or worse...expelled! :: nat

"Shh, shh!" Kinley mock whispered as she waited for Nat to finish climbing down the terrace. She and her roommate were breaking out of Nabakza their dorm for the first time this school year. Kinley was pretty impressed, to be honest. It was the day before classes started and they were already making a run for it. Kinley looked around in the dark, making sure no security guards were around to hear them. The girls were dressed all in black (their traditional garb for sneaking out), war paint striped across their cheeks for added effect, but those Deilig guards caught them three times last year anyway!

Finally, Nat jumped off the ivy covered lattice and joined Kinley on the ground. "Success!" She and Nat shared a high five. "Let's go cause a little mayhem, shall we?"

Nat took a deep breath of the cool nighttime air as she and Kinley surveyed the school grounds. It smelled like freedom. Nat and Kinley both shared the opinion that the early curfew on unsettled students was deeply unfair, and therefore their little nighttime excursions were their way of correcting a terrible injustice.

"Let's go to the music hall," Nat suggested. Another injustice she faced here at Redfern was the inability to practice music outside of class, because the dorm walls were paper freaking thin. "I'll play some songs, and we can party allll night."

Her and Rio had mastered the art of getting through locked doors, utilizing his shapeshifting. She almost didn't want to settle, because it would mean losing that ability. Almost.

Kinley nodded at the suggestion and Seven took off into the night sky, suddenly a large barn owl. Low-light vision was a necessity for sneaking around at night; he'd keep an eye on the girls from up in the air.

"I'm so happy to be back," Kinley said as they walked through the night. She twirled in a circle, holding her arms out. It felt so good to be out here. Crickets chirped around them as they walked, but besides that the only noises came from the breeze blowing against the trees. The smell of salt wafted through the air. "My mom complained every single time I left Solas this summer. Even when I came to visit you last month. To another overloridian's estate. Like, hello."

"Ugh, I'm not," Nat said with an exaggerated shudder. She hated school, if she could just quit one day and become a musician, it would be like a dream come true. But she wasn't good enough for that, yet. Then again, if Nat had to deal with someone as crazy overprotective as Kinley's mom, she would rather be here too. Nat and her mom had their differences, but at least she was allowed to freaking go places by herself.

"What did your mom think, you were gonna get murdered at my house or something?" she asked. "I mean, I'm pretty sure Mollie wanted to murder us at times, but she didn't."

Kinley rolled her eyes. "She's afraid I'm going to get murdered no matter what I do, no matter where I go." She didn't have to get into the fact that her parents still sent chaperones with her whenever she left the estate grounds for any reason, Nat already knew that.

"Come on, you know you're happy to be back. It's gotta be nice getting away from Mollie. And you get meeee instead."

Kinley had wished for a sibling many times growing up, but she was sure happy she didn't get stuck with a big sister like Mollie. Kinley laughed out loud and then covered her mouth for a minute to stifle the noise before she continued. "That look on her face! When we tried on those dresses!"

Mollie was into sewing or something, and the last time Kinley had been at their house she had tried on the stupid dresses that Mollie made, and Nat took pictures with Mrs. Sterling's camera with Kinley in provocative poses. "Ha, that was great."

Nat laughed too. "I mean, she's here too, unfortunately," she said emphatically. As for the dress thing...served her right. Nat only did it out of revenge, because Mollie had gone through her room, found some vodka she'd hidden in there, and ratted her out to their parents. Like what the hell? Her dumb sister was always trying to get her in trouble.

"But I guess I am kinda glad to be back here with you," she grinned.

Unlike the last time they'd tried this, they actually made it to the music hall without being caught. They crept up to the back door, and Rio turned into a little beetle and crawled under it. There was some rustling on the other side, and then the door opened to reveal Rio in the form of a grinning monkey. Success!

"Open Sesame!" Kinley said as Rio worked the lock on the oterh side of the door. A wide grin grew across her face as it swung open, Nat's daemon grinning back as a cute little monkey. They'd done it!

"Take that, Mr. Bellomy!" she said, pumping her fist in the air. Their headmaster had promised them last year that if they were ever caught again they'd be suspended for a week, but fifth year Kin and Nat were way too smart to get caught again.

The girls closed and locked the door behind them, and then snuck quietly through the halls until they made it to the big room with the piano Nat had been dying to get her hands on.

"Serenade me!" she instructed, gesturing grandly at the instrument. While Nat got set up, Kinley would go dig around in the office near the piano. What did teachers leave alone in offices? She wanted to find out.

When they got to the big room with the stage and the piano and turned on the lights, Nat let out a breath at the sight. This was the hall where the band classes had their "concerts", if they could even call them that, but Nat had never seen it empty like this before. She'd always wanted to play by herself on stage before, but was too nervous to do it with an audience. But now...

As Kinley explored the offices, Nat got to exploring the piano. She sat down at the bench, her hands hovering over the keys, deciding what to play. She thought of a song she had made up herself over the summer, one that she hadn't played for anyone else yet. She closed her eyes and started to play. The acoustics in this room were phenomenal, and Nat let herself get totally lost in the music.

When she was done, she opened her eyes and looked at Kinley. "So...what did you think?" she asked, her face feeling a little warm. She trusted Kinley enough to play for her, but she was always self-conscious about her songs.

"Um, are you kidding?" Kinley asked, leaving her jaw hanging after she spoke. She used a hand to manually close her mouth. "Jaw. Dropped. That was incredible, Nat!"

She walked over and leaned against the piano. "How the did you learn to play like that? My mom tried to make me take lessons when I was, like, seven or something and wowee did I suck. Dad made me quit." Kinley looked down at the stand to see what kind of crazy notes Nat had been playing, and realized there was no sheet music.

"Did you play that from memory? Color me impressed, Natalie Sterling."

Nat had a very small, pleased smile on her face when Kinley complimented her music. Though Nat loved music and thought it was the only thing she was good at, she still lacked a lot of confidence in herself when playing for other clio, and it felt good to know that her friend enjoyed her song. "Thanks," she said. "My dad taught me, actually. It's all about muscle memory." In fact up until recently, Nat hadn't even known how to read sheet music. She'd always played by ear, until their family friend Jack taught her so that she could expand a bit. She still preferred not to use it, though.

"That's totally cool," Kinley said. Nat's dad was blind, which made it even cooler.

"So," she said, switching subjects. She scooted next to Nat on the piano bench. "Look what I found while you were out here being Miss Mozart (whoever that is)." Kinley dropped a baggie onto the shelf of the piano. "Bam."

Weed. One of the music teachers must have confiscated it from a student, but they hadn't disposed of it yet.

Nat's eyes widened. "Oh shit, Kin," she said, a smile starting to form on her face. But then she hesitated, and bit her lip. It wasn't that she didn't want to smoke; far, faaaar from it, but she had never actually stolen someone else's drugs in order to do it before. That seemed a little messed up, even for her. Plus, that was a lot of weed! It must've cost a ton, whoever's it was. "I dunno, though...it's not ours."

Kinley shrugged, the smile still on her face from her big reveal. "I mean, they prooooobably shouldn't have left it lying around." Kinley definitely wasn't against taking it, or at least some of it.

"Besides, it's the perfect crime. It's not like anyone can report it stolen."

Nat shifted uncomfortably. "It's not about getting caught," she said. When had she ever cared about getting caught? It's not like it had ever mattered, the school was never going to expel an overloridian's daughter, and everyone knew it. But when Nat broke the rules, she did it for fun, or to protest something she thought was unfair. Victimless crimes, basically. She didn't steal, or do things that would really fuck up someone's day. "Look, just put it back, okay? I can buy us some tomorrow."

Kinley sighed. "That's way less fun, but have it your way." She picked the baggy up with a frown and carried it back to the office, looking back at Nat every so often with puppy dog eyes until she was out of sight. She'd known Nat probably wouldn't go for it when she'd found it, but it was worth a try. She dropped it back on the desk she'd found it in, and turned to walk back out.

She'd just gotten back in view of Nat and was ready to call her a buzzkill when the door to the room they were in burst open.

Fuck.

Nat's eyes widened slightly, but she otherwise didn't react when the door burst open and one of the campus security guards stormed in.

"What do you two girls think you're doing!?" she demanded. Her eyes narrowed in recognition as she eyed the two. Nat and Kinley were a bit notorious among the security guards for sneaking around at night. It was stupid, why should they have to stay in the dorms past 9pm just because they were unsettled?

"Playing the piano," Nat replied.

The guard wasn't amused. "You two are coming with me. To the headmaster's office."

Kinley sighed. What a lame place to get caught--they wouldn't even have the joy of sprinting from the guards in the dark.

"At least tell me you missed us," she told the guards as she and Nat followed them out of the building. "Summer has to be pretty boring without us around."

Nat watched the security guards' faces. Two of them, including the one who had yelled at them, looked annoyed, but the third actually looked amused, as if she agreed that she missed Kinley. It had to be a boring job, Nat thought, being a campus security guard. The most exciting thing that happened around here was the occasional fight between students. Catching Nat and Kinley in the music hall would probably be the highlight of these guys' week.

Eventually they got to the headmaster's quarters. He didn't look to happy to be bothered at this time of night. Nat wondered what an old dude like him was doing up this late, anyways. Didn't old clio go to bed early?

"Classes haven't even started yet, and this is how you two decide to start the school year?" he asked, rubbing his face in irritation. "Last year I warned you girls what would happen if you sneaked out at night again."

A week's suspension. As if that was supposed to scare them or something. What a joke this place was.

Blah blah blah. Bellomy was dry and crotchety as usual. Old, miserable men had nothing to do but steal fun from adventure seeking kids. And to suspend them, as if that was some kind of punishment they were afraid of. It was a joke.

"A week's suspension," she said in mock disappointment. She only acted ashamed for half a moment before asking, "This has to be some kind of record though, right?" She looked back and forth between the headmaster and the guards who were still in the office. Had anyone else ever actually gotten suspended before the school year even officially began?

"Breaking the rules is nothing to be proud of!" Bellomy snapped. Nat had to suppress a snicker. What was the big deal, anyways? They weren't hurting anyone by going to the music hall at night. Settled kids were allowed out of their dorms at night, and most of them were barely older than Nat and Kinley. It was a stupid, pointless rule.

In the end, Bellomy wound up suspending them for the second week of classes, so that they could be there for all the introductory parts of class and whatnot. Ugh. If she was gonna be suspended, couldn't she at least miss the boring first couple days? Oh well.

"Bellomy is so dumb," she said to Kinley later, as they made their way back to the dorms. "And he's, like, ancient. I think he was the headmaster when my dad went to school here, a million years ago. Shouldn't he retire or something?"

As the friends walked out of the office having received their punishments, Kinley pointed to a photo on the wall of Bellomy from what looked like ages ago. "Look, it's Mr. Bellomy a hundred years ago," she said. While she purposely said it loud enough for their headmaster to hear, the door shut behind them before he could respond.

One of the security guards trailed behind them to ensure the duo made it back to their dorms without any other incident, but Kinley and Nat completely ignored her as they walked.

Nat wrote:And he's, like, ancient. I think he was the headmaster when my dad went to school here, a million years ago. Shouldn't he retire or something?

"I bet your dad had trouble with him, too; maybe that's why he hates us so much. Your dad is so cool." Talking about Nat's dad got her thinking about her own parents. "Ugh, my mom and dad are gonna freak. I wish I had your parents." Being home was bad enough when she wasn't in trouble.

"Look, it's Mr. Bellomy a hundred years ago."

"I didn't even know they had cameras back then," Nat replied.

"I bet your dad had trouble with him, too; maybe that's why he hates us so much. Your dad is so cool. Ugh, my mom and dad are gonna freak. I wish I had your parents."

"Maybe we can trade you for Mollie," Nat said, smiling. Despite what Kinley thought of her parents, she knew she would probably still get grounded or something. Though her parents, especially her dad, were definitely more lenient than Kinley's, even they wouldn't let 'suspended on the first day of school' slide completely. "Not that my mom would ever trade away The Golden Child."

Nat wrote:"Maybe we can trade you for Mollie,"

"Done," Kinley responded, putting her hands up in front of her. "Mollie would fit in perfectly at my house, honestly. They'd trade me in a heartbeat." She frowned as she said this. Her parents couldn't stand her, and she was nothing like them.

Nat frowned, noticing her friend's change in demeanor. She kind of understood how Kin felt, a little bit, not feeling like she fit in with her family. But she didn't have to deal with any crazy overbearingness like Kinley did. "You can't choose your family, ya know?" she said with a sigh. She gave Kin a playful nudge. "At least you have the most awesome best friend in the world, though."

"Eh, she's alright," Kinley said with a grin. She wasn't that upset about her parents--she'd given up on trying to please them ages ago (mostly because to please them she'd have to be so bored, like, all the time), but she really didn't feel like spending a whole week being berated about safety and whatever. Womp.

The besties finished their journey back to the dorm, the stupid security guard following them all the way up the stairs to their room. She hadn't been pleased when Kinley suggested they re-enter their room the way they left it, up the lattice and through the window.

Eventually they got into their beds, their daemons shifted into something comfy to sleep in, and then they went to bed. Tomorrow their fifth years would start. WOO.