Slightly Less Badass

~Chapter Fourteen~

A/N
I'm back! Hope everyone had great holidays and that everyone did well on their exams! Enjoy this (sorta) long chapter.
-----

After the fan fiasco, it sorta became every man for himself. We all retreated back up to our rooms for the night, no longer trusting each other. Jacob and David both swore that she had gone rogue and they had no idea that she was going to do that. I didn't know wether I should believe them or not but they looked angry enough that I finally decided to trust them. They couldn't even figure out when she went to the store to buy the stuff so when I go downstairs for breakfast the next morning, I'm alert for more pranks. If Rina was going off on her own, she was dangerous. Plus she had a huge advantage with her list of pranks that she's been coming up with for who knows how long. Jay and Jacob are the only ones in the kitchen so I relax slightly. They stop arguing when they notice I've entered the room.
"Watcha doing?" I ask. Jacob clears his throat but shakes his head.
"Nothing," he mumbles.
"That's a lie."
"We should go to dinner tonight," Jacob abruptly changes to subject. Jay grins but Jacob remains frowning. They're both being sketchy but I decide to ignore it because they're offering food.
"Go where for dinner?"
They both shrug.
"Well, I guess that's the end of that conversation. Did she get you guys too?" Both of them appeared to have rainbow sparkles stuck in their hair and a thin pile of it was at their feet.
"Nah she just got me. Put a bucket above my bathroom door and it spilled all over me this morning," Jay replies. He runs a hand through his hair and some purple sparkles flutter to the floor.
"Then how come you're sparkly?" I ask Jacob. This makes Jay laugh and Jacob frown.
"This dumbass took a handful of the glitter and threw it on me when I entered the kitchen," Jacob grumbles. Jay laughs even louder.
"I was hoping it was Rina coming in. I was going to throw it at her."
"Whatever."
"I said I was sorry."
"Traitor," David says angrily as he comes into the room he shakes his head wildly and more glitter falls to the floor. He resembled a dog shaking mud off of itself. There's now lots of glitter covering the floor. Someone's going to have to vacuum later. Not me, but someone will have to.
"I'm guessing the sneak is up?" I ask. He doesn't reply but he doesn't need to. Just then Rina enters the room, smiling widely.
"Talking about little old me?
"Traitor," David grumbles again. Apparently I'm not the only victim of Rina. That made me feel slightly better. She starts humming happily but we all ignore her. There's an awkward pause where nobody talks. Rina is completely oblivious to the looks Jay, David, and I are sharing. Jacob is too preoccupied with grooming his hair to pay attention to us. Already I was trying to think of some way to get back at her and I could tell the others were thinking the same thing. I grab a muffin and go back to my room to scheme. It's surprising how hard it is to think if new pranks. As soon as I think I've got a decent idea, I realize how stupid it is and throw it away. But then it suddenly comes to me and it's so clever, that I actually laugh out loud. Then another great idea pops into my head and I can't decide which is better. There's a knock on the door so I stop laughing and look over to see who it is.
"That's your evil laugh," Jay says with amusement. "Should I come back later?"
"No but I know how we're going to get back at Rina." He comes fully inside the room and shuts the door. He looks slightly excited.
"Excellent, cause I've got nothing. What's the idea?"
"It's a secret. I'll tell you once Jacob and David are with us. This especially involves David because he'll probably have to find somewhere else to sleep tonight. So what are we doing today?"
"Well Rina wants to-"
"Why should we do anything Rina wants to do," I grumble, still upset over what she did. I know I'm being childish but I really don't care.
"If I recall, you wanted to do it too. She wants to go on a boat ride to look for dolphins. It's a little cloudy but it's not supposed to rain anymore. There's some restaurant that the boat will take us to for lunch. According to the website they have really good food. After that she wants to go to some shell beach to collect shells and then take some pictures. And apparently we're going out for dinner tonight."
"Hm well that actually sounds fun. I suppose we can do that."
"Alright get ready so we can leave. Oh, and she wants us to dress nice for the pictures. She said, and I quote, 'dress like you're a typical white kid taking a cliche beach picture with your family.' I'm not really sure what that means, but that's her instructions."
-)(-)(-)(-)(-)(-)(-)(-)(-)(-)(-
"Oh my goodness gracious I'm hungry," I groan as we sit down. It was a super fun day but it seemed to stretch on forever. Also, we were so distracted today that we forgot we were in the middle of a war so we are all back to talking to each other and no evil plans have been made yet. I'd say today has been very successful.
"Oh you're always hungry. Stop whining," Rina retorts and nudges me. I glare at her.
"We ate lunch at, like, 11:30 and it's now almost 8:30. We didn't eat any snacks today. So I'll whine as much as I want to whine. You can't act like you're not starving too."
"I am," she admits. "But you don't hear me complaining."
"Oh please you were complaining all day about being hungry until you remembered you had an open pack of Skittles in your purse. Which, by the way, I'm still upset with you for not sharing."
"Oh whatever. I'm going to the bathroom."
Abruptly she stands up from the table, giving Jacob a meaningful look and David a not so subtle kick under the table. Both of them roll their eyes and mutter some lame excuse before hurrying after Rina.
"Well then," I say awkwardly. Jay clears his throat and glances around the restaurant. My plans for Rina become more intense in that moment. Why do my friends insist on leaving me alone in awkward situations. Not only am I going to do the prank I originally planned, but I will add some more things onto it just as a special thank you for leaving me with Jay again. It's like the closet 2.0. Jay clears his throat again and meets my gaze.
"Did you, uh, have you been getting my apology presents?" he asks weakly. A small blush was covering his cheeks. I can't help it, I laugh slightly. He looks rather offended but I quickly explain.
"Yes I got the cupcake that Rina ruined and the bed full of flowers. They were lovely, thank you. Jay, are you nervous?"
He nods and his face gets another shade darker. I laugh again.
"I'm sorry it's just that you rarely ever get nervous and it's kinda funny. You and Jacob like to act like you're the Man of Steel."
"That's... Superman, right?"
"Yes. Apparently you need to brush up on your superhero knowledge. I'm actually kinda disappointed with you. What was the point of watching DC and Marvel movies almost every weekend if you hardly paid attention."
"I'm sorry I'm not as obsessed with it as you are," he mutters.
"Well, you should be. They're great movies."
"Wait, you said you got the flowers?" Jay asks, suddenly looking concerned.
"Yep."
"What about the scrapbook? Oh, never mind. We were gone all day; of course you didn't see it."
He goes back to looking nervous. I'm oddly touched the sight of him. The fact that I could make Jay as nervous as our first date was somehow reassuring.
"You made me a scrapbook?"
"Ya. I actually made it awhile ago but then you know..."
"Oh. Right."
Cue more uncomfortable silence. The conversation was going well but went downhill quick. I spin around in my seat to see where Rina's gone off to but I as I scan the crowded room I don't see any of them. They're buttholes sometimes. Thankfully the waiter arrives just then. We order our drinks and some mozzarella sticks but don't get get the others anything. For a third time Jay clears his throat. I barley contain my groan; I hate small talk. It's too awkward and I'm horrible at it. Everything I said made me seem either uninterested or creepy.
"So did you have a good vacation?" he asks.
"Yes but it's not over yet. We still have two days left. Well, technically only one since we're packing and leaving the second day. Did you have fun?"
"Yea it's been great." He pauses, looking at me intently. Shit, this is about to become a serious conversation, isn't it. I don't know if I'm in the mood for a serious conversation. I'm not good at serious, either. I guess I'm not really good at any type of conversation. Maybe I should just keep my mouth shut and never talk again.
"So it appears you and Jacob are friends again? Did you make him a cupcake as well?" I quickly ask before he can say anything. He looks confused for a moment.
"Um ya. We talked. We're fine now."
There's another few seconds of awkwardness. Jay clears his throat and meets my eyes.
"Listen, Mira, I'm really super duper sorry for what I said and what I-"
"I know. I'm sorry too."
Jay looks how I feel- shocked. I most certainly did not expect myself to say that. But I find it being true, that I am sorry we didn't talk over something so stupid. All we had to do was talk but instead we just ignored each other. He's the first to recover and continues speaking. He takes my apology the wrong way, though, and starts talking really quickly like he's trying to convince me of something.
"You have nothing to be sorry for. I can't believe the thought ever even crossed my mind. We've been dating for years and I accused you of something so horrible-"
"I forgive you. And I'm sorry that I held such a grudge."
"You deserved to hold a grudge."
I don't know what to say after this so I just keep my mouth shut. I don't really know what this meant- are we back together, or are we not back together? We didn't exactly clarify. Jay is too busy searching for something in Rina's purse. I'm not really sure if I want to know what he's doing so I just choose to ignore it. Now it's my turn to uncomfortably clear my throat.
"Well that was an interesting and cheesy conversation."
"Ha yea, it was. Uh, so, Mira..."
"Yes?"
I blink in surprise as he gets up out of his seat. He hesitates then kneels on the ground. My face gets hotter than it's ever been before. Ohmygod please tell me he's not going to. Please, no. I could feel everyone in the restaurant watching us. I'm going to kill him later, he knows how much I absolutely hate a lot of attention from strangers. He already made me suffer through this once, I don't understand why we have to do it again.
"Oh, a, well we're- we're already engaged you idiot," I blurt out. He just smirks and holds something up. At first I just blink in surprise at the blue Ring Pop in his hand. Then roll my eyes at it.
"Mira, will you forgive me so we can finally get married?" He looks up at me with amusement but I can see the pleading in his eyes. I roll my eyes again as people around me silently go 'awww.' They obviously can't hear what we're saying or see that he was holding a Ring Pop otherwise they'd be very confused a they'd be judging us tremendously.
"Of course I will. Yes, you nerd."
He looks rather shocked that I actually said yes. I grab the blue raspberry Ring Pop from him and lick the deliciousness. Jay gets up to hug me and kissed me on the cheek. People around us clap. Coincidentally Rina and the others choose that moment to return. Those dummies. I really dislike them sometimes. Also, I wonder how long they've been planning this.
"Congratulations."
"I still hate you. I know you planned this," I reply to her, still licking my sucker.
"Actually Jay planned it all in his own. I didn't even know he was going to do this. I was just told to leave the table."
"How romantical," David says sarcastically and grabs one of the mozzarella sticks that just arrived. I quickly take it from him and take a bite out of it. He glares at me. Rina smirks and reaches for the other stick but Jay slaps her hand away and takes a bite out of that one. Now she's glaring at him too.
"We only got three. One for Jay, one for me, then we split the third. Get your own," I tell them.
"Jerk," Rina utters.
"Bitch," I reply without hesitation. She smiles at this. We may be adults but we still make random random fandom references in public. I don't think we'll ever grow up.
"I guess this means I have to find my actual engagement ring," I mutter to myself. After Jay kicked me out, I threw it dramatically. It landed in one of my boxes so it's in my room somewhere, I just don't know where.
"What? What did you just say?" Jay asks.
"Nothing," I reply quickly. "Don't worry about it."
Jay rolls his eyes and attempt to look angry. It doesn't last long and within seconds he's smiling.
"You better not have lost it," he says. "Im not buying you another one and I don't think that Ring Pop will last you much longer."
"I'll find it. And if I don't then I'll buy myself a new one."
Jay opens his mouth to reply but suddenly Rina jumps up out of her seat. She walks over to Jay and nudges him.
"Move. Go sit next to your fiancé so I can sit by my husband," she says and nudges him again. It was strange to hear such grown up words that relate to us. I don't think I'll ever get used to being an adult. Jay laughs and stands up. They switch seats and Jay immediately grabs my hand under the table
"I still can't believe I'm the only single one out of us. I'd thought for sure that Rina and Mira will be crazy cat ladies," says Jacob. We all laugh.
"Honestly, we thought that too," Rina says. "But look at us now."