YOUNG 𓇻 SEASON I.5 ( PRT 2 )
PARENTS DAY

To try and distract Emma's mind from anything related to the News About Kids or getting Justice for Squeegee Kids during their lunch period, Manny had started a conversation about the boys in their school that they would put on a scale from hot to not. A discussion that most likely was fused by the interaction Emma and Sean had entailed in the hallway minutes prior.

"Umm, what about..." Manny looked to each picnic bench that surrounded the girls for somebody to pick out. "Him." she gestured her crisp packet in the direction of Jimmy, who was discarding his lunch in a nearby trash can, and also seemingly awaiting for an aggravated looking Ashley to finish talking to Toby and JT.

"Not." Emma stuck her fork prongs into the stale skin of her slab of tofurkey. "He's dating Toby's step sister. Plus, he's been mean to Sean a lot since he came back for no reason."

Manny then proceeded to careen her head in Arlee's path. "What about you?"

"Jimmy's alright I guess." Arlee tore a section of the crust off her dry ham and lettuce sandwich. "Wouldn't say he's hot though."

Manny popped a cheese and pickled flavoured crisp into her mouth. "Alright." she scanned the area for another pick until her gaze landed right on Spinner Mason. They all soon turned to the object of her attention. He sat a couple picnic benches away with Paige Michealchck and Federico, plus some other girl who Arlee didn't know from their grade.

"Definitely not." Emma simply stated, taking a small bite of her food.

"Yeah, what she said." muttered Arlee as she purposefully stuffed half of her sandwich into her mouth just so her answer would be twice as inaudible.

That still didn't deter Manny from giving her a puzzled look. "But didn't you dance with him at the school dance last Friday?"

Arlee swallowed thickly. She went in search of her orange juice box, ripped the bendy plastic straw from its side and flitted her gaze straight down to it to try and concentrate on trying not to tear a huge gaping hole in the wrong gap with her straw. "Not really."

Not really. Not freaking really. Was that seriously the best she could do?

Luckily, Manny decided to move on from that non-answer of an answer to continue on with their little game. "Okay what about Federico?"

Arlee's face shrewd to infinity once she'd managed to finally stab a hole through her juice cartoon. "Ugh, Manny."

"I'm not asking you, obviously." clarified Manny. "I was asking Em, since she told me about how she used to have a crush on hi-"

"Manny !" Emma rushed to cut her off, causing Arlee to swiftly stare straight at her with a raised brow at that as she drank her juice. But decided for her sake, to drop the plethora of queries that had just bombarded her head about Manny's accidental confession. "Can we please change the subject ?"

Arlee lowered her juice cartoon from her lips. "Depends on what subject you want to switch  it to, like for example....anything NAK related."  

"I was actually gonna ask if you'd done the homework for English." replied Emma. "But now you've mentioned it, I do have one last thing to get off my chest."

NAK. NAK. Any more of this and Arlee was going to disappear into orbit. "Haven't you already said everything ?"

"I'm sorry it just annoys me so much." lamented Emma. "I mean, how do they think it's okay to talk to kids like they don't have minds of their own ?"

Manny folded her arms against the table. "It's not like people really think about it at all."

"That's the thing, they don't want us to think! They want us to become brain dead, NAK robots."

Just as those words escaped Emma's mouth for what Arlee was hoping to be the last time, Toby and JT approached the table with their lunches.

JT had decided to worm his way in the tiny gap between Emma and herself, slamming his tray down unnecessarily and making the other half of her sandwich fall to the floor.

Upon noticing what he'd done, he sheepishly grinned at her. And in retaliation, she took a handful of his curly fries.  Not that there was a vast amount on his plate to begin with, considering the school's strict regimen on portion control.

"What's with her?" Toby questioned Manny about Emma, brows furrowing as he tried to understand how one person could rave about a singular subject with breathing for air.

Manny glanced in the boy's direction, "NAK rage, kinda like road rage."

"Or worse." Arlee commented, making Manny nod in agreement whilst Emma looked at both of her friends with a flickering artificial smile.

"In the announcements, they have commercials. They're trying to buy our brand loyalty in homeroom." Emma put down her carton of milk like she'd just made a prophetical declaration.

JT quirked his brow. "Emma, who are you talking to?" he asked in the form of a rhetorical query. He gestured his hand towards the rest of the group who had long tuned out the sound of her continuous ranting. They didn't mean to, of course, she had made some very valid points. But during lunch, thinking about how a company wanted to brainwash them via Healthy Eating ads and anti-Squegee kid campaigns was the last thing they wanted to do.

"I could talk..." Emma muttered to herself.  "Or I could take action." she rose to her feet whilst collecting her things, and before anybody at that table knew it, she was off on a vigilante mission. That mission in question? To rid the school of having to ever be controlled by the outer media again. Or at least, something along those lines. 

Once Emma had left and flew back up the stairs into the school, Toby swiftly shifted from his position beside Manny over to the spot where she'd sat moments prior. His puppy dog stare following her the whole time. "Imagine being her for a day."

Arlee sighed to herself at the thought of being that passionately driven at half 1 in the afternoon. "I would, but that would take way too much effort."

JT stuffed a handful of curly fries into his mouth and migrated his attention from Toby and his obvious affection for Emma, over to Arlee and her lack of affection for the empty juice cartoon she'd just finished poking deep holes into. "Still bummed about your dad not coming to Parent's Day tomorrow?"

"It's like you said, I'm not acing school." Arlee briefly bent over to pick up the remenants of her now soggy grass and twigs infested sandwich. With a pinch of her forefinger and thumb, she placed it into a spare napkin that Emma had left behind. "If he turned up and actually found out about how I was doing in class then he'd flip. He'd probably start ranting about how it's the computer and my new obsession to the 'net's fault."

"Don't you have a B in Media?" Manny reminded her. "I'm sure he'd be happy about that."

In dreamland, maybe.

"Except Media isn't on his classes that matter list. If it's not Math, one of the Science, or World History then he doesn't care."

Toby spared her a pity smile, with a catch. "Do you wanna swap parents for 24 hours?" And a unsavoury dry quip for the cherry on top.

Arlee promptly went to give him some sage advice. "Everything's gonna be fine, Toby. They'll probably end up throwing a couple passive aggressive comments at eachother at best."

"I can obviously tell you're not a child of a messy divorce. I bet your Mom and Dad are all kushy with each other after theirs." mused Toby. That managed to kill any form of noise between them in record speed. "What?"

See, that was the one downside with fast friends. Sometimes you didn't have the time, or didn't want to have the time, to the fill them in on all the tiny gaps that existed between the time you didn't know them and the time they entered your life.

It took JT's wide eyed1,000 mile but all too telling stare, and Manny not being able to break her concerned one from Arlee's drastic shift in body language for Toby to pick up on the morbidly obvious. "Oh, um, I didn't——"

"No, it's..." Arlee instantly sprung from her seat across from him, her soggy sandwich in her palm. This wasn't embarrassment. That would just be all kinds of messed up. It was her realising that she'd have to explain this to other people in the future whenever she decided to invite them into her life. Assumption would always point them to her mother being out of the picture because of divorce. And honestly, that was better than the alternative. "I'm gonna go and throw this out."

Her walk to the trash can felt like she was walking in a hazy blur. Noise fell to a still, a lingering still. Like life form was existing but behind a blanketed sheet and an ugly mash of back chatter.

Arlee hated it. She hated the fact that even after four years, and going through all the five stages of greif that 9 year old could at the time, she still was lassoed into that not-so wonderful dreamscape that she'd been stuck in right after her mother's passing.

And she hated Parent's Day. Because it made her realise that before she'd left, her Mom had been the one to handle all this. Her Dad always hid behind his papers. But the difference was he had a reason to. Ignacio handled the heavy lifting, the longer shifts that brought a sweat to his brow, and her mother, Mariana, she did the things in between. They were a team.

That wasn't to say that taking care of Arlee and her siblings was all her Mom ever did. Her mother also had a lot of hobbies and interests of her own. She just knew how to put them to one side when it mattered.

Arlee had learnt as part of her bad habit grieving to stop thinking about her or the other people that she'd lost, which luckily so far, was just her Abuelito (or as she'd so endearingly called him, Nono).

They were just on vacation in her mind. Except their stay didn't have a return date.

"What Toby said—" Manny's voice made Arlee jump and completely forgot why she was still standing by the bin.

"It doesn't matter." her answer came with a sharpening sting. Arlee combated it by quickly disposing her sandwich, composing herself whilst her back was still turned, then swivelled right back around with a resounding amount of fake energy to make the whole situation disappear.  "We should go find Emma."

A weary smile replaced the doleful simmer of an expression that had canvased Manny's face. She handed Arlee her bag that she'd unknowingly abandoned by the benches. "Can we give it a couple minutes?"

What'd she actually been trying to say was, can we enjoy this interlude of not having to hear Emma's continuous ravings about News About Kids for the little time they both had before the next period. And for one thing, Arlee wasn't against that idea at all. "I do need to pick up a book I saved in the library."

Manny blinked at her in surprise as they began their descent into school again. "You read?"

Arlee placed one strap of her bag against her shoulder with furrowed brows. "Yeah? I just don't like to do it in the day time, or at school, or for homework——"

"So when?" questioned Manny. "At night?"

"Yeah, mostly. That's the only way I've been able to get through the rest of that book Ms Kwan's making us read for English." replied Arlee.

Manny let out a small groan at the reminder. "I don't really wanna think about finishing it on my own. There's so many plots and it's all kind of...confusing."

"You don't have to." proposed Arlee. And at first, Manny threw her a confused look. "We can read it together at my house tomorrow afterschool. You, Me and Emma."

Manny was seemingly fully on board with the idea of a communal real along to Ms Kwan's novel study book of the week, but shrouded that excitement when she realised something that Arlee had failed to. "Wait, but it's Parent's Day. And Emma's going with her Mom."

Of course. Parent's Day.

Arlee came to a halt once they'd reached the foyer of the school. "We can do it today?"

Manny shook her head. "I can't, my Dad doesn't let me go out on a weekday if it's unplanned."

Serenely, Arlee looped her free arm around Manny's. "Then I'm gonna get my Dad to call him and ask him. He's good at persuasion."

All she had to do was get her Dad's attention first.

Hours of non-stop protesting about the biased News About Kids broadcast had won Emma Nelson the chance to write an article about it in the school's newspaper. And honestly, Arlee was rather impressed with her friend. She knew Emma had a voice, a surprisingly loud one at that, but she'd never expected for it to reach so far that the Principal and the greater masses would actually listen to her.  Though, Emma's succession still didn't mean that she would refrain from discussing the topic at hand.

She was most likely going to be fighting NAK till the day she was no longer a kid herself.

"I can't believe the principal is actually letting you write this." Manny acknowledged, as she adjusted her backpack strap.

Arlee flipped a page in the book that she wasn't reading. Taking the extra precautions to watch where she was going in case she accidentally collided head on with a person, or a door. "NAK might as well shut up shop right now from the power your article's gonna have."

"I know, it's so cool." Emma's toothy grin only got bigger from thinking about the impact her news article in the Grapevine was going to do. So much so, that Arlee's partially sarcastic comment fell deaf in her ears.

Arlee's glance lifted from the page she had been scanning over for the past 5 minutes of their walk to the computer lab, immediately shifting to share a look with Manny, one that Emma thankfully didn't see.

All three of the girls made their way into the pact space and halted upon seeing Sean sitting there, and more specifically, the placement of his worn out bag on the chair where they all normally resided.

"It's okay, I'll stand." said Manny softly, moving towards the chair that Emma slid into.

He spotted Emma staring for a second longer then necessary, but didn't do much to acknowledge her obvious non-verbal attempt to politely ask him to move his stuff without actually letting the words come out of her mouth. A trivial game of cat and mouse except neither cat or mouse were in it to hurt another. They were just struck by the awkward bow of confliction and mixed emotions.

When Arlee spotted Sean huff and his hand start to move to push his bag off, she decided to speak up. "I'm going to see what Dumb and Slightly-Less Dumber are doing, you guys can tell me what you did later." And with that, she saved everyone involved the trouble of that turning in anymore terse than it needed to be.

"Emma's right, I could whine or I could do something about Parents Day...." was the first thing Arlee heard Toby utter confidently when she took the empty chair beside him.

"What's the plan then?" Arlee drew her spiny chair closer, finding her interest to grow more with whatever JT and Toby were brewing up, then Emma's fight against a topic that she surely was going to forget about in a week. Or a day.

The remenants of unearthed awkwardness from their previous incident at lunch made Toby fall stagnant for a beat when his eyes pulled away from the computer screen at Arlee's presence. And when she recognised that, every part of her being was hoping for him not to bring it up again.

"Arlee, about lunch—"

"It's okay." was her fast crack of a reply. It managed to levitate whatever unnecessary complexity that conversation would've started if they went down that path.  "So then, what're you planning to do to try and stop World War III kicking off between your mom and dad?"

Toby turned right back around to close a tab on his computer and open another one. "Convince my parents there's no need to show up." after a couple buffers, a very authentic looking letter from the school popped up in a word document. "Ok, so I download the logo from the Degrassi website. Then, I scanned Mr.Simpson's signature from the last newsletter he sent home," he sat back in his chair with full pride plastered on his face. "It's a masterpiece."

"Masterpiece?" Arlee queried with a raised brow. "No, Toby, It's-"

"Insanity," JT finished off her sentence and at that, she nodded in agreement.  The lengths he was going to keep his parents from crossing paths were pretty astronomically insane. "And we don't mean that in a good way."

They then both looked over his letter together to check if it sounded plausible enough for a teacher to have written it, and not a 12 year old boy with highly advanced computer skills. "Alright, so, your parents don't have to come because of your exemplary performance in all your scholastic pursuits," Arlee recited off the screen in front of her eyes, looking back to Toby to check if that was right.

JT's features were instantly riddled with confusion from the grammatically enhanced sentence that he'd just heard her repeat. "What?"

"Translation, I'm acing school." clarified Toby, pushing the computer screen back to his line of vision.  "It's all in the details, my friends. This'll work, it has to."

Arlee began to collect her belongings after that ceremonious conclusion to his master-mind plan when she'd spotted Emma and Manny begin to leave the room. "And I don't doubt that it won't." She clutched her books to her chest. "But, if things get messy...I get a 20?"

Toby didn't bother giving her the time of day and continued to type up the rest of fake school letter he was producing. "Not in a million years."

She rolled her eyes at that, but didn't seize at the opportunity of stealing the cap off JT's ginourmus head whilst he was semi-distracted by the lint he'd plucked from his border shorts, before beginning to walk away in a catch-up pursuit for Manny and Emma.

"Yeah, that's it, steal another one of my personal valuables!" He shouted after her, causing a couple heads in the computer room to turn.

Arlee paused at the threshold of the door and flashed her greatest teasing grin at him whilst flipping the hat backwards and adjusted it. "This thing is huge. Is your head actually as big as I thought it was or do you just like storing a lot of things in your hat?"

Instead of giving her an answer to that dig, JT stuck out his tounge at her, the latter doing the same, before she then merrily ventured back into the corridor for one more hour of total school bliss.

Parents Day started mundanely average. The halls were packed, the spirit in the air was more serious than normal, and Arlee, though having no parents of her own to be there, had been appointed to be a part of the new found welcome committee alongside Spinner and her brother by Mr Simpson for the whole event.

It wasn't the ideal place she wanted to be, especially on a weekend. But it wasn't like she had any other exhilarating alternatives that didn't go beyond being stuck at home catching up on homework on the couch before her Dad came through the door. This was as good as it got really.

School. On a Friday. Handing out fliers about Degrassi and its many great educational pro's with her older brother and his friend who she was sort of trying to avoid for no particular reason whatsoever.

At all

Don't even think about asking.

In an attempt to get away from the teems of parents and kids flocking in and out of the corridors, Arlee had slipped away into the girl's bathroom and locked herself in a stall with her aunt's phone that she'd stolen from her dresser drawer in the early hours of the morning before school.

Her intentions had been to call her father right around the beginnings of the day, just to check if he was coming. If that shoot down was nothing more than him just being late and distracted that morning. But as Arlee sat down on the closed toilet lid and her thumb hovered over the first digits to her Dad's office number,  she came to the all pretensive conclusion, for the third time in a row, that it wasn't worth it and let a heavy sigh escape.

"What do you think of this top Ter? Too preppy?"

The sound of sudden voices caused Arlee to sharply stand and promptly unlock the bathroom stall. The first one, the voice, was Ashley Kerwin. Having to hear her give school announcements every other day after her 'triumphant' win as president of the student council made her pretty distinguishable to pick out.

"No, it's perfect."

That one was a little less recognisable. Soft. Meagre. All signs led to Terri.

After the dance and what had proceeded, she'd seen her walk around with that hive of Grade 8's, who some may have called the quote on quote 'popular kids'. And Arlee wasn't one to judge character based on things she observed, but from what she'd see at lunch or the periods between classes as she passed halls, she always wondered how someone like Terri wanted to be friends with two people that were so....a lot.

"As in casting agent perfect?" Ashley shot out in what sounded like approval seeking.

"Yeah, I guess."

Heels clicked against the linoleum of the bathroom floor when its front door went flying open yet again. "Ash, stress any further and you're gonna pop a lung or a major artery."

Arlee's hand stop in motion, and a whole new swarm of contemplation manifested itself in her mind. If she went out there, they'd all stare, Paige would stare. But if she stayed for a little longer then it'd look like she'd been eavesdropping on their conversation, and that was worse then a couple milliseconds of attention being put on her by a couple of older kids.

"What's there to stress about?" Ashley brushed off Paige's fake concern. "I'm not stressed."

"Of course not, hon." said Paige in all her sardonic grace and glory.

With a huff, Arlee pushed open the door to the stall and surely enough, all three girls flashed their gazes right over in her direction for approximately a second or less before returning back to what they were discussing but just at a lower register.

Ashley watched Paige hike the bag she had on her upwards and decided to point out how obscenely large it was. "I thought you said you were only going for one outfit change?"

"I am. But I wasn't going to throw my things into any old school bag. That might ruin my outfit." Paige draped her bag full of outfits onto her shoulder, and migrated over to the first stall door right next to the one Arlee was leaning against. Her doe eyed stare made a beeline straight towards her, though she fashioned it to make it seem as though she didn't notice her presence at all. "And I always love looking my best."

The door's heavy lock clicked behind her once Paige shut it,  leaving Arlee in a whirlwind of many thoughts.  Her biggest being that she'd expected some form of a ramification to come from that glare she'd received from Paige during the dance after Spinner had shot her down...on accident.

A laugh, A whisper, A name or two. But this was tame.

Then again, she was still 7th Grade worm food in this place. Heard but not seen. So there was the likely fact that just as she'd hoped, Paige had geninuly forgotten about her existence after that dance.

Arlee quietly took herself to a sink that was just far enough from both the girls that still remained in the bathroom, placed her aunt's phone on the basin of the sink, and turned on the faucet to thoroughly wash her hands even though she hadn't used a single appliance in there. It was a force of habit. Scratch that, it was a force of quick thinking.

In the reflection of the mirror two meters away,  Ashley leaned closer with her eye-pencil and angled it carefully till she inevitably gave up and shoved it onto Terri so she could help her instead. "Look at me. I'm shaking. You do it."

And Terri did her best, with all the moving about and blinking that was coming from the former's end. Just evidently not good enough for Ashley's standards.

"Ow! Be careful." Ashley jerked back and wiped her pinkie around the corner of her smogged eye. "That's my eye, It's what I see with."

Terri stared over at her like she'd just been caught with her hand in the cookie jar and was being scolded for her wrongdoings. "Sorry, I'm not good at this."

"Yeah, I can tell."

That was enough to make Arlee abandon the paper towel that she'd been thoroughly drying her hands with by the sink, and leave with her aunt's phone without having to witness any more of that exchange.

If that was what true friendship looked like, then the future was truly and utterly bleak.

Upon remerging from the bathroom to the main school hallway, more kids and more parents had filled the area than before. Some of them were engaging in discussions with teacher's outside of their classroom doorways whilst the children had an expression displaying their need to be anywhere but this place. And others of them had their eye on a large banner that had been hung up along a row of lockers.

Taking a curiosity as to what they were gawping at, Arlee angled her head up to the scene of their fascination and it soon became all too clear.

Welcome to the Official ASS Parent's Day!

A supple breath expelled from her lips, one filled with both confusion over who was able to sneak that through without anyone noticing and amusement for the clever wordplay.

From the corner of her eye, Arlee spotted Mr Raditch sternly make his way down the hall and over to the banner with less appreciation for the grammatical entandra up on display for all the school community to see. He stopped directly at her side and for all intents and purposes, she shot her glance straight back up to the top of the lockers like she couldn't feel his presence. "Do you have any idea who's behind this display of juvenile vandalism?"

She puffed out a breath once more. "Uh, no sir."

Mr Raditch ran a hand down his face, and peered over to his left for a beat at the hushed laughter and whispers that were gathering from the mock bannister still being up on display. Arlee was nearly ready to slowly back away but he eventually re-acknowledged her still being there. "Alright. Well, I'll see to finding out who it was."

And with that, he was gone. Only to be replaced with the laughter of the real culprit who'd been behind the bannister switch-a-roo when the coast was completely Raditch clear.

"I always like it when there's truth in advertising."

Her oh so amazing brother.

Turning her frame merely, Arlee also came face to face with Spinner sharing equal amusment to the defacement of the banner. She eyed him for a little longer than she should've. "Forget me, you win hands down at this."

Federico stared up at the banner like it was his pride and joy. "Quick thinking is all you need."

Arlee couldn't help but quirk a brow at both of their vagueness. "Win what?"

"We have this little thing going." revealed Federico. "We're trying to make our labour worth the while." He then showed her the camera in his hand. "Got some totally embarrassing shots of a couple teachers and kids on a camera Simpson gave us."

For the fiftieth time that day, Arlee rolled her eyes. "It's volunteering, not labour."

Before Federico could have the opportunity to refute that by stating all the ways that this was indeed child labour, a woman in a cable knit sweater approached the three of them from behind.

"Excuse me."

Arlee was the first to pay her any attention, though she didn't respond initially and awkwardly stared right through the lady.

"Yes, you."

She wasn't expecting anyone else. But her blank face probably made it seem as though she was. "Do you...or any of you, know where I might find an Archie Simpson by any chance?"

Arlee put on her best friendly smile. "Oh, he's—-"

"Down the left and then to the side." interrupted Spinner vigorously. "Then you keep going all the way down till you get to the end."

She threw a look of appreciation in his path, then went sauntering off in a direction that definitely wasn't anywhere near Mr Simpson's classroom. Arlee thought, just for a solid second, about catching up with her. But realised doing that would solidify her as being un-fun stick in the mud. "What was that for?"

Spinner shrugged his shoulders without care. As he always did. "Like Federico said, if we're gonna get forced to do this, then we might as well have fun while we're doing it. I'm sure she's gonna love her Parent-Teacher talk with the janitor."

Federico started to suddenly absentmindedly tap on Spinner's shoulder when Paige and her eye-catching outfit entered the school hallway. "Hey, dude, check it out." He was dumbfounded, still enthralled in his up and down appealing infatuation. Like a moth to a flame. Spinner stared too, just not as obvious or intense. "Wonder who she's trying to impress. Because whoever it is, it's working."

The temptation to throw a wrench in their, or more so Federico's, unchecked school boy fantasises was all too tempting for Arlee, considering the intel she'd picked up from the girl's bathroom. "Yeah, I bet Toby's mom is really gonna love it."

But it was Spinner who managed to pick up on that unintentional snide comment first. "Toby's mom?"

"Yeah, her and Ashley and were getting ready in the bathroom before. I think they know about her being a casting agent." confirmed Arlee. Neither Ashley or Paige had outright said that the casting agent was Toby's mother, but it was the only logical explanation she could think of. Unless there was coincidentally another person in the casting agency who was happening to visit Degrassi during Parent's Day.

Silence weighed still. And Federico started visibly fall into his thoughts. A brow flying up in high course. "I can see Paige on magazines."

The groan of discomfort that left through Arlee's sigh was one of great dismay. "You're so lame that it hurts me."

Federico offered her a scowl. "Don't you have halls to guard?"

"You know, back when I was a kid, they used to write those kind of things on the insides of the bathroom stalls. Not on banners." Another new, but all too familiar voice stated from behind the trio. "We really are living in a new millennium."

"Tía?" Federico didn't hold back his surprise. "What're you...why're you here?"

"I'm here for your Parent's Day." Araceli adjusted her mini purse on her shoulder. Her floral skirt and top number prominent. "I overheard Arlee talking to your dad about Parent's Day yesterday. I was on my way back from the Chemist and I thought I might check in and see what it's all about."

Both of Arlee's brows raised like that was such a surprising thing, somebody paying attention and listening. "Really?"

"Yes, really." Araceli repeated with a confused chuckle as to why she was so astonished. They were family. And even if she probably had a million and one better things to do with her time, she was still willing to try and help out when necessary. "You also have something that belongs to me, don't you?"

Arlee fished the phone out of her back pocket and sombrely gave it back to Araceli. "I just needed it for a day."

"Asking goes a long way." Araceli spared her a lecture about asking without taking and gave her a sign that it didn't bother her that much. "Is your mom around, Gavin?"

"No, uh, she had things." Spinner strained a hand against the back of his neck whilst his concentration landed on what was happening in the background. Or more specifically, one specific thing. "Later."

He started to walk off, but was abruptly cut in his path when Mr Simpson stepped in front of him from out of the abyss. "Not so fast."

In his hands were scissors, and his expression rendered on anything but pleased at the sign. If anything, Arlee was certain he probably had a clear indication on who the culprit was seeing as nobody else apart from the pair of them and herself had been appointment to his newly formed welcome committee for the afternoon. "Alright boys, who's the genius that thought this up?"

"Not me." They both stated in clear harmony.

Until Federico decided they was no point in trying to worm his way out of a measly little prank gone wrong. "It was an accident."

"He'll take it down for you." reassured Araceli without a second thought. He remained silent, his lips falling to a straight line and annoyance flaring. "Re-word those coincidentally swapped around letters too, won't you?"

Rigidly, Federico nodded, accepting the scissors from Mr Simpson. "And after that, you can report to Mr Raditch".

His response was no response. All Federico could think about was finding measures, cues, to ask for a bail out without having to shamelessly corral from them. He was all to aware that Araceli would tell their Dad, when she could catch him. But that didn't stop him from trying.

"Don't look at me."

And failing.

With his head hung and a clip to the back of the head from Araceli for being dumb, Federico marched away to go and face the music of his bored stunt. Spinner followed after him as well from behind, but abandoned him halfway when he ran into Paige in the hallway and their accidental bump to the shoulder turned to a hearty conversation. Questions.

All of which Arlee flashed a look at, once. Only once. And maybe three times after it.

They were in her eye line. It wasn't intentional.

At all.

Like her trying to avoid Spinner because of...reasons. Non-negotiable or revealing or obvious reasons. He just wasn't on her list of people she wanted to be chummy with in this life at the moment. Maybe she'd try again in another 20 years.

"I'm sorry about that." Araceli apologised with a rub to her head with her fingertips.

"You don't have to apologise." reassured Mr Simpson sympathetically.

"I do." Araceli adjusted her purse yet again when it started to slip from her slender, lean shoulder. "And I'll be having a very long talk with his dad about his untapped creativity when I get home."

He let out a hearty, but muted, laugh. And so did she. It reminded Arlee that they'd once been somewhat friends during high school. And that this, Parent's Day for her, was probably just like going for coffee with someone who was a friend. Except it came with the bonus of delving into your child's academic successes and failures. 

"Hey, Mr Simpson was telling me about your latest media immersion assignment." Araceli brought up out of the blue to Arlee. "B+ ?"

Arlee shrouded in her excitement. "It's nothing."

"It was detailed, descriptive, and you managed to include the examples I pointed out in class."pointed out Mr Simpson. "You did good, be proud of yourself."

Araceli tilted her head in a manner that made Arlee feel worse about not being proud of her Junior High work ethic. "Couldn't have put it better."

"Thanks." Arlee gratitude came out a little less than enthusiastic.

"It was nice catching up with you again Snake."Araceli's lips broke into a small smile at her slip up. "——Archie."

He placed a tentative hand to her shoulder in departure. "You too Celi."

Once Mr Simpson had left, Araceli and slowly but surely, Arlee, started to walk back in the direction of the school's foyer. The evidence of her stagnant emotions clearly evident. "Hey, you heard him, you're doing good."

Arlee stuffed her hands into her limited spaced pockets. "In one subject that's not even the big 5."

At that, Araceli decided to come to a perplexed halt. "Says who?"

"Dad." Uh oh. Now she was balancing on an over explanation territory. Arlee knew this was her aunt, who she lived under one roof with and loved unconditionally, but there was only so much she was comfortable in spilling. "If it's not English, Math, World History—"

"Oh, give him the benefit of the doubt, he's a little old school." excused Araceli with a tut. "Back when he was younger media and technology was barely a thing, let alone a whole school subject."

There was definitely some truth to her explanation. The value in new age millennium gizmos and tech was something that was still a very concept to her father. They hadn't owned a computer till at least two years ago in their home, and cell phones were pretty much out of the option due to the cost of phone bills on top of electricity bills with it. Then there was that whole Y2K scare that came with the cross over between the old and new, and from what she could remember, her Dad had been even more adamant on them not tapping into the internet just yet.

However, Arlee's issue didn't necessarily lie in whether or not her Dad had an appreciation for making websites and infographic like she could. It was a rooted issue that had finally became all too noticeable. "But you don't think like that."

Araceli lifted a brow at her assumption that they were close in age. "Well I have the benefit of being 5 years younger and more into the future than him. Don't tell him I said that though."

Her playful warning managed to spring some kind of an upturned elated grin against Arlee's face. But it soon faltered.  "So, if he was into the things I was good at, then he'd be more free to come to things like Parent's Day?"

"Honey, you know your Dad's a busy guy, he's just got a lot on today."

Finally, that rubber band that was holding together all the aghast grievances she had over her Dad and his never-ending work schedule snapped. "It's not just today though, it's everyday. It's everything that isn't his work."

"Arlee?"

She'd asked that like it was a question, because she could read between the lines. The clearly obvious. And the way she looked at her then, with such, pity? No. Growing concern? It made Arlee all the more in hurry to escape the new Pandora's Box of weened away true feelings that she'd just opened.

"I thought this year would be different."

That was part of growing up, realisation. It hit you head on when you least expected it. And left a gnarly invisible bruise in its place.

In an attempt to escape from the beginnings of her mini-emotional outburst,  Arlee had decided to take her glumness to the basketball courts by the car park to lazily attempt a game with nobody but herself.

As expected, her amusment only lasted for
only less then a minute, and each time she'd move  closer to try and reach the the hoop and score, she was distracted by another car pulling up and another family get out in troves with a unappeased kid attached to it.

The Parent's Day effect, is what Arlee was now coining it. Plaguing at least one in every average child who just like this day, also dreaded when report cards were faxed and sent out to houses across the district.

The average child except for her, obviously.

On her tenth and final attempt to reach the summit of the net with disappointing results, she let the ball roll against the gravel to the other end of the court.

"And that's why girl's don't play basketball."

A shadowy presence obstructed the minimal sunlight that had been shining from up above and through the crevices of the school basketball court chain-link fence. But Arlee didn't have to turn around to know who the face behind it was. A pang still twinged in the caverns of her gut though. At the very very worst timing known to man kind. What reason did it have to do that? None.

Arlee felt that familar feeling temper her stomach. Her movements. Its beating and ability to tamper with the way she responded to normal human dialect. But she managed to shut it off by focusing on his typical schoolyard dose of sexism. "Shut up Spinner."

When she'd turned around after picking up the ball from the ground, Spinner was already in the basketball court and standing at the halfway line. "What's your deal?"

She bounced the ball in place, her contact slightly fraying from his. Why was he out here and not talking to Paige and her new expensive outfit like he'd been intending to? Why was she even asking that? Arlee had to silence the music of her speculation for her own good. "Nothing."

"Pass."

And then it got even weirder.

"What?"

"The ball." Spinner motioned to the basketball in her hand. "Pass."

Still unsure about his intentions, Arlee threw over the basketball a little harshly. He looked to her like she was insane. And heck, maybe she was. "Anger issues much."

Arlee harshly stepped to the side in silence, her eyes slitting to a beady glare. Taking that as his invitiation to show her how it was done, Spinner picked up the ball and moved as far back as could, angled his arms in a weird stance, aimed, fired, and completely missed the back-board by a mile off.

His failure put a very miniscual smile on Arlee's face. "Nice one Kobe."

He scoffed at her brazen attitude when rolled and kicked the ball back up to his hands. Standing in the middle of the court. "You think you could do better?"

Arlee still kept her hands firmly crossed to her chest. "Well from that, yeah, probably."

Not. Probably not. Definently not. What was she doing?

In acceptance to that accidental challenge, Spinner held the ball out to her, but when Arlee went to take it from his grasp, he held it higher. "What're you—" And higher. "Give it back." And oh so much higher. "Spinner."

"You say I can't play?" Spinner brought the ball back down and started to bounce it against the gravel uncoordinatedly. "Well, I say I can prove you wrong."

This was the part where Arlee was waiting for the punchline. A joke. A sparse insult. That was how these kind of exchanges normally always ended. He called her loser, or that dumb nickname that was a 'girly' version of her brother's name, she'd tell him get lost and the cycle would continue. But here they were tolerant of one another. Talking civilly. And she, in all the ways that didn't want to admit it, was kind of okay with this happening. Whatever this exactly was about to turn into.  

"How?"

He smirked in her direction, stopping his continuous dribbling of the ball and nestling it under his blotchy arm. "Horse."

"Horse?" Arlee blankly stared at him. "Like a cold?"

Evidently, that was enough to ware his patience by at least one percent. "What, no, like the game. You throw a shot, I throw a shot, if anyone of us makes the shot, we get a letter."

Arlee nodded with a swirl of non-existent confidence in whatever game she'd just agreed to play. "Sounds easy enough."

Again, Spinner's motivation to one up her wasn't deterred. "Prove it."

Intrigue was telling her to accept that, no question, nothing. But her ruminating skepticism, along with a couple non-descriptive feelings, were prompting her to ask the obvious. "Why would you even wanna play with me?"

She was worm food, and he was the crow that pecked into the soil and was supposed to swallow her whole or ignore her entire existence. But then Degrassi happened, and the dance. And even prior to that, they'd been in a similar scenario talking on her driveway before her brother came back outside. He wasn't all scary and brutal. Mean to his bones. He was just...calm. Normal. And dare she even say a little nice.

"Paige's talking to some scout lady, and your brother got in trouble with Mr Raditch for the sign so he has to write him some apology essay by hand in the library." Spinner fumbled with the basketball between his hands. "I wanted this place, but since you won't go away I might as well find a way to make you leave."

Accepting that tangled explanation, Arlee held her fist and palm up to simulate a match of rock, paper, scissors. Though, Spinner didn't initially pick up on that being her intentions and gave a stumped, weirded out expression.
"We have to see who starts first, don't we?"

Turning compliant, Spinner inched closer, placed the ball on the floor between them and lifted his own hand and fist to engage in the first round of rock, paper, scissors. The final results culminating in him winning due to Arlee had managed to avoid eye contact with him completely whilst throwing up any old sign that pointed to one of the three options. He went rock,  and she went with a claw that looked like scissors.

Meekly, Spinner picked the ball up and threw his first shot into the hoop and actually managed to make it. Two-for two. "Oh, first point already. Get ready to get schooled, Federina."

Her competitive side was soon awaken by those fighters words, and in a moments notice, the guard that she'd been putting up melted away along with the glumness Parent's Day had caused as they ran up and down the court. Blocking. And swiping. And adding way more steps than were probably required in this game...Horse. In the midst of their back and forth, they hadn't even acknowledged or realised that Araceli had been observing them on the outskirts of the courts.

By the end of it, the unanimous winner by least shoves and proper basket, even if they were completely difficult to make, was Arlee.

"Give the viewers at home a personal account on how it feels to loose so badly, Spin."

He didn't spare her a glare. "I let you have that last letter."

"Sure, okay."

Or a nudge to the shoulder to get the ball before she could.  "Dork."

And just like that, they were back to normal. 

Araceli came out onto the court once Spinner had simultaneously decided it was time for him to leave with the basketball. "Not breaking up the fun, am I?"

Arlee looked to Spinner, as he also looked to her. And in that quiet moment, they both unanimously decided to never speak of them playing together again. Or at least, she assumed that was his plan.

"I didn't know you and Gavin were friends."said Araceli when Spinner had fully vacated the area. The two of them migrated from the inside of the courts to a picnic bench that was located just on the outskirts of it, the elder of the two sitting on the actual bench and the other flat surface. "From what I can remember, I was sure you two would be sworn enemies by now."

Arlee drew her knees up and folded her arms against them, her eyes squinting from the sun that was cascading down on them. "We're not friends."

Scooching back, Araceli placed her elbows against the edge of the table, her frame leaning comfortably against her niece's lower calf. "Met up with a couple more of your teacher's, you know."

"Like who?"

"Ms Kwan." revealed Araceli. "She's a really nice lady, had a lot of good things to say about you and how you're taking English. But, she did say you do have a habit of talking to JT a little too much, which I'm not all that surprised about. And that you're also behind on some reading exercises?"

Arlee didn't have it in her to find a well strung together excuse. "I'm finishing them soon."

"Your science teacher also had a lot of nice things to say about you, art, math." continued Araceli, crossing one leg over the other. "That's the big 5, right?"

A trickle of a sigh left the cusp of Arlee's lips.
"I shouldn't have said what I said about my Dad to you."

"No, you should've." Araceli decided to abandon her seat and move up to sit against the surface of the table alongside Arlee. "It's important to get things like that off your chest."

But not too much, that was what Arlee had always told herself. Too much meant an overflow. And overflows weren't easy to clean if things got messy. "Please can you just, not say that I said that to him."

"Why not? It's obviously been bugging you. Him not being able to attend some of your events."

"No." Arlee blinked back the watery substance that was threatening to invade her eyes. It wasn't tears, probably sweat that had managed to make its passive voyage from the top of her head to just about the side of her face. "I just...don't want to make it into a big deal. Because it's not. Federico doesn't care so why should I?"

"That shouldn't be the norm." affirmed Araceli. "My step-father worked too, a lot at that. And he still managed to get in at the last second when I had a recital. Or an art show."

Something in her tightened. "Yeah, but he didn't loose Abuelita forever."

Araceli's lips pursed at first, her eyes batting away to the parking lot. To the bareness of the sidewalk. To the fraying greenery and life beyond it. She'd gotten what Arlee had meant, but for her sake, she had decided to put the sting of the reminder of her sister being gone aside to envelop Arlee in a hug. "We're a team, okay? All of us. And from now on, whenever you have anything going on, if he can't make it....I will. Got it?"

Arlee let herself exhale outwards with a supple head nod. "Got it."

ronnie's notes
deep, deep, stuff.

remember the scene with arlee / spinner playing basketball, it comes back later in the later seasons ( that i've already planned ! ) in a very cute way. that's all I'll say 👀

but I hope you guys like the second and final part of this chapter. plz comment if u wanna see more. ik I basically abandoned this story for the better part of a year but i'm taking away time from  the other one that I regularly update to try and revive this one, and from what I can see there's someone out there reading lmao. helps keep my motivation up :)

okay bye bye !!