Of Scissors And Scooby Doo

Chapter 3

You know, this morning I looked into the mirror and thought: Tori, don't get your hopes too high up, it's only going to bite you in the butt again. Expect nothing, then maybe you'll get something.

And boy, did I get something!

I decided I would change my way of approaching Jade. And by changing I mean stopping. Even though she talked to me yesterday and I could see glimpses of the old Jade, my Jade, I figured that after I walked away from her with the announcement that she wouldn't get rid of me so easily, Jade would try to build her walls up even higher. Maybe even add an electric fence, just to be sure. So I didn't even bother to talk to her at all today. Instead, I focused on her friends.

Cat was first.

"Hey Cat!"

She turned away from the soda machine and smiled when she saw me. "Oh, hey Tori! How are you?"

"I'm good, what about you?"

"I'm great," she chirped happily and held up a can of Wahoo Punch, "I just got a soda! See?"

She giggled and made the can dance in front of my face. I nodded, my mouth in a tight smile. I still find it weird how the smallest things could excite this girl. For a moment I wondered why Jade and Cat were even friends, why they spent so much time together. I mean, they seemed to always be together, especially when Jade wasn't with Beck... It's not like I was jealous or anything but... it was weird. "That's great. So hey, I was wondering... if you could help me with something."

Cat nodded eagerly. "Oh, yeah sure! I love helping people!"

"Okay. See, here's the thing: Everyone is so nice to me here and I'm so happy about that but... there's one person who's... confusing me, I guess."

"Who?"

"Jade. And I don't really understand what's the deal with her."

Cat's head cocked to the side. "What do you mean, 'the deal'?"

"Well, I'm just wondering why she's so weird to me..."

I lean forward a bit as I looked at her expectantly. Maybe she knew something, something that I could use. But all she did was take a deep breath and shrug her shoulders. "It's just the way she is. She doesn't like..."people" very much." I was a little confused by the use of air quotes but I let her continue. "When I first met her she didn't want me around either. But now we're best friends!"

Bang! Why didn't she just shoot me right then and there? Maybe I lied. Maybe I was jealous. But Cat was smiling at me so happily that I couldn't find even one little spark of anger toward her in my body. "Oh. I see." I forced a smile when Cat blinked up at me and hoped she didn't notice the disappointment that welled up inside of me at hearing her words. Jade obviously hadn't told her that she knew me before I showed up here three days ago and I wouldn't even think about telling anyone. There had to be a reason Jade didn't want anyone to know and I respected that. I mean, she didn't even tell her... best friend... about me. "How long have you and Jade been friends for?"

"For about two years! We both applied here the same year and we met at our auditions. Andre, Beck and Robbie too." She then started to launch into a weird story about her brother and potatoes and I figured I wouldn't get any more information out of her.

Next on my list was Andre but... he didn't really have that much to say other than that she could be pretty nice if she wanted to, but that it apparently didn't happen very often. Then he began playing on his keyboard and the conversation about Jade soon slipped into a discussion about the fact that nothing rhymed with orange.

All that I got from Robbie was that he was kinda scared of her and while he considered Jade to be his friend, he didn't think Jade thought the same about him. Oh yeah, and his puppet thought she's smoking hot, with which... I really couldn't argue to be honest.