For The Better

Moving Forward

As Skie walked into her drama class later that day, Maddison appeared in front of her.

"Skylar."

Skie paused. "What do you want? To make fun of me again? To rub what happened this morning in my face?"

"I'm trying to apologize, jerk."

Skie stepped back. "Oh."

Madi rolled her eyes. "Don't make this weird. I don't like you and I don't think I ever will. But you keep getting me in trouble and quite frankly its not worth my time. So I'll stop bothering you. And sorry."

Skie felt a small smile creep onto her face. "Uh, thanks. And I'm sorry too, uh, for pushing you."

"Yeah, whatever." Madi walked past and slowly sat down.

"That was interesting." Skie said to Danielle.

"Yeah. I don't know if I believe that she'll stop, but maybe she's trying? Or maybe Hazel put her up to it."

"Yeah, probably the latter."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

In the few weeks that followed the "bathroom incident" as both sisters, Hazel, and Danielle called it, things were surprisingly calm. Madi seemed to have been sincere in her promise to stop bothering Skie, which made everything a whole lot easier.

Skie also started hanging out with Hazel's friends Daisy and Lilian a bit more while practicing for the play. She really enjoyed their company and began to feel more comfortable being herself. Between that, her own friends, and her weekly meetings with Hazel, the headmistress and her parents were quite pleased with how she was progressing.

One day around three weeks later, Hazel came into Daisy's dorm where Daisy, Skie, and Danielle were practicing a scene for the play. It was early November, and the production was set to be in about 2 weeks.

"Oh, hi Hazel!" Daisy paused in the scene. 

"Don't mind me, you guys finish." Hazel laughed and sat down on Lil's empty bed to watch.

"I told you, Sher Lockholmes always gets her man." Daisy slid back into character.

Danielle moved forwards towards Skie and lightly pushed her back. "Look at you. You've taken everything. My spotlight, my fans, even my dress?!"

Skie pushed back. "I was tired of always being in your shadow, waiting on you hand and foot. Gwendolyn do this! Gwendolyn do that! And what did I get in return?"

"Um, a giant paycheck? A backstage pass to all my concerts? What more could you want?"

Daisy cut in. "She wanted to be you, Miss Shyne."

All the girls paused. Then Danielle snapped out of character, "And scene!"

Hazel began dramatically clapping and the three bowed.

"Is that actually the end of the scene?" Hazel asked.

"Nah, then I get arrested and get to scream 'I will NOT remain silent', but we need other characters to do that."

"I see. Anyway, I have great news! I'm the head of makeup crew and I talked Hannah into helping me!"

The three girls grinned.

"Hazel, what about Lil?" Daisy asked.

"Daisy, do you actually want Lilian doing your makeup? I don't think she knows the difference between eyeliner and lipstick."

"Fair point."

"Hey! I totally do!" Lil huffed as she walked through the door.

Everyone looked at each other and then cracked up.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"Hazel, can we postpone our meeting? We need to put up sets for the play today." Skie said, bouncing into the discipline room where Hazel was waiting for her.

"Oh shoot, that's today? I'll come with you. Here, let me put this tea in some travel mugs."

A few minutes and two mugs of tea later, the girls were headed out to the garage where the sets were kept.

"So the play is in a week, huh?"

Skie nodded. "Next Friday. I'm kinda nervous."

"Ah, you'll do great."

Skie rolled her eyes. "You can't guarantee that, Hazel."

"No, but I can guarantee that you'll look great, so there's something."

Skie laughed as the two friends continued onwards.

AN: And we're back! Sorry for the very long wait, but taking a step back helped me figure out how I want the plot to finish. We're getting near the end, but there's still quite a lot left to happen!

Next up, the play! I know this chapter was a bit shorter, the next one will be too. This is mostly just set up for the final conflict *dun dun dun*