Chapter #16Unstable Stability by: rugal b.   The next forty-five minutes or so are spent playing a few games of first to ten in different combinations: you're with Monica first, then Penny and finally Ashley. Amber, being a swimmer, sits the games out.
Though of the four of you Penny isn't on the basketball team either though unlike Amber she had been until this year when she'd dropped basketball to focus exclusively on soccer. Not because she was overwhelmed, rather it came down the simple fact that she was better at one than the other. Soccer had always been her stronger sport and a key departure from the team meant more opportunities for players to show their stuff so Penny realized that she couldn't have anything splitting her focus.
That's to say nothing of the fact that departure was Hannah Westrick who...
And again you demure from thinking about it. Samantha doesn't like thinking about it. All of the drama and back and forth sniping and stupid bullshit. All of it's doing is distracting everyone and the voice, Samantha's own, can't help but lament the state of affairs. Samantha doesn't hate Westside and she's not unhappy there. There's plenty of people she's on friendly terms with, she has a healthy amount of friends and is socially active.
But when she looks at her own friends, much as she might tell someone like Monica that there's not really any difference between an Eastman student and a Westside student at times she can't help but wonder if maybe there is. Samantha Carpenter is by no means a Kumbaya-singing love and peace type (leave that to someone like Ceres Kesey) but she doesn't like drama. If two people have an issue then they should settle it themselves, not allow the problem to turn into a black hole that sucks in everyone around it.
That's not to say that she's cold-hearted and would never help someone having a problem, far from it; but where drama's involved the problems of other people are not, and should not be, her problems too.
She never hears about drama from Eastman. Well, no, some times there is but it's usually quick, over and done with at least from what she hears and never spirals out of control the way it does at Westside. Is Alyssa Randall that good at keeping everything in line? Or is it just something... inherent? It's a stupid thought to entertain she thinks but at times she can't help but feel like maybe she's an Eastman girl stuck in a Westside world.
Maybe it's just stability that she likes.
She's lived in her home -- a comfortable middle class house in a comfortable middle class cul-de-sac near McKinley Elementary -- her entire life. She's known these four girls since elementary school. When she made the decision to step away from the track team it took her a long time to adjust to a routine that didn't include it.
Even when the Strickers moved into the neighborhood from out of state in the middle of fifth grade it took quite a while for Samantha to get used to their presence. Ashley had once admitted that for the first month or two they thought Samantha didn't like them.
So maybe it's not that she's an Eastman girl in a Westside world, rather the comfortable stability that Eastman seems to provide seems more appealing. By contrast, the only thing stable about Westside is its instability.
"Are you okay? You seem like you've got a lot on your mind."
The Strickers, having homework to do, have since headed home so it's just yourself, Monica and Amber sitting in Monica's backyard and enjoying the crisp air of the autumn evening; funny enough for as much as she pines for the comfort of stability it's the ever changing fall that's Samantha's favorite time of year.
To Amber's concern you simply wave it off. "It's nothing. The usual I guess," you say and realize that was a mistake. The "usual" that Samantha tends to refer to means that Amber and Monica are going to prod you endlessly for the latest updates and gossip. But maybe it's knowing that you had to deal with Chelsea that tempers them because for once they don't press the issue. Such, Samantha supposes, is the reputation of of Westside's head cheerleader.
Just what do they think of her at Eastman? Things can get warped, meaning and rumors twisted, in the game of telephone and when you're struck by the thought that they might all think of Chelsea as this snake-haired she-devil that breathes fire and can kill you with a look you can't help but laugh to yourself.
"It's nothing," you say dismissing their confused questions. "Chelsea wasn't that bad you know. We didn't even talk about anything juicy, she just wanted to tell me that she was thinking about throwing the cheerleaders' support behind both basketball teams this year and not just her boyfriend's."
"Well you're gonna need all the support you can get," Monica declares proudly. "Connie's really doing a good job of whipping everyone into shape."
"She's not running you ragged is she?" you ask.
Monica just shakes her head in response. "No, it's just that she's good at recognizing what everyone can do and knowing how to use them," she says.
"In other words, the same strategy as always," you tease, "get the ball to Hannah." You laugh when Monica lightly punches you in the arm.
While enjoying all of this you take a moment to assess Samantha's two friends.
Monica, her dark brown hair now hanging loose, is pretty but in a way that's very unspectacular. She's not going turn heads but neither would she be regarded as plain. Her nose has a very Greek quality to it and the rest of her face, relaxed now, rarely ever betrays what she may actually be thinking or feeling. Not to say that she herself as a stoic personality, far from it, but visually her face has the same kind of somber, stoic quality that one might see on one of those old Roman or Greek statues.
But if Monica is stoically pretty, then Amber is vibrantly beautiful. Her hair, straight and honey-colored, falls down below her shoulders and surrounds a face that's full and bright. If Monica never loses her poker face then Amber is the exact opposite, her emotions being very easy to read. It's not just her face that's full, however, as Amber's figure is wide-hipped and large chested and at times Samantha can't help but feel very lacking in comparison.
It's in this way that you pass the next hour -- Samantha content to share the evening with her two oldest friends and you content to share the evening with two nice-looking girls -- until at last goodbyes are said and everyone parts for the day.
* * * * *
Getting through next morning comes easily. You're actually surprised because you thought it might take a while to sift through everything to pull off the impersonation but really almost immediately you had it. Samantha's friends suspected nothing, her parents suspected nothing. In first period you chat and laugh with Catherine Muskov without raising alarm bells. Less so with her basketball teammates Corale Weaver and Haley Flanagan.
Not out of any dislike for them, rather Corale's just not the talkative type and Haley is so tightly wound that she can be exhausting to deal with.
Catherine though...
For all of Samantha's love of stability and resistance to the breaking of routine she warmed up very quickly to Catherine. Perhaps it's just Catherine's nature, an athlete whose easygoing nature makes it easy for her to glide from one group to the next; someone who can talk with a nerd as easily as she could a jock. There's something very admirable about having such a magnetic and malleable personality, Samantha thinks, and at times she worries if what she sees as her own measured personality might in fact be a shortcoming making her far too rigid.
But you put any thoughts of that aside as you tell Catherine that you're not joining her for lunch today, a statement that causes her to ask if you're hanging out with the basketball players but you give a noncommittal response. From there you go through the rest of the morning's classes as you steel yourself for what's to come.
No, not the meeting with Chelsea. You're ready for that because you know how it'll go. Chelsea will have slapped a mask onto a member of the cheerleading squad, probably Lin or one of the Garners if she doesn't think she can get Yumi or Cindy. From there she'll crow about what a boon this is for her, then she'll ask you to tell her about the basketball team and from there she'll probably start working out a plan to consolidate her hold on the school.
So it's to no surprise when you receive a text from Chelsea (she must've gotten Samantha's number before you came over yesterday) in second period telling you that she used the mask on a cheerleader this morning; guess she was just that impatient. It's little bit more of a surprise when, in fourth, she texts you saying to get over to the gym as fast as you can once Samantha's lunch comes and that door to the loft will be unlocked.
It's a bigger surprise when you head up the stairs and into the loft to see no Chelsea or Gordon around but... Kendra Saunders? Not Yumi or Eva but one of Chelsea's own allies? And it's to your great shock when she finally opens her mouth.
"Oh, Will!" Kendra cries out in a voice that's as smooth as her caramel skin. "You have to help me!"  You have the following choice: 1. Continue |
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