from the top | rp discussion

A hallway.

Shoulders back and head held high, Yoon Ji-ae treated Rockwell's halls as though they were her personal runway — because, as far as she was concerned, they were. A silly little (perfectly tailored) uniform wasn't enough to stop her from looking as perfect as humanly possible every day at school. No; she had a reputation to uphold, and she simply couldn't settle for anything less.

But it was annoying, because people were idiots, and they didn't look where they were going, and made no effort to move out of her way. Of course, Ji-ae herself could always move, but. That wasn't the point. People were so careless and inconsiderate. When someone heading the opposite way in the hallway brushed past with just enough contact to make her bag strap slide down slightly on her shoulder, she turned to send the perpetrator a sharp look. "Excuse you."

Angel had just been trying to get to class. But, being the clumsy fool he was, he'd accidentally brushed against someone and knocked their bag off their shoulder ever so slightly. But not just anyone — the girl that he just so happened to have a crush on. "Um... sorry?" he proffered, awkwardly. His mind went blank, and he was grateful for the fact that the words he had managed to get out hadn't been stuttered.

Yet another reminder that he did not belong here, that he couldn't have been less out-of-place. Sure, he was a talented artist — to a degree — but most of his skill lay in finding things and having rich relatives who could buy him nice lenses. Then again, that's probably what the rich ones do too, except they can afford helicopters and drones for even better shots of things I can't reach. Angel wished his grandmother had chosen some other art school for him to go to.

Between practices, classes, trying to work the rumor mill and plan the first party of the year, Asher should have been more tired than he felt. But instead, he was headed down the hallway towards the front of the school where he was expecting to get final preparations for his party put in place (deliveries of the alcoholic beverages, in secret after dark, but don’t tell anyone. Wink.) Okay, sure, he was still sporting a bruise from Megara’s assault hit on his handsome face from a couple days ago, but he was over it. He’d spread the rumor of her jumping him and hitting him in the hallway, and let it escalate from there. Okay, maybe he had the unfair advantage of going to model for Kaylie and telling her a slightly exaggerated story, and then watching it spread like wildfire, but oh well. He couldn’t control everything.

As he walked down the hallway, Asher was on a mission, to get this done before he got caught. But still, he couldn’t help but smile at the terrified freshie who worked up the courage to ask him about the time and place for the party. He reminded them to keep tabs on his twitter feed, gave them a wink, and continued on his way. Which is when he saw Aleida.

“Careful, Dominguez.” He said cooly as he walked past her and her armful of books. Good, at least she couldn’t hit him without dropping her books and squashing her toes. “Someone might think you’re actually studying”

Aleida hated the beginning of the year, when teachers insisted on all these books you had to bring to class every session. It faded out over the span of the year, but at the beginning it was a nightmare. Like now, when there she was with no less than four books stacked precariously on top of one another when it would be just her luck that Rockwell's biggest blimp of hot air would come floating down the hallway. Dominguez? Really? "what are you, my coach? Or are you just trying to establish that we're enemies or something?"

How did Garret put up with Asher and all his idiocy?

At least Aleida didn't have to crane her neck to look up at him, the benefit of her height and the added inch of heels, she didn't even have to lift up her chin to look at him as long as he kept his distance. And Asher always kept his distance. She would have been content to just keep walking and go on her way, but honestly how could she resist smiling at the sight of that bruised face of his. Someone - Meg - had finally given Asher the backhanded slap action he'd been begging for since freshman year and damn it was nice to see it in place. Too bad that it would fade.

Coach? Bitch please. Asher just snorted. “Oh, so we are enemies now?” He said, fake-surprised. “I just wanted to make sure…you never know when someone is trying to play you and fuck you over.” He said pointedly. He never knew the exact details of what had gone down between her and Garrett, but that he’d seen her for the manipulative liar that she was, he’d warned Garrett, who had in turn not spoken to him for a week, then a month later Garrett had stormed red-faced into his dorm and declared Aleida public enemy Number one. Basically, she’d played his best friend, and she was trying to get away with it.

Not if he had anything to say about it.

If she wanted to establish that they were enemies, then he could establish exactly what he thought of her, and why she’d better watch her back. He could see her smiling at the bruise on his face, and he held up a hand to the side of his cheek to show it off. “A fascinating story, but not nearly as fascinating as the one you are holding in your hands.” He said, motioning to the stack of books she was carrying. While wearing heels. It was almost as if she was asking to break an ankle.

Aleida laughed at Asher's pointed words. "Enemies? Darling Asher, dear, that implies that I care about you and what you're doing." her eyes ran over him, assessing him from head to toe for a moment before shaking her head as though she pitied him, "I don't. I mean, sure, it's fun to see the bruise on your cheek. But I really don't care about how it happened, or why." She continued her steps down the hallway, knowing that Asher wasn't the type to just walk away when he felt like he hadn't gotten in the last word. Her goal? The window, where she set her books up on the sill before turning around to face her fellow Fulsom member.

"So what's your real angle here? And we both know you're not here to exact revenge upon me because Garret is smart and he'd want to be here and I doubt it would be in the form of a verbal lashing from you considering you probably don't even know all the ways I screwed your boy over," Really, it was almost sad how easy it had been to drive a wedge between the two boys. Maybe they should work on their friendship before trying to take out some half baked revenge plot against her.

"Honestly, you should be thanking me for the lesson I taught your boy. Next time, maybe he'll listen to your advice." She doubted it though, after all Asher had a habit of spewing out a lot of hot air. Garret was naturally smart enough to learn not to listen to everything Asher said, or else he'd probably be able to feel brain cells dying off.

“Ah, but stating that you don’t care tells me exactly how much you do.” Asher said sweetly, turning slightly only so that he could track her with his eyes as she set her books down on the window. He knew this was going to take a delicate touch. He knew Choco-boy Garrett had the dirt on her, like the kind that would get her thrown out of school in two seconds, but had labeled it their nuclear option and had made it clear that that particular file was their last resource.

So Asher had to remind himself to let her comments wash over him, regardless of how they might have sounded coming from anyone else. “That’s true.” He commented with a nod. Whether or not it was true, even falsely confirming her attempted bites sucked the venom out of them. “I don’t know what happened between you and Garrett.” Except that she’d broken Garrett’s heart, and that was enough to warrant the death penalty, in Asher’s opinion. Garrett had been hard enough to break out of his robotic shell, but after Aleida, he’d been nearly mute for weeks. Whether or not he appreciated it at the time, Asher had at least made him eat and drink.

He bit down the first comment that came to mind when she took a second dig at Garrett. Honestly, people would never understand why he and Garret were friends, they didn’t have to. They just had to know enough to fear them. “But wouldn’t you think, for someone of your…” He said, raking his eyes up and down her as she had just done to him, “…let’s call it talent. Wouldn’t you rather screw over someone your equal? It’s much more satisfying.”

Asher was an idiot. His logic made that perfectly clear and Aleida rolled her eyes at his comment. Please. She didn't even care about Asher back when she'd been trying to get on Garret's good side- hell she didn't even have to do anything to drive the wedge between Garret and Asher. Nope. Asher had done that all on his own by not having the good sense to shut up when his boy was interested in a pretty girl. But what the hell kind of game was Troy Bolton Jr. here up to with his whole 'that's true' and 'someone of your equal' bullshit.

"Speak plain, Asher, or move on. My ears don't appreciate listening to your grating voice for too long," Honestly though, Aleida knew exactly what Asher and Garret were capable of. She knew how the world worked; Darwinism, the strong survived and the weak died off alone. Pre-Garret, she had firmly believed she was the strong in the world, and now....she was far less certain. Not that she'd ever deign to admit it, but when you spent time around someone, even for your own selfish gain, they rubbed off on you.

She'd never admit that she actually did think Garret was a genius who could do whatever he set his mind to. That with a little more confidence Garret would be ten times the catch Asher pretended to be. All she'd ever admit was that Garret was right about Game of Thrones being a good show. Everything else? Well obviously she was the one who had been playing him. Obviously. "If you're trying to get me to help you do something, the answer is no. Especially if this something has anything to do with the ruse of a party you're throwing for whatever real crap you're trying to slide by with,"

Had she eaten daggers for breakfast? Because her words were extra sharp today. No beating around the bush, apparently. Just attack and attack. Not that she’d ever been particularly nice to him, but still. “Who hurt you, Aleida?” He asked, ignoring her implied question and tilting his head slightly to the side. It wasn’t really a question, because she knew what Garrett and himself were capable of, if they had a decently good reason to put their skills to work.

“Try to get you?” Asher asked, a small chuckle escaping his lips. “Oh, you misunderstand me, Aleida.” He said. He didn’t have to try and get her to do anything. She would, voluntarily. Even if she could see that the party was a distraction, she had no idea what for, which gave Asher the entire hand. Plus, he had Garrett. And the nuclear option.

“But, since you’ve clearly got me solved, and there’s nothing I can do to convince you…” He moved his hand to his pocket and pulled out his phone. “Then I suppose there’s nothing I can do here. Shame though. It’d be really unfortunate if Mr. Gonzalez found out that you plagiarized your last essay on…King Lear, was it?” He turned his phone over in his hand, as if ready to send a text in a second. “You know what he’s capable of.” He said with a small shrug. He was relaxed, so that if anyone was passing by would think he looked threatening, but the smirk he was giving Aleida said otherwise.

Who hurt you, Aleida?

God, could Asher be any more annoying and irritating, as if all bad people had some super tragic reasoning behind it. Maybe not, Kenny-Boy, maybe some people were just born to be bitches. She was so done with this conversation, that she'd been about to just grab her books and walk off when he was suddenly rambling about her essay and she stiffened. No, she didn't plagiarize the whole thing, but there were definite parts of it that had been.....well not her own words that was for sure. One partly plagiarized essay wouldn't be enough to get her thrown out of Rockwell, but it would definitely make her life another variation of hell.

Fuck Hershey. Fuck Kenny. Most of all, Fuck Aleida for being so stupid and getting involved in the shenanigans of these two, she should have been smarter than that. But that's exactly what this whole fucked up situation was based on- the fact that when it came to nearly anything in life her IQ was on the same level as a rock.

"What do you want, Asher?" If he thought her words were sharp before, they'd now reached a nuclear level of venom- more of a snarl than a question. What could he possibly have in mind that he'd need of her, and while there was a strong part of Aleida that wanted to believe he was bluffing about sending off the text or email or whatever he had designed to alert Gonzalez about her essay......a stronger part of her knew that there was no such thing as human decency in Asher's body, and he'd do whatever he wanted to anyone without any thought about how much it could fuck up their lives.

Or rather, he enjoyed fucking up their lives....well, maybe just hers.

The second her back stiffened at his mention of her essay, Asher knew he had her. He honestly thought she was smarter than this, plagiarizing part of an essay when she knew that Garrett was in the system? That was stupid and ignorant. Oh well, her folly was his gain. And he planned on cashing in.

That didn't stop the smug smile that spread over his face as she whipped back around to try and spit poison at him. What did he want? "Dirt" He said, flipping his phone in his hand and sliding it back into his pocket. "I want dirt, as much as you can get." He said, adding "Scholarship Fulsom kids, specifically." He shrugged and put his hands in his pockets. He knew she'd spit back something about him doing his own dirty work in Fulsom, but he had his reasons. "They'll be at the party, and I expect you there to start." He gave her a nod, and started to turn to head in the direction of where he had been heading before bumping into her.

"Oh, and make sure it's good." He said over his shoulder. He'd know if it wasn't, which she already knew. "You know what happens if it's not." He said, giving the pocket with his phone a tap with one hand.

Don't say I never did anything for you Garrett. Asher thought to himself as he headed off to his next "appointment"