The anticipation can be more dreadful than the experience itself, and for the past couple of days all of the students in Saint Damian are not only worried but disoriented. For the first time in years there was someone going against the popular people, someone that tried to change the status quo of the school, but for the past couple of days there has been a complete shift in direction, not a single word was exchanged between Iara and Anastacia, the vow of silence against Lily and Iara is still running, even some of the jocks and cheerleaders have given up on hurling insults at them, their lives have gone back to obscurity.

Unfortunately for the people on the bottom of the social ladder in the school without Iara and Lily taking the attention of Anastacia, the cheerleader has fallen in her old habits, making fun of the students that don't fit in, snarky remarks against those that try, the misfits waited too long for a change, these five days have been hard enough, they decided to do something.

It's wednesday again, Iara has been satisfied with the way things turned out, as much as she wanted to destroy Anastacia it seems that at some point her mind got confused and she discovered some unwanted desires. Thereason she is fine with going back to the shadows isn't because she had a wet dream with the cheerleader, it's due to her feeling disappointed that the dream wasn't real.

"We have business with you two," Lily gasps in fear when an unknown voice talks to them, she got too used and happy to just talk to one person, Iara turns around from her locker looking at the two people that got their attention.

One of them is a 5 '5 androgynous person, their hair is a fuzzy mullet dyed aquamarine, their light khaki skin has undertones of yellow, especially in the face, but almost all of it is covered by the baggy uniform they wear. The other one is a 5 '10 muscular man, he has shaved his hair leaving a small fade, wears orange sunglasses and has cool black skin, his clothes seem to have been changed in some way to fit a lot of accessories, necklaces, rings and a lot of badges, all of them from some kind of anime, he tries to smile while the former just keeps a neutral face.

"Does anyone in this school talk to people for friendly reasons without wanting something for us?" Iara looks at Lily when asking, feeling a little angry that their isolation has been interrupted.

"My name is Dylan, their name is River, we want you to go back to fighting Anastacia," he says.

Iara raises an eyebrow, she was already having to mentally prepare herself to dance with Anastacia for the art project they have later in the day and now she needs to fight her for two people she has never met? They must be crazy.

The girl lets out a small laugh saying, "Why would we try to fight her again? We decided to leave that behind us, right?" Lily immediately nodded her head in agreement.

"Yeah, no shit? You guys are Gucci because we aren't! For the last two years Anastacia and the Owls of Christ have been making our life a living hell, but when you two started to fight back against them we had some moments of peace but now they have gotten back to their roots. We are the roots!" River explains with a heated tone, gesticulating as they try to show all of the passion they have for their safety.

"Have you tried... fighting back? I don't know man, throw a punch or two," Iara says while closing the locker and beginning her walk to her classroom being followed by Lily and the two strangers.

"It doesn't work, we tried fighting them with words and with straight hands, Anastacia argues like a lawyer, and it's impossible to fight the football team and cheerleaders, until now, you're the only one who got under her skin and made her stop," Dylan countered.

"We will help you with the anniversary!" River's words almost don't leave their month before Iara has stopped walking, she immediately turns to the two of them with a smile.

"Well.That's great, we will be organizing everything this saturday, we will begin at seven. See you there." she taps the two on the shoulder and once again begins to walk away.

River and Dylan stay behind, hesitating for a moment, they desire for confirmation, the latter moves a little closer to the two girls and says loud enough that both of them can hear.

"You will do it right? We will be there," in response, Iara turns around giving him a thumbs up close to her chest.

Iara and Lily walk in silence for a moment, stopping almost at the door, Lily's hands fidget on her clothes before she decides to cross her arms and ask, "You aren't actually gonna look for a fight against Cassie right?"

"The fuck is Cassie?"

"Anastacia, duh! And Cassie is the girl from Euphoria, they are, like, the same person!" she explains while rolling her eyes at the lack of social awareness her friend has.

"How was I supposed to know that they're the same? And even if I did why would I assume it's Cassie from Euphoria? Why not Cassie from the Ant Man movies?" Iara holds her hands up trying to explain herself.

"Who gives a fuck about Cassie? Answer the question—how bout that?" Lily says, rubbing her face trying to keep her temper in check.

"You mentioned he—" Iara would continue to argue, but she gets interrupted by Lily's exasperated voice.

"Just answer the fucking question!"

"Fine. I won't pick a fight, I'm not four. I will try to get her to stop bullying people with a normal conversation. I can mention this Cassie woman if she asks why it's bad to bully people." Iara tells her plan with a smile, not noticing the amount of doubt written on Lily's face.

Lily wants to argue, she doesn't feel like the two girls can have a normal conversation without fighting, nor she believes Cassie bullies people like Anastacia, but she already knows Iara and the amount of time and effort it would take to convince her to do something different would be impossible to achieve while in between classes.

"I... don't think you should do it, but I'm rooting for you, and good luck." she says while walking to her class.

Iara ignores the beginning and just takes the supportive part of what her friend said, she enters the classroom feeling a familiar sense of doom. She has been having a tough time this past week without Anastacia being her full focus of anger, thankfully, she doesn't have to wait long to get her dose of annoyance.

Anastacia is not sitting on her chair, Adam is sitting on her chair and she sits on his lap, the power couple of the school has rekindled, Adam is a 6'1 man, with short wavy blonde hair slicked back, Lily describes him as a walking cosplay of a young homelader. His skin originally is a strong shade of beige, but he always has a fake tan clinging on his skin giving him a pale shade of gold that darkens in his arms and some parts of his face where the sun hits when he is training.

"I need to talk about our project with you, without your little troll, please." Iara uttered with a little more anger in her voice than intended.

"Honey, do you hear barking? Because I think a female dog just sat next to us." Adam bickers back, not bothering to look at Iara seemingly mesmerized by Anastacia's eyes.

The cheerleader also doesn't look at the girl beside her, turning to completely look at her boyfriend, she embraces him with a smile pulling him in a tender embrace, their eyes locking, for a moment seemly forgetting about the world around them, they share a quick kiss making Iara roll her eyes at this sight.

"Honey, Unfortunately I have to talk to her... leave us alone please," Anastacia's voice has never been so soft. Iara is a little surprised that this witch can have such a sweet side, the cheerleader gets up and Adam leaves with a few charming words exchanged between the two, when he leaves, all the happiness seems to leave with him.

The younger girl sits back down on her chair, with an immediate change of posture her eyes narrow, she crosses her arms and her eyes don't hide the disgust she feels just by looking at Iara, she sighs before saying.

"What? Make it quick." Iara takes a deep breath because she wants to be able to have an actual conversation and not just yell insults at each other..

"I saw you making fun of some weird kids this week. Stop that, it's not cool, and I assumed you were better than that." For a second Iara swears she saw Anastacia's posture soften a little, a smile almost finding its way on her face but quickly being shut down.

"There has been a confusion, I do whatever I want, you don't know me, actually I think you do, you must have a perfect image of me you just don't want to believe it, when someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time, I showed you who I was at our first meeting didn't I? Did it seem like I was someone that you could tell me what to do?" Her voice comes out in a rushed and angry whisper.

Iara has to stop for a second, slowly blinking as her brain tries to understand why Anastacia would react like this to a simple request, the older girl ran a hand through her hair trying to find a way to skip this conversational landmine, trying to avoid the intense gaze Anastacia is giving her, Iara looks away.

"I ain't got time to unpack all of that, but stop bullying the weird people, they're already weird, there's no reason for you and your goons to make fun of them, stop that. Or I will stop you," at the end of the sentence Iara turns to look at Anastacia.

The other girl slightly tilts her head to the side as she says, "Are you threatening me? I pitied you and left you alone, do you want me to remember that you exist and destroy you again?"

Iara rolls her eyes, her face getting a little red as the anger she feels gets stronger and stronger, standing up she grabs Anastacia by the collar, she gets close seeing Anastacia's eyes widen, just like everybody in the class.

"First of all, stop talking like a silly movie villain or I'm gonna kick your ass. And stop bullying the weird kids because I was not threatening you, I was giving you a fucking warning." Iara says before shoving Anastacia back on the chair.

The classroom waits for a fight, but Anastacia does not get up, the teacher enters the classroom at the same time Adam goes to check on his girlfriend, getting the confirmation that she is fine he takes a moment to scowl at Iara before heading to his seat.

Anastacia didn't listen to a word the teacher said, her face never losing a small shade of red, her hands tightly holding a pen and memories of how close Iara was rushing to her head, she is angry, she is so angry, no really she is! She could not be any closer to rage than she already is!

That is a lie, she could barely hear a word the other girl said to understand why she should be mad, all she can remember is the small details on Iara's face, the way her lips seem almost inviting, the way she was looking down on Anastacia, the way her breath got a little strained from anger. The whole week Anastacia has been hugging, kissing and trying to feel something with Adam, and in less than a minute Iara already made her feel more than he could ever do.

When they leave the classroom Anastacia already knows that the next class is the dance that they rehearsed, the cheerleader did not stop rehearsing even though she wasn't speaking with the unnamable one, the girl knows without a doubt that she can perfectly perform the dance but she fears what having the entincing presence of Iara in her personal space may do to her mind.

She wishes God had given some time for her to get used to the idea and compose herself before meeting Iara, but when she gets in class it seems that they have decided to sit in the same place they did a week ago, meaning Carol and Lily are together and there are two vacant spots. The older girl doesn't seem to care as she gives a thumbs up to Lily and sits next to Carol, Anastacia knows it would be weird to avoid the seats completely so she complies quietly moving to her place.

She hears the three people talking about their projects, almost like they are all friends. She wonders if this is how Caeser felt when he was stabbed in the side. The teacher seems happy to give some minutes for all of the students to share their work, make final adjustments and cry about what they couldn't do.

"An, be honest, what does this look like?" Carol gets up and says while holding a painting that Anastacia could not explain what it is supposed to look like.

It's a surrealist painting, she assumes, of an individual wearing a yellow robe, maybe a cape, where you would expect to find his face there's only a black void that almost disconnects itself from the clothing, two huge red wings sprawl out of his back with what seems to be eyes on the edges, the background looks foggy, almost eerie, but Anastacia can't figure out if that was the intended purpose.

 "Like a... weird little yellow guy?" she answers, making Carol let out a heavy sigh as she dramatically sits down on the chair looking at an unbothered Lily.

"This is not predicament, Iara immediately guessed right, the people who didn't understand are probably just a lil behind the knowledge Iara has." the shorter of the three says in a tone that shows not a sign of concern. It seems that this week of working with Carol made her comfortable enough to show her true side to the cheerleaders.

Anastacia takes a deep breath trying to keep herself calm, it is especially hard as she sees the smug smile on Iara's face, it's a shame that the amount of beauty she has gets outshined by how insufferable she is.

"No Lily, I am smarter, hotter, funnier, prettier, and just a better person in general, but maybe Anastacia just didn't have time to read the king in yellow." Anastacia is about to answer all of the insults when she realizes what the painting actually means, she turns to look at Carol with a small smile as she says.

"You actually read it? What'd you think?" Anastacia has talked about cosmic horrors for years but Carol and Josh always ignored her.

"I didn't read it, Lily had an idea and I just painted. Why would I read horror stories? You gotta be a giant pussy to get scared by words." Carol shrugs, making Anastacia's mood get even worse since she can't even share her interest with friends, feeling defeated she lowers her head, already giving up on trying to show the wonders of suspense in writing to her friend.

"First of all, say coward instead of pussy, and second of all, it's not the words making you feel uneasy, it's your imagination, you read and if it's good enough you kind of forget you're reading and just get the fear." Iara says looking at Carol, and because she was focused on the Brazilian she misses the beaming smile that made its way on Anastacia's face.

Lily explains, "Iara loves everything that has horror in it, sometimes I feel like she loves the movie more than she loves me."

"The movies have a mute option." Iara answered with a sarcastic smile.