Thank you for the follows, faves, and reviews so far.
This chapter takes place a days after the last, and is the start of the 'Reconnection' arc of the fic.
Disclaimer: I don't own 'VicTORious' or 'iCarly'.
No POV
The following Monday after Tori's song, the tanned girl enters school. As usual, she keeps her eyes ahead and acts as if no one is around. Stopping at her locker, she sees Beck at Jade's locker out of the corner of her eyes, the tall actor waiting for the pale thespian.
Opening her locker, she grabs her books for the day and closes her locker before turning and heading towards Sikowitz's class. What she doesn't see is the rest of the group at arriving at Jade's locker, the new hangout spot since Tori has distanced herself after the trick Jade and Shelby played.
"I don't like this version of Tori." Cat says with a small pout, watching the half-Latina walk away.
"Neither do I." Andre says with a sigh, watching his best friend disappear from sight. "Why is she like this?" He wonders aloud, looking back to Cat and the others.
"Wish I knew." Beck says, leaning against Jade's locker. "She was fine a while ago. Then, all of a sudden, she's gone distant, acting like no one else exists or something." He says, shaking his head.
"It's not y…, our business." Jade says, walking up to the others and pushing her ex away from her locker. "Why are you all crowded around my locker?" She asks, glaring at them as she exchanges her books.
"Well, we can't wait by Tori's locker anymore. She ignores us and refuses to acknowledge us anymore." Andre says, staring at the Goth. "You two were looking kinda close before all this. You know what happened?" He asks her, raising an eyebrow.
"No idea." Jade says, lying. Thankfully, Cat's the only one who noticed the lie and chose to let it go. "Stay away from my locker." She says, walking away.
Before she can get to the soda machine to grab a quick drink before class, a petite hand grabs her wrist and drags her to the janitor's closet.
"What really happened?" Cat asks, crossing her arms and standing in front of the closet door after pushing Jade in and closing it behind them. "And don't tell me nothing, or you don't know." She says, leaning against the door.
"It's nothing." Jade says, staring with a hint of shock at how Cat's acting. "Can you let me leave now?" She asks with a sigh as Cat stares at her.
"It's not nothing." Cat says, shaking her head. "I saw how close you two were becoming. I saw you and Shelby getting close too." She points out, not budging from her spot. "And you told me the three of you were working our together or something. Now, Tori wants nothing to do with you, she's distanced herself from us, and even Trina has stopped chasing Beck around, which can only mean she knows what's going on and is taking Tori's side, and is trying not to cause problems or something." She says, sounding smarter than most people give her credit for.
"Shelby and I played a joke on Tori." Jade says, releasing a sigh as she tells a condensed version of the story. "And now, she hates us so she's distancing herself from us because of me." She says after telling the story of how she and Shelby pretended to date to try to make Tori jealous.
"I can't believe you used her emotions like that." Cat says, shaking her head. "What made you think that was okay? And why did Shelby go along with it?" She asks, more to herself than Jade, trying to figure things out, and failing.
"I wasn't doing it to mess with her or something." Jade says defensively. "I found out she liked me, and I thought that if I made her jealous, she'd admit it or something. Shelby went along to help." She says, raising her voice a bit.
"Think about this Jade." Cat says, locking eyes with the Goth. "Steven dated her and Carly Shay, and Ryder used her for a grade with intent to dump her after the performance. And I don't know how things between her and Danny went, but she broke up with him for a reason." She says, pushing off the door. "What made you think messing with her, dating her sister and trying to make her jealous, would actually work?" She asks, opening the door and leaving, a slightly stunned Jade left in the middle of the janitor's closet.
Staring at where Cat was standing, Jade can't help but think about what the shorter girl has said. Dropping her head a bit, she lets out a slow breath. 'Damn. She's right. She was used and cheated on, plus whatever happened to make her dump Danny, by guys she liked. And now, I mess with her by pretending to date her twin sister.' She thinks to herself, shaking her head.
As Jade stays in the closet, her thoughts consuming her, Cat makes her way to class, taking the seat behind Tori.
"Good morning class." Sikowitz says, walking in through the door by the stage. "Today, we're going to try acting in pairs." He says, stepping onto the stage. "Where is Jade?" He asks, looking around the room, missing the flinch from Tori at the mention of the pale girl's name. "Oh well. Anyway, the assignment is that the teams of two must write a short script, five to seven pages, where the characters are the complete opposite of the one portraying them. This assignment is to test how well an actor can play someone so different from them." He says, looking around the room. "The pairs are: Andre and Robbie, Beck and Jade, Anna and Elsa," He says, listing off pairs, again missing Tori flinch at Jade's name. "And Tori and Cat." He says, finishing the pairs. "Get together with your partner, Beck I suggest looking for yours, and get ready on your script. You have the rest of the class to get started." He says, grabbing a coconut and drinking from the bright green straw, sitting on the stage and watching his students.
"Is there anything the script should have? Characters opposite the actor portraying them leaves a lot open for a plot." Beck asks as he grabs his bag and gets ready to leave the class.
"The script can have whatever you wish. Just two characters, opposite personality than the actor playing them, and no less than five pages, no more than eight." Sikowitz says, sipping his coconut.
"I thought it was seven page max?" Andre asks, moving to sit beside Robbie.
"Seven. Eight. Whatever." Sikowitz says, shrugging his shoulders.
Cat POV
"So, what should we write about?" I ask cautiously, moving to take the seat to Tori's right.
"Don't care." Tori says, not looking at me.
"How about two friends talking about why the one is acting so different than usual?" I risk asking, looking at my lap.
"Because no one cares about her." Tori says with no emotion.
"Of course someone cares about her." I say automatically, looking at her. "She has friends and family that care about her." I say, not liking the lack of emotion on her face.
"Then why were her feeling used against her for fun?" Tori asks, not looking at me. "Meet at my house after school. We'll work on it then." She says, standing up and leaving the class, ignoring the stares and Sikowitz's attempt to ask her where she's going.
"What was that about?" Andre asks, turning around to look at me.
"I don't know." I say, shaking my head.
No POV
After School
"Hey." Trina says, leaning against the doorframe of Tori's bedroom door. "Cat's here." She says, watching her sister.
"I'll be down in a minute." Tori says, pulling her sleeve down and standing up.
"Why do you do that?" Trina asks, placing her hands on Tori's shoulders when Tori gets close enough.
"It helps the pain." Tori says, walking past Trina and heading downstairs.
"Damn you Jade." Trina says to herself as Tori disappears down the stairs. "Damn you Shelby." She adds on, knowing of her other sister's involvement.
Next chapter will be the Tori/Cat part where they work on their script, as well as the start of Tori trying to reconnect with her friends, starting with Cat. It'll be a slow process, but worth it. I'll probably do two friends per chapter of the reconnection after Cat's so there won't be as many chapters. After that though, Shelby and Jade will have solo chapters.
We will find out what Trina was talking about after Tori pulled her sleeve down (Though it might be a bit obvious) later in the arc.
Hope this chapter was good.
Blessed Be.