Chapter Text
“We gotta head out kiddo. Can’t be late for work.”
“But Pauuuuuuuuul,” Richie draws out behind his toothbrush, “I’ll be sitting outside forever with nothing to dooooo.” But really, who leaves for a work meeting at 6:45 in the morning? On a Friday of all days, a Friday that has been vigorously blocked out on the calendar for over a month in bold red lettering reading: STUCO FIELD TRIP.
Richie wasn’t too fond of student council, but it had its benefits. Like no jocks or cheerleaders daring to join in fear of their popularity being smited, meaning the group chalked up to being a group of the nerdiest losers at Hatchetfield High. Luckily, all his friends fit into that category. And this day was one of the few times a year where they got rewarded for their academic endeavors and boy, did they milk it.
See, if you were voting on the location for your upcoming club field trip and your friends took up most of the council, the results would automatically be skewed in your favor. So, with one vote for Lakeside mall, three for Cineplex specifically, and a whopping six votes for Hatchetfield Natural History Museum’s Dinosaur Emporium, the most auspicious attraction won by a landslide.
An impatient foot begins tapping in the middle of the hallway when reality steals him from his inner rambling. He spits out his toothpaste and grabs his drawstring from his bedroom floor, turning on the light to find his shoes he definitely hadn’t forgotten to put on yet.
His uncle calls to him over his own footsteps clomping downstairs, “You can always catch a ride with Ruth if-”
“Nope! I am never riding in her car again, the woman is a speed demon,” he yells back. It’s true. Richie had only seen the speedometer read 10 miles above the speed limit with Ruth in the driver’s seat and he wasn’t willing to risk his safety this morning. He grabs the Converse he wants, the bright red ones that are still clean and fresh looking after having been shucked into the back corner of his closet since last Christmas. He has been saving them for a day like this, nothing and no one to tarnish them.
“I’m pretty sure I’ve seen her drive on the sidewalk to cut traffic once,” he shudders.
Paul laughs, “As I suspected. Alright, out the door, bud.” He holds out his worn leather jacket for Richie to grab. Which mind you, he would not be caught dead wearing. Why would he ruin his perfectly good outfit? For the weather? Absolutely not, especially when he just rearranged all the pins on his vest for the special occasion.
“I’m coming, I’m coming,” he dramatically sighs, begrudgingly accepts the coat from Paul’s hands, and trudges outside. He swings the car door open and curls up in the passenger seat like a small cat, the coat blanketing his long legs. He opens his bag to double check he packed all the necessities: water, insulated lunch box, inhaler, 40 bucks, notecards, a handful of pens, his camera, Nintendo switch and phone, and- Ah fuck, Ruth still had his headphones. He digs his phone out and winces as the blue light blinds him momentarily before his eyes adjust. Damn his late-night doom scrolling. After a few hard blinks, he opens the group chat with his fellow field trippers.
Dinosaur (Museum) Train
Reminder ruth you still have my headphones !!!
6:41a
Petey 6:41a
Rich, you pulled an all-nighter??
No i just woke up paul has stupid work ;((
6:41a
PbJ 6:41a
omg the night owl has become the early bird
Reese’s Pieces 6:42a
Welcome to the team pal!
Stfu <3 u guys r gay
6:42a
PbJ 6:43a
we all are idiot <3
wait are you already going to school
Ya, wut abt paul and work didn’t compute 4 u >:P
6:43a
Petey 6:43a
There goes my peaceful morning...
Nobody asked ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Anywayyy ruthie when you wake up p l e a s e grab my baby b4 you leave
6:44a
“Is your seatbelt on?” Paul grabs his attention with a question he knew the answer to. Click!
“It is now.”
“Rich, we’ve talked about this,” His uncle puts on his best strict ‘this is serious’ voice.
“It’s fine!” the teenager groans, “We’re fine, nobody died. I forgot, okay?”
“Okay...”
“Okay!” He punctuates, focusing singularly on the blue-lit screen.
“Okay,” Paul’s stern demeanor subsides into something apologetic as he anxiously thrums his fingers on the wheel. He sharply exhales through his nose, clicking his turn signal on, “I know you’re bummed about waking up early today and messing with your schedule, but this conference was moved very suddenly and there wasn’t time to change the date. I would’ve worked this out if I could.”
“I know that, Paul. It’s no biggie,” he stretches his arms above his head with a yawn, almost dropping his phone in the process. He makes a pitiful wincing noise as he attempts to catch the sacred device and dryly chuckles, “Being out of school is all that really matters today.”
The reduced chance of Jägerman and his goon squad coming to smash his head in before class, he means, but he chooses to omit that to not further upset the already wound-up driver. He massages his bright white shoelaces between his ring finger and thumb, staring down at his lap. His only pair to have escaped being thrown in the dumpster by the student parking lot or flushed down a toilet before football practice, and he intends to keep it that way.
“And the educational experience,” Paul footnotes. The boy could clearly hear the swirly and obnoxious laughter that sentiment would have cost him, making his scoff all the more bitter.
“You say that as if I didn’t go to the museum for Ruth’s birthday every year for, like, 8 years in a row. She had me memorize all the fun factoids before I knew my times tables,” Richie can’t help but grin at that, even in his angsty internal monologuing.
He thinks he could quote the entirety of The Land Before Time and Jurassic Park because of his best friend’s obsession. The three of them - Ruth, Peter, and him - surely scratched those CDs into dust with how much the girl replayed them after every party. She honest to God looked close to having heart attack when Steph so nonchalantly mentioned she hadn’t seen either film last week. So, the tradition continues as she is bringing both for tomorrow night’s sleep over. He can’t be too judgmental with how many times he catches his friends absentmindedly humming Merry Go Round of Life because of him. Those little things were what got the three of them through the heartache (or physical ache) of middle and high school.
“You never know,” the man claims, returning a smile, “Maybe you’ll see the information in a brand-new light,” pulls to a gentle stop by the foyer.
“Look! One of your little friends is here already.”
“Huh?” He shuffles to face the car window to see a small shape sprawled out by the building’s front entrance. Even in the dim light of the morning, he could recognize the pastel pink backpack in the figure’s clutches from a mile away, usually zipping past his vision as the high-strung girl who wears it steamrolls his shoulder.
“Why is Grace so early?”
“Don’t know. You can ak her yourself. By getting out of my car,” Paul swoops his arm, an emphasis for his nephew’s exit.
“Alright! Message received,” he pushes him playfully, plods out of car, waving goodbye, “See ya later, Paul.”
He cups his hands around his mouth before yelling a “Love you!”
“Love you too, kid! Have a wonderful day! Learn something!” his uncle hollers out the window as he steers out of the school zone.
His watches the bumper of the gray Honda Accord shrink into the distance before turning heel to further analyze this whole Grace situation. Surprisingly, she isn’t viciously scribbling down Bible verses or whatever she does in her spare time. She is slumped against the small alcove before the dark metal doors, asleep. Her legs fold in an oddly rigid way beneath her, arms strenuously wrapped around her middle, and it is the first time he has seen her posture so limp and far from its usual height and practiced nature. Even her perfectly pinned back hair has become unkempt, sticking up in odd places, not dissimilarly to his own.
He adjusts his bag close to his chest to minimize the clattering of his items and holds his breath as he slowly, very very slowly, sits in the closest corner to Grace. Now being up close, but not too close he calculated, he hears her chattering teeth and notices her shiver as the wind picks up ever so slightly.
He considers waking her, asking a million questions about how, why and when she showed up, lending her Paul’s jacket maybe, but quickly distinguishes the thought. Grace and Richie are… friends? Sure, they had classes together and walk among the same social circles, but they don’t hang out. I mean, why would they? Outside of school projects, there didn’t appear to be any common ground between them. He would probably freak her out with his pestering questions or bore her, repulse her even with his anime tangents. Still, she looks uneasy, which is uncommon for her, to Richie’s knowledge, but especially for anyone who should be peacefully sleeping. On concrete. Outside. In the ungodliest hour of the morning.
Obviously, that might disturb someone’s sleep! That’s literally it and he’s reading signs that aren’t there.
Although thinking about it, Grace’s peculiar behavior did not come about randomly this morning. She has been acting weird, and not just Grace weird, for the past month or so. Like showing up late to study hall, out of her holy grail of mechanical pencils weird. Like not passing deceivingly cheery fliers in the hallways or protesting PDA weird. Like being the sixth voter for the museum trip weird. Apparently, Ruth convinced her at the last minute to choose something other than some old Michigan church uptown. The Flemwad convinced Grace Chastity Belt to not go to church. She has been baffling him a lot lately, but sleeping outside the school, bike rack empty, and shaking like a leaf weird has been the most concerning of all.
His moral dilemma solves itself as Grace jolts awake, nearly hitting her head on the back wall as it shoots up in from its rag doll position. He hadn’t realized he’s been staring, but he’s definitely staring now because Grace takes one look at him and yelps, hiding her face and wrenches her body towards the doors. He fumbles hastily to seem like he’s doing something, anything else besides boring two eye-sized holes into her side.
Richie pulls his switch out from his bag and gawks at the black screen instead, not too keen to start it up quite yet. He could still hear her frozen teeth, but now her throat whistles painfully and she sounds on the brink of tears. He wants to reach out and wrap her in a warm hug, but what if it’s too much? Too soon? Too weird? Grace probably wants to be alone, needs space and time without him trying to figure her out like she was a hidden deluxe mystery toy at the bottom of a cereal box. That was probably why she was out here in the first place. He reluctantly powers his switch on, but to his dismay, it blinks and loudly whirs to life.
‘I object! That was...objectable!’
Shit. He thwacks the machine, once, twice, three times to get it to shut the fuck up. He jams his finger into the pause button, relief briefly washing over him. He cranes his neck back to Grace as she scrubs her face and stares at him, or through him more accurately, with wide puffy eyes.
“Good morning?” he squeaks out.
Her lips stay clamped firmly shut, no response formulating, only her now scrutinizing gaze scanning him as he did her moments ago. Her chest spasms with her breathing. She traces patterns over her knuckles before she flattened her top hand over the other, forcibly stopping the movement. Her ankle rolls and rolls and rolls before she grabs it too. He knew Grace to be intense, but right now she just looked tense. Before she spoke, her mouth unlatched a couple of times, any remark retreating before it ever makes it past her bolted jaw.
“What time is it?” she lands on, now focused on brushing through her tangled hair with her fingers, her usual brightly colored clips nowhere to be found.
“Mmh,” he checks the time on his switch diligently, as to not set it off again, “It's about to be 7.”
Her eyebrows shoot towards her hairline, “…You’re early.”
He assumes she was surprised or confused. He always had trouble with the difference between the two emotions.
“Yeah, my uncle has a meeting this morning.”
She simply nods, the answer being sufficient for her as her brows fall into their earlier position. Grace finally peers downward, halting her interrogation of Richie, and starts scuffing a small rock around with the tip of her foot. Her hair falls back out of place, but she makes no attempts to move it again. The boy takes the opportunity to start questioning her.
“So did your parents drive you or?” She pointedly kept her head down, fixating on the shifting pebble. It reminds him of how he skillfully avoids cheerleaders’ whispered snickers following he and his friends down the halls.
“No. I walked,” she rasps.
“Oh.” Not the answer he first expected, but Grace seemed the type to have exceptional direction. He slides across the concrete into a more conversational distance with his kinda-sorta-aquaintance.
“When did you get here?”
“Um-” she thickly swallows something caught in her throat before responding, uncertainty wavering her voice, “An hour ago, I think.”
“Shit, that early?” he grimaces, debating putting a comforting hand on her back.
“Language!” she twists to curtly glare at him once more, crossing her arms over her chest.
“Sorry!”
Grace harkens back to her thousand-yard stare and Richie feels in his bones that he blew it. So long bonding moment, hello awkward interactions and narrowly avoiding each other for all eternity. The universe damns the concept of him making any more friends after the Jägerman reign overthrew the Hatchetfield Nighthawks yet again. Defeated, he mutes his long-forgotten console and scrolls through the games list. Luigi’s Mansion seems fitting for his currently glum predicament. Though he doesn’t get very far in his game play before he feels a light tugging on his shirt hem.
“Did you fall?” a meek whisper asks.
“Huh?” He faces the source.
“Your knees,” the voice, Grace, explains, pointing out the dark scrapes on them. Huh. Max had probably shoved him onto the sidewalk last night or something. Or Kyle. He doesn’t keep track anymore.
“Uhh, oh yeah, I fell.” He clears his throat, because he’s an amazing liar. Totally. Something about her confused head tilt and unsure hum tells him maybe she doesn’t believe him.
“Does it hurt? Because, I have an icepack in my lunchbox. Or wait! Actually I...” she unzips the front pocket of her backpack and fishes a thin cardboard box out, “have Band-Aids with me.”
She presents a couple to him, a dash of hesitancy mixes through her words, but sounding surer of herself than moments before. Looking it too, her shoulders and back far less hunched. He accepts the peace offering easily.
“Wow, thank you,” Richie peels back the waxy wrappers to reveal pastel hues and cutesy stars decorating them. Not his style per say, but he cannot deny their charm as they securely stick to his skin.
“It’s nothing,” she insists, “I always have some on hand, especially at school.”
It is then he notices a matching plasticky shine neatly crisscrossing over her elbow. The grooves of a locker undeniably bruise her upper arm. He has apparently memorized that pattern based on how quickly he recognized it. Maybe a bonding moment won’t be as farfetched as it seems.
“So, um...you feel excited about today?” he wonders, his hope growing with each word.
“Oh sure,” she was staring at him owlishly. It was becoming a little ominous at this point. Was he meant to say something different? Something more maybe? Okay. Okay.
“Ha, uhm, hopefully it’s better than Cineplex. It’s so dinky and-and overpriced,” he forces out an awkward laugh.
She pulls yet another face Richie couldn’t decipher. Not that the phenomenon was unusual for him, but it always made him wary of what they could be thinking. Was she nervous? Disoriented? Bombarded by his social ineptness? He could never tell. Her brows knit together, and she puffs her cheeks, blowing air out. She starts to mindlessly draw shapes on her knuckles again. Maybe she couldn’t tell either. Maybe he should ask.
“Huh. Yeah, my parents never go to places like that. Theaters are a cesspit for raunchy teens to eat greasy food, get handsy and smoke drugs in the parking lot,” Right. He almost forgot who he was talking to for a second.
“In fact, they were not too sure about me coming here either, because they didn’t believe in evolution. Or dinosaurs.”
Or maybe she would answer in the calmest voice for what was the most bat shit crazy thing he’d heard all morning. Granted it wasn’t hard to be true at 7am on a Friday. At least this is an interesting base he knows how to build upon without the discussion fizzling away.
“What do you mean ‘didn’t’? As in past tense?” he questioned, gently setting his elbows onto his crossed legs, placing his head in his hands, his interest piquing at her statement. What can he say? He was eager to figure out the anomaly that must be the Chasity household. Who in town isn’t?
“Mhm,” she plays with fingers, tapping out an unknown rhythm on them like ivory keys on a piano, “Um, the church my parents used to go to was like, super Evangelical and culty and stuff. It’s why we moved to Hatchetfield when I was born. Cuz the ministry turned out to be... y’know. Pretty terrible.”
Wow. That was super forward and direct. No beating around the bush or lengthy introductory whatsoever. When did Grace Chastity become the easiest person to talk to? 10/10 explanation if you ask Richie. He was consistently used to scouring for meanings in convoluted conversations, trying, and usually failing, to understand his fellow peers; Grace’s straightforward nature finally strikes a chord with him. Probably because she wasn’t yelling about Jesus in the middle of third period. Frankly, he never expected to have a normal Jesus conversation with anyone, but here he is.
“Oh my god- gosh,” he rectifies before Grace can, “That...makes a lot of sense. How did you end up in Hatchetfield, if you mind don’t mind me asking?” She stops her fiddling, something stirring behind her expression.
“Uh. No,” Shit. He was prodding too much. This is extremely personal, and he overstepped. Way to go Shitlips.
“No, I don’t mind, I mean,” she quickly shakes her head and squeezes her eyes shut for a moment. Like she needs to reset the pieces of her puzzled thought process before continuing, “So. We’re from Ohio, and Mama and Daddy grew up with that church, but they left when they had me. The church used to...used to...what’s the- the word for forcing people to do stuff?” She snaps as if trying to will the unlit lightbulb to ding above her head.
Richie pauses his incessant nodding to rattle answers off, “As in guilt tripping? Pressuring, coercing-”
“Coerce!” she exclaims, her enthusiastic hands now coming in to animate the story, “The deacons would coerce people into giving all their real money to trade it out for like, fake, illegal currency to ‘make offerings with God’ and ‘help cleanse the town’ which doesn’t make any sense- But!” she backtracks, and begins almost in a mantra, “That’s because I was taught better. They thought it was normal, but you can’t really raise a baby without real money. So, they left with nothing and didn’t tell anyone. I never met the rest of my family because they hardly leave town. Hatchetfield was cheap and tiny, nobody could come looking for us. Plus, Witchwood Forest is too big and creepy to search through.”
“That’s insane. They went to a church which basically said dinosaurs were fake? Cuz, what? Noah didn’t bring them on his ark or something?” he jokes, crossing his fingers he doesn’t offend her.
“I mean, yes. Kind of,” she chuckles. Richie - 1, Social awkwardness - 0, let’s go, “Dinosaurs are evidence of evolution, which was strictly against creationism, and therefore forbidden to teach in town. The people thought it was blasphemous.”
“So... they said dinosaurs can make you go to Hell?” Ruth would get a kick out of this story.
“That’s what they thought. But like, you don’t know what you don’t know, y’know?” She looks to him for confirmation and the curious boy keeps nodding like his life depends on it. She continues with more conviction.
“I mean, even their school curriculum prohibited almost all science outside of cooking and some nursing techniques. So, I told them serpents used to be dinosaurs in the Garden of Eden and that helped them understand!” she takes a moment to catch her breath and think before rephrasing, “Or, well, more like made the processing of their existence a bit easier.”
“The what garden?” he absently asks. He hadn’t stopped listening on purpose, this story was just a lot to take in all at once. It didn’t help that the rising sun was getting in his eyes now, making it ten times harder to focus on anything but his blindness.
Grace’s face drops and her antsy ankle begins corkscrewing again, “Never mind.”
“No, really! My parents were crazy religious too, so I don’t exactly have a positive perspective of Bible stuff.” He prattles, raising his arm and repositioning his head so the big oak tree on the lawn would block the sun’s white glare.
“My parents aren’t crazy,” she bolsters from her shady spot, the lighting contrast only accentuating the deep lines on her face.
“What?” His eyes blow wide open as he quickly tries to dig his way out of the hole he talked himself into, “No! No, I didn’t mean it like that at all. Sorry, eugh stupid words...” he chides, pinching the bridge of his nose. To his surprise, Grace’s bristly exterior withdraws as she does something he had previously thought she was incapable of.
“No, it’s fine, I know what you meant. I’m sorry,” An actual apology from Grace Chasity, the most self-righteous girl in town. It seems things truly have been changing for her; otherwise, Richie is going crazy.
“I uh, I said that as a knee jerk...thing. People can be freakin’ rude about this sort of thing,” she draws her knees up and lays her cheek atop them.
“Totally get that,” Richie tentatively places a hand on her soft blue shoe, an attempt at consoling while not feeling confident in jumping to skin contact with her. So, he will do what he always does after hearing a poignant life story: give one right back.
“You probably know school has been rough for me. Dad almost transferred me to Sycamore back in elementary because of the bullying. He and my uncle went there. But my mom was really against it. We would’ve needed to move, and she didn’t want to switch churches. So that was the end of that.”
Richie is suddenly walloped by the whiplash he gave himself. From feeling like the therapist friend, to suddenly handing off the clipboard to Grace and sprawling across a long ass lounge chair as he begins spilling his deepest darkest secrets to her faster than he ever intended to. He feels rusty drawers creak in his mind, revealing what has been filed into the back of his brain for years now, and for good reason. No vivid memory emerges, but a long-forgotten swirling in his gut does.
Maybe he should change the subject before a question cuts too deep. Maybe he should have laid back in bed and taken a ride with Ruth instead of sitting in this deeply uncomfortable moment. Maybe then his brain wouldn’t have turned on yet and he wouldn’t have caught the way the girl’s hands ball into ire fists while his start to shake.
“But that’s not fair. That was not your mom’s decision.”
“I guess. But it...um, seemed easier? To let her do whatever she wanted. Compared to when she didn’t.” He does not remember much of his mother, but those Sunday morning drives, whether it be the aggressive shouting matches or oppressive silence, are hard to forget.
A warmth presses into his hand, giving it a tender squeeze. A soothing gesture. A reciprocal gift. A doorway back. Back to the front of the school. Out of that fucking backseat.
“I’m sorry,” with her second apology of the morning, his friend’s face twists into something he can pinpoint. Guilt.
“It’s okay. Seriously. You didn’t do anything. I don’t even live with them anymore. They left town my uhh- Seventh? Eighth grade year?” It sounds so soon for how long ago those times felt, “I’ve been with my uncle ever since.”
“Uncle Paul?” Grace correctly guesses.
“Uh-huh. You know him?”
“Mm, of him,” she fixes the ruffles of her socks, methodically sculpting them into defined swirls. She firmly keeps her other hand in Richie’s. “Mr. Woodward from my church talks about him every once in a while.”
“Ohhh,” Yeah, he had met Bill Woodward before. He was the type of guy with small talk you couldn’t escape and to have endless ‘back in the 90s’ stories. Not in a bad way, but in a Paul won’t invite him to the house without Pete’s brother as a begrudging buffer way. He should absolutely be the final boss for some indie video game about longwinded coworkers. “Alice’s dad. Got it.”
“Do you know where your parents went?” Soft words contrast Grace’s usual biting tone.
“Um. No. Paul says they were just... gone one morning. He reported them missing,” Flashes of memories come and go, empty cupboards and a vacant driveway, a discouraging police investigation, no school for a couple of weeks, but everything is covered in a thick layer of film and grime by his mind. “I think? I dunno. It’s all fuzzy.”
Richie goes quiet and a heavy stillness sweeps over the two teens. It is too damn early for this. But here they are. Reflecting on their childhoods with the dawning light. Grabbing ahold of each other to keep from retreating into dusty photo albums and abandoned forest trails of their pasts. They slipped on their fresh red shoes and pristine socks that frilled at the cuffs after all. A passing thought gets a quick snort out of Richie.
“Maybe they ran off to Ohio to join some sketchy Evangelists.”
“Ohio sounds pretty crummy,” Grace decides resolutely.
“Definitely,” he doesn’t even finish the word before his wholehearted cackle escapes him, Grace’s quick to follow suit. He never knew she leans into people when she laughs hard enough.
He does know, according to the number of times his phone pings from his pocket, that Ruth has woken up and started spam texting him. He opens her messages to scroll through a wall of typical Ruth ranting, in all caps is a long string of curse words. Though her last message confirms she is indeed bringing his headphones. Score!
“Is that Ruth?” Grace perks up, peeking over his shoulder. Richie jumps when he realizes how close she had gotten. She needs a bell or something.
“Yeah. She says she’ll most likely be late. She got halfway to school before realizing she left her bag at home. She lost her car keys too,” another buzz, “And her phone.”
Maybe Ruth needs little bells more than Grace. Her object permanence was severely lacking for someone who memorizes movie and musical scripts in her free time. Because she fully told him she lost her phone. Through her phone. Ruth’s keys could still be on her at this rate.
“How do you drive off without your keys?” Grace wonders.
“No no, she forgot them the second time she got home,” a final buzz confirms his hunch, “Aaaand they were in her pocket the whole time,” he explains, fully picturing Ruth ravaging her room in her search, leaving only the blatant stone left unturned. He has borne witness to Ruth’s chaotic morning routine many a time and cannot understand how she gets to school without receiving a tardy pass upon entering the vicinity.
“Of course they were,” the girl’s giggle returns with a goofy smile, making her cheeks flush.
Richie swipes out of Ruth’s contact and into the group chat to gage everyone else’s ETA. The sun was fully out from behind the horizon and disgruntled traffic could be heard in the distance. Grace’s hand flinches away as some passing cars pull into the school. One drops off a couple rowdy boys he recognizes vaguely as part of Ruth’s theater troupe, and the other parks and reveals a frazzled Miss Mulberry pushing her glasses down to scold the newcomers.
“Rudolph! Trevor! Respectful volumes, please. The whole neighborhood can hear your rough housing!”
The taller one swiftly leads them both behind the oak tree as the shorter claps a hand onto his baseball-capped head in embarrassment. Which is backwards. Ew.
Luckily, most of his friends left their houses in a timely manner and will be arriving shortly. One of which, he realizes, has not been inducted into the group chat. Obviously, he has to change that. She was technically an unofficial founder, voter #6, though unbeknownst to anyone but himself and Ruth. So, willing to beg if the situation calls for it, Richie hands Grace his phone for her to add in her number. Though his pleading is unnecessary as she gladly types it in. Richie quickly names the jumble of digits as the friend each was associated with before beginning the virtual conversation.
Dinosaur (Museum) Train
Added gc to the gc :D
7:19a
PbJ 7:19a
who
Ruthie 7:19a
YAYAYAYAY
HI GRACIEEEEEEE
GC 7:19a
Hi Ruth!
PbJ 7:19a
aha
Reese’s Pieces 7:20a
Omgoodness, Grace welcome aboard the Dinosaur Train!! 🦖🚂
GC 7:20a
Thank you.
Petey 7:20a
Oh, so Richie can add Grace, but I can’t add Steph? /j
“Oh,” Grace’s wide grin falters and her brows gain a pinch, “Um, I can leave the group chat if it’s going to bother Pete.”
“Nah, you’re good. He was just joking. That’s what /j means,” tapping the tone indicator on her screen. Her mouth curves into an ‘oh’ shape.
“I see,” she squints, “I thought it was a typo.”
“Peter doesn’t do typos. He’s the guy correcting everyone else’s spelling.” The guy wins one spelling bee in sixth grade and suddenly he is the goddamn master of which the literary prophecy foretold.
“Hehe. Nerd.” Her voice could not hold any less malice.
“That’s what I’ve been saying!” Richie almost jumps from his spot, that is how excited he is. He settles on swatting the air in triumph. Grace attempts to high-five his flapping hand, which only amuses the boy more. She sticks her tongue out at him. So does he. She throws her previously forgotten pebble, missing his head by a long shot. Then she throws her backpack and does not miss, leaving Richie to gasp in fake disbelief. Grace looks in the complete opposite direction, pretending to mind her business as she whistles inconspicuously to herself.
Grace is seriously funny when she wants to be. And will totally be a force when it comes to debating his factual opinions. Oh yeah, she is going to fit right into their little group of underdogs. Is it too soon to judge? Doesn’t matter, he’s already too attached to his newly found bestie to care. Their text tones go off simultaneously and it is the first time he notices that Grace programmed hers sound like an angelic choir. She whisks her phone up from her lap and reads with it two inches from her face.
Ruthie 7:21a
Steph isn’t on this trip DUMMY
Pete stop beign meanur making Grace aixnous >:((
7:23a
Petey 7:23a
Sorry Grace!
Geez Rich, autocorrect did you dirty: *being, *mean, *you’re, *anxious.
GC 7:23a
You are good! Richie explained /j to me.
Petey thumbs up a message
I turn it off 4 u <3
7:23a
Ruthie 7:24a
Ya, you’re at your smarty pants quota today so noooo more spell check for you mister
Petey thumbs down two messages
Petey 7:24a
Everyone, stop texxting and driving! Ruth especially!!
And with Pete’s grave, grave error, the entire chat blows up with GIFs, laughing emojis, and searing comments absolutely murdering him of his hypocritical mistake. Even Reese hearts PJ’s glorious and severely un-punctuated monologuing. They are essentially pointing and laughing at him through the screen, plus the minion GIF Richie sends virtually does. What? 50% of GIFs are minions at this point, sue him.
“Hey! Don’t you fucking laugh!” As if on cue, Pete loudly accuses from across the parking lot, pointing directly at Richie through his brother’s passenger side window.
“Don’t correct my grammar then!” Richie hollers back, receiving a harsh shush from their teacher chaperone. He full on sprints over to the bright blue car, Grace scampering behind as he yanks Peter onto the pavement. Their arms swing back and forth as Richie can no longer contain his excitement in his own body. He just made a new friend! And all of them were going to spend a whole day together! Free of demented sports ballers! It is impossible to sit still under these circumstances, especially after the high of watching a former spelling bee champion fall from grace in real time.
Speaking of Grace, Richie feels waves of nervousness emanating from her once Pete clicks into his side. She’s staring wide-eyed again and rolling the fabric of her backpack straps between her fingers. He gives Pete a noogie, intent on annoying the shit out him and drawing a laugh out of Grace. Fortunately, he succeeds in both.
“Hi Peter,” Grace smiles shyly with a matching wave.
“ Hey Grace. What’s up?” Pete gently swats Richie away before running his hand over his mussed-up hair.
She folds her arms up, “I’m fine. Nothing’s wrong.”
“Um, yeah, awesome,” Pete bobs his head uselessly. Is this how he looked talking to Grace all morning? They’re extremely awkward, outside the standard error for their nerdy bell curve. “Excited for some dinosaur...stuff?”
“Yep,” she blurts. Pete defaults to a double thumbs up. What normally comes off as charming makes his floundering much plainer to anyone watching.
Are they trying to have a conversation or murder Richie in cold blood? What the two are attempting is the same thing as a felony to him: small talk. He knows that immovable objects are scientifically impossible, but these two are getting closer the longer they try to converse via tight-lipped smiles and minimal eye contact. So, he decides to be the miraculous unstoppable force in the name of friendship and being over lingering pauses. He catches Grace’s shifty gaze and gives her a little nod of encouragement. She audibly gulps down some courage and ends the miserable silence.
“But I don’t um. Don’t usually ride the bus to school! I’m a little nervous about it.”
Pete grimaces, but his rigid neck and shoulders get their relaxed slouch back, “Ah geez, hate to burst your bubble Grace but school buses are actually hell on wheels. Like all seven rings combined.”
“He’s being dramatic because he hates the bus driver,” Richie butts in with an exaggerated whisper, cupping his hand for theatrical flair.
“Hey!” Pete begins his defense, “Mr. Walker hates children and chose to work with them! I have no sympathy for the old man, I just don’t.”
The rough edges smooth into easy banter as the three collectively relax into a much better flow. Apparently, Grace is obsessed with The Magic School Bus, which spurs Pete into a boring ‘but the scientific inaccuracies’ lecture before three loud honks rip through the air as a familiar pickup with picturesque blue fuzzy dice snags a parking spot.
PJ leans on the horn one more time, grinning like it was her personal mission to interrupt Pete ‘Um, Actually’ Spankoffski . She slides out, opens Reese’s car door like the gentleman she is, and lazily salutes the group. The horn was abrupt, but the squeal Reese unleashes makes Richie jump out of his skin.
"Good morniiiiing!” She singsongs like the Disney princess she is. Seriously, someone had to have pushed her down an enchanted portal well into the real world, because the girl has all the ingredients of a quirky 2010s cartoon baked into her being. Reese darts over and wraps each of them in her signature bear hug, back pats and all. She pulls away from Grace and cringes at her shellshocked look.
“Oh, sorry! Did I startle you? I've been so excited all morning, I guess I couldn’t contain myself. I’m a hugger,” Reese rambles, still holding Grace’s forearms.
“You’re fine,” Grace assures once she phases back into reality.
“Don’t worry. You get used to it,” PJ claps a hand on their shoulders.
Pete and Richie react simultaneously, “Eh, kinda.” “Not really.”
“Don’t listen to them! I’m not that bad. Promise,” Reese rubs her neck bashfully. The boys make obnoxiously over the top thumbs down and throat-cutting gesture behind her, making Grace snicker. She turns to the culprits and tries to give a believable gasp while a laugh bubbles underneath. “Stahhhhp! No no no no no. Why are you- Stop! Don’t lie to Grace right now!”
“Okay, okay! I guess your hugs are notoriously warm and fuzzy,” Pete resigns.
“See? I knew it,” she playfully pokes her arm.
Richie throws his hands up in defeat, “You got us.”
Before he continues with his teasing, his phone buzzes from his pocket. He pulls it out and answers without glancing down. Immediately, he is assaulted by Ruth’s consciousness streaming out of her mouth at 100mph with max volume. His friends don’t even have to ask who’s on the line; they hear her voice loud and clear without being on speaker phone.
“Hello to you too.... No! No, the bus isn’t here yet. You got a hot minute.... How am I not surprised?.... Aww, you love us.... Rude.... We should ask, but I’d be down with that....”
“Is that Ruth?” Grace pipes up, most definitely asking out of courtesy, not because she doesn’t know.
“That it is. She’s asking for you,” Ruth blows a raspberry on the other end.
“Oh. Um,” she holds her hand out with anticipation, “may I?”
“Yeah, go for it,” Richie gives up his phone and sighs deeply. Ruth is... Ruth, and he loves her, but her phone calls are more entertaining from afar. Yet somehow, Grace seems oddly relaxed, his phone nestled under her ear as she twirls her hair and casually chats away. Even Pete quirks his brow at Richie as if he would know better than him, which he doesn’t, so he shakes his head and shrugs.
But honestly, it’s not the weirdest thing he’s seen from her today. So, he props himself on the hood of PJ’s truck and announces to his friends,
“Who’s ready for some F-U-N today? That’s spells fun, Pete.”
“Not this again!”