That Afternoon:
Back at Lakeview Academy, Jon smiled with, technically unearned, pride as she walked out of the locker room in her cheer uniform for the first time. It consisted of a tight blue top with Lakeview's roaring lion mascot across her chest and a very short blue and white skirt. Of course, hers alone had the word 'captain' emblazoned on her back. She knew from having seen it from the outside that she looked drool worthy right now, but, as much of a boost to her confidence as that was, the obvious respect and admiration the rest of the squad had for her might be even more of an ego boost.
Her first cheer practice as Sarah got underway, and pretty quickly her worries over slipping up started to fade away. Her practice with the original Sarah had paid off, and whenever she was worried about performing a certain more technical move herself, she could use her position as captain as an excuse to observe the other girls doing it instead. It helped that Tiffany was so supportive, the statuesque platinum blonde vice-captain standing by her side through the whole thing. Like, she'll never surpass Karyn, but Tiff is actually a kind of incredible friend. Karyn's wish was proving very effective.
"Ugh, I'm just not getting it," one of the sophomore girls who had just been elevated to the varsity cheer squad, Scarlett Trace, complained after landing on her butt while trying to perform a particular maneuver.
Jon leaned down and helped the girl up, "You'll get it, Scar, you just need some practice. Feel the rhythm of the music, and move from your hips." She was actually just parroting some of the advice Sarah had given her the previous day, but to the younger girl, Jon was the expert. For someone who'd never really excelled at anything before, suddenly getting to bask in Sarah's accomplishments as a trophy winning cheerleader was intoxicating. Sure, it was whatever the sports equivalent of stolen valor was, but she couldn't bring herself to care at that moment.
Honestly she was having trouble caring about a lot of things she felt she probably should. It was just really easy to get swept up in Sarah's life, and she surprised herself by missing very little from her old one. Like, today was amazing Jon reflected, thinking back to lunch with Karyn and the squad. Sure, Sarah had stared daggers at her the whole time, Kyla looked like she was going into shock, and Biff continued to sulk at the edge of the classroom, but the girls had loved Karyn and it just fit having the gorgeous redhead join them at the popular kids table. Maybe that's why it's been relatively easy so far? Karyn's your best friend and you haven't really had to give her up like you thought you might.
She bit her lip momentarily. She was beginning to realize she needed to sit down and have a conversation with Karyn when she could be out of character to sort through the somewhat confusing feelings she'd been having over the last couple of days. That afternoon after practice she was going with Sarah's mom to get her nails done (An event she was more than a little nervous about since she'd have to bluff being the woman's daughter in an extended bit of one on one time), but she decided she'd text Karyn after practice and set up a meeting for the next day to figure out where they stood and talk things out.
"Hey Sarah, you think the new girls are ready to try the pyramid?" Amber asked her, drawing Jon's attention back to the present.
Jon shook her lovely head, snapping back into Sarah mode as she agreed to do the pyramid. After all, how could the squad function without her at the top?
Kyla Leeson was having a very strange day indeed. Actually, she'd been having a series of strange days, but today had gotten even weirder. It wasn't like aliens had suddenly descended from the heavens, at least as far as she knew, but people were acting odd all around her and she was beginning to wonder if there was some sort of root cause, like psychedelic mold in the school's vents or something.
She was on her way back from school now, walking alone since Jay had either ditched or been sick. Karyn and Jon walked the other direction and Gladys and Leonard both had to stay after for math club. It gave her ample opportunity to run the events of the past few days over in her mind.
It had started with Jon Gibson, who had come back from break transformed from the easy going amiable guy she knew into a really sullen and reserved person. His answers had become monosyllabic, he barely talked to any of their little group of geeky friends at all except for Karyn and even when he talked in hushed tones to his best friend he seemed angry and snappish for some reason. She chalked that personality swing to grief over his grandfather passing, but when she took it in context of the other other strangeness going on, it became more suspect.
Then there was Sarah McMillan. Now, there was no love lost between Kyla and the head cheerleader even if she didn't have the personal animosity Karyn had for her. The golden haired girl wasn't as bad as Tiffany, or especially her oaf of a boyfriend, but suffice to say, Kyla still wasn't a fan. She wasn't alone in that, or at least she thought she hadn't been, among the less popular crowd at school. That all seemed to change the day they came back from break and Sarah broke up with her boyfriend. Now, that in of itself wasn't weird, but Kyla kept running into people who previously would have either not cared, or even engaged in some schadenfreude at the cheerleader's expense, taking her side and going 'Oh poor Sarah'.
The absolute most bizarre example of that was how her friend Karyn, a girl who hated Sarah's guts, was suddenly friendly with her. Like, they had lunch together! Karyn, a girl who always shunned the popular kids to hang out at the losers table, was suddenly sitting right in the heart of that clique. In some ways it tracked; Karyn was insanely hot under her jumper, smart, and pretty well off financially. On the surface she'd fit in better with Sarah's friends than she would with Kyla's but until today, Karyn seemed perfectly happy amongst the geeks.
"None of it is impossible, but everything that's happened seems highly improbable," She muttered to herself as she finally neared her house. She'd have to talk to Jay about this when he got back to class, since he hadn't been responding to texts all day (his phone probably broke again). She needed a second opinion to figure out if something was afoot, or if she was just going crazy.
