping to tweak each other's outfits and hairstyles, the five Wet Side Story girls paraded out of Mack's bedroom looking like models from the newest edition of Vogue.
"Wow," Brady said quietly to Mack as she passed. "That miracle finally happened for you, huh?"
"It couldn't have come any sooner, I was getting so fed up of them," Mack sighed, practically collapsing into Brady's arms.
"And even with controlling that lot you managed to dress yourself in the nicest outfit of all," Brady said, keeping his hold of Mack's arms as he stepped back to admire her outfit.
"This?" Mack asked, glancing down at herself.
"Yeah, you look great," Brady said mischievously, relishing in the fact that Mack was hating him see her blushing.
"I would complement you back but wearing flip flops to school is a disgrace," Mack chuckled, quickly diverting the conversation away from her as she gently knocked Brady's foot with hers.
"Hey, these are my fancy ones!" Brady shot back, failing to hold in his laugh.
"Come on, we should round them all up and get to the bus stop," Mack said, slinging her schoolbag over her shoulder. Although Mack and Brady would very rarely ride on the bus to school, there was simply no way that they could fit all ten Wet Side Story characters and themselves into Brady's car. So the bus was really their only option.
"Ok, guys, when the bus comes, let us get on first and then just find a seat and sit in it," Mack instructed the rabble of teens on the pavement.
"Yes, ok, Mack," Seacat sighed like a whiny ten year old that was being scolded. Obviously he was not enjoying being spoken to in such a patronising way, and quite a lot of the others were in agreement with this decision.
"Don't do anything else. Don't talk to anyone, don't even look at anyone you don't know," Mack continued. "Just sit in your seat."
"Mack, we get it," Butchy snapped. "We ain't kids."
Mack just forced a smile at the group before turning back around and letting her face settle back into its frown.
"Mack, try to relax," Brady said, stepping behind her and placing two hands on her shoulders as she whistled out a heavy sigh. "I'm sure they'll be fine, just leave them to it." And Brady was pretty much correct.
The bus ride was a lot less stressful than Mack had anticipated it to be. After the ten Wet Side Story characters found their seats they managed to go the whole bus journey without creating a huge scene, which was a pretty good accomplishment for them. That doesn't mean to say that they followed Mack's instructions though. Despite Mack's many efforts to explain to the characters that they should try their best not to go introducing themselves to anyone, she soon saw multiple groups of the teens talking to people on the bus. Seacat and Rascal had gotten talking to two freshmen boys, who were laughing at stupid videos on their phones before showing them to the two surfer boys behind them in the hopes of making them laugh. Giggles, who was sat with CheeChee, noticed that the girl sat in front of them was Casey, the girl that she set up on a date at the skate park way back when the teens first arrived. And because she was sat with CheeChee and in front of Lugnut, she soon dragged those two into the conversation with the girl. But Struts, who was sat with Lugnut, was too engrossed in yet another book to even acknowledge anything else, let alone start talking to new people. Coral and Butchy, who were sat across the aisle from Struts and Lugnut and behind Seacat and Rascal would occasionally add to their discussion with the two younger boys but mainly just sat and had a sort of heart-to-heart, much to Butchy's sister's delight.
Speaking of Lela, besides commenting on how cute her brother was being for finally stepping up the romance side of his relationship with Coral, she was just babbling away to Tanner about how excited she was about…everything really. "This is so exciting!" she squealed. "I can't wait to get there and take part in all the classes and meet new people and- Ooh what classes are we doing?"
"It depends, we'll let you choose as soon as Brady and I get our schedules," Mack explained, giving the wide-eyed girl (who had practically scrambled over the back of her seat to ask Mack a question) a fond smile. At least someone was happy about all of this.
"We can choose what we do for ourselves?" Lela checked, her eyes popping even wider (if that was possible) in disbelief.
"Well, yeah," Mack replied, curious as to why Lela found this information so shocking.
"This place keeps getting better and better," Lela beamed. Lela's whole life had been controlled, whether that was by her older brother or these 'movie people' she'd just found out about, so now even simple things like making decisions for herself were amazing privileges.
"Ooh, Coral just went in for a kiss," Brady informed Lela from his seat next to Mack. Lela had been so intrigued about her brother's discussion with his girlfriend that, over the course of the bus ride, she'd managed to enthral Tanner, Mack and Brady into spying as well. It was like their personal soap opera. Coral and Butchy weren't a particularly romantic couple anyway so this sudden turn of events was proving to be pretty entertaining.
"What?!" Lela squeaked in excitement as she whipped her head to see for herself. Her conversation about school was completely forgotten now. "What's she laughing at?" she whispered to Tanner, who she'd left in charge of monitoring the couple.
"Nothing, that's just the giggle she does when she's flirting," Tanner said in a slightly bored tone. This was his sister he was watching after all, it wasn't his preferred choice of pass time to watch her flirt with a guy he didn't really like himself.
"She has suddenly started getting really flirty, hasn't she?" Mack noted, turning to Brady for a sign of agreement.
"Yeah, I wonder how that's going to go down at school," Brady said with a chuckle at the thought. "They can't exactly just start making out in the cafeteria, can they?"
"I wouldn't put it past them," Mack sighed with a slight shake of her head as she watched Coral play with the collar of the plaid shirt that had replaced Butchy's leather vest over a plain white t-shirt. She must really like his new look because Mack had never seen her look at someone with such adoration.
Before Butchy and Coral could take their flirting any further, the two freshmen could annoy Seacat and Rascal anymore and Giggles and CheeChee could gather anymore gossip about people at school they had yet to even see, the school bus rolled to a stop and everyone began spilling out.
Mack had been so involved with her various discussions that she'd completely forgotten about telling the 60s teens where to meet up when they got off the bus. In a panic, Mack pushed past students and scrambled down the steps of the bus to get to them quicker. But she was already too late. Not a single Wet Side Story character could be seen anywhere.
"I can't believe we lost them already!" Mack cried, turning to Brady with a look of horror on her face. "How do they move that quickly? They were all just there a minute ago!"
"Well they can't have gone far, can- wait, isn't that Lela and Tanner?" Brady said, cutting himself off as he spotted Lela's bright pink cardigan and raven hair disappearing through a doorway.
Mack spun so fast that her head almost fell off her shoulders. Sure enough, the two lovebirds were already running off to explore, and since Mack and Brady couldn't see any of the others, at least rounding up a few of them was a start. So they bolted after them.
Lela was spinning in a circle with a giddy smile on her face by the time that Mack and Brady reached her. When she saw them she came to an abrupt stop, but the smile never left her face. "Oh my gosh, guys, I love it here already!" she cried. Mack and Brady were pretty sure that no one had ever been this excited about school. "Isn't it great, Tanner?" she continued.
"Yeah, it's pretty neat," Tanner replied with a grin and one of his goofy laughs. If Lela liked it then so did Tanner, at least that was his logic anyway.
"Why, I'm so happy I think I could just-" Lela began.
But Mack and Brady realised what the couple were going to say all too late.
"Sing!" they both exclaimed, their faces pure pictures of glee.
"No!" Mack and Brady both shouted, trying to grab Lela and Tanner but they were already running off down the corridor.
"Oh my god, this can't get worse, can it?" Mack half-begged, already losing the will to live and they'd barely been off the bus for a minute.
"I think it could," Brady said. And as soon as Mack followed Brady's line of sight she saw Lela and Tanner disappearing off round a corner. They'd already lost eight teens; they really didn't need to lose anymore. So once again, Mack and Brady found themselves chasing after them, only to find Tanner bursting into song.
Tanner: "Take a look around at this amazing place
I don't know if it's Earth or if it's outer space
Wherever we are, it's clear to me
That this is right where I wanna be"
Lela: "Take a look around at this amazing world
Where you can do it all even if you're a girl
Imagine the possibilities
Yeah this is right where I wanna be"
Lela & Tanner: "This is right where I wanna be
I can't think of anywhere better
Right where I wanna be
I wanna stay here forever and ever"
Naturally, when people start singing and dancing in a school hallway you'd expect them to be getting some pretty strange looks. But to Mack and Brady's surprise the puzzled looks weren't really appearing, no one really seemed to care. That didn't still stop them from racing to catch up with the pair though. Mack grabbed Lela's arm, stopping her in her tracks, and turned to face her whilst Brady ran past to deal with Tanner. Lela didn't sense Mack's panic though because after calling out Mack's name again she just beamed again and carried on singing.
Lela: "I think I'm gonna love it here because it seems
Like the kind of place where I can follow my dreams"
Mack could clearly see how delighted Lela was to be here, so she felt kind of bad for trying to crush her spirit. After all, she didn't know any better. This is just what she did, this was normal to her.
"Lela, I really don't think that you should-" Mack started, the guilt already starting to creep up on her. But she needn't have worried because before she could even formulate a sentence Tanner ran up behind Lela, grabbed her hand and spun her off down the hallway.
Lela & Tanner: "This is right where I wanna be
I can't think of anywhere better
Right where I wanna be
I'm gonna stay here forever and ever and ever and ever"
By this point Lela and Tanner had found the door to the outdoor cafeteria, which they eagerly ran towards.
"Guys," Brady called as soon as he and Mack made it to the cafeteria's doorway. They both couldn't help letting out a sigh when they saw the pair skipping among the tables, giggling away to themselves with their huge grins still plastered across their faces. "Look, we know you're excited-"
"Really? How could you tell?" Lela giggled as she spun past him and burst into song again.
Lela & Tanner: "The more I see the more I just can't get enough"
Lela: "There's so much to learn"
Tanner: "And so much fun cool stuff"
Lela & Tanner: "We seem to fit in here perfectly
And this is right where we wanna be"
Tanner held out his hand to Lela, who gladly took it, before the pair scurried back past Mack and Brady and into the hallway again, where the dance number picked up again. Although this time, the people in the hallway had stepped it up to even smiling at the singing pair.
Lela & Tanner: "This is right where I wanna be
I can't think of anywhere better
Right where I wanna be
We're gonna stay right here forever and ever
Forever and ever, forever and ever, forever and ever, forever and ever, forever and ever"
After dragging a few people stood by their lockers into the middle of the hall to dance with them, Lela and Tanner finished with a triumphant, beaming smile before collapsing into a fit of giggles.
"That was so much fun!" Lela grinned to her boyfriend.
"I know, right?" Tanner laughed, swinging their joined hands between them.
"This is one of the worst things we've ever decided to do," Mack hissed to Brady as she marched towards the pair.
"Oh come on, it's not that bad," Brady said, both teens knowing that he was lying.
"How did things go wrong this quickly?" Mack asked, although she knew there would be no answer. "We've literally been here for under five minutes and they've already broken into song. I thought everything would be fine."
"Mack! Wasn't that fun?" Lela called out, eventually spotting the furious brunette. Clearly Lela couldn't read Mack's expression very well.
"Guys, I know you're excited but you can't go around doing that here," Mack said, trying to explain things to Lela and Tanner as calmly as she could.
"Can't do what?" Tanner asked.
But Mack was interrupted by a noise, a rather unsettling noise.
"Mack," Brady said quietly turning her attention to the source of the noise, which he was currently staring at.
"That," she answered Tanner as her eyes practically popped out of her head. 'That' was the noise she (and pretty much everyone else in the whole school) was hearing. And the noise belonged to the large group of people that had just turned on to their corridor. The large group of people that were singing and dancing louder than Lela and Tanner had been. The large group of people that were led by the remaining eight Wet Side Story characters. "Oh no," was all that Mack could utter.
I hope that you enjoyed it!
Things are already going wrong, huh? But this is just the start of the problems that are about to come…
I used Right Where I Wanna Be (from Teen Beach 2, duh) in this chapter because I thought it fitted really well with them arriving at school for the first time, I just feel like they'd be super excited about it at first.
Like I mentioned at the start of this chapter, I started posting things on my Tumblr account (just type in cherrygorilla on Tumblr and you can find it, it won't let me include a link for you) whilst I was away. I don't know if any of you have actually taken the time to look at it yet but so far I have a requested one-shot up on there, a few sarcastic chapter summaries of Paper Flowers, a character profile for Coral (in case you wanted to know some more about her) and I've been answering some questions that people have been sending in too. I don't know if anyone's interested in me keep up with the posts on there now that I'm but check it out and let me know if you are!
Also, apparently it was the three year anniversary of Teen Beach Movie whilst I was away on holiday (which is where I watched the two movies for the first time, so that place is pretty special to me) so that's pretty cool. I honestly can't believe that it's been three years since it first aired, I don't know whether it feels longer or shorter to me. XD But I'm so grateful for this film because it's what inspired me to write, which has brought me so much joy along with the movie itself, and it's helped me make friends with a lot of wonderful writers in this fandom, which I am very thankful for. So yeah, happy third birthday TBM!
One more thing, guys, we missed 'Hate on Coral Day 2016'… What were we all doing?! Anyway, I think it was supposed to be on the 28th of July so we're a week late. Because we were so late to celebrate, guys, we're going to need to be worse than ever. Go wild! Rant about her as much as you like in a review, I'd honestly be happy to read them. Or if you have any other ways you want to celebrate this momentous occasion, I'd be open to anything! XD And if you have no idea what I'm talking about then go and read chapter four of Surf, Sun, Sand…that's where it all began.
Anyway, thank you so much for reading! I'll get started on the next chapter as soon as I can! Don't forget to review!
-cherrygorilla