Behind Their Backs || Douxie Casperan

12 || Dinner Party Problems

Based on Season 1, Episode 11: Recipe for Disaster

(Unedited, Not Proofread, 4576 words)
Trigger Warnings: Fight scenes

"Hey, Claire, can I talk to you for a second?" I ask, walking up to join the girl, who has been trying to get rid of Steve's attention for the past three or four minutes. She turns to me with a smile, graciously accepting and bidding Steve farewell. He leaves, albeit with plenty annoyance, and Claire's smile immediately drops. 

"Where were you yesterday? Jim was acting insane, and I needed someone to calm him down! He completely embarrassed himself and me!" Claire exclaims, crossing her arms over her chest as she glares at me. 

"I was..." I panic, trying to find a valid excuse. 

Then I remember I have one. 

"I was at the hospital," I mumble, pulling my jacket off my shoulder until the bandages appear beneath the sleeves of my tee-shirt. She gasps and immediately changes tone. 

"What happened? Nobody told me you were hurt! We need to go tell Ms. Janeth and—" she carries on for a few seconds before I finally clear my throat and she perks up, asking again," What happened?"

"Well, Jim was paranoid on his birthday, and after your family left him, he called me to come pick him up," I explain, and Claire reaches up to cover her mouth, guilt written all over her face. "It was storming on our way home, and I didn't see a tree branch had fallen in my path. I hit it going a little too fast and got thrown into the road. Scraped my arm up, hurt my leg, and scared Jim half to death." 

"I'm so sorry, Vicky..." Claire says, reaching a hand out towards me, "I should've asked nicely. Ugh! We should've just taken Jim home when he asked! I'm sorry. I'll... ugh." She's conflicted over what she should be apologizing for, and how much energy she should spend doing so.

"It's fine. I've been staying at Jim's house, so his mother took me to the hospital yesterday. That's why I was out," I finish my explanation and she nods with a nearly unreadable expression on her face. "Speaking of Jim..."

Her expression shifts to anger, "What was up with him yesterday? He was being a jerk."

"He was coping," I reply, and Claire raises an eyebrow. "He doesn't have good stress-coping skills. I'm not making excuses for what he did— trust me, Toby sent me videos and I had to help fish him out of a sewer." 

"A sewer?" she asks, laughing a bit. 

"It's a long story," I mumble, waving her off. "But for real, he's been struggling. This play is taking a toll on him, and he's got a lot of other stuff going on. Stuff I've been having to help him with, so I do know he's got it rough. Trust me, if I didn't already have ninety percent of Mercutio's lines memorized, I would be in his spot too." 

"But you come to rehearsal," she points out, and I nod my head side to side in agreement. She sighs after a second and admits, "I'll try to cut him some slack, but if he rewrites Shakespeare again, it's over." 

"Deal," I say, and she reaches out her hand. I grab onto it and shake it, and we both smile at each other before heading to first period history class with... ugh... Strickler. 

"Vicky, we're going home to talk to Draal. Something came up," Jim says, denying me our bike ride together to Trollmarket. Toby stands next to Jim, visibly annoyed. We're all at my locker as I'm switching out books and supplies, preparing for my ride home.

"Does this have anything to do with Strickler calling you back after class?" I ask, and Jim nods. "What is it?" 

"He's coming over for dinner," Jim reveals, and my eyes widen as I slam my locker door shut. "He's basically having a date with my mother."