Vinny

7. Man Down

Still concerned about last night, and without having seen Ian in any of their shared classes, Doug sat down at the group's lunch table with a lot on his mind.

"You still worried man?" Kyle asked. Doug had been brooding at the table, just looking down at his food, not really contributing to the group conversation much. It was almost like the group mentally lost Doug, who sat there quietly barely in the conversation.

"Yeah..." he said while drifting back to silence, just thinking about everything and how it came about. He was never the partying type. Why Chad? How did they know each other? I never thought he would get involved with a group like that. The group growing increasingly aware of the weight on Doug's mind, their conversation died down, just together sitting in mostly silence, twiddling the food onto their forks, waiting for the lunch period to be over.

Briiing

* * *

"I'm actually really excited to go to this party," Jess said to Cassie, the girl who had become one of her closest friends for the last year ever since she started dating Kyle. Well to be fair, the only reason they got along so well today is because they always seemed to be getting dragged along with whatever wild plans Kyle and Vinny had come up with. In the end the close bond between the two boys ended up forming just a close of a bond between the two girls. "Especially since this will be the first year you and Kyle will get to wear a couples costume, right?"

"Yeah, we met at that huge Halloween party at Jimmy Campbell's house last year that like, half the school was invited to."

"Right!" Jess said remembering the bits and pieces of the event. Dylan Rutger got so drunk he fell asleep right next to the pool and rolled into it in his sleep, safe to say that was a good wake up call for him. She didn't remember Kyle talking to Cassie at the party, but she did remember that he kind of just disappeared for the night at some time past midnight. However, though most of the night was bits and pieces there was thing she remembered clear as day, she and Vince looked stunning in their couples costume.

"You and Vinny did superheroes last year right?" Cassie asked although she was pretty sure she remembered that right.

"Yeah, I was Captain Marvel and Vince was Captain America, like he kept saying it didn't make sense because they never dated but I said it was fine, a lot of couples costume pairs aren't actual couples. Like besides a few fanfics, the wolf and red riding hood never got it on, but Mark and Suzie looked really good last year."

"Oh, yeah you're right, he was always cutely chasing her around."

"So anyways, I thought since we are both doing couples costumes, we should all fit into the same theme."

"Oh, so that's why we are doing Disney guys and gals?" Jess asked, surprised because that was not the reason she had in mind. "I thought you just saw that I would be a perfect Belle."

"More like Kyle's a perfect fit for the beast." Jess said with a slight laugh that turned to a sigh fast. Cassie had been confiding in her for the past couple months about her uneasiness with Kyle as of late. She understands that he dropped off of the baseball team because he wasn't as into it as he used to be. He would always talk about how he felt like he was drifting further and further from the other guys on the team, but he truly loved the sport, and put up with his teammates in order to continue playing. She also understands that when Vinny asked him to watch the NSEUT and then asked him to join the team, he was just doing it to kill some time, but as Kyle started to play more and more he realized the Esport had just as much excitement to him as baseball did at the time, and since he got to play with his friends he really got into the game. Finally, she understands that it's not his fault that girls liked him, that they would come up and talk to him like she was invisible. He had never actually shown feelings for another girl, like he did pick her over those other girls after all.

"Cass... Cass... earth to Cass," Jess said as she snapped in front of her friends' spaced-out face.

"Uh yeah, just thinking about stuff."

"I know hun," Jess responded, using Cassie's own term, "you should call him about the costume."

"Yeah okay." Cassie responded as she walked away to call Kyle, Jess took this time to call Vince about the costume situation on her end.

"Hey Vince... Yeah we just got to the costume shop now, you're still going to dress up as my prince, right?... Perfect!... Okay Vince, Talk to you later." Well that was very productive Jess thought to herself, in a matter of a minute she got her whole Halloween costume locked in. She only had to wait for Cassie to come back and they would start shopping for pieces to put together their costumes.

If only Cassie's conversation had been as streamline as Jess'. She came back to join up with her friend after a good ten minutes.