Shortcake - A Richpez Story

Chapter 3

A/N: Honestly, I just put this song in because this is an awesome song, and Florence is an awesome artist. Also, this song helped me write this chapter. So yay. ALSO, I haven't seen any StarKid in person, so all the panels and musicals I've seen have only been online. Sooo if you can't tell already I don't know too much stuff. I only just discovered StarKid a few months ago, so not all my information will be correct.

Jaime's POV

Jaime looks at Lauren sleeping, feeling guilty for waking her up after last night.

"Lauren," she says softly, "wake up. Do you want to go to rehearsals today?"

Lauren's eyes snap open, and for a moment she looks panicked. Her eyes lock on mine and I see her visibly relax.

"W-what?" She stutters.

"Rehearsals. Do you want to go today?"

"Yeah. Yeah, yeah, of course."

"Are you sure, last night was...."

"No, I wanna go. I need something to keep my mind off it."

Jaime looks at her for a moment, contemplating whether she should let Lauren go. In the end, she decides to let her go, but she decides she'll keep a watchful eye on Lauren just in case.

They hop into the car where a quiet, five minute drive to Starlight Theatre awaits them. Lauren says nothing when they are greeted by the other StarKids who've already arrived, offering nothing but a small smile. Jaime glances at her during rehearsals, making sure she isn't on the verge of breaking down or anything, but Lauren continues to smile her way through dance moves and lines. Pretending.

Joey's POV

I watch Lauren suspiciously, wondering what is up. Her smile is just a little bit too wide, her movements lack the enthusiasm they once had, and her beautiful brown eyes don't shine like they usually do.

Wait, beautiful? When did I start thinking things like that? I can't be thinking like that, not now!

For a moment, I lose myself in thoughts, and then I realize Lauren is slipping off into the hallway looking pretty distressed. Making sure I don't have any parts coming up, I follow her. I peek around the corner and see her sink down next to the wall, breathing heavily enough for me to see. She brings her knees up to her chest and rests her head on them. I slowly walk up to her, almost unsure of what I should do. I'm her best friend, so I want to go and hug her, but would that be weird? Does it really matter now? Lauren just needs someone right now.

I feel a tap on my shoulder and turn around to see Jaime, who looks worried. She brings me away from Lauren to speak to me.

"What's wrong?" I ask.

"There was an incident last night," Jaime replies, making me instantly nervous.

"Was it Will? Last I talked to Lauren she said that Will was talking to her again, and he isn't a good person," I say, "but that was a while ago, she kind of stopped talking to me after a while."

"Yeah, she stopped talking to everyone, including me, but it's not Will's fault she's feeling crappy. I mean, she went to go see an old friend last night, but she never said who it was. Maybe what happened last night wasn't the only issue."

"So...you gonna tell me what happened last night, or no?" I mutter.

She lightly punches my shoulder. "She got mugged by this drunk dude, and he chased her all the way up to the apartment. It just shocked her. Pretty badly by the looks of it."

I look back behind the corner to see Lauren curled up, shoulders shaking slightly. "Wow, that's...terrible."

"Yeah. She keeps trying to keep things inside, just like when she distanced herself from us, but I think she really needs someone. And I don't think it's just the mugging that's gotten to her," Jaime explains.

"I don't think so, either," I agree.

"You should go talk to her," she suggests, "you guys have always been really close. Hell, you're almost more of a best friend to her than I am."

I shrug, suddenly a bit embarrassed. "I guess so."

I walk over to Lauren and put my arm around her shoulder, which she jumps at, and her head snaps up to reveal her flushed, tear-stained face. My heart instantly melts, and my stomach twists knowing how much she must be in pain.

I wrap my arms around her, and eventually she hugs me right back. I feel her tears soak through my shirt, but I don't really care. All I know is that she needs a friend right now, and I'm going to be there for her.

She pulls away, wipes her eyes, and then looks at me. "I'm sorry Joey."

I look back at her, startled. "What for?"

"I got your shirt all wet," she mumbles, looking down. "I'm sorry."

"Lo, I don't care! All I care about is you feeling better."

She looks back up at me, and I can see relief in her eyes. I don't know why she'd be so worried about that.

"Hey, we haven't had our talks in a while," she says suddenly. "I kind of...."

"Dropped off the face of the Earth," I finish.

"I'm sorry about that, Joey, I'm sorry. I just got busy and-" Lauren starts.

"It's fine, stop apologizing so much!" I cut her off. "You're fine."

A small pause. "Ok, so...what have you been up to?" Lauren queries. "You know, now that I'm actually talking to you again." She's trying to forget her few moments of weakness.

"Well, I've been meaning to talk to you about this, but since you dropped me as a friend-ow!" I laugh, as Lauren punches me in the arm, a lot less softer than Jaime, but still soft. "Ok, ok, I'm sorry. But, uh, I got a girlfriend."

When I look into Lauren's eyes, the first thing I see is surprise and hurt, but it is quickly masked.

"JoJo that's great!" She exclaims. "Who's the lucky girl?"

"Her name's Cassandra," I reply. "She's the one-"

"The one you met in the coffee shop how many months ago," Lauren finishes for me.

I smile at the thought of it. "Yeah, yeah we did."

Jaime appears and tells us it's time for us to come back because our parts are coming up, and finish off our conversation. I know that she's not really ok, but I'm just glad I was able to make her smile. I wonder why she surprised and kind of looking hurt over me dating Cassandra, but I'm sure she's probably just guilty about not talking to me about it sooner. Lauren's like that. Lauren is a funny, honest, and pretty adorable person. You can depend on her whenever, and she'll never fail to be there for you. She's the best friend I've ever had.

A/N: Just wanna say hello, I hope you enjoyed. I just wanna say that some dark and triggering subjects will be coming up, so if you don't like that...sorry. I know that Lauren would never do these things, and everything I say in upcoming chapters are obviously fake, and I would never EVER wish anything like what I'm going to bring up upon anyone. I don't wish to offend anyone or make anyone feel uncomfortable. Everything I bring up will be based on experiences of my own, whether it be with my loved ones or myself, but obviously not the exact scenarios. That would be...not very nice. Anyways, enough of my rambling. Basically, TG Warning for upcoming chapters, all scenarios of this book are fake, and I wish to offend no one, and I'm so so so sorry if I do.

I hope you enjoyed this chapter. I'm sorry for all the dark stuff. It's gonna get darker. So if you don't like that stuff sorry. That's most of what I write. Anyways, bye bye.

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