Chapter #37The Enemy of My Enemy is Also My Enemy by: imaj   “I’ll bite,” you say warily.
“You’ve made the right decision,” Chelsea says firmly, leaving an unspoken threat hanging in the air. “Follow me. We need to talk in private.”
Surprisingly, she leads you back the way you just came. Back towards the Fuck Room. Even more Surprisingly, she has a key. She deftly unlocks the door and ushers you in.
“There,” says Chelsea as she locks the door behind you both. “Now no one can interrupt us.”
She pauses a moment to make it very obvious that she’s looking around the room. She sniffs the air theatrically a couple of times before continuing.
“Ugh, disgusting,” she squeals. “The boys leave this place in such a mess. I really should have a word with them about the things they get up to in here.”
This is vintage Chelsea: The seemingly unintentional insult designed to put you ill at ease. As Kim though, you see it as a transparent ruse. You simply stare at her blankly.
“Uh, Okay,” says Chelsea, a little unsettled by the deviation from her planned script. “I wanted to thank you for helping me get all that stuff for visiting Eva in hospital. I told Gordon and he was like totally impressed. He told Steve and he was totally impressed too.”
Ah, you realise. She’s about to claim credit for setting you up with Patterson.
“Steve really appreciates it when people contribute to the team spirit in the school. I hope you don’t mind me telling him what a help you were,” Chelsea pauses for a moment and puts on her thoughtful face. “You know, you two would make a cute couple.”
And that’s the bait, you think. You doubt that Chelsea has any real ability to affect Patterson’s love life but she’s going to such an effort you decide to play along with her.
“I’m glad I could help,” you say in your sincere voice. “If there’s anything else I can help you with, just tell me.”
“Really,” asks Chelsea, surprised at the apparent swing in your responses. “I mean, thanks Kim. Now that you say that, there is something.”
“Of course there is,” you say cheerfully, pitching it just right to make it unclear if you’re being sarcastic or not.
“I’m worried about the team,” she continues. “Something’s totally messing things up. First we lost Cindy because of her sister’s accident and then we lost Eva too. It’s almost as if someone is trying to set me, us, up for a fall.”
Never mind that Chelsea was probably rubbing her hands with glee at the loss of such obvious rivals, you think. Better not say anything.
“Then I heard that Jessica had been talking to that freak Morgana,” says Chelsea venomously. Well, Chelsea could only be nice for so long, you think. “She’s involved, I know it.”
“Maybe you could talk to her, I’m sure it’s a misunderstanding,” you say, trying not to snigger. You know the reason of course: Chelsea detests the more unpopular fringes of the school.
Actually she detests Kim too, but that hasn’t stopped her asking you to do her dirty work.
“I’m scared Kim,” she replies. A clever comeback, you think. It might have worked on her boyfriend, Gordon Black, you don’t care so much. “If she knows I’m onto her… I’m scared that she’ll do something. I need someone who isn’t one of my friends to find out.”
It would have been a lot quicker if she’d just came up and said she needed you to spy on people for her. Now the real Kim would reject such an offer out of hand, but then, you’re not the real Kim. Pitting both sides against the other seems like a great idea to you. Of course, you can’t just accept straight away without making Chelsea suspicious.
“I’m not sure Chelsea,” you say reluctantly. “It sounds a lot like you want me to break people’s confidences. I’m not sure I could do that good conscience, given my position as student council president.”
“It’s for the team,” says Chelsea, drawing herself up haughtily. It looks like she’s getting ready for a fight. “What’s good for the team is good for the school.”
“I wish there was some way I could help, I do,” you say trying to placate her. “I know how important the team is to you. I just… I just need a really good reason to do this sort of thing.”
Which is a roundabout way of saying that you need a bribe. Hopefully you’ve made it obvious enough for Chelsea to understand without it being too obvious and out of character. Luckily she picks up the hint.
“You know,” she says with an expression on her face that you take to mean that she thinks she is being clever. “We’re holding try outs for replacements for Cindy and Eva tomorrow. You should come along.”
“Do you really think so,” you say enthusiastically. “I mean, if I was on the team I’m sure I’d care about it just as much as you do.”
“Totally,” she nods. “And we can talk about Morgana afterwards, can’t we?”
“Of course.”
This is an unexpected bonus. Not only will you be able to play both sides against each other, you’ll be ideally placed to pick up the pieces afterwards. And to top it off, Chelsea will be congratulating herself because she will think she’s just gotten another person on the team totally beholden to her.
There’s only one thing that could have made this meeting go better: If you’d made a copy of Chelsea on your mask. So that’s exactly what you do.
*****
“She was a little suspicious when she came round from the powder,” you whisper to Morgana, who is really Keith wearing a Morgana mask. “But I managed to convince her she’d fainted because she was so worried about you.”
“So you have her now too,” whispers the fake Morgana after looking around. It’s the end of the day and the library is close to empty, but you can understand her caution.
“Her face and her trust,” you reply. “As far she’ll be able to tell, I’m doing exactly what she asked me to right now.”
“I don’t like this. If either Chelsea or Jessica works out you are double crossing them they’ll be unhappy,” explains Morgana. “You saw how close Jessica was to violence this morning.”
“I can handle it,” you say confidently. “And even if they do find out, I can start again as someone else within a day. Maybe even as one of them.”
“Where does that leave me,” asks Morgana. “I can’t change with a wave of my hand. You should think about backing out of this cheerleader try out thing.”
“I can handle it,” you repeat.
“The only way I can think of is to skip school for a day,” continues Morgana, ignoring you. “Pretend you were sick or something.”
“I can handle it,” you repeat again. “Wait, what did you say?”
“Back out of this try out thing?”
“No,” you say, shaking your head. “After that.”
“Pretend you were sick?”
“That’s brilliant Keith,” you exclaim, a new plan starting to form in your mind.
“Uh, I don’t like the look on your face, Kim.”
“Did I mention I could handle it? I think I did,” you pout. “You just worry about getting Jessica to Madam Andrassy’s after school tomorrow.”
You’d forgotten about the hex you’d placed on Chelsea’s bed before the weekend. You could use it to make her too ill to go to school tomorrow. Then you could attend in her place and run the try outs yourself. You almost start laughing thinking of the mischief you could cause by picking the ‘wrong’ people for the team.
Or you could attend the try outs as Kim and take your place as Chelsea’s newest spy.  indicates the next chapter needs to be written. |
| Members who added to this interactive story also contributed to these: |
View Portfolio
Visit Notebook
Send Gift Points
Awards
Badges
Send Email
Community Newsfeed
General Discussion
Sponsored Items
Book of Trinkets
Static Items
Books
Groups
Interactive Stories
Audio
Campfire Creatives
Community Notes
Crossword Puzzles
Documents
Folders
Images
In & Outs
Madlibs
Photo Albums
Polls
Product Reviews
Quizzes
Survey Forms
Web Pages
Word Searches
More by this author