Fight or Flight ( Doctor Who Fanfiction )

Haylor.

Two years & three months Before.

"Have you two made it official yet?"

I blinked a couple of times as we shouldered our bags and navigated out of the last class of the day. Rue, Rory, and Mels all had various after-school extracurriculars on Wednesdays, but neither of us did - meaning we often walked out together, and just walked to her house to wait for the other three to join us.

Amelia didn't usually take much interest in my love life. I assumed it was an off-limits topic, but apparently she felt differently.

"I think we're just... having fun."

"She said you're taking her on a week-long ski trip."

"We both like skiing."

She didn't bring it up again until we were outside the school, when we'd met my security detail and when I thought we were over the topic.

I turned down the waiting car, in favor of walking with Amy, as I normally did. The car stalked us at a distance as we left the school, and one guard walked behind us by a few paces. I could only pretend to be so normal.

It was unusual for someone with this much security to attend something as simple as a public school in Leadworth. I owed that to Rue. Every time they tried to put us in a higher-end facility, Rue would start to recede into herself and crack under the stress that came with it. Panic attacks and meltdowns became regular. And any time they tried to put me in an institution where she had no hope of ever attending for the aforementioned reasons, her health did even worse. Public school, as lawless as it was and as vicious as the other kids were, was the only place where she seemed to thrive.

And unlike other kids of our caliber, who had to attend prestigious institutions for opportunity and family name, our futures were already decided. I would have needed my tutors even in a private school, to prepare for the kind of work I was expected to do after graduation. And Rue... well, no one expected much from her.

But this was why they'd moved us out here in the first place, when she was only five and I was seven - even as a baby she couldn't handle flashing cameras of paparazzi, or the rush of a big city, or the bustling of constant travel that had hallmarked our parents lives before her. Child psychologists had recommended that we live somewhere with a slower pace, and my parents - well, my mother - took that to heart and set their sights on small-town Leadworth, with it's gentle green hills and minimal light pollution.

"I don't think you should take her."

I raised my eyebrows. "What do you have against Kate Haylor? I thought the two of you were friends."

"We are," Amy said hesitantly. "Sort of. We're on the same team, we talk. That's how I know you shouldn't be with her."

I kept a light tone. "I don't see why not. She's nice enough, and a star student. I think if this were a boy you would be saying how you hope he'd influence me."

"Don't," Amy snapped. "Do not call me homophobic on top of everything else."

"You're not giving me anything else to go on."

"I hear how she talks about you."

Still unconcerned, I adjusted my bag on my shoulder. "Yeah? How's that?"

She was quiet, as if she was plotting her next move.

I didn't press, willing to drop the subject at any point and never speak of it again.

"I'm going to say something harsh," she said carefully, and glared when I scoffed. "But it's true. All she cares about is your money."

"Kate's used to a certain lifestyle," I said slowly. "But so am I."