Another chapter from "The Blonde Squad". This one is based on one of my favourite scenes, where Jade's look of concern as Cat continues the charade is so serious. I loved how she could immediately tell that this was going beyond one of Cat's quirks into something more serious. I hope I did it justice.

...

Jade was annoyed by Tori's obsession with blondes. Her take on it was that if you wanted to be blonde, dye your hair. Be blonde because you wanted to be blonde, not because of some strange belief that it would magically make boys treat you differently. Jade was a natural brunette but she had dyed her hair black from her own love of the colour and look, not to make anyone else happy.

Jade had been the one to help Cat dye her hair pink originally. It had cost her a scolding from Cat's mother and a refusal to let her pick up Cat for a week, but Mrs. Valentine had eventually "forgiven" Jade for "being a bad influence". Jade was willing to take that title as long as Cat's smile stuck around. It had, and eventually Mrs. Valentine had stopped sighing in frustration when she looked at Cat's hair, although she always visibly bristled when Cat explained that she had partly chosen the colour due to having seen blood in her hair and liking the colour. Jade did not like that look being aimed at Cat, and helped her solidify her habit of referring to her hair as "red velvet cupcake" colouring.

If Tori had wanted to dye her hair blonde, Jade would have had not problem with it. It might have given her a few chances to refer to Tori as the only "dumb blonde" she knew (she did not like jokes that were based on hair colour, partly due to her protectiveness over Cat), but in Tori's case she would have made an exception. But Tori's obsession with blondes having more fun was so exaggerated that Jade hoped it would "dye" out in the evening she agreed to spend with Tori and Cat at the sushi place. Why had she agreed when she was already peeved at Beck and uncomfortable from Robbie's bobby pins poking into her scalp? She was starved. She wanted food and to take a break from Beck's bossiness (agreeing to let him direct her so close to a break up might have been a bad idea), and sushi sounded inviting. Besides, she sort of wanted to watch Tori's disillusionment when undoubtedly she was not treated much different than normal for having blonde hair and blue contact lenses.

But it was not Tori's disillusionment that was most notable (although she did get rejected in a rather spectacular manner). Cat met a boy while in her movie costume, and spent the entire evening with the boy without ever thinking - bless her innocent heart - to mention that she did not look like that in her every day life. She only realized this the next day at Tori's prompting. This resulted in a meltdown from Cat, worried the boy would not like the real her, and an encouraging talk from Tori on being true to oneself and being loved for it.

Although Jade believed in what Tori was saying, a bit of internet sleuthing made her suspicious that this boy most certainly had a blue-eyed, blonde type. Cat freaked out, absolutely unhappy. Tori tried to convince her that being herself around the boy would change his mind and he would love her for the real her. Jade, cynical, was not so sure, but believed that even if it was painful, Cat would be better off if the guy did leave her over her looks once he learned what she looked like. If he was that shallow, he did not deserve a great (but complicated and precious) girl like Cat.

At the movie premiere event for Beck's short film, Jade slid through some curtains next to Tori.

"You see Cat's boy toy yet?" she asked, not bothering to spend time on frivalous greetings. She and Tori were past that stage - never that she'd ever been in that stage except with insults.

"Right over there," Tori said with her excited love-it-about-to-blossom tone.

Ugh. She's so amped up, and I have this sixth sense that something is about to crush Cat's heart. But ... maybe it'll be wrong for once. I hope it's wrong.

"Aah, so she's meeting him here?" she said instead.

"Yup." Tori's anticipation was still evident. "And I guarantee when he sees what she really looks like he's going to be even more psyched-"

"Whoa," Jade interrupted, already frowning. She had noticed Cat, looking like a china doll in a pretty pink dress with the thick, curled blonde wig on her head and blue contacts in her eyes. Cat was tripping her way over to the boy as if this was a charade that was sustainable, but Jade decided in that second that they were not doing this! "Whoa." Her own usual jadedness - appropriate for her name - was replaced with a voice of deep, troubled concern. Masquerading for a man was only going to get Cat hurt and it needed to end now.

"Nooo. Oh, Cat!" Tori's tone was like a flattening balloon, hope leaking away. Jade was relieved that Tori saw the same danger she did in Cat's facade. Her genuine sadness was clear on their friend's behalf.

Tori spotted Robbie entering the room and approached him, accusing, "Hey! Did you do that to Cat's head?"

Robbie, whose crush on Cat had never been hidden, sighed. "I couldn't talk her out of it."

"You helped her?" Tori protested his accompaniment.

"Do you see this belt? I am a wig-master. Helping people with their wig needs is my duty," Robbie protested.

Tori snapped the belt against him painfully, then strode back to Jade.

"Now what?" she asked Jade in a quiet hiss.

"Now we wait for little miss to leave so we can pull her aside and do an intervention," Jade said glumly. She held no satisfaction in the fact she was going to have to break it to Cat that no guy that made you feel like you needed to change like that was worth it.

Look at that - Jade West could spot the unhealthy relationship. Maybe she was learning after all.

The movie started and although Jade was keeping a discrete eye on Cat and her date (for the moment), she still stole several glances at Beck and was relieved to see him looking so pleased with the short film. Although it was a bit cheesy on some of the comedy lines, he was cheesy too in the same sort of adorably annoying way. It was good to see him so happy with something he had created - he deserved it. She enjoyed some of the laughs at her own comedic timing and inflection. At least the dumb role had played off as funny instead of just stupid. She could live with that.

But then, there was an unintended halftime show to rival all halftime shows. Bird seed spilled on Cat's wig, and Andre's escapee bird decided that meant the little brunette - excuses, blonde - would make an excellent bird feeder. Cat was understandably freaked out and ran out of the room with a trembling excuse that she needed to go "freshen up".

No kidding, girl.

Jade looked at her sympathetically as she ran out of the room. Tori and Robbie were both jumping up to follow her and Jade decided to let them go. She was tempted to tell them she would handle it, but she feared that her concern would come out in a harsh form rather than the comfort Cat would probably need. She was more likely to tell Cat to cut out the crap and be herself and stop letting people take advantage of her malleability than to say something constructive. Jade knew that it was a mixture of annoyance at herself for having changed her own behaviour and interactions to fit different roles and relationships through the years at her own expense combined with her own deep love and fear of someone taking advantage of Cat when she would not be around to protect her.

A minute later, she got a text, which broke her away from her distraction of watching Beck get stressed out by his movie being paused and upstaged by a renegade bird.

Talked to Cat. Ending this now. Making her take off that ridiculous stuff.

Good, she texted back to Tori. She could not help adding, But I thought you said wearing contact lenses and blonde wigs was going to be so much fun?

Tori sent an emoji of an angry exploding head with the question Do you want to be the one talking Cat through this? I'd love to trade with you, so Jade decided to hold back on any more needling there. But after a few minutes, she went to the boy and mentioned he should go find his date. She could at least spare Cat the shame of dealing with this in front of thirty or forty of their classmates and families.

Tori and Robbie returned to the theater, looking downcast and worried for the outcome of Cat's poor little heart. They all sat together, whispering to one another about the hope that maybe the guy did not have such a defined type after all, maybe he would like Cat for who she was, that she deserved a good guy and ...

"I'm getting a text," Jade said, ending the quiet tenseness. She looked at it, blinked hard twice, then cleared her throat. "Yeah, he dumped her. I've got to go."

Jade went out to the hallway and went to the broom closet. She found Cat, curled up and miserable. She wrapped herself around her, squeezing her in a hug that would have absorbed all the pain from her heart if only Jade could figure out some sort of magic formula to do so. They sat there. Jade never needed unnecessary words, and she sat with Cat for half an hour. They could hear the movie start up again, the distant rumble of amped up speakers vibrating the back wall of the closet. After the distorted closing credits music rattled the hanging tools through the final chord, Cat whispered, "I want to go home."

"I know, but how about we wait here a little longer?"

"But I wanna go," Cat whimpered.

"Uh huh. But if we leave now, people leaving the show will see you and I don't want them gossiping about you. Let's wait it out. If no one sees you upset, they'll never know about it. They'll think you were just talking to someone in the theater that you met tonight, and then left to change out of your costume after the parrot landed on you," Jade explained gently, wiping Cat's cheeks with her sleeve.

"O...o...okay," Cat sniffled.

"All right."

They sat there for a long time. After a bit, they heard a familiar knock.

"Come in, Beck," Jade said. She did not know who told him, but she was sure he knew and that was why he was there. Sure enough, when he cracked open the door just enough to slip it unobtrusively, he was holding Cat's purple giraffe.

"Mr. Purple!" she said gratefully, reaching out for it.

"There you go, Cupcake," he said gently. She snuggled it for a moment before he added, "I think both Tori and Robbie are looking for you."

"I was silly. They'll just laugh," she said in concern.

"They wouldn't laugh about this," Beck told her sincerely, crouching down to look her in the eye. "They're your friends and they love you. No one wanted to see you hurt, Cat - no one."

"You sure?" She looked for assurance from him.

"Sure as I can be."

"Okay. Maybe I'll go talk to them, just for a bit."

"Good. And then I'll take you home after," Jade told her.

"Okay."

"The theater's empty. You can go meet them in there."

...

Jade waited outside the theater. She did not eavesdrop, but she did listen for voices and tones. She could hear Tori at first, her sympathetic tones mixing with Cat's naive voice. When Tori exited, she shrugged at Jade.

"Well, I did my best. Glad you're the one who takes care of her most. That's a hard job."

"It is," Jade replied honestly. "But worth it."

"Yup. And ... sorry I was the one who convinced her looking like Cinderella would make her more worth people's attention."

"We all get mixed up ideas sometimes," Jade acknowledged.

"I guess I'm still working on learning some of those things for myself. You're good at it though."

"Me?"

"Yeah. You're clearly comfortable with standing out as you, and you do a good job at it," Tori said with an embarrassed shrug. "I admire that about you. I need to get that point myself."

"It'll come," Jade said. She knew it would. Tori was smart enough to learn from mistakes like this, and seeing it play out in Cat's life would likely be far more powerful than anything that she would have learned from experiencing something like this herself. Tori's empathy was a keystone to her personality.

"Going home. See you tomorrow."

"See you," Jade replied quietly, returning to listening. She could hear sweet notes of guitar music and Robbie singing and ... was that a little giggle? Her heart relaxed a little. Cat was getting happiness pumped back into her heart. It was going to be okay.

When, several minutes later, a rather shot-down Robbie exited and whispered quickly, "Don't let Cat dye her hair blonde," she figured that Cat had made some sort of comment like that ... missing the point of the whole evening.

"Work on building up her self-esteem - check," she said with a gentle punch to Robbie's shoulder. "Good try, Rob."

"Thanks."

Cat emerged, cradling her giraffe in her arms, yawning.

"I think I need sleep," she mumbled.

"I think so too. Let's get you home, my favourite cupcake."

"You and Beck both called me that tonight," Cat noted sweetly, following Jade out of the school to the parking lot that was flooded by artificial lights

"Well, your hair is the colour of one, isn't it?" Jade replied.

"Yeah, it is! Because that's my favourite flavour and pink is my favourite colour, so I chose it for both of those reasons."

"And it fits you perfectly."

"Really?"

"Are cupcakes better with frosting?"

"Of course!"

"Then that's my answer."

It took Cat a few seconds to connect the dots, but then she smiled.

"Okay."

And they would be just that.