3.3

Taylor Hebert

Dragging herself out of bed that morning hadn't been fun. She was wrecked and she'd barely managed to get to sleep the previous night with everything on her mind thanks to Madison.

Even before the other girl's visit she hadn't been planning to go in to school, it would have only been Friday she'd missed and it wasn't like it would have been the first time either. She had just wanted another day to decompress after all the shit that had happened and that she'd get to avoid everyone was only half of the temptation.

Really she'd wanted to put things off until Monday, to not have to see the faces of all the people who thought they'd finally broken her and flaunted it at her wherever she went. She definitely didn't want to deal with whatever the fuck Emma and Sophia would be like if they'd thought she was actually somehow responsible for the flute disappearing either.

Most of all though she didn't want to see Madison again, because the other girl had given her a promise, given her word and part of Taylor wanted to cling to the fantasy that Madison would actually keep it. Even though she knew that she probably wouldn't, just like everyone else.

But then the other girl had to call her, give her a warning only an idiot would have needed and she'd stupidly said she'd 'see her tomorrow' without thinking and she'd be damned if she was going to chicken out at that point.

The first part of her day had been easy enough at least, none of the other girls were in her homeroom so it was easy to relax a bit and with Computer Studies first period, she still didn't have to worry about sharing a class with any of her bullies until World Issues for second period.

That had been weird.

She hadn't trusted Madison to keep her word, but she'd promised to give her a chance and so they'd shared a brief nod and she was content to ignore the other girl for the rest of class.

But then Julia had to go and steal the assignment she'd spent the last forty minutes working on. She'd been pissed, upset, betrayed that Madison hadn't stopped it, hadn't done a damn thing.

And then Madison had just walked over and handed it back to her.

There weren't any juice stains, no one had scribbled over it, she'd just handed it over like it was normal and told her she was trying to keep her promise.

Taylor hadn't known what to feel and had left as soon as Julia and her hanger-ons had stormed out after class had finished. She knew they'd go straight to the cafeteria, so if the others wanted to try something she'd at least have some time to eat her lunch before they might have found her.

She did try to change up where she ate lunch each day, but there were only so many places she could go indoors without looking like she was trying to either join one of the gangs, spy for one of the gangs or get a hit from the druggies and it was too cold to head outside for that long in any case.

No one had bothered her in the end, which had been nice and whilst part of her couldn't help but wonder if Madison had had something to do with it. - She had forcibly reminded herself that it wasn't the first time she'd managed to get through a whole lunch period without being harassed and had pushed the thought from her mind.

At least with Madison's warning she understood why Emma had looked so unbelievably pissed with her in Math as she had tried to tune out the whispers of conversation and the subtle glances towards her. She was used to the stares, the mocking, people saying things behind her back even as she hated it. But even with Emma there glaring daggers at her, no one was stupid enough to try anything with Mr Quinlan ready to dish out punishments on a moment's notice.

But then she'd had Art as last period and even with how strange World Issues with Madison and Julia had been, Art class had taken her completely off guard.

Art wasn't ever going to be her favourite class, but it wasn't the worst either and the only reason she tended to dread it as much as she did was the fact she shared it with Sophia Hess.

Even when she was trying to be cautious, Sophia had still managed to shoulder check her hard as she'd walked into the classroom and she hadn't been able to stop herself from stumbling to the side and smacking loudly into the door.

People had laughed like they always did and she'd tried to ignore it like she always had, but it felt different in a way she had trouble pinning down. Sophia had just seemed even more pissed off than usual for some reason and it had made her wonder with a certain ingrained paranoia if smacking her shoulder on the door hadn't been the goal of the other girl's plan.

She had ended up taking her seat with the nagging worry she was missing something, that maybe something had happened or was going to happen and she wasn't ready or prepared for whatever Sophia had planned for her.

She'd been tense, coiled like a tightly wound spring from the moment the class had started, but Art was always a bit more of a relaxed lesson unless someone managed to annoy Mrs Morsey enough, or she was in a bad mood to begin with. So when nothing had happened after the first ten minutes Taylor had let herself lower her guard slightly, still feeling cautious and wary, but not enough that she couldn't try and concentrate more on the lesson itself as Mrs Morsey lectured from the front of the room.

Though since it was Friday and last period Mrs Morsey did her usual thing of speeding through the material as quickly as possible, then letting them have study room for the rest of the class whilst she popped out of the classroom to do whatever it was she did when she left.

Taylor was always fine with that, people generally just chatted or got on with their homework and as long as she kept an eye on Sophia to make sure she didn't try anything, or get anyone else to try anything it was usually a good way to finish out the day. - As long as the other girl hadn't managed to sabotage her beforehand at least.

Even so she'd almost jumped out of her seat when moments after Mrs Morsey had left, one of the boys she barely remembered the name of had turned around to face her with a lazy grin.

She'd been on edge, her gaze darting to Sophia and back, expecting an insult or some request to borrow a pencil she'd never get back or something but instead-

"Dude what did you say to Madison man? That shit was hilarious earlier."

"What?" She managed to say as her brain tried to keep up.

"At lunch, weren't you there? Little Mads laid into her man, fucking spitfire she is, funniest shit I've seen in my life."

And she had absolutely no idea what he was talking about.

Desperately her mind was trying to find the angle of attack, how his nonsense was supposed to be hurting her and all she could do was return a blank and probably very confused look to the boy who annoyingly only seemed to think that made the whole situation funnier.

"Oh man you didn't hear?" He grinned with a stage whisper, making an exaggerated gesture towards Sophia a few desks over to their right. "Tall and brooding over there started shit with Mads, but she was ready to throw down! Man I thought she was just a groupie but she don't take shit and Sophia be pissed off now, better thank your homie for that later you know?"

She didn't know! She'd only seen Madison that morning! What the hell had Madison done?!

But before she could ask that or any of the other dozen questions that were begging to be answered, the door opened again and Mrs Morsey stepped back in. Conversations quickly cutting off and the boy in front of her gave her a quick lazy nod as he slipped back around to face his own desk.

Taylor had chanced a glance at Sophia to find the other girl was now glaring openly at her and for once in her life Taylor was pretty sure it wasn't only because of her own continued existence.

She really needed to speak to Madison.

.

.

Madison Clements

Thanks to Quest giving her another waypoint marker to follow, she'd managed to enjoy a peaceful if rushed lunch before she'd needed to head to Art for third period.

Since she wasn't looking to push her luck after her little stunt in the cafeteria, especially after the adrenaline had worn off and she'd had to sit down for a minute from the whole 'holy shit I just talked back to Sophia in front of everyone and survived.' Madison had decided not to head back to drop off her tray, instead just throwing her rubbish in the trash and storing away the plastic tray into her Inventory to put off trying to figure out how she'd get it back where it belonged later.

Art had been easy at least, Mrs Morsey was a decent teacher if a lazy one and since the lesson had just been theory she'd managed to tune out most of the conversations around her that had not so subtly been about her. Between the people who were there and everyone else who wasn't and were not so quietly lamenting that they'd missed the show.

On the one hand pissing off Sophia had probably just shortened her lifespan by a few years, but on the other hand doing it in public like she had might have balanced the scales. - Since hopefully the other girl would realise any immediate physical retribution would just make her look worse by proving Madison's point. Sophia was smart, but Madison knew uncomfortably well how easily emotions could override logic at times and wasn't particularly looking forward to seeing how that played out for Sophia herself.

Computer Studies was her last period which she shared with Emma, but the other girl hadn't so much as looked at her when she'd got there, grouping up with a couple of other girls Madison had rarely spoken to. Though since the most they could do was look meaningfully at her and snicker from the other side of the classroom, she hadn't felt like she was missing much in any case.

After that she was free and as much as part of her very much wanted to teleport straight back to her room, with how much attention she'd already managed to get she figured it probably wasn't the smartest move and took the bus back home as normal.

Browsing her phone on the journey she wasn't surprised to find she'd been kicked from a couple of the group chats she was in. She had a few texts, a nasty one from Julia she didn't bother responding to but saved just in case, one from Daphne asking if she was okay and one from Roz saying she didn't care about what had happened even if it was in her words; 'the most entertaining time in the cafeteria since forever.' But also that she wasn't going to pick Madison over the others, which she appreciated the blunt honesty of if nothing else.

Madison knew she had a few hours to herself once she'd got in, her mom would be back later after seeing a friend and her dad had messaged her saying he'd be late, but would be picking up some takeout on the way back, which had given her plenty of time to experiment!

The first thing she'd done once she'd locked the front door behind her was teleport to her room, ticking the mental box that had her wanting to be sure she didn't just have lateral teleportation. It would have still been a cool power, but she would have definitely been extremely disappointed if it had been the case.

She'd finally been able to confirm that she did retain her momentum, or at least most of it as she ran across her bedroom and then was running down the hall. Something which was definitely cool, even if it meant she was still screwed if she got thrown into the stratosphere or something and had to teleport from terminal velocity.

Since she was still limiting herself to the house she had no idea what her range was, or what if any limitations there were as to where she could actually go, but with the weekend right around the corner she was hoping she'd have plenty of time to find out.

After that and filling in her notepad with various ideas and speculations she'd simply tried to see if she had a limit on how much she could teleport, but had quickly discovered that either she didn't have a limit or whatever she was doing in the house wasn't enough for her to reach it.

Her mom had arrived home not long after, though much earlier than she'd been expecting. But she'd had plenty of time not to completely incriminate herself as she'd reflexively teleported back to her bedroom from the kitchen the moment she'd heard the front door go.

For the first time in what felt like a while she'd actually told her mom how her day had gone, all of it and whilst her mom had cautioned her from letting success go to her head, the hug that followed had just reassured her she was doing the right thing.

Dinner was much more relaxed than the previous day as she recounted some of what she'd told her mom to her dad over Chinese takeout, something they did rarely enough that they tended to sit together when they had it. She didn't think she'd quite managed to convey to either of them just how close she'd come to being punched in the face from her confrontation with Sophia, but in hindsight she'd decided that was probably a good thing and opted not to clarify the point.

When she got back to her room a while later Madison had been surprised to find that she'd had a missed call. Usually her phone was in her pocket, but she'd left it on charge since she'd got home after spending lunch and most of her bus ride back watching videos to pass the time.

"Taylor?" She remarked curiously as she unlocked the screen and brought up her missed calls, checking the timestamp and seeing it was only from about forty minutes ago and she wondered if it was too late to call the other girl back. Taylor had called from her house phone and Madison had the brief thought that she really needed to get the other girl's mobile number if this was going to become a regular thing for them, which was a weird enough thought in itself.

After a deliberating about it for a few minutes she decided to call Taylor back, sitting herself down on the edge of her bed and then immediately standing up to pace as soon as it actually started ringing.

"Hebert household?"

"Um hello!" She squeaked, very much not expecting the tired older man's voice that greeted her, her brain catching up a moment later as she realised it was probably Taylor's father who had picked up the phone.

"Hello" came the voice again, a small warmth of amusement colouring the tone. "Are you one of Taylor's friends? I don't think I know your name."

Madison froze, not sure which answer to give. Would Taylor hate her if she said yes? But wouldn't her father be very, very confused if she said no?! "I'm Madison sir, I know Taylor from school." Perfect!

Taylor's dad chuckled down the line. "It's just Danny, if you keep calling me sir I'm going to feel even older than I am. It's nice to meet you though Madison, Taylor... She doesn't really talk to her old man about her friends much anymore, but maybe Taylor can invite you over for dinner one night? I'd love to meet you and it's been a while since we've had anyone over."

What did she even say to that?! "...Thank you si-Danny, I guess I'll talk to Taylor about it some time?" 'Deflect, deflect, deflect!' "Is she free? She called me earlier but I missed it."

"No that's fine, I'll go and find Taylor and hand you over to her, just a moment Madison."

There was a muffled sound, presumably the sound of Taylor's dad walking through the house before she heard what sounded like knocking and the echoes of conversation she couldn't quite make out before the line cleared and another much more familiar voice replaced it a moment later.

"Hello?"

"Hey Taylor" Madison sighed in relief, her dad had been nice but that was way too stressful. "You called earlier? Sorry I left my phone on charge when I had dinner so I missed it."

"Oh, yeah. Um thanks for calling back?"

Oh Scion they were as bad as each other at this.

"No problem Taylor, so what's up? Did Emma end up doing something in the end?" She wouldn't have put it past the other girl, but after what had happened at lunch Madison had assumed Emma would have been way too distracted to go after Taylor again until Monday at least.

"Huh? Oh no Emma just glared at me in Math, she can't really do anything with Mr Quinlan there anyway."

"Yeah I know what you mean, oh did he make you try and do all of yesterday's stuff as well? I've got so much homework..." She lamented with another sigh, homework she really needed to get started on... At some point since she had Math first period on Monday, which already sucked enough without giving said teacher an actual reason to hate her if she didn't do it.

"Yeah" Taylor groaned and then seemed to catch herself and Madison had to stifle a giggle as she imagined the other girl's expression. "But I was actually calling because I heard some weird stuff in the afternoon that you, I don't know? Had a fight with Sophia in the cafeteria or something? I only got bits and pieces."

"Oh that" she replied automatically as she wondered how best to put it, even as the events replayed in her mind for what was probably the fiftieth time by that point.

"You actually fought Sophia at lunch?!" Came Taylor's shocked voice, snapping her out of her train of thoughts. "Is that why she was so pissed off in Art afterwards?"

"Sort of?" She replied with a questioning lilt as she actually thought about whether it counted as a 'fight'. "And yeah that's probably why her resting bitch face was worse than usual" she laughed and then laughed even harder when Taylor almost choked on a surprised laugh of her own.

"But yeah," Madison continued into the silence on the other end of the line that followed. "At lunch Julia told Emma all about what happened in World Issues, her and Sophia called me out on it and I basically just told them what I told you."

She heard Taylor take a sharp breath as she finished speaking. "Wow Madison, is it bad I kind of wish I'd seen the look on their faces?"

Madison giggled, "oh no, it was glorious and that wasn't even the best part."

"Really?"

Madison nodded even though Taylor obviously couldn't see it. "Uh huh, Sophia started her whole 'oh you think you're better than us' bullshit and then I sort of called her out on it in front of everyone."

There was a pause. "Holy shit Madison, how are you still alive?"

She laughed, more in the same relief she'd felt after the 'fight' than anything. "She wasn't going to do anything in front of all those skinheads and everyone else who wants a piece of her, though I'm going to be careful next week." And wasn't that an understatement.

"Yeah no shit..." Taylor trailed off and Madison let the quiet that followed linger, leaving Taylor to collect her own thoughts wherever they lead.

"You were really serious?"

"Sorry?"

"About... The whole apology thing, being better, all of that? You... That was actually real?"

She smiled, "of course Taylor, I know I'll probably never get to be your friend now or anything like that, but I still want to do right by you. Make up for all the shit I did."

"...You keep making it weirdly difficult to keep hating you."

"I'm sorry?"

Taylor sighed, "forget it, you know I'm beginning to feel like I'm actually going to feel bad when Sophia murders you next week."

Madison let out a weak chuckle, "yeah I'm not looking forward to that either, I think she took it personally when I suggested she apologise to you."

"...for fuck's sake Madison do you have a death wish? You know what, don't even answer that, I feel like if I keep speaking to you you're going to infect me with your personal brand of insanity. Just, goodnight Madison and... Thanks for all that stuff okay?"

"Any time Taylor," she smiled. "Night."