Warning: This chapter contains swearing, mentions of food and school.

Man this chapter isn't anything special but did it take me a long time to write oh wow

Also I was planning on setting up a day and updating weekly but maybe my writing schedule is too unstable for that

If you can't tell, Piper is a total babe who gets all the ladies and sometimes all the dudes (tho she prefers ladies who wouldn't)

But she's a giant dork with Hazel bc awkward crushes do that to a person y'know

Kids these days and their homosexual thoughts

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Ever since classes had started again, Piper was making waking up ten minutes before she was supposed to be in the classroom into a nasty habit. It was something they meant to fix, sure, but it was already the second week of school and there they were, shoving a cereal bar in their mouth and trying to pull their pants up at the same time. It wasn't working too well.

She contemplated her options for a bit. She could go out and wait for the bus in the nasty weather (she was about seventy percent sure it was going to rain) and show up to class half an hour late, or, in alternative, she could pretend she was coming down with a fever and stay home playing the sims all day. She was tempted to do the latter, she did, after all, have frozen pizza in the freezer that was just begging to be eaten, but in the end she decided against that. She had a literature project she was going to work on with her partner in the library, and she didn't want to have to reschedule. She'd like to talk as little with that weird Leo kid as she could manage to.

Through some type of miracle, Piper made it out the door in two short minutes, balancing their backpack so the books wouldn't fall and blowing the hair out of their face. It was even a bigger miracle, they thought, that the elevator was already there. They breathed a sigh of relief as they stepped inside it and hoped they'd make it to the bus stop in less than seven minutes.

Just as the elevator doors were closing, Piper almost jumped out of her skin when she heard a high pitched "Hold the elevator!". Now, she wasn't the nicest person, and she didn't especially feel like making small talk that early in the morning. Therefore, she would've ignored the request.

She would've ignored the request if she hadn't recognized that voice.

Hazel thanked them as she entered the small space, her cheeks flustered. Piper had to hold themselves back from grinning at what the girl was wearing. Sure, they saw uniform wearing girls around school all the time (in fact, their best friend was a girl who wore a uniform more often than not), but there was something about the way that Hazel wore hers, with the white shirt buttoned up all the way to the top and the black skirt wrinkle free that made her look different. good kind of different.

"You going to school?" Shit. She knew it was a useless thing to say, of course she was going to school, but the silence between them was getting uncomfortable.

"Yes." The girl replied, standing up straighter. "Are you?"

"Nah. I just like leaving my apartment at seven twenty in the morning while wearing my school uniform. It's one of those things, ya know." She immediately regretted the comment after taking one look at Hazel's nervous expression. "That was a joke, sorry. It wasn't a very funny one." She quickly added.

"No, I got it." She assured, despite looking relieved after listening to their explanation. "I'm just a little nervous today, sorry."

"What's up?" They questioned, before considering that may not have been the best thing to do.

Hazel looked at her shoes while she answered in a low voice. "School's not really...fun."

"What do you mean? Do I have to beat someone up?"

The girl shook her head slowly. "No, it's not that. It's just that i'm new, and-"

"Oh, I get it." The elevator had reached their stop, which, they had noticed when she was pressing the button, was also Hazel's. They hopped out and held the door open for the girl. "Listen, kid, you'll make friends eventually. You just have to be patient… and possibly stop worrying so much. It'll happen."

They half expected the girl to ignore them and walk away, but instead she gave Piper a hint of a smile. "Uh, thanks."

Despite feeling like her heart was about to jump out of her mouth, Piper tried to respond as smoothly as she could. "Anytime." She said with a smirk.

"Uh, I'll see you later, I guess." Hazel turned around and opened the main building door, walking outside in the process. She left the door open, which they appreciated.

After realizing they were holding an elevator door with a smirk on their face while looking at thin air, they quickly shut said door and tried to ignore the heat they felt upon their cheeks.

What was wrong with them? They'd had crushes before, but it had been nothing like this. It was like they'd forgotten everything they'd ever learnt about flirting. Maybe it had something to do with not knowing if the girl in question was straight- which she probably was-, leaving Piper with small room to flirt, which was, by the way, one of the only things they really knew how to do. Reyna joked that they could talk their way into anyone's pants. It was ironic how they were crushing on the one person that nearly made them stutter whenever she looked at them.

"Crap! The bus!" It was with a jump that she remembered she was late and was rushing to get to school on time. How could she have forgotten that, she wondered as she ran outside. Damn that Hazel girl.