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Chapter 3

Andre's the first one to see her. Somehow, between Tori and Jade bickering—what has it been, two minutes?—and Beck trying in vain to break things up, between Robbie's commentary and Rex's snarky comments, he catches a glimpse of chestnut and for some reason his brain screams red.

"Hey, you guys, who's that?"

They turn, because even through the fighting they can hear something different in Andre's voice. Tori glances at the girl with chestnut hair quizzically. "I don't—"

And then she turns and they freeze, because it's Cat and yet it's not Cat. Cat would be leaping at them, squealing and hugging and hyperventilating with excitement, but this girl merely smiles and starts walking over. She walks differently, the skip in her step gone and replaced with a smooth glide that was all hips and grace.

It's enough to make Jade hesitate before yelling at Cat for not returning her calls, but because she's Jade, she does so anyway.

Cat might have cried, would have definitely apologized and done her best to make things smooth and fun and happy again, but this girl tells them that she no longer has a phone with Cat's face but someone else's eyes.

They don't quite dare call her a liar to her face.

"So," Tori says, because she's Tori and Cat's standing right in front of her and even though this feels strange it's still Cat. "How was summer camp?"

Cat smiles for the first time. It's a softer smile than the vibrant grin she'd sported before—softer, and quieter, but also not as revealing as before. "Life-changing."

They're not the only ones who don't recognize her. Mr. Sikowitz passes her in the hall and doesn't spare her a glance, but then again, he never really looked at Cat either, so Caterina doesn't really care.

Their first class is voice, and the teacher brusquely orders them to introduce themselves and sing something. No one's prepared anything, but Jade and Beck snap out a duet and Tori sings a couple bars of "Make it Shine" in the way only Tori can. Andre easily makes something up on the spot, and Robbie stumbles through a rendition of "Popeye" that makes the teacher laugh.

Then, it's her turn.

Caterina smiles at Tori's worried look and Beck's encouraging thumbs up—they always expect me to be the weakest link—and stands up. "My name is Caterina Valentine," she says, and can feel her friends flinching in surprise because when has she ever introduced herself this way?

Then, she opens her mouth and "Rolling in the Deep" is what comes out. She doesn't need to see the others' faces to know that she nails it.

Tori doesn't think her mouth has stopped hanging open since classes began. Part of her wants to go up to this stranger that's possessed her best friend's body and shake her until she goes back to normal, and the other part is afraid to. She's always considered Cat her best friend, but never truly felt that the red-haired girl saw her in the same way.

And if even Jade was still observing the new creature wearing Cat's face, then Tori thought it was probably a good idea to follow her example. So she watches, and her surprise grows.

Everything about Cat has changed, from the way her soft body has changed to muscles and strength to the way she's taking charge of whatever task the teachers assign her. Dancing, vocals, instruments—no matter what she's doing, no one can take their eyes off her.

She's not the best in the room. Beck's still a better actor, Jade and Tori still get the solos, and Andre is still Andre. She's no where near being the best—but for the first time, she's in the running.

And, watching her snap out the new choreography they'd just learned with an almost uncanny grace, Tori has to admit that she's quickly catching up.

Robbie feels the difference most acutely. He'd changed as well over the summer—filled out where'd he'd once been skin-and-bones, lost his glasses for contacts, and actually tanned instead of burned. He'd imagined meeting Cat again, imagined finally working up the courage to ask her out, imagining finally being with the girl he'd crushed on for years.

Now, watching Cat—Caterina—as she strode through the halls, he knew he'd never have a chance. Somehow, despite him finally escaping nerd-dom, she was still that much more ahead of him.

And he didn't need Rex to tell him that he'd never catch up.

Beck's the least surprised at the change in Cat, but then again, he was the only one who'd truly ever caught a glimpse of how strong the girl actually could be. Behind that sunny smile and the innocent way she'd offered her friendship had been a wall of steel that refused to break even when jealous seniors came at it with sledgehammers.

That strength was no longer hidden by a cheerful smile or childlike demeanor. Instead, it covered her like a crown, evident in every tilt of her head and nuance of her voice.

He's aware of her now in a way that he's never been aware of her before. Suddenly, touching her seems strangely meaningful in a way it has never been before. Even the brush of his hands over her shoulders—a meaningless Cat and Beck gesture—is different.

He's not sure what to think about that.

Andre wonders where Little Red went, and why she decided to leave them. He wonders why Cat disappeared so quickly, so forcibly, and why Caterina seems so much harder than Cat had been. Because he's Andre, (you're more than your talent) he tries to coax Cat back out—but Caterina refuses to respond to her old nickname, and his throat just won't let him call her the mask she's chosen to don.

It's not her name.

Caterina's the one who beats out Tori for the solo in the year's first production. Caterina's the one who, when assigned to work with him, insist on cool professionalism instead of the joking back-and-forth banter they'd always shared. He'd always known that working with her would be different from working with Tori—who shone but needed others to power her light—but he hadn't imagined this.

Robbie catches him staring and says sadly that maybe Cat just decided to grow up without them. Andre doesn't notice the catch in the other boy's voice or the sadness in his honest brown eyes, because he's too busy rejecting Robbie's words.

Caterina isn't the grown-up Cat.

Growing up isn't supposed to put iron in your spine, ice in your eyes, and a hundred mirrors obscuring who you truly are.

Jade West does not take the change in her best friend well.

She has always been aggressive, possessive, and fiercely jealous if anything tried to take what was rightfully hers. Cat, more than anyone except maybe Beck, was hers, and how dare she change into a stranger without taking Jade along with her!

Caterina's eyes are polite, and somewhere in their caramel depths Jade sees the friendship they'd always shared, but there's wariness and guardedness and space where Cat had always let Jade see everything about her—and Jade hates it.

It had been bad enough when Tori had walked into her life and tried to steal the two people in the world who were most important to her. (Ok, so maybe "steal" was too strong a word, but at this point Jade doesn't care.) People might have thought she overreacted with her hostile treatment of the new girl, but Jade saw the way Tori would link her arms with Cat and make the red-haired girl laugh.

Screw Beck, (and she would, long and hard), Jade knew he was loyal—but how dare Tori try to take her naïve, impressionable best friend away from her!

But this—this was a million times worse. And as much as Jade wants to scream at Caterina to give her Cat back, she knows that the only thing she can do is win Cat back on her own, because she's Jade West and she's never given up anything she loved without a fight.

Trina watches their perfection falter and crack with pleasure. They'd never let her in to their perfect ToriAndreCatJadeBeckRobbie circle, no matter how hard she tried to squeeze out a little corner for Trina. She's never truly hated them, not even when her own sister abandoned her, but she'd always reserved a little something special for Cat.

They'd had a connection.

She'd seen a bit of herself in the girl, actually. Something about the unseen talent and way the others treated her, (asiftheywerebetter) was familiar and painful. The lighthearted ridicule, the areyoustupid looks that weren't meant to hurt but did—Trina knew them all, and the fact that Cat knew it as well had endeared her to the older Vega sister.

Now, watching Caterina pirouette and sing and win hearts, Trina smiles vindictively because one day she'll be the one showing all of them. She'll stand up with hard eyes and wow them with her talent. Tori's too stupid, Jade's too dense, and the boys are too blind to understand what has occurred.

They will shatter, and then she won't be the only one on the fringes anymore.

Cat was the focal point for the group, and as Caterina watches her friends (were they still even that?) hang and stumble in limbo, she wonders if she should reach out and pull them all back in. They'd been perfect with Cat, but could they function with Caterina?

Rolling in the Deep, sung by Ariana Grande, (a.k.a. Cat), is also available on youtube.