Inside Out: A ROTBTD FanFiction

Chapter 9: Art Critics

The next day, Merida was in the girls locker room trying to force her hair into a ponytail for gym class. Ending up with something that more closely resembled a bird's nest that had been trampled by elephants. All this work and she wasn't even changed into her gym attire yet.

"Need a hand?" A high pitched voice offered from behind her. She turned to see another red headed girl with friendly teal eyes. "I'm pretty good with uncooperative hair." She smiled sweetly. Her own hair kept in two neat braids on either side of her head.

Merida shrugged and sat on a bench between the walls of lockers. She looked nice enough and she really could use some help. "You can try."

The girl smiled and came to stand behind her. "You have beautiful hair." She said as she began to gently mess with it. "I would kill to get this texture."

Merida laughed. "That's what you say, until you have to deal with it."

She giggled softly and pulled the hair band back over the mass of curls stepping back to observe her work. "What do you think?" She asked cocking her head to the side like a puppy waiting to be petted.

Merida reached back to touch her newly styled hair and smiled as she felt how comfortably tight and smooth the ginger had managed to get it. "It's great!" She glanced back at her with a smile, cocking her brow a bit in skeptulation. "How did you do that?"

She shrugged with a smile and held out one of her braids that was woven with blond highlights. "I've had a lot of practice. I get pretty monstrous bedhead."

"You should see mine." She shook her head a bit laughing quietly. Suddenly realizing that they hadn't been properly introduced. "I don't think we've met. I'm Merida." she offered turned toward her so that she was straddling the bench.

"Anna." She returned with a smile. "I'm new, I just moved here from Finland. You probably know my sister Ellen though."

Merida nodded. She wasn't too fond of Ellens slightly stuck-up attitude but wasn't about to say that in front of her sister.

Suddenly girlish giggles erupted from the corner where a group of girls were standing huddled around a notebook. Merida gestured to the disruption with her head. "What's up with them?"

Anna glanced over and gave her head a shake. "I don't know. Looks like some drawing."

Merida pursed her lips and wandered over peeking over a shorter brunette to see what they were looking at.

It was a drawing. It perfectly captured an athletic blond that she knew all too well... Astrid. "Who drew this?" She asked a petite asian girl standing next to her.

"Hiccup." she answered before bursting into a fit of snickers.

Merida gasped covering her mouth with a hand to try and muffle it but luckily, no one heard it over the storm of chuckling. She should have recognized it as Hayden's sketchbook. He carried it with him everywhere, it never left his side. But how did it get in here? She glanced over at the hands that were holding the book and then followed them up to the face.

Her jaw dropped as it settled on the long freckled face of Ramona. She was pretty, she could admit that, at least when she wasn't wearing that evil grin. Merida was sure that if Ruff didn't spend so much time with her brother, she would be nicer.

Merida instinctively reached out and snatched the notebook from the blondes long fingers. "Where did you get this?"

Ruff looked up at her with narrowed, cold blue eyes, before a grin spread over her face. "He gave it to me." she said. Suggesting that he hadn't given it willingly. "Now can I please have it back, so I can return it to him." She held out her hand and wriggled her fingers.

"Go fuck yourself." Merida muttered before flipping her hair and snatching up her bag, stuffing the journal inside with unnecessary force. She could hear Ramona yelling threats after her as she hurried out of the door and into the empty hallway just as the bell rung. Guess she was skipping gym today. Who would have thought it would be for the sake of art.