𝑼𝑵𝑬𝑿𝑷𝑬𝑪𝑻𝑬𝑫 | 𝑐ℎ𝑎𝑠𝑒 𝑑𝑎𝑣𝑒𝑛𝑝𝑜𝑟𝑡

𝐷𝐸𝑇𝐸𝑁𝑇𝐼𝑂𝑁 𝑇𝐸𝑁𝑆𝐼𝑂𝑁

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　　 𝐎𝐔𝐑 𝐋𝐀𝐔𝐆𝐇𝐓𝐄𝐑 𝐈𝐒 𝐇𝐎𝐋𝐋𝐄𝐑𝐈𝐍𝐆 through the hallways as we try to catch our breath. Adam has just accidentally thrown a can at Leo's head and I swear you could hear the emptiness in his head. Leo isn't pleased, but we are enjoying every moment of his annoyance.

As short-lived as it is, it's feeling much longer than that. I've not been doing well since Marcus tried to kiss me and it's been weighing down on me. I haven't talked to him about it as I'm actively avoiding him, but it's not making anything better.

I can't enjoy the rehearsals anymore as Chase has made it very clear that he doesn't support Marcus being in the play any longer. As much as I get where he's coming from, there's no way I'm cutting him out of it. I keep reminding Chase that it's purely professional and outside of rehearsals, I never speak to Marcus anymore.

As much as I hate to admit it, I do really miss Marcus. He'd become such a good friend of mine and I miss the times we talked in class and tried to finish our homework together as quickly as we could. I miss cracking jokes with him during rehearsals or getting lunch with him whenever the others had dipped school for another mission.

Not only had he disrespected Chase, he'd also hurt my feelings. I told him I didn't want to kiss him and he tried to do it anyway, so I'm still angry about that too. However, all of my irritation and frustration is going nowhere because I can't talk to him about it.

Perry's nagging voice cuts through the hallway as she hobbles over to us. 'Not so fast,' she says with a bit too much of a dramatic pause between each word. 'You three have missed school yesterday and not just yesterday. It has been happening way too much as you can see in my statistics here.'

She holds up a clipboard with students' names on it, three of which are Adam, Bree and Chase's. There are plenty of checks, but also many crosses besides their names. My eyes gloss over the page when I see my name. My month has been littered with crosses too, but even I have not skipped school as often as they have.

Chase frowns as he goes over the clipboard and crosses his arms over his chest. 'You still keep your records on paper? You do know we have computers now,' he retorts. 'And indoor plumbing. . . and fire.'

'Do you really want to poke the bear?' Perry asks as she narrows her eyes at him, her finger dangling in his face.

Leo almost snorts on his drink and holds his hand over his mouth to keep everything in until he swallows. 'Do you really want to use that analogy?' he asks in disbelief as Perry lowers her finger.

Bree swings her backpack to the front and fumbles in the front pocket where she retrieves a note from. 'Here is a note from our father,' she says a bit too smugly for my liking as she hands the note to Perry.

However, Perry doesn't even read it as she shreds it to pieces. 'Just because your daddy lets you skip school, doesn't mean I have to. I always have to be the disciplinarian. It's the same as I tell my cats,' she rants and pauses to hiss like a cat. 'See you three in detention.'

Chase lets out a frustrated groan as Perry walks away and drops himself on a bench nearby. 'Great, we go on missions to save the world and get punished. This isn't fair,' he complains.

'She has no idea what we've done for her this year alone,' Bree scoffs and rolls her eyes.

'It's only detention once for all the days you've missed school, it could be much worse,' I say optimistically, but get met with annoyed huffs as a response. 'And your secret is still safe.'

'You can't say anything. You miss school all the time too and never have detention,' Leo says.

Chase leans back on the bench and frowns again. 'Leo's right. Why don't you ever get into trouble?' he asks, sounding actually very offended.