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❪ CHAPTER NINE ! ❫
-ˏˋ BIG TIME SMOOTHIES ˊˎ-

TEN MINUTES AFTER THEIR PACT was made, the four boys already strayed away from it. They laid on blue rafts in the pool, now wearing beach attire outfits. They were the only ones in the pool since they shooed anyone who bothered coming near them. The boys loudly slurped on coconuts.

"Once you've sipped from a real coconut," Kendall spoke in a soft relaxed voice, "There's no goin' back."

Just like almost everyone else at the Palm Woods, the boys each wore a pair of sunglasses. Logan, James and Carlos grinned, "So true."

Aurora shook her head at her friends. She was seated on the same chair she was in before, not in the pool because she could not swim. Technically she would not have to swim since the boys were using rafts, but she honestly did not trust being near both a pool of water and four teenage boys at the same time.

Just like the boys, Aurora had on different clothes as well. She changed out of her long pants and was now wearing light blue shorts with plain white sneakers. She had on a thin t-shirt with red, navy blue and white stripes.

Aurora bit the inside of her cheek, now wanting a cold drink of her own. Her eyes scanned the area, seeing what her options were. Once her eyes landed on a woman at a stand selling different colored smoothies, she got up out of her chair.

"I'll be right back guys." She spoke loud enough for her friends to hear. Though, they seemed too relaxed to care. Aurora smiled at the smoothie stand, "I'm gonna go get myself a pink smoothie."

James replied, "Oh, that sounds good. Can you get me a blue one?"

Aurora turned her head downwards to look at James. She spoke with confusion, "But...you're already drinking from a coconut?"

James' brows elevated from under his shades as his smile got bigger. "You bet I am." He responded, slurping his coconut again.

Aurora rolled her eyes and turned to her right, making her way towards the stand. She knew she only had fifteen dollars, so she hoped the smoothies were not too expensive.

The woman sent Aurora a warm smile when she started to approach her. She wore a green apron and cap to match that both had the logo "Planet Smoothie" printed on them. Two blenders, a cash register and six cups of smoothies in six different colors were placed on top of the stand.

"Hello, what can I get you?" The lady asked in a peppy voice.

Aurora looked at the wooden retail sign next to the stand. It had the same logo, along with with different smoothie names in the same colors as the drinks.

"Um, can I get one Blueberry Bliss and one Strawberry Surprise?" Aurora asked.

The woman nodded her head. "Eleven ninety-eight."

In relief, Aurora reached into her pocket and grabbed the money she had. She handed the ten and five dollar bills to the woman who happily took them our of her hand. She opened the cash register and counted the change before giving it to Aurora. She shoved the bills and coins into her pocket.

The lady picked up the pink and blue smoothies that were already made and gave them to Aurora. "Have a nice day." She chimed. Aurora thanked her before turning on her heels and heading back towards her seat.

As Aurora approached her seat, she noticed that the pool had a lot more people inside of it than it did before, and plus the boys were not floating around anymore. They stood soaked with water on the other side of the pool. Aurora figured that the other teenagers at the Palm Woods finally got tired of the four boys hogging the pool. She chuckled before taking a sip of her smoothie.

Two girls, a blonde and a brunette, walked out from inside of the building. The blonde wore a yellow camisole sundress, an almost finished yellow smoothie in her hand to match. Pink glasses sat on top of her head. The brunette wore a red ruffled top with jeans that vaguely went past her knees. The blond seemed to be telling the other girl an interesting story.

Aurora and the two other girls were not paying to where they were walking. The blonde eventually realized that her and her friend were headed straight for Aurora, and stopped in the middle of her sentence. She tried to warn her friend to move out of the way, but she was too late. Aurora bumped right into the brunette, and her pink smoothie spilled all over the girl's red shirt. Some of the smoothie spilled onto Aurora too, but not as much. The cup fell out of Aurora's hand.

The four boys on the other side of the pool all cringed when they saw the scene. They saw that the unknown brunette looked furious.

"At least it wasn't my smoothie." James smiled. Both Kendall and Logan sent him a glare.

Kendall spoke out, "We should go help her."

Kendall's friends nodded and began to walk around to the other side of the pool.

"Oh my gosh!" Aurora stated after the smoothie was spilled. "I am so sorry!"

The two other girls both had their jaws wide open. The blonde was simply shocked, but the brunette was angry and disgusted. "You've got to be kidding me!" She attempted to wipe the drink off of her. She continued with aggression, "I just bought this shirt!"

Aurora grimaced. She felt as if she was Gabriella Montez from High School Musical and she had just dropped her cheese fries on Sharpay Evans.

The blonde reached out her free hand to help her friend. "It's okay Hun, it was an accident." She turned to look at Aurora, "Sorry, she's having a really bad day." She lied, covering up for her friend's usual hostile behavior towards strangers.

The brunette looked up from her shirt and set her eyes on Aurora. She knew the girl did not mean to spill her smoothie all over her, but she did not care. Still angry, she grabbed her blonde friend's almost empty smoothie of her hands. She took off the round lid with swift and threw the rest of the drink onto Aurora's shirt.

The four boys making their way over to the girls stopped in their tracks.

"Ooooo," The boys cringed once more. They were not too far away from the girls, but far enough to not be included in the conversation. Carlos scrunched up his face and gripped onto the helmet in his hands, "Maybe we should let Aurora handle this one."

James nodded his head. "I think this is a pretty safe distance."

This time, it was Aurora's turn to hang her jaw low in anger. She scoffed, "What the hell?! What'd you do that for?"

A devious, satisfied smile formed on the brunette's face. She said in response, "Pay back."

The blonde girl shut her eyes in annoyance at her friend.

Aurora blinked a couple of times in disbelief. "It was an accident!" She raised her voice and scrunched up her nose.

The brunette smiled. "Oh, that's great!" She spoke with enthusiasm, similar to how the Jennifers did a while ago. She dropped her happy expression and replaced it with a glare, "Because I don't care."

Logan turned to look at his friends. "Should we say something?" He asked. Kendall tilted his head to a side. He told him, "No, I kinda wanna see how this pans out."

Aurora clenched her jaw as her nostrils dilated. She thought for a moment before pursing her lips. She removed the lid off of the smoothie she got for James and threw it at the brunette, distracting her from what she was about to do.

While the brunette's eyes followed the plastic lid to the ground, Aurora dumped the entire blue smoothie over the girl's head. She dropped the plastic cup onto the ground.

"Ooh!" Carlos, Logan and Kendall laughed loudly at the scene from the distance.

"Wha- my smoothie!" James whined in a high pitched voice.

The brunette pressed her lips firmly together. She wiped the drink off of her eyelids in order for her to see. The blonde bit her lip, trying not to giggle at the sight.

"Smoothie princess looks pretty pissed." Kendall gave a lopsided smirk, trying to contain the rest of his laughter.

Logan smiled and bit his lip. "Yeah, your princess tends to have that effect on people." He remarked.

Kendall smacked Logan playfully in his stomach.

Aurora held her head high and gave the brunette a coy smirk. She taunted, "Blue looks good on you." Her eyes smiled for her at her own comment.

If the brunette was not pissed-off before, she most certainly was now. Her jaw was set and her blood was boiling. Wanting to have the last laugh, she did the first thing that popped into her head.

Aurora was just about to turn around and look for her friends before the brunette shoved her into the pool. A bit of water splashed onto her and the blonde, but she did not really mind since she was already covered in berry flavored smoothies.

The blonde gasped and she took a few steps towards the pool before turning back to look at her friend. "Was that really necessary?!"

The brunette shrugged.

The four boys' eyes widened and they sprung into action, sprinting and scrambling towards the part of the pool Aurora was pushed into. They stopped once they reached the two girls.

"Why would you do that?!" James questioned the brunette loudly. "She can't swim!"

The brunette grimaced. "...Oops."

The four boys scanned the pool in search of a girl struggling to swim, but began to panic when they saw no sign of her.

"Where is she? She was right here!" James panicked and pointed at the pool.

Logan replied instantly, "She's drowning obviously!" He looked at his friends. "One of us needs to go in and bring her back up!"

Carlos put on his helmet before any more words were shared.

"On it!" He gave his helmet two quick taps before jumping into the pool.

Kendall turned to look at Logan with worry. "How long can someone hold their breath underwater before drowning?" He questioned, his brows furrowed and raised.

Logan tilted his head. "Well, for an average person...about thirty seconds."

Kendall and James' eyes bulged.

"But, if the person is in really good health, then about two minutes." Logan added quickly.

James looked back down at the pool. He commented, "I hope Aurora ate her spinach when we were saplings."

Kendall and Logan both turned their heads slowly to give James looks of confusion at his choice of words.

James opened his arms, "What?"

Carlos popped out from the water and took in a deep breath of air. The teenagers snapped their heads towards him, then began to worry more when they noticed Carlos was alone.

"I can't find her!" Carlos panicked inside of the pool.

Kendall pulled his chin close to his neck and scrunched up his face. "What do you mean you can't find her?!"

"It's a small pool, how hard can it be?!" James shouted at his friend.

"I can't see that well underwater!" Carlos quickly defended. "And there's a lot of people in here!"

Kendall fluttered his eyes. "Yeah, but they're not drowning!"

"Please help me!" Carlos pleaded.

As quick as they possibly could, the three boys went into the pool and under the water to help look for the girl.

The blonde girl glanced at her friend. She quickly turned her gaze back to the pool, wanting to make sure Aurora was okay. She spoke to the brunette without facing her, "You should have gone in to help her. This is your fault anyways." She pointed out.

The brunette did not say a word. She did feel guilty about pushing the girl she did not even know into the pool, but she was not going to show it. She kept her focus on the water just like the blonde.

After a few seconds of waiting, the two girls saw Kendall erupt out from of the pool with the girl in his arms. Aurora sucked in a large breath of air before bursting into a fit of violent coughs. The three other boys came out from under the water and helped Kendall get Aurora out of the pool.

The two girls moved out of the boys way as Kendall gently laid the girl down on the ground in a sitting position. Her soaking wet hair and clothes clung to her body.

Kendall remembered that this situation was pretty similar to how him and the boys met Aurora. Well, it was how him, James and Carlos met Aurora. Logan did not live in Minnesota at the time.

Him and the two other boys were taking swimming lessons at camp the summer before kindergarten. It was probably the fourth week into the program, and Aurora's parents decided that she should do something over the summer instead of watching television programs and playing with toys.

Since Aurora came into the program pretty late, she could not swim like the other kids. She was also new and had no friends at the camp, so she was easy to pick on. A few of the boys from the camp thought it would be funny to make fun of the hair clips she wore in her hair.

Kendall, Carlos and James tried to defend the new girl, but Aurora told them she did not need their help and she could stand up for herself. Aurora said a few not so nice words to the kids making fun of her, which resulted in one of them shoving her into the pool.

Carlos jumped in to save her, being the adventurous one. After he got her out of the pool Aurora yelled at him and told him that she did not need his help once again, even though she did. Later on she finally thanked him and the boys for trying to stick up for her.

James spoke out bringing Kendall back to reality, "Are you alright?" He questioned the girl.

Logan scanned the girl for any negative signs. "Do you feel okay? Did you get any water in your system? Do you need a doctor?"

Carlos added, "Do you need a towel?"

"Do you need CPR?" Kendall asked. He raised his brows, "Or mouth to mouth?"

Logan shut his eyes for a brief second before looking back at Aurora again. He spoke to Kendall without facing him, "That's for when someone is unresponsive and not breathing."

Kendall shrugged, "It was worth a shot."

"I'm fine," Aurora groaned before coughing a bit more. She turned to Carlos, "But, I could use a towel."

Carlos nodded at the girl before running off to find a towel.

Kendall moved some of the tendrils of hair that were clinging to the girl's face out of the way. He remarked, "You've got to stop with this being shoved into pools thing. I'm starting to think you have some sort of death wish."

James and Logan laughed at Kendall's joke. Aurora let out a chuckle before coughing some more.

The blonde girl nudged her shoulder into the brunette's, gaining her attention. She instructed, "You need to apologize."

Seconds later Carlos ran back up to the group with a white Palm Woods towel in his hand. The boys helped bring Aurora to her feet and Carlos wrapped the towel around her shoulders.

The blonde gave the brunette a look.

The brunette's nostrils flared and she rolled her eyes. She took a step towards the group and called out, "Hey."

The boys transferred their gazes onto the brunette. Aurora turned her head towards her before giving her and icy stare and shifting her body to face her completely.

The brunette bit her lip, procrastinating on her apology. Her friend let out a fake cough from behind her.

She mumbled without making eye contact, "I'm sorry I pushed you into the pool." She spoke with barely any emotion. "I didn't stop to think about if you could swim or not."

Aurora took a slow step towards the girl. She deadpanned with a blank expression, "Can you?"

The brunette finally looked directly at Aurora. "What?" She asked, her brows pulled together.

"Can you swim?" Aurora plainly repeated. The girl in front of her nodded.

"Yeah," She answered. "Why?"

Aurora held onto her towel so it would not fall and pushed the girl into the pool without sharing another word.

The four boys as well as the blonde began to laugh. A small smile appeared on Aurora's face.

The blonde girl turned to Aurora. She bit her lip before speaking up, "I'm Cindy, by the way." She stated. Aurora pulled the towel closer to her body before facing her.

She questioned with a smile, "As in Cinderella?"

Cindy chuckled. "Yeah, you could say that." She considered.

The brunette popped her head out from under the water and ran her hands over her face. Most of the sticky drink that was previously all over her hair and shirt had washed off.

She held her hands up and shouted, "I deserved that!"

"I know!" Aurora replied back. She pursed her lips as she tried to contain her smile. "What's your name?"

A vague grin spread across the brunette's face as she kept herself up in the water. "Belle."

Aurora let out a scoff. Another girl with a Disney princess name. She nodded her head and told her, "Aurora."

Belle tilted her head to a side. "As in the princess?"

Aurora shrugged, "Yeah, you could say that."

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THIRTY MINUTES LATER, THE GROUP OF FIVE was dried off thanks to the sun. Aurora went ahead and borrowed some money from the boys in order to buy herself and James some new smoothies. While she got the drinks, the boys stood a couple of yards away from a table the Jennifers sat down at. The three girls were drinking pink smoothies of their own and reading movie scripts.

"Okay," Kendall began. He pushed his sunglasses up his nose bridge. "We do realize there are three of them and four of us."

James shook his head. "No, there's three of us, excluding you." He claimed, turning away from his friend to look back at the girls.

Kendall wrinkled his nose and pulled his brows together in a frown. He questioned, "Why me?"

James pointed out as if it were an obvious answer, "You have Aurora." He shrugged his shoulders.

Kendall gave his friend a bored expression with his nose still scrunched up. He inclined his head to a side, "No, I don't."

Carlos pointed to his friend and nodded repeatedly. "We saw you holding hands on the plane earlier."

Kendall pressed his lips firmly together. "That was only because she was scared the plane would crash." The boy explained, pointing a finger back at Carlos.

James fixed his hair and brushed it out of his face. "Fine." He sassed. He elevated his brows, "But I call dibs on the blonde." He snapped his fingers and pointed them towards the girl sitting in the middle.

Aurora made her way over towards the boys, holding two fresh smoothies in her hands. She was about to sip her smoothie until she noticed the boys were stretching and cracking their knuckles.

The girl moved the straw away from her mouth. She narrowed her eyes at the boys' in confusion and made her way next to Logan. She questioned slowly, "What are you guys doing?"

Carlos smiled with pride. "Asking the Jennifers out."

"Again?" Aurora blinked numerous times and gave a surprised smile. The three girls already rejected them, so there was really no point in asking them out a second time in the same day.

"Yes, again." James rubbed his hands together and spoke in a slightly deeper voice, "Second time's a charm."

Logan pressed his lips together. "Actually, it's the third time." He corrected James without facing him.

Aurora looked back and forth between the girls and her best friends. She gave a soft laugh. "Well, good luck." She told the boys, "You'll need it."

Aurora took a few steps back and sat on the side of the nearest lounge chair, mistakenly taking a sip from James' blue smoothie that she had yet to give him. Once she noticed that the drink tasted different from the one she had earlier, she stopped drinking and glanced down at it. Believing it tasted better than the pink smoothie, she shrugged and continued to drink from it.

Logan spoke to his friends before they could make a move. "Okay, this is pointless." He assured. "They already blew us off."

James scoffed. "No, they said, 'later.'" He pointed out and turned to Carlos who continued, "And it's later."

"Okay!" A familiar voice spoke from behind Aurora's seat. Aurora turned around to see Kelly standing there with her cell phone and folder in her hands.

The woman continued, "Mom's all checked in, your sister complained again that she has no friends, so your mom let her watch 'shark cage' on Fox, and..."

Kelly began to trail off when she noticed the only person paying attention to her was Aurora. The four boys had their backs facing her, too busy looking at the girls seated in front of them. Kelly went on, trying to see what exactly the boys were looking at. "...now it's time to start Gustavo's 'Boy-Band Boot Camp.'"

Kelly glanced at Aurora and asked, "What exactly are they doing?"

"Asking out the Plastics." Aurora remarked before furrowing her brows. "Or the Heathers...I haven't decided which one to call them yet."

Kendall finally turned halfway around to face Kelly. He held out his arms as if he was talking to a child, "Kelly, we're a little busy here." He turned back around.

Kelly pulled her chin close to her neck with disbelief. "So am I." She insisted and retorted, "And they won't go for you until you're famous, so let's roll." She turned around and began to walk away, Aurora getting up from her seat to follow behind her. The two of them stopped when James started to speak.

"Ho ho ho," James laughed quickly. The rest of his friends turned around as he went on and testified, "Kelly, Kelly, clearly you don't understand the power of the..."

James gave her his famous facial expression, wiggling his fingers in front of his face. The other boys pointed to him and smiled.

Kelly shut her eyes and let out an inaudible scoff. She shut her folder and gave the boys a challenging look. She shifted her feet and let the boys attempt to ask the girls out, knowing what was going to happen next.

The boys turned around and prepared themselves.

Aurora shook her head. "This is not gonna end well." She took another sip from the blue drink.

Kelly chuckled and turned to face her. She tilted her head to a side and questioned curiously, "Where'd you get the smoothie?"

"The smoothie stand over there." Aurora nodded her head in the direction of the stand.

Kelly nodded, interested. "Maybe I'll get one before we leave." She declared.

Aurora hummed and held out the pink smoothie to Kelly since she had not drank from it. "Here, take this one."

Kelly smiled and thanked the girl. She started to drink the smoothie, happy to finally get something cold into her system.

Meanwhile, the four boys exhaled before heading towards the Jennifers. They walked up to the table with smooth walks.

James began, "Ladies,"

The Jennifers moved their scripts away from their faces, revealing their displeased looks. They each held their smoothies in their hands.

The boys smiled as James went on, "I don't think we properly introduced—"

James cut himself off when the three girls threw their drinks at the boys, covering them in the pink liquid.

"...ourselves." James licked the drink off of his lips. Logan wiped his eyelids clean while Carlos' mouth hung open.

Aurora laughed at the scene. "What is it with the girls in this town and throwing smoothies?"

Kelly shrugged, a smile on her face.

Kendall gave a sarcastic smile. "Okay," He gave James a pat on his stomach. "Let's go to boot camp." Kendall closed, him and his friends turning away from the girls.

✧∘ଂ ࿐ ཾ

STARTED WRITING: July 28, 2019
PUBLISHED: July 31, 2019
WORD COUNT: 4093

the gifs are kinda blurry and i'm mad but
w h a t e v e r.