𝙇𝙚𝙩 𝙃𝙚𝙧 𝙂𝙤 - 𝙀. 𝘾𝙪𝙡𝙡𝙚𝙣

[13] FRIENDS AND FIENDS

Regina felt lighter than she had before she'd gone into the therapist's office. Her therapist was a kind woman in her late thirties named Dr. Kelly Harmon, though she'd told Regina that she can just call her Kelly. For their first session, Regina had mostly recounted the events that had happened and Dr. Harmon had asked her a lot of questions. They'd also discussed Regina's family situation and her friends and pretty much anything else about Regina's life. At first, Regina had thought it'd be irrelevant, but still it felt nice to be so open about her life with someone who stood outside of it. It was as if she'd gotten a big secret off her chest, even though they never really discussed anything like it.

As she left the building from which Dr. Harmon worked, she found Jessica waiting out front beside her car. Despite the storm that Alice predicted to fall over Forks, Port Angeles still had calm weather. The sky was grey from all the clouds, sure, but Regina had gotten used to that. The temperature was pretty nice and the wind wasn't cold, so Regina kept her jacket slung over her arms.

"Well?" Jessica prompted when she looked up from her phone and spotted Regina approaching her. Regina smiled and gave Jessica a tight hug as soon as she was close enough. Jessica let out a startled laugh and hugged her back regardless.

"Thank you." Regina pressed a kiss to Jessica's cheek. Jessica's expression softened as the two friends let go.

"No need." Jessica squeezed her friend's hand and then let go to walk around the car to the driver's side. Regina got in as well and raised an eyebrow at her grinning friend who surely had something up her sleeve. "So, what do you say about going shopping for a bit? Oh, and Mike texted me, we're all going to the diner later to hang out, so you're coming, right?"

"Sounds like you and Mike are both full of great ideas today."

Jessica gave her an affronted look, "I'm always full of good ideas. What are you talking about?"

"Like when you decided to wear a loose skirt two weeks ago when it was storming so the wind blew your skirt up?" Regina asked innocently. Jessica playfully glared her way.

"Okay, that was a lapse of judgement."

Regina laughed, "Yes, it was. But hey, at least Mike seemed to enjoy the view."

"Shut up," Jessica groaned, only making Regina laugh harder.

The two of them headed to the mall and spent a couple of hours there until their stomachs started grumbling and they decided it was time to head back to Forks to meet up with their friends. Mike was texting Jessica impatiently, wondering when the two of them would get there, but since Jessica was behind the wheel, Regina answered. When Mike found out they were ten minutes out, he asked them if they knew what they wanted to eat yet, because then he could order for them. Seeing how hungry both of them were, they gladly send him their orders.

Once they'd arrived at the diner, they found that Mike was joined by Erik, Angela and Tyler. They were hardly seated or the waitress already came with their orders and they all dug in while talking about anything. Once they'd finished eating, Angela had asked both Regina and Jessica to show her what they'd bought, which ended up with them holding up the different shirts and skirts and whatnots that they'd bought. Angela was genuinely interested, but the boys were goofing around, making them laugh as they came up with the most ridiculous criticism in the poshest accents—apparently Regina's skirt was the wrong shade of blue because it didn't match her eyes. Her eyes were brown.

The evening was great and Regina was having the time of her life until she got a call from Emmett. She excused herself and went outside, away from the rowdy diner, and answered, "Hey, Em, what's up?"