Work Text:
“SLUMBER PARTY!” Jester cheered, sweeping into the room with her arms full.
“YAY!” Mollymauk cheered, sitting up from where he had flopped on a sleeping bag already.
Yasha, Veth, and Essek crowded around Molly as Jester sat down and dumped all the goods onto the floor.
Veth immediately snatched up the phone book. “Who are we prank calling first?!” she shouted.
“Nail polish, huh?” Yasha said, picking up a dozen multicolored bottles and examining them in the light of the rapidly setting sun.
“Yup.” Jester said, spreading out an array of magazines of all genres. There were the typical fashion and gossip magazines that she and Molly devoured like penny candy, a handful of home and garden magazines (for Yasha), and then a singular scientific journal that had likely been purchased just for the occasion for Essek. “How was everybody’s summers?” she trilled.
“Decent.” Veth said, flipping through the phone book with a red marker in her other hand. “All of my family are doing fine. As usual. How was town?”
“Same old.” Molly said, with a wave of his hand. “We spent a lot of time at the pool. And a lot of time at the movie theater. And a lot of time at our respective houses. The works.”
“Who else was around?” Yasha asked.
“Fjord, of course.” Jester said with a grin. “He was lifeguarding, like, the entire summer.”
“We know.” Essek sighed, watching Veth flick through the phonebook.
Jester sighed dreamily. “My summer was basically a romance novel, you guys.”
“Well, obviously not!” Veth snapped, flipping to the next page with a judgmental page-turning sound. “You guys have been ignoring each other like you’re the next carrier of the bubonic plague. If it really was as perfect as you said, you’d be dangling off of each other’s arms all ga-ga and gross.”
Jester’s smile deflated. “I mean, I want to, but we agreed not to during the year.”
“Why?” Yasha asked. “I don’t get it. You both were happy, right?”
“Aren’t we, like, rivals?” Molly mused. “That group and us.”
“Who’s in that group?” Essek asked.
“Fjord Stone, Caduceus Clay, Beau Lionett, and Caleb Widogast.” Veth said. “Their numbers are in here, by the way. We should prank call - you good there?”
Essek swallowed. His ears had flattened against the side of his head in some kind of anxious gesture. “We’re rivals with - um - Caleb?”
“You know him?” Molly asked. “No judgement - he's Veth's friend.”
Essek nodded slowly. “Yes. We worked together at the library over the summer. We got to know each other…fairly well, I’d say.”
“Wow. Surprised he tolerated your presence near his precious books.” Jester said.
“He didn’t, at first.” Essek laughed. “He was rather protective of them. I don’t think he appreciated having someone else there, but eventually we got along.”
Molly made a face, staring at Essek.
“Are you feeling okay?” he asked.
Essek blinked. “Yes, of course - why?”
“You’re smiling.”
“More than that.” Jester jumped in. “You look… dopey. ”
“Dopey?” Essek echoed.
“Y’know, dopey.” Yasha helped. “Woozy, dizzy -”
“Swoony… ” Jester added, elbowing him.
Essek’s dopey expression immediately dropped. “What? No! Why would you say that -”
Veth shrugged. “As far as I know, it’s kind of a rule that nerds have a thing for each other.”
Molly nodded. “You guys would be so cute together.”
“Let’s prank call him!” Jester cried, stealing the phonebook and frantically flipping through it. Dozens, if not hundreds of names and numbers had been circled, with several pages dog-earred for easy use.
“Here it is!” she cried. Veth grabbed the phone and pulled it onto her lap as Jester began reading out numbers for her to dial.
“Wait.” Essek gulped. “Are you actually going to -”
“CAY-LEB!!!!” Jester shrieked into the phone (loudly) with Veth holding it out. “Are you there!? Who is this?!”
“AGHHH!” came a vaguely Zemnian accent. “Was? Who is this?”
“It’s Veth and Jester!” Veth shouted. “We’re with Essek!”
“Wait - no - !” Essek shouted, scrambling for the phone.
“Gettem!” Jester ordered, and Molly leapt off of the sleeping bag and tackled Essek onto his back.
“AGH! This is already a horrible prank call!” Essek shouted, squirming under Molly’s grip. “You’re not supposed to announce who you are - !”
“Aw, shit.” Jester grumbled.
“Is something wrong?” Caleb’s voice asked.
Veth muttered something and snatched the phone from Jester.
“We’re calling because…because…”
“Because we’ve kidnapped your cat!” Molly shouted, still wrestling to pin Essek to the floor.
“YES!” Veth yelled. “We’ve kidnapped your cat!”
There was a long beat of silence.
“ Ja, right.” Caleb said. “Frumpkin is right here. Clearly you’ve got the wrong one.”
Veth scoffed. “You’ve played right into our hands! We’ve replaced Frumpkin with a NEW FAKE cat! Comply with our questions or you’ll never see him again!”
“This is what you guys do for enrichment!?” Essek hollered.
There was another pause. “What questions do you even have? If someone wanted help with homework, you didn’t have to ransom my cat -”
“No, no!” Jester shouted, snatching the phone back. “You and Essek -”
Essek let out a long yell that sounded like he was trying to drown out the conversation.
“ Ja. What about it.” Caleb deadpanned.
“Like, are you totally in love with him or something?” Jester giggled.
Essek dropped his head facedown on the floor with a bonk of humiliation and defeat.
There was an even longer beat of silence.
“I don’t really see how that’s any of your business, Jester.” Caleb said, but somehow a smile was audible.
“Aw, come on!” Veth cried. “We have him right here, so you can’t lie!”
“I doubt that. Have a good evening.”
He hung up.
Jester threw down the phone frustratedly. “You guys! Why won’t you tell us what happened?!”
“Nothing. Happened.” Essek scowled, peeling himself off of the ground as Molly moved away from him.
“Yeah, right.” Veth scoffed. “We’ll figure it out eventually! Fjord next!”
“Yes!” Molly crowed excitedly. “Let’s focus on the romance drama we’ve actually confirmed. ”
Jester made a face. “I don’t know, guys. We agreed to put it aside for the school year.”
“Why?” Veth asked. “That’s stupid. If you’re in love, just be in love. Nobody’s stopping you.”
“It would just be awkward. And not the same. Our friend groups are rivals!”
“Are you sure about that?” Essek asked. “I’ve never heard any of that group say anything bad about you guys. I think that they think that you don’t like them. ”
“That’s ridiculous.” Molly scoffed. “And completely irrelevant. Veth, call Fjord.”
Veth swiped the phone book out from under Jester’s grip and began to dial the numbers as Jester’s face grew increasingly more flushed.
Molly held out his hand expectantly and Veth plopped the phone in his grip.
“Hello, is this Fjord?”
“Yes.” the phone huffed. “Who is this?”
“It’s Jester! ” Veth squealed into the phone in a very poor impression of Jester’s accent.
“Oh my gods.” Essek buried his face in his hands (but made no moves to stop them).
“Just calling to say hiiiiiii. Whatcha doing?”
There was a pause.
“Hello, Veth.” Fjord finally said.
“FUCK!” Veth barked. Molly and Yasha both chuckled. Well, Yasha chuckled. Molly snickered.
“Is Jester even there?”
Veth looked up from the phone. Jester drew her hand across her neck several times in an obvious gesture of no.
“Nope!” Veth squawked. “Just me.”
There was another pause. Then a rustling of pages. “Are you sure? This looks like Jester’s home phone number -”
“NOPE!” Veth squawked again. “OKAYTHANKSBYE!”
She slammed the phone down, hanging up, and shoving it away.
“Told you!” Jester pointed at her. “He’s not interested anymore. Don’t call him again!”
“Fine, sheesh.” Veth said, picking up the phone and setting it far away from her. “I won’t, I won’t.”
“Good.”
For a moment, there was a painfully awkward silence, but then it was quickly dissolved by Molly scooping up the bottles of nail polish and declaring, “Yasha, dearest, what color would you like your nails?”
Yasha moved over so she was sitting in front of Molly and she said, “Black, as usual.”
“Of course, of course. Ever dependable.”
“Ohmigods.” Jester exclaimed. “Essek, I should paint your nails, too!”
Essek instinctually flinched his hands away, but when he saw Jester’s excited look, he sighed and dropped them back down, defeated. “Fine.”
Jester squealed excitedly, gathering up the bottles and sitting in front of Essek. “What colors do you want?”
Essek hesitated. “Er…you can surprise me.”
Jester instantly grabbed up the bright pink nail polish. Essek made a facial expression like he was disappointed in himself.
“Ugh, unfair.” Veth sighed, grabbing the bottle of green nail polish. “I have to do everything myself here.”
“What did you do over the summer, Veth?” Yasha asked, as Molly began to paint pitch-black nail polish onto her nails. From the looks of it, the bottle had never been opened before - Jester must’ve gotten it specifically for her.
“I spent way too much time with my extended family.” Veth scoffed. “I can barely even stand to look at them anymore.”
“Do they live in town?” Essek asked.
“They live in the next town over, for the most part.” Veth said. “And since there’s less of us living here, we always have to drive to them and not the other way around. Which is horrible, because their town is way worse than here.”
“Not to be rude, but this town sucks.” Molly said bluntly. “Jester and I spent the entire summer here, and I think we’ve walked in and out of every store, restaurant, and parking lot in the whole place. Sometimes more than once a day.”
“Yeah, but at least we have a public pool! At least we have a park! At least we have a good movie theater!”
“At least the library is close.” Essek said with a shrug. “It’s within walking distance.”
“Was the library really far away where you used to live, Essek?” Jester asked.
“Yeah, what’s your deal with living here?” Molly asked. “I was under the impression that staying here was a temporary thing.”
Essek sighed again. “My family has moved around a lot. It’s not very clear to me what the…entire plan has been. But for this summer, my mother was doing a favor for…some distant relative, or something, by doing some job here. For the summer. But then something changed and now we’re stuck here.”
“Eh. Could be worse.” Yasha shrugged. “I hear the town where Veth’s extended family lives doesn’t even have a proper dentist’s office. They have to drive all the way here for that.”
“Yes, that’s so important when picking a place to live.” Molly drawled. “Dentistry. I’d rather be living somewhere else for a year, even if it’s smaller, because we’ve literally done everything there is to do here thousands of times.”
“Well, this is our last year to do all that.” Jester chimed in. “Since we’re all graduating and probably leaving next year.”
“And that’s why my mother’s… crazy-ass job situation is none of my concern.” Essek concluded. “I already have one foot out the door and am no longer involved.”
“Wow.” Veth said. “I’ve never heard Essek curse before.”
“Get used to it.”
“When I leave here,” Jester said excitedly, “I’m going to go to a big city. With lots of people. And lots of places. And lots of hot people.”
“I cannot believe we’re back on this topic.” Essek muttered under his breath.
“No kidding!” Veth cried, switching the hand she was painting. “Everybody here knows each other WAY too well! Dating has become gross. This is why having fresh blood like Essek is so good.”
“I feel the need to announce,” Essek declared, “That if my hands weren’t full, I would be facepalming.”
“I kinda got that vibe.” Yasha noted.
“Yeah, but Essek isn’t even available to add to the dating pool. Probably.” Jester said. “Since he spent the entire summer in the library kissing Caleb.”
“We did not! ” Essek said sharply, his face suddenly flushing.
“So you are available?” Molly teased.
Essek’s ears flattened against the side of his head again. “Also no.”
“Fine.” Molly huffed.
“Oof. Imagine being Caleb.” Jester sighed. “Hot guy works with you at the library, says he’s going to leave, and then suddenly appears at school -”
Veth made a face. “Oh, gods. That’s fucked up!”
Molly leaned around Yasha’s shoulders, smirking in Essek’s general direction. “I don’t see you denying this.”
“We’re not - we weren’t -” Essek spluttered.
“You know what?” Jester shouted loudly. “Veth, do we have Caduceus’ number in that phone book?”
“I think so!” Veth responded.
“Call him! If Caleb and Essek were making out, he would know.”
“OKAY.” Essek suddenly shouted. “Fine! Fine! I admit defeat! Don’t call someone about this!”
“So you WERE making out in the library!” Veth cackled. “HAH! I knew it!”
Essek buried his head into his one free hand. “Fine. Yes.”
Instantly, the rest of the room burst out laughing, with Molly the loudest as he flopped onto his back.
“Okay, NOW imagine being Caleb!” he shouted. “The hot guy you’ve spent the entire summer kissing and pining over says he’s leaving your life forever, and now you have to spend time with him for the rest of the year!”
This only made the group laugh even harder.
“It’s not going to be like that!” Essek shouted, embarrassed. “I’ll explain everything to him. Eventually.”
“It’s already been a week!” Veth hooted. “If you don’t do it soon - oh my GODS, the drama.”
Jester finished painting Essek’s other hand and he immediately buried his head in both of his hands.
“Can we PLEASE change the subject.” he shouted.
“Fine, fine.” Jester giggled. “Hey, Yasha, what’d you do this summer? Didn’t you go to the seaside?”
“Yes, I did!” Yasha said with a smile.
“Bet there’s lots of fun at the seaside.” Molly grumbled. “With clean movie theaters and new parks and interesting people to talk to.”
“And hot people!” Veth shouted.
Now, with Essek, it was hard to tell that he was blushing until he was really blushing. But with Yasha’s pale face, the hint of pink that rose around her cheeks was easy to see.
“Wait. Hot people? Hot person? ” Molly prompted, a devious grin already spreading.
“N-no.” Yasha spluttered, but now it was obvious.
“Oh my GODS!” Jester squealed, almost knocking over the bottle of purple nail polish she’d started to paint onto her own nails. “Yasha, did you have a summer fling too?”
“No, of course not.” she choked out, but her heart wasn’t in it.
“Come on, love,” Molly prompted. “Tell us!”
“Tell us! Tell us!” Jester cheered.
The chants of “Tell us!” grew louder and louder from Molly, Jester, and Veth (Essek facepalmed loudly this time and did not join in) until Yasha sighed and said, “Okay, fine, maybe there was something.”
Everybody fell silent at once and leaned in.
“There’s this boardwalk at my favorite beach.” Yasha began. “And last year, I would go down to the beach, have a burger at this boardwalk place, and then spend the afternoon on the water. So I went to do that this year, too, except I recognized someone there.”
“Wait. Recognized? ” Veth asked.
“You mean there WASN’T some new hot person?” Jester complained. “Just one of these losers we live in the same zip code as!?”
“Shh!” Molly snapped. “Let her continue! Who’d you recognize? And why haven’t you told me this yet!?”
Yasha swallowed, looking nervous. “Um…you guys know Beau, right? Beau Lionett?”
As one, the entire group gasped, scandalized. Well, except for Essek.
“If I remember correctly, she’s a part of the…uh… rival friend group?” he asked.
“She’s a part of OUR rival friend group.” Jester corrected, her jaw hanging open. “Ohmigods. Yasha! You had a hot summer fling with BEAU!?”
“Well, not really.” Yasha said. “We kinda just met up every day for a while. And we hung out on the beach and did some surfing and just…talked.”
“And then what?” Veth asked. “That can’t be all. You guys have been all gross about each other for ages!”
“Well, it kind of just became a thing we did.” Yasha shrugged. “We hung out every afternoon for…two weeks. Until one night we just kept hanging out and we went back to her place -”
“Oooooh! ” Jester squealed. “ Soooooo romantic!”
“We’re the worst audience ever.” Essek grumbled.
Yasha didn’t seem fazed. “And we snuck a bottle of wine from Beau’s parent’s stash, and we got kinda drunk and then….”
She trailed off, her face falling a bit. Nobody dared to interrupt.
“Then she kissed me.”
Once again, the entire group gasped as if this were the most scandalous thing they’d ever heard. Even Essek.
“And then what!?” Molly shouted.
Yasha wrung her freshly-painted hands in her lap. “Then we heard her parents coming down the stairs, so I had to run off, and when I went back to the burger place the next day and…she was gone.”
“WHAT?!” Veth shrieked.
“That’s horrible!” Jester exclaimed. “Oh my gods. Did she come back the next day?”
“No.”
“Or the next day?”
“No.”
“Or the day after that!?”
“I don't think so. But I left that day, so maybe she did."
Essek made a face. “That’s…awkward.”
“I’m gonna kick her ass!” Molly shouted, jumping to his feet. “Veth, hand me the phone!”
“No!” Yasha cried. “Don’t! Don’t call her, Molly, please.”
Molly collapsed back into the cross-legged seat he’d had before. “She hurt you! I’ll beat her up!”
“No offense, but Beau could definitely beat you in a fight.” Jester said. “She’s fucking ripped.”
“Unimportant!”
“If she doesn’t want us to call Beau,” Essek said, in that annoyingly patient voice he sometimes used, “Then we won’t.”
“Fine.” Molly grumbled.
“I’m sure it was just some misunderstanding.” Veth said, drumming her fingers on the phone. “Are you a bad kisser, Yasha?”
Yasha’s face immediately turned neon red. “N-no. Uh. Maybe. I don’t know.”
“Yasha is probably a GREAT kisser.” Molly defended. “Something else had to have happened.”
“Well, I don’t know.” Yasha said.
“Have you talked to her since school started?” Essek asked.
Yasha shook her head and looked away, ashamed. “No. I’ve been kind of avoiding her. And she’s been kind of avoiding me.”
“Well, that will never work!” Jester cried. “You have to talk! You guys are crazy for each other!”
“Maybe eventually.” Yasha sighed. “But not now.”
Yasha’s sad admission made the fight in the room melt. It was clear that this wasn’t some fistfight to be won.
“This is ridiculous.” Veth facepalmed. “I literally can’t believe it. Half of us spent the entire summer… gallavanting around with our rivals!”
“Truly, this is horrible.” Molly sighed. “And I’m still single!”
“Right! We’re HOT!” she shouted. “How are we the only people who didn’t get wrapped up in some romantic summer fling?”
Essek buried his head in his hands. “This whole thing is way more trouble than it’s worth.”
“Aw, come on.” Jester said. “I bet once you talk to Caleb, it’ll all be fine. I bet he’s super into you.”
“You’re one to talk!” Molly declared. “You need to talk to Fjord! Caleb and Essek have an excuse as to how their fling fell apart, but you don’t!”
“It sounded like a good idea at the time! And we agreed!”
Molly and Jester’s argument quickly devolved into a shouting match that nobody else seemed able to understand or break up. It only stopped when the doorbell suddenly rang.
“PIZZA!” Veth hollered at the top of her lungs. She leapt to her feet and sped out of the room, with Yasha and Essek hot on her heels.
“I know that you guys probably don’t want to talk about it, but all I’m going to say is that you should talk to Beau and Caleb.” Veth said, as she dashed down the stairs.
Essek and Yasha sighed simultaneously.
“Really.” she said, slowing down at the landing. “I think you guys could make this work. Somehow.”
However, before anything else could happen, Molly and Jester came careening down the stairs far, far too quickly with a series of rapid thunks.
Before anybody could move, they crashed into their group huddle like a bowling ball, sending all five of them toppling down the stairs in a series of screams and curses.
It felt pretty symbolic for how the entire school year would likely go.