The Extraterrestrial Truth And The Girl From Seat 2B [ONC 2022]

1.4 [THE ALIENS COME FOR SCOTTY]

Graduation was a slog. Vic barely remembered it. Vic was barely cognizant of it aside from how hot it was outside and how uncomfortable it was to walk out in front of everybody to shake the hands of school officials she had never met. 

It was supposed to be momentous. It really wasn't. The ceremony itself was stupid. The ceremony was dumb. And, yet, it was everything. 

When things started to change too quickly, she retreated back into herself and began to watch the sky. In the photos she had to take with her mother, in the back seat of Leo's car on the way to a party she never intended to attend, in the kitchen where she found herself suddenly back in her body, surrounded by people and music. Oh. There it was. She knew she was supposed to be having fun, so she tried to put the thoughts of the extraterrestrial to the side. 

Eventually, the night wore down a little more, and Vic found herself laying on the ground, looking up at the stars. She was too blitzed to think of what would be on her mind under any other circumstance-- the truth of the extraterrestrial, of what lay beyond her, of what was outside the confines of her stupid little town.

There was something out there, she knew-- but her brain wasn't working correctly at the moment, and it was easier to just look and rotate the thought in her mind than to properly formulate it.

"Hey, Vic." It was near two in the morning. Vic turned her head to see who, exactly, was talking to her. She should have known that it was the girl from seat 2B, come to talk to her.

"Oh, uh... hey." Vicky pointedly didn't say her name. She still didn't know it. That was on purpose. If she knew her name, then...

Vicky hadn't really been able to stop thinking about her. It didn't help that she saw her everywhere, and quite literally all over the place. It might have been the start of something. The issue was that the two of them had agreed it would mean nothing. 2B seemed more than capable of sticking to that, and Vic told herself she would be damned if she wasn't going to do the same.

"Hey."

"You already said that."

"I supposed I did." 2B didn't ask to sit down with Vicky. She just did.

She was clearly both tired and wired. Her eyes were wide and hard to look at because it looked like they were vibrating and the sight of them bugging out made her uncomfortable. She looked away for that reason and others.

"So."

"So..."

"So we're graduated."

"Yeah."

"That's weird."

"Yeah."

"You have plans for the summer?"

Vicky still didn't look at her. "Not really. I'm not even moving when it's time for college. Living in town and all. It's cheaper that way."

And it was. A dorm cost more than Vicky was willing to spend, and her mother needed a bit of help with the rent anyway, and Vicky didn't want her to suffer for it at all.

"Why?" Vicky asked, filling the weird, awkward silence. "Do you have big plans to something?"

"What, like the circus?" 2B grinned.

She had no idea what she meant by that. "What?"

"Sorry. I-- no. I don't. I mean, I have plans,, I just..." She trailed off, gesticulating as punctuation. "You know."

Vicky didn't. That much was obvious.

"Sorry. It was a stupid joke. I-- I'm... I want to head to college in the city, if I can afford it. The dream is student housing, or moving in with my cousin. I didn't want to stay here and all. I have... reasons."