Ashley groaned as her alarm clock buzzed through the room. She slammed her hand down on the snooze button and rolled over not anticipating her first day of school. Since her chat with Angel she tried to act as normal as possible around Denise, whatever she was doing seemed to be working because she had layed off her back for the most part. Before she could even drift back off to sleep Denise came knocking on her door, switching on her lights.
“First day of school, you’ll miss the bus if you don’t get up now.” Denise said switching open the blinds.
“Five more minutes.” Ashley grumbled, the pillow covering her head muffling her voice.
“Time to get up.” Denise said again pulling back the covers.
Ashley groaned and sat up in bed stretching as she yawned. “I still don’t understand why I just can’t ride with Jared and Tina, the bus is so annoying.”
“Being driven to school is a privilege, you lost those a few weeks ago. Maybe eventually you can win them back, but for now you’re taking the bus.” Denise said sternly.
“Fine.” Ashley sighed in a huff.
“Ashley, I’m not trying to be mean but you broke my trust and now you have to deal with the consequences.” Denise tried to explain to her for what seemed like millionth time in only a few weeks.
“I said fine.” Ashley groaned and made her way into her bathroom.
Denise sighed deeply as she left the room. She hated having to be this strict, but she knew it was necessary.
Ashley quickly got ready for school, not caring much about her appearance. She hadn’t cared much about anything in the past few weeks. Her encounter with Adam had really shaken her up and made her rethink who she was becoming. She knew she had to make changes in her life, but she wanted to make them on her own. She knew talking to anyone too much about what had happened wouldn’t end well. Everyone was livid enough at the fact that he would even date her, if they found out what really happened after they left the club she wouldn’t be able to forget about it like she was trying to do.
After eating a quick breakfast, at Denise’s request, she finally made her way to the bus stop. She groaned as she looked around at the others at the bus stop. Most were freshman or transfers as she hadn’t seen them before. She didn’t want to be around these people, she wasn’t much in a talking or socializing mood. She smirked as she heard an ever-familiar honk coming from across the street. Looking up she saw Jared’s blue van parked across the street. The windows rolled down as he yelled out to her.
“Girl get your ass in this car, you know there’s no way in hell I would let you ride the cheese bus to school.”
Ashley shook her head laughing as she crossed the street and hoped in the back. “Thank you for saving me from hell on wheels. I can’t believe my mom wants me to ride that thing.”
“In all honesty she told me I could pick you up, she just wanted you to sweat it out thinking you had to take the bus. You know after what happened I would never disobey your mom again. She nearly killed me.” Jared teased.
“She’s not mad at you, I explained the whole thing and how you had no clue what was going on.” Ashley reassured him. “Question is are you still mad at me?”
Since she was grounded Jared and Ashley hadn’t had much time to talk and work out their differences but she knew things would blow over eventually.
“As long as you never lie to me again we’re beyond cool.”
“Deal.” She smiled glad to have her friends back. “So Tina how was your summer in New York? I bet you had an amazing time!”
“You bet, but apparently I missed a lot while I was gone.” She raised a brow.
“I’ll fill you in at lunch, promise.” Ashley smiled and sat back as they made their way to school.
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Third period had just begun and Ashley was already dreading the rest of the day. She sighed, fidgeting with her pen as her teacher spoke monotonously at the front of the room. A noise from the loud speaker brought a much-welcomed interruption to their learning.
“The following students are to report to the auditorium for the rest of third period…”the secretary began. “James Robinson, Meghan Adams, Elaine Sheppard, Ashley McLean, Denis Johnson, Stephanie Fredericks, Tiffany Jenkins, Max Russo, Justin Gates and Kyle Sullivan.”
Ashley wondered why she would be called down with that group but was happy to get away from her class.
She made her way out of her class and upstairs to the auditorium. Just as she was about to reach the door she ran into the other girls who had been called down. It was no secret that they didn’t like her and they had no problem showing it. Glaring as they passed by they walked through the auditorium door neglecting to hold the door open for Ashley. She rolled her eyes at their immaturity and pulled the door open making her way inside.
“Great that’s everyone.” The head of the academy’s summer program, Deanna, greeted them. “Please take a seat upfront, we don’t have much time.”
Ashley sighed taking a seat in the front row a few seats away from everyone else.
“You may all be wondering what you’re doing here or you just might not care because you got out of class.” Deanna teased. “But I do have good reason for pulling you away. We have some very exciting news.”
Erik stood up next to her pulling what seemed to look like a stack of scripts from his bag.
“You all were the cream of the crop from our summer program but due to lack of time we didn’t get to showcase you all. As you know we frequently get permission to put on productions of Broadway shows and we have just received permission to do Beauty and the Beast.” Deanna informed. The small crowd erupted into an excited chatter as Deanna hushed them and continued. “We have already cast everyone based on your performances this summer and we are expecting you to have your lines down when academy starts up again in two weeks.”
Erik began passing out the scripts to everyone and then retrieved envelopes from his bag.
“On your way out you will each get an envelope containing your part. I do not want you to open it in this room, if you do I will take it right back and someone else will get your part. Know that our decisions were made by reviewing all shows each of you have appeared in this past year and our decisions are final.” She reinforced before handing out the envelopes.”
“Can we open them outside?” Meghan asked in anticipation to see what part she had received, confident she would get the lead.
“I’d prefer if you waited until after school, but I know that might be a little tough. I know you all are going to want to talk about your roles but we are trying to keep this as undercover as possible until the main auditions are held. So this shouldn’t leave the ten of you.”
“Forth period will begin soon. You are free to leave, but please place your scripts in your locker before heading to your next class.”
Everyone quickly made their way out of the auditorium and into the downstairs hallway. The girls wasted no time opening their envelopes as Ashley continued onto her locker ignoring them.
“Mrs. Potts?” Meghan exclaimed angrily. “I’m the fricken tea pot?”
The boys couldn’t help but take a second to laugh at her expression before she smacked them angrily.
“What part did you guys get?” Meghan asked looking at the other girls.
They all opened their enveloped pulling out the card in the inside.
“Babette? Who’s that?” Stephanie asked.
“I got Chip….guess I’m a fricken teapot too…and a boy at that.” Elaine said angrily.
“Tiffany please tell me you got Belle, or I might just have to scream.” Meghan said pulling the card out of her hand and reading in. “That little bitch!
Tiffany took the card back and read the name aloud. “Madame de la Grande Bouche…”
“It’s my senior year and she’s ruining everything!” by now Meghan was pacing the hallway fumes nearly coming from her ears.
“I told you she was trouble.” Elaine pitched in.
“We need to take her down now, that’s it I don’t want to wait anymore.”
The boys looked on in confusion not knowing what the big deal was. None of them understood why the girls hated Ashley so much.
“We need a plan now…by tomorrow she’ll wish she never stole my part in the first place.” Meghan crossed her arms and stared down the hallway where she could see Ashley by her locker.
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Ashley grinned as she walked over to Jared’s locker just before lunch. She still hadn’t opened her envelope, wanting to do it with her friends. She knew it was a secret but she could trust Jared and Tina to keep it.
“What are you so happy about?” Jared asked as Tina joined them.
“This.” She held up the envelope, as they looked at her in question. “Ok you have to keep this a secret but we’re going to be doing Beauty and the Beast!”
“Seriously?” Jared asked excitedly.
“I haven’t opened it yet but whatever my role is, it’s in this envelope. No auditions this time, we were hand picked.” She bit her lip nervously as she handed Jared the paper. “You open it.”
“You sure?” Jared asked opening it as he did. He pulled out the paper and a big grin spread across his face. Tina looked over his shoulder and grinned as he turned the paper around to show her.
Ashley’s eyes grew wide as she saw the name on the paper. She grinned in excitement trying to contain a squeal as she jumped to hug him. She knew she couldn’t act too excited in the middle of the hallway.
“This is so awesome!” Tina said hugging her.
“I can’t believe it!” Ashley couldn’t keep the smile off her face as the threesome made their way to lunch.
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Later that night Ashley was home highlighting her lines in her script when her phone rang. Not recognizing the caller ID she decided not to pick it up. After a few moments the ringer went off letting her know she had a voice mail. Deciding to check it later she tossed her phone to the side and went back to work highlighting. No more then a few moments later her phone rang again, this time from a different number then before. She sighed and picked it up.
“Hello?” she said timidly.
“Slut.” Came an unrecognizable voice from the other side.
“Excuse me?”
“Whore.” They yelled once more before hanging up.
Ashley rolled her eyes at someone’s stupid attempt at a prank call as her phone rang again. The caller ID once again showing a new number.
“Hello?” she answered the phone slightly more aggressive then she had before.
“Is this Ashley?” a guys voice came from the other side.
“Who is this?”
“I heard you were the girl to call if I wanted to have some fun.”
“Who the fuck is this?” she asked angrily.
“What would it take for me to get into those tight jeans of yours?” the voice asked again.
“Fuck off.” Ashley yelled and hung up the phone. She noticed that she now had two voice mails. She took a deep breath before dialing her voicemail.
“Hey baby, you don’t know me but believe me you’ll wanna. How’s about you call me back and we talk about how we can have ourselves a good time?” she deleted the message before it could finish going on to the next.
“Slut…why do you even bother getting off your knees? Just go back to doing what you do best. WHORE!” the girls voice yelled before hanging up.
“What the hell is this shit?” Ashley groaned closing her phone. She was just about to turn it off when it began ringing again.
“What?” Ashley yelled not even bothering to check the caller ID this time.
“Umm I was just calling to talk to you, but if you’re in a bad mood I can call back.” Jared said.
“Oh sorry babe.” Ashley sighed. “I’ve just been getting a lot of prank calls for some reason.”
“That’s why I was calling, I might be able to tell you why.” He said timidly. “I’m on my way over, can I come in or do I have to come to the window?”
“Just come to my window…what’s going on?” she asked worried.
“Just wait until I get there ok. Don’t pick up the phone anymore.”
Ashley hung up the phone and shut it off not wanting to deal with anymore phone calls. She wondered what Jared knew that she didn’t. About five minutes later Jared was climbing through her window a worried look on his face.
“Hey.” He hugged her. “How many calls did you get?”
“Like four, then I shut my phone off…what’s going on? Who the hell keeps calling me?”
“My guess would be anyone who was down at Sunny’s tonight.”
“What are you talking about?” Ashley furrowed her brow in confusion.
“Please don’t shoot the messenger, but I found these all over the guys bathroom there tonight.” He pulled a folded piece of paper out of his back pocket and handed it to her.
Ashley quickly unfolded it and stared down at the flyer in her hands not knowing whether to cry or scream. On the flyer was a picture of a naked girl spread out on the floor, her hands touching herself. It wasn’t the body that shocked her, it was the face; someone had put her face onto the body with the message ‘For a good time call…’ complete with her cell phone number.
“That’s not me! I mean that’s my face but the body sure as hell ain’t mine.” Ashley stared at the flyer in her hands.
“Oh believe me, I know.” Jared shook his head. I took down all the ones I could find, but I don’t know where else they’re up.”
“Who would do something like this?” she asked on the verge of tears. “Why do these people hate me so much?”
Jared pulled Ashley into a hug as she let the tears flow.
“I’m sorry babe, we’ll figure out who did this ok?” he rubbed her back and took the paper from her hands crumbling it up and throwing it away. “Just don’t answer your phone for now ok?”
Ashley pulled away from him and wiped her eyes. She didn’t know how to deal with this. She never thought that anyone would stoop so low just because they didn’t like her. This prank was beyond cruel and she had every intention on finding out who was responsible for this.
Author's Chapter Notes:
ok so I know this chapter might seem out of context as to what was just going on but I promise everything will fall into place. I'm hoping to have the next chapter done by Thursday and then another by Sunday and then everything will be back on track and you'll get where this chapter fits in but I promise it's not random.
Chapter End Notes:
please review and thanks to everyone who has been reviewing I appreciate it!
