Melissa didn't believe it. Melissa didn't believe any of it, at all. Kyla's gotta be hiding something! she thought with nervous and irrepressible excitement, and just a slight twinge of betrayal she tried to convince herself she shouldn't be feeling. And there's obviously much more to Sarah McMillan than meets the eye, here, too! The brunette found herself trying to catch her breath and her heart thumping wildly at her ribcage as she followed Sarah into the library, even though she'd hardly been running at all. Whatever the story here was, Melissa had a feeling it was huge, and curiosity was killing her. Screw the closet tranny club accidently summoning a Mist Demon from the Hell Dimension, I gotta follow up on this rumor first!
She'd just about talked Randy's ears off last night with all the gossip and the speculation she just couldn't keep pent up in her head. Of course all he did was nod and let his eyes glaze over while Melissa poured her theories onto him, but that didn't stop her back then. "'Maybe I'm just itching to see exactly how it's going to blow up in her face,' she said! She said that, Randy, but did that look like it blowing up in Sarah's face to you? No, it didn't, of course it didn't, and it didn't look like it to Kyla either! I saw her face, when Sarah walked out of that bathroom, Randy, and that wasn't the face she makes when everything's going according to plan! That's the face Kyla makes when something might blow up in her face! She recovered, yeah, she improvised, but I could see, somewhere in there, something wasn't right! And you saw the way she was looking at Sarah, right!?"
"Uh-huh," Randy nodded wearily. He had not, in fact, noticed a thing about the way Kyla looked at Sarah, nor did he care. But then, Melissa didn't care that he didn't care.
"Kyla wasn't happy with Sarah being there one bit, no matter what show she was putting on. She was 111% just toying with her, the whole time! And when she saw the way she was acting with Biff... by the way, you think Sarah has a crush on Biff? She certainly looked like it!"
Randy shrugged. "Nothing special about that."
"Nothing special if you aren't wanting to cross swords with Kyla!" Melissa corrected. "Kyla wasn't letting it happen while Sarah was with us, nah, but then, why would she let a girl crushing on Biff hang out with us in the first place? That isn't right, for her! Maybe she has some scheme for Sarah, but why wouldn't she tell me? She can tell me, I'm her best friend! Maybeit'sbecauseshewantsitasecretbutshethinksItalktoomuchandsoifIknoweveryoneknowsbutthat'snottruebecauseI'dneverdothattomyfriendright? Youdon'tthinkItalktoomuchdoyou?"
"Huh?" Randy suddenly realized it was a question directed at him. "I didn't catch that; you said it too fast."
"Okay, okay, I do talk a lot, but not when it's about important stuff like this! You gotta keep secrets to learn secrets, you know? I guess Kyla will tell me when she's ready to tell me, but what about Sarah? Tonight was way out of character for her! I gotta find out what that was about, I gotta buttonhole her tomorrow."
"Sure," Randy nodded disinterestedly. "You do that." And so, Melissa did that.
It was actually sorta at Kyla's request, in fact. Melissa had met up with her that morning, before school, at the usual spot with the rest of the girls, trading around gossip like they always did. Compared to the rumors around Kyla and Sarah, none of it was all that interesting: Tiffany had apparently slept with some college student last Friday, Sabrina Johnson had gotten into another fight and apparently came to school with some stitches, Athena DeVries was foretelling the end of the world again, Jon Gibson's hubristic abuse of omnipotence would bring about the ultimate doom, and so on. It was all same old same old, as far as Melissa was concerned, but what happened with Sarah and Kyla!? That ended up dominating the girls' discussion until Kyla showed up, and when she showed up they nearly swarmed her with questions about it, most of all Melissa and Tiffany.
"Relax, relax, ladies, I'm not making Sarah a full member of our group here or anything," Kyla assured them. "I'm just doing this to flex on her, more than anything else. I wanna show far I can lift an absolute dork like her from the depths of loserdom with the littlest bit of effort, and of course I can always drop her right back down there when it suits me." Kyla giggled. "I'd say, for the sake of the experiment, we oughtta at least extend a fair chance at her getting in with us," Kyla said, smile fading a bit at that, "but I do want at least one of you keeping a close eye on her. You seem to have taken an interest already, Melissa, so why don't you go?"
Melissa was staring at Kyla, in shock. She nodded and immediately replied "Of course, of course, I was wanting to watch her anyway," but her mind was still racing. Just to flex on her? Is that really it!? I mean, she's not above wholly vain shows of power, but there's no way Kyla doesn't know about Sarah's crush on Biff! There's no way she can't see what sort of problems letting an old enemy get this kind of influence, this close to her, can cause! "But, no offense, Kyla, are you sure this is really the smartest thing to do? Sarah's an utter nobody!"
"Yeah, and I can't imagine she much appreciated being an utter nobody before," Kyla said with a sad and heavy sigh, as if recalling unwanted memories. "So I figure, why not do a good turn for a while? People will love it, right?"
"I love it!" Amber piped up. "I think it's really sweet! I think it's totally super cool of you to be doing that stuff with that girl, right?"
"It is pretty nice of her," Erika Weber concurred, with much less of Amber's enthusiasm. Melissa suspected she and Erika were thinking the same thing: Too nice of her.
"Oh, if I'm not mistaken, it's almost time!" Kyla said with a sudden start, after a glance out a window. "Everyone, stay back and watch this!" Kyla said to them, heading over to the door for Sarah's entrance.
That was only a few minutes ago. And what had happened in the meantime only puzzled Melissa even further. What the hell possessed Sarah, that she'd get up in the spotlight like that!? Melissa had always had Sarah pegged as someone comfortable with being a nobody. Happy, maybe not, but comfortable for sure, and that display up there showed exactly why: all of that attention terrified her. She was convinced at an irrational level that she'd never get it right, so much so that it'd feel like failure even if she did. And yet, here she was, walking out with Kyla's blessing to get the attention of God and everybody, only to flip around and bolt the moment the anxieties she knew she had burned her again. Why!? Kyla had probably been expecting it, too; it would've been difficult for anyone not so close to her to see it, but Melissa had seen enough of Kyla's malice before to know it when she tried to hide it. But honestly, her wanting Sarah to run off and make a fool of herself was probably the least weird thing about that interaction. Her taking all the credit for something so vain was likely the second least weird. That she would prop up Sarah at all, though, felt just as weird as it did last night.
Stupid, stupid, stupid! What the hell was that, Sarah!? she cursed herself internally. She wasn't going to cry, she was not, as long as she could help it, but that didn't rule out scolding herself for her misbehavior. What was that about Confidence, and Charisma, and Beauty, and all that!? I know I have that last one nearly down, with almost all my cerebral mind! Those were looks of admiration, envy, even shock, and I just ran like a scared little girl! You aren't going to be building any self confidence doing that, now are you!? Look at the abyss until the abyss looks away! I-
"Hey... why the long face?" Sarah recognized the voice immediately, and so employed a deep breath and much willpower to force herself to meet her former bestie's gaze. "You looked stunning out there, girl! That's gonna be the talk of the town for days, you know!" Melissa said, trying to lift her spirits somewhat. It didn't work; attention was the last thing Sarah's new subconscious wanted, and as for her conscious mind, Sarah wasn't too thrilled to be dealing with Melissa already.
"Y-yeah... thanks." Anxiety was starting to wrack Sarah internally; she knew only too well that what Melissa learned here, all the popular kids would be learning soon, and Melissa had a special intuition for finding out what she wanted to know. There was a way Sarah could turn this to her advantage, but that could backfire badly if Sarah didn't play it right, and with Kyla's abysmal conversation skill... Be confident, and take risks! Sarah reminded herself. Stop thinking about how it can go wrong, and focus on making it go right!
"No, really, I mean it!" Melissa repeated, feeling the insincerity of the thanks. She took a seat the library's study area Sarah had found to hide, and continued "Kyla'd said something before, about there being hidden gems in the school here and there, but ohmigawd, it's like she found a sapphire in the mud in your case!"
I was the one who said that, Sarah thought. "Y-yeah, I get it, I get it," she replied, blushing hard and giving only a hint of a smile as she looked away, before scolding herself and looking back at Melissa. "I-I just... it's nothing, really... not my best..."
"You think that wasn't your best?" Melissa chuckled. "Well dayum gurl, I'm really interested to see what your 'best' is! You just stick tight with Kyla until she teases that out of ya. How'd you do it, by the way?"
"Do what?"
"Convince Kyla to take you on as her pet project. She never does that, except for good friends of hers, like me. How'd you do it?" Melissa was trying to be casual about it, but Sarah knew her well enough to see the curiosity smoldering in her eye sockets.
This is it, Sarah realized. This is where I dangle the bait. "K-Kyla... (gulp)... Kyla told me not to tell you."
Somewhere within Melissa's bright maroon eyes, the smoldering curiosity had just ignited to real flame. "Oh~!?"
"She... she said... if she lost the bet, that... that she'd explain everything," Sarah struggled to explain without stuttering. "Until then... I'm not to say... anything."
"Butyoucantellmenowright!?" Melissa was trying very hard to contain the excitement in her voice, and failing. "Kylaalreadywonthebetandmadeyouprettysoyoucantellmewhatitisshetoldyounottotellmeright!? Prettyprettypleasewithstrawberriesandcream!?"
"Uh... not exactly..." Sarah began, once again intimidated despite herself, and once again scolding herself for not keeping eye contact with the girl she was speaking to. "There's... more to the deal... than you know..."
"WellpleasepleasepleasetellmewhatisitIdon'tknow!" Melissa was looking at Sarah in much the same way a child looks at a gift under his Christmas tree. "I, Icanhelpyouwinthebetassoonaspossibleifyoujusttellmehow!"
"Well..." Sarah feigned thought for a moment. "I guess I'd need help to win either way... but... if I tell you... you promise you'll help me win, not Kyla?"
That gave her pause. Sarah figured it would. Melissa now thought of Kyla the way she used to think of her, after all, and Melissa had just about worshipped her back then. On the one hand, she'd risk staining that relationship, but in return would get the most delicious-smelling bit of gossip she'd had in a long time. She gotta be asking herself, "How could one possibly blackmail the mighty Kyla Leeson?" Sarah thought to herself. Whether she ends up helping me or not, she's gotta be incredibly suspicious of Kyla now, which is a point in my favor anyway.
Finally, Melissa nodded. "Yeah, I can make that deal. You tell me stuff, and I'll help you out! NowpleaseohpleaseohpleasetellmeaboutthisbetyouandKylamade! Whatisthedealreallyactuallysupposedtobeabout!?"
"Th-thanks, Melissa!" Sarah smiled a broad smile, and allowed herself to look away for now, hiding her blush. She knew it wasn't really so, but it felt on some level like winning back a friend. "I r-really appreciate the help!"
"Yesyesyesandthedeal?" Melissa urged. "WhatamIhelpingyoutodoheregirl?"
"Okay..." Sarah looked back into Melissa's shimmering maroon eyes and forced herself to stop stuttering again. "Without revealing too much... The idea is... I'll try and get in good... with you girls... become popular... stop being so shy... get better at talking... get pretty... maybe become a cheerleader... And Kyla... she'll curry favor with my people... the geeks... the losers... goths, maybe... become well-liked, more than just respected... not so snooty, anymore... whoever does it better... is the winner... we check, at the end of each day, for a clear winner... and continue if... we can't. Does that make sense?"
Melissa looked thoughtful, apparently puzzling some things together. "Interesting... So, basically, you're trying to see who can trade places with the other more easily? How the heck did you get Kyla to agree to that?"
Sarah gave Melissa a look.
"You can't tell me, right, right..." Melissa replied with some vexation. "But her reworking your look, how'd you get her to agree to that? Is that part of the bet too?"
"Well, uh..." Sarah almost looked away, but caught herself. This was one that set her anxieties off again. She really didn't wanna have to tell a direct lie to Melissa; she had a nose for those. The truth of the matter, however, was just as unbelievable as a lie, and also directly contradictory to the lies Kyla had been telling. "F-for that one... it's... uh... it's easiest if I j-just show you."
Melissa raised an eyebrow. "Why...?"
"C-can you meet me at my house early tomorrow, before... before you put your own makeup on? I'll be going to Kyla's house soon after that... I can show you at my house before then, and... you can go home when I go to Kyla's."
"But why though? Can't you just tell me before then?" Melissa asked. "And why are you going to Kyla's house so early?"
Sarah bit her lip and looked away, shamefully. There simply wasn't anything she could think to tell Melissa that she'd trust to sound well with Kyla's stuttering voice.
Melissa sighed. "Okay, I'll be there. Anything else?"
Sarah briefly relayed that she'd be asking some of Melissa's friends (her former friends) for help with speech, posture, and general training to get over her anxieties, told her she'd be trying for a spot on the cheerleaders later that afternoon, and very deliberately avoided any talk of Biff, Steve, and other boyfriends, lest Melissa start to suspect her intentions there. True to her word, Melissa was supportive, said she'd back her up in the general quest for popularity, would talk to some of the other cheerleaders as a heads up, and overall seemed kinda impressed by Sarah's drive. By the time they were done talking it was well into first period, though neither of them had any issue with just skipping a period (Melissa had notes from a classmate, anyway). The only unusual thing that remained in the conversation occurred near the very end, when it was about time to leave and start heading to second period.
"Why do you need a copy of your class schedule?" Melissa asked as Sarah went to get one from the librarian. "It's late spring."
"I don't know what Kyla's classes were before," Sarah said absent-mindedly. Her stutter had been steadily getting better as she got more comfortable talking to Melissa.
Melissa gave Sarah a very, very curious look, but said nothing.
