[PRIVATE]

[fates_jaye]

After her napkin war at the Perkolator with Ash and Angela, Jaye goes back to her room to change clothes, and midway through that activity, she gets a phone call.


"You never call, you never write..."

Jaye smiles. "Hey."

"What is up," Mahandra asks from the other end of the line. "Why can I never get in touch with you anymore?"

"I E-mailed!"

"Drunk E-mails don't count."

"That should explain my absence. Hold on, I'm pantsless," Jaye says, tucking the phone between her ear and shoulder in order to pull on a dry pair of jeans.

Mahandra pauses. "Am I interrupting something? Because if there's anything resembling booty in your room-"

"Just mine, dammit," Jaye assures her. "I got into a little napkin war at the coffee place. With a teacher. Stop laughing."

"No," Mahandra says.

"He threw water on me, I threw coffee on him, and he threatened to tell my parents and buy me coffee."

"At least he's buying you a replacement. That's right, Parents' Weekend, huh?"

Jaye flopped onto her bed. "Parents' Weekend is a misnomer. Sharon's coming."

"Oh, God."

"I know. She's staying in the hotel, though, so at least no one's going to be dangling out the window by their ankles."

Mahandra snorts.

"What?"

"It's Sharon. One of you is going to have a sharp implement at the other's throat within the first twenty minutes. And every twenty minutes after that."

Jaye makes a face. She's definitely not looking forward to it. "Can we not talk about Sharon? Because I don't want to die of a stroke right now. It would ruin my weekend."

Mahandra laughs a little. "So what have you been up to, besides dousing teachers with coffee? By the way, that is no way to treat coffee. I don't care what the excuse is."

"I know. Ummm. I've been hanging out a lot lately. I'm in a class I didn't sign up for. I mocked the boys at hockey. And I met the girl whose surprise birthday party I helped throw."

There was a pause. "Okay, I thought I just heard you say you threw a birthday party for a girl you didn't know," says Manahdra.

Jaye sighs. She doesn't even know why she brought it up, because she knew this was going to happen. "I didn't throw the party. I just helped."

"You helped people? Good God, Jaye! Where's the damn pod?"

She sits up on her bed. "See? See? I told Anakin that was exactly what you were going to say!"

"Glad to see you're still thinking of me when you're ignoring me," Mahandra says, but she doesn't sound like she means it. "Which one's Anakin?"

"Blond Boy that I got drunk with that one time?"

"Oh, right. Jedi guy."

"Yep. And you say I never share. What've you been up to?"

There's a silence. Relative silence, anyway. It sounds like Mahandra might be beating her head against something. "Oh, God, what?" Jaye asks.

"Gretchen's planning prom," Mahandra whimpers.

This is outrage Jaye can understand. "She can't! It's a year and a half away!"

"I know! I can't pull off a nefarious plan without you! You're the one with the nefarious plans! I just have bad hair!"

Jaye does feel a little bad for not being around. "At least your school doesn't have zombies."

"Zombies would be cool. They could weed out the stupid," Mahandra says.

"Giant squid?"

Another pause. "Okay, that's a little over the top. Look, I have to get to work."

"You called me!" Jaye reminds her.

"I thought I'd be leaving you another message!" Mahandra says.

"I'll be better."

"You better. Watch yourself, okay?"

"You, too," Jaye nods. "Bye."

"Bye."