Heathers Requests/One Shots

Learn From My Mistakes Pt. 2

In Texas, we've gotten snow. Snow. In Texas. Aside from that, my heater isn't working and my pool has frozen over and there have been on and off power outages. Fun. Anyway, hope you like it! TW//minor swearing

Cady woke up to her phone ringing. Karen or Gretchen, surely. Janis had given up calling, and so had Damien. She was a little mad from getting woken up from her nap, but they couldn't have known that.

"Hey girl!" Silence. Cady sat up, no doubt they were going to want to hang out. She had gotten a lot of makeup and, after a lot of makeup tutorials, she was a natural.

"Hello? Is this... Cady Heron?" She didn't recognize the voice. It wasn't Gretchen's, full of excitement like a ready to burst water balloon. And it wasn't Karen's, absent and airy. "This is Veronica, Veronica Sawyer. I'm Janis's cousin?"

"Oh. Hi. Why are you calling me?" Honestly, Cady was so over Janis. She was so clingy. Like, why was she so obsessed with her?

"Janis told me something about plastic? Could you fill me in, cause, uh- she sounded pretty upset." This was just like Janis, playing the victim and being so clingy.

"She's being so overdramatic," Cady told her, putting her phone on speaker so she could do her makeup with both hands. She grabbed a bottle of primer to apply while she talked. "She's being so clingy lately, it's like she's obsessed with me! Honestly..."

Crackling from the other end. "Okay... so here's what Janis told me happened. You skipped her art show to throw a rager at your house. Correct?" Cady paused, looking between her foundations. "Correct? Hello?"

"Hmm?" she hummed, finally picking the right one. "Oh, yeah, it is. And then she got so mad, like what the hell?" Veronica sighed. "What?"

"Did Janis ever tell you why she hates Regina?" Cady paused. She never really had told her why she hated Regina, she just did. It was like a cosmic truth of the universe. Like we wear pink on Wednesdays, or gravity exists, or how V(x,p) = v(x)w(p) is the Prospect Theory.

"No, I don't think she did. But that's irrelevant." Cady didn't see what Regina had anything to do with it. After all, she had dethroned her. She let her fingers glance over concealers, highlighters, blushes and bronzers.

"No, no it's not." Veronica's voice was forceful, just like Janis's. It makes you want to listen, because you know they have something important to say. "Listen. Regina was having a pool party and didn't invite Janis because she thought the she was a lesbian."

Cady was only half-listening, trying to figure out what lip tint would go with her red blouse and skirt. Veronica plowed on relentlessly.

"And then Regina said, and I think this is an exact quote, 'What? Are you obsessed with me?' right after Janis confronted her for ditching her to hang with her boyfriend." Cady rolled her eyes.

"Look, it was her first boyfriend! Regina probably just got excited about her first boyfriend, and didn't realize that she was neglecting Janis." Yeah, that was a good explanation. Maybe Veronica would hang up now. She didn't.

"You are defending her! The tyrant you brought down, the bitch on top, that's you now!" Cady rolled her eyes again, but Veronica seemed to sense it. "No, think about it! Look around your room, look at yourself! Who do you see? Cady, or Regina?"

Cady scoffed, but her eyes caught on the many pairs of heels. Regina had told her all her shoes were trashy, and had insisted on her buying new ones. All her makeup was on Regina's suggestion (or more accurately, order). She still wore pink on Wednesdays.

"Well-" Cady caught herself. She didn't want to just speak what Regina had told her, what she was and had been parroting for years.

"Exactly," Veronica said. There was a pause, before Veronica said, "I was where you are now. I joined the popular group. I'm not getting into what happened, because it's really complicated - and might make you an accomplice in multiple murder cases -"

"What?"

"-but it's okay to like makeup, or- or fashion, or mall trips. But liking those things doesn't - and shouldn't make you - a bitch." A weighty pause. 

"Do you think she'll forgive me?" Cady asked, trying not to bite her manicure. Veronica hummed, thinking. That was what scared Cady, the not knowing. Math was easy. Figuring out yourself was not.

"I don't know. But I think she will. Janis thinks that you can earn friendship back. I should know. I once slapped her when we were 12, and she avoided me for a month or two, but after an apology and a couple lunches on me, she forgave me. So, I don't know." Cady paused, then sighed.

With math, some people needed to find the formulas, the principles. So maybe she had to do the same thing. "Sure. Yeah. Bye, Veronica."

"Bye Cady." Click. Cady looked at herself in the mirror. She looked liked a redhead Regina. For the first time, she realized...

"I don't like what I see."

(795 words)