Stay With Me (A SoKeefe Human AU)

𝙲𝚑𝚊𝚙𝚝𝚎𝚛 𝟹 • 𝚂𝚘𝚙𝚑𝚒𝚎 • 𝚃𝚑𝚎 𝙹𝚘𝚞𝚛𝚗𝚎𝚢 𝚝𝚘 𝚂𝚌𝚑𝚘𝚘𝚕

"Um... Sophie?" Dex asked, gaping at them.

"Oh, hi Dex!" She said, blushing slightly then running forward to engulf him in a huge hug. "I haven't seen you for a couple days! How did the camping trip go?"

"It went fine," he muttered. He glanced past Sophie to look at Keefe. "Who's that?"

"Oh, that's my friend Keefe," she said, gesturing toward him. "Keefe, Dex. Dex, Keefe."

"Hi," Keefe said, eyeing Dex warily. He put out a hand. "Keefe Sencen."

"Dex Dizznee." Dex extended his own hand and shook his hand. "I'm Sophie's best friend," he added after the handshake.

Keefe turned toward Sophie, a look of mock betrayal on his face. "So I'm not your best friend anymore? I see how it is."

She rolled her eyes. "Shut up," she whined.

Keefe grinned. "Make me."

She shrugged casually. "Sure, punching you in the mouth always works well."

"Hey!" He held his jaw and backed away. "Don't you hurt my baby!"

"I thought the hair was your baby?" Sophie said, giggling.

"Well, both of them," he said. "And by the way, you said it wrong. It's The Hair™."

"Shouldn't we walk to school now, Sophie?" Dex butted in, glancing between the two of them with a slight scowl on his face.

"Sur—" Sophie began to say, but was interrupted by Grady charging into the kitchen.

"Oh no, you don't, Sophie Elizabeth Foster-Ruewen! I don't trust That Boy to not hurt you!" He said, waving a baseball bat in the air.

"Dad!" Sophie cried, quickly scampering to Keefe's side and shielding him with her arms. "What do you have against Keefe? He's my friend!"

"Friend," Grady grumbled. "More like an enemy."

She groaned, exasperated. "Geez, Dad! He's not going to hurt me or anything! Besides, Dex is here! Just leave him alone, will you? What has he ever done to you? It's MY life, you don't need to interfere. I'm fourteen now, not a little kid! UGH! Stop being so overprotective!" She ranted.

"Uh... Sophie?" Dex asked timidly.

"What," she said, gritting her teeth and turning to face Dex.

"We're... gonna be late for school."

Sophie turned to Grady. "See, Dad? We're gonna be LATE! You wouldn't want me to be LATE, would you?"

Grady muttered something under his breath that she couldn't hear, but finally stalked away, calling over his shoulder, "Fine! But I WILL be watching from the window! And carrying my baseball bat with me!"

"Come on. Let's go," Sophie snapped bluntly, still mad at her father for way overreacting.

She stepped out on the front porch without seeing if any of the boys were following her. What is up with Grady today? She thought furiously, matching her intense marching with her thoughts.

"Whoa. Someone's angry today," A voice behind her said. She spun around and saw Keefe standing there with a crooked smirk and a bright red backpack with a picture of Bob Ross on it.

She inadvertently giggled. When Keefe saw that she was staring at his backpack, he crossed his arms.

"What?" He said defensively. "Bob Ross is my hero. 'There are no mistakes, only happy little accidents,'" he said, shifting his voice to sound exactly like him.

"Whoa," Sophie breathed, stepping forward. "How did you do that?"

Keefe shrugged. "Dunno. But I think Dexy there wants us to get going or else we really are going to be late."

"Oh okay," Sophie said, craning her head to get a glimpse of Dex. He looked slightly disgruntled.

"Why did Dex send you here?" Sophie asked as they caught up with him.

"Because he was chicken." Keefe grinned at Dex. "So he asked me to go."

"I wasn't chicken!" Dex said, pouting. "I just knew that Sophie is dangerous when she's mad."

"And I'm the only one who can cheer her back up again," Keefe chimed in from the other side of Sophie, winking.

She rolled her eyes good-naturedly, then spotted the school in front of them. "Look, that must be Foxfire!" She said, pointing at the sign rising over the trees.

"Holy macaroni, it's huge," Keefe muttered as they finally finished their journey and stepped inside the ginormous gates.

That was an understatement. It wasn't just huge, it was larger than ginormous, gigantic, humongous, massive, enormous, and immense combined together. There was a wide tower in front of them, with a huge sign that said: Office & Help Center. Beyond that was a huge, glittering pyramid made out of glass. Different colored towers and wings made out of stained glass curved around the pyramid in a "U" shape. To the left, there was an amphitheater and two other smaller buildings. To the right, there was a ginormous library and cafeteria. On the sides of and behind the structure, there were fields, basketball courts, tennis courts, and so many other things.

Sophie felt a finger lift her jaw back up to its normal place. She hadn't even been aware that it had dropped.

"Uh, you okay there, Foster?" Keefe said, looking at her. "I know you're the Queen of Overreacting, but going completely still and unmoving on me because of the size of our school is... a little unnatural?"

Sophie snapped back into real life. "Oh. Right. Yeah, I'm back now," she said, reaching up to tug her eyelashes.

Keefe's brow furrowed as he looked over Sophie's shoulder. "Who's that coming toward us?" He asked, tugging lightly on her ponytail.

"Who?" She said distractedly, trying to flick a loose eyelash off her shoulder.

"Her. That girl. With the curly brown hair?" He said, pointing behind her.

Curly brown hair? Sophie thought, freezing. There were only a few girls she knew who fit that description, and she hoped that it was them, and not the one it probably was.

But her suspicions were confirmed when she glanced back, just for a split second, and caught sight of the swaggering girl with two other girls by her side.

The girl in the middle could only be one girl.

Stina.