Who: Jen and Phee When: afternoon, weekday, April sometime Where: From school to park
More and more, Phee was losing patience with school. She was finding it more difficult to concentrate when her teachers were blabbering on and on, and she had started to daydream during class more often than not. The only part she really liked about it anymore was seeing Greg, but she could do that elsewhere. On some level she knew this wasn’t normal for her, she’d always been a good student, but it was hard to remember why she should care about any of it anymore. It wasn’t like she had to impress her mom with her report card anymore. There was her future to think about, but that loomed distant and foggy in her mind ... what did any of it matter if she could just disappear at any time? Or the people she cared about? Did any of them even really have a future in this town?
She was quick to jump up with her bookbag when the final bell rang, and Phee hurried out into the hallway. There were only a couple other people at school she liked seeing, and Phee made her way to Jen’s locker, hoping the other girl wasn’t busy this evening. She was feeling restless as always, and the weather was getting better, so Phee wanted to be outside and roaming.
Jen never liked being at school, it always felt like a waste of her time when she was twice as productive at doing this work at home. So much time went into idiots asking stupid questions or being disruptive and the teachers rarely had anything to tell her she couldn't find on her own. So Phee's new found attitude was relatable to her on every level. They didn't spend a lot of time together since Phee was seeing Greg and Jen didn't love hanging out with him but she did love hanging out with Phee when Greg was somewhere else. She had nothing against him other than that he was a guy and he wasn't super bright but at least he made Phee happy so Jen was cool with him.
She was ignoring the slew of far more annoying boys rushing past her when she spotted Phee coming down the hall. She shut her locker and pulled her earbuds out of her ears, giving her a little wave. Things had been quiet lately and it was weirdly easy to put all the crazy scary shit behind her. A part of her knew that probably wasn't normal but not a lot of things felt normal in Point Pleasant so it... in a way kind of did feel normal? She didn't think about it too deeply. Phee was a little less sad these days even if her mom's disappearance was still hanging over her like a thunder cloud, she still smiled more often now, time doing its job in healing her from the hurt. Jen was more than happy to help with that too. "Hey," she said and made a show of looking all around Phee. "No boyfriend today? What's up?"
“Yeah, I ditched him for the day, I’m all yours,” Phee said with a smile and a playful roll of her eyes. She hadn’t exactly ditched Greg, but she had told him that she wanted to hang out with Jen for a while. Phee hadn’t been spending a lot of time with her, more comfortable being an emotional trainwreck around her boyfriend than anyone else. Except maybe Bash, but she tried not to lean on him too much because he was hurting too. But she’d been making more time for her friend in the past few weeks, and wanted to keep it up. “Are you busy, or wanna go somewhere or something?”
"Lucky me," Jen replied warmly and moved to Phee's side, slipping her arm around hers. "Let's go somewhere, the weather is actually amazing. We could grab some food and go to the park or something." It was amazing what a difference a few degrees could make and now that it was above the 40s it was actually kind of nice to be out and about, provided she wore a warm jacket which she did. "I seriously can't wait to get out of here," she added as they pressed against the lockers to avoid more boys and why the hell did boys always have to take up so much space!
Phee shot an unseen glare at the gaggle of idiot boys and continued down the hall with her friend. She knew well enough that her boyfriend was the same type of guy on the outside, but Greg had good qualities about him that she didn’t think most of those guys had. Maybe that was willful ignorance or something, but who cared. She was relieved that Jen was on board with doing something outdoors, Phee really wanted to be out in the sunshine and open air today. Somewhere she could sit on the ground and feel the grass. “Let’s hit up Dino’s for some subs or something, and yeah, park,” she agreed as they made their way to the double doors.
"Dino's sounds good," Jen replied, glad they weren't going to go through the whole 'if you're sure you want to go there' routine that girls so often fell into too easily. "You're lucky I borrowed my dad's car today," she added, certain that Phee wouldn't exactly love riding tandem on a bike but as long as she didn't have to cycle up the hill to Overlook, Jen was fine with it. But they were getting food and this way Jen could give her a ride home after so she was glad she had the car. She suspected she was borrowing it more these days because Grady was worried about her but things had been pretty nice and quiet for a while. She'd probably be back on her bike by summer.
She had been prepared to walk the whole way, but Phee was grateful that Jen had the car at the same time. The weather was nice and the exercise would’ve been good for her, but oh well. They would walk around at the park after they got done eating, she felt sure. Phee felt restless, and having a roaming conversation with Jen sounded like it would hit the spot. She climbed into Jen’s dad’s car once they arrived at it, stuffing her bookbag down between her feet for the ride. “Ms. Hall totally pissed me off today,” she said once Jen was settled too, giving a mighty roll of her eyes. “She can be such an asshole. Like, it’s not going to ruin my whole life to not know what a fucking rhombus is.”
"It'd be great if teachers just did their jobs and taught you stuff instead of bitching about what you don't know," Jen replied with an eyeroll of her own. "I've had teachers who are so excited about teaching me stuff that I end up remembering everything they said. Ms. Hall is not one of them. Though I guess she does inspire me to study because I like to make her look dumb when she wakes me up in class." She grinned and backed the car up, getting them going. She was hungry, not having eaten much at lunch and she was pretty sure her dad was working late. Yet again. "I'm totally gonna be an honor student out of spite," she added jokingly, mostly since she wasn't about to be an honorary anything. She didn't do many extracurriculars and while she handed in all projects and did well on tests, her teachers didn't much like how 'absent' she was in class.
Phee laughed, glad that she had friends who didn’t fret over respecting teachers and shit like that. At least one friend, anyway. Some of her others were still stuck in goody-two-shoes land, thinking that impressing teachers would give them a leg up in life or something. Phee was over that. She mostly just wanted to be left alone these days, getting more and more ‘absent’ in class herself. “Then you can like, flip everybody off early at graduation when they call the honors kids up first,” she said, grinning a bit. Jen was so cool, especially for the daughter of the town sheriff, Phee could see her doing something like that. If she even showed up for the graduation ceremony at all. It was crazy to think it was happening so soon, even if Phee was still a junior. Her brother and Greg and Jen wouldn’t be in high school anymore and that seemed so weird. The next school year was going to be a strange one.
Jen was firmly of the opinion that if people wanted to be respected, they had to act like they were worthy of respect. Some of their teachers really did not act in that manner so fuck them. "I'll probably behave at graduation," she said with a little smirk. "Poor dad is so stressed about everything, I may as well give him something nice to remember me by when I leave for college. Like the picture perfect graduation." It felt so far away; the mere idea of going to college, of graduating high school, of leaving Point Pleasant, it didn't feel in the least bit real. "I might still flip Ms. Hall off discreetly."
She made an ‘aw’ sound and laughed a bit. Poor Sheriff Barrett, Phee had to imagine that job was super stressful. She wondered how much he really believed about the more fucked up aspects of Point Pleasant ... she couldn’t imagine knowing the truth and not being able to do much about it without people thinking you were crazy. Nobody wanted a crazy sheriff. “If my dad actually shows up to my graduation, I’m going to flip him off,” Phee said without putting much thought into it. She was just so pissed at James these days. Let him remember that. “Your dad, does he like ... know what really goes on in this town? Does he believe in stuff?”
"I mean... Yeah," Jen said with a little furrow of her brows. "Some of it. I don't know how much. How can you not know after the fog, right? Although, yeah, a lot of people seem to have just forgotten or chosen to twist their memories into something more manageable or something. That? Is fucking crazy." She didn't know just how many of those things her dad believed, he wasn't super into her tall tales of witchcraft but he knew the strange dark man that showed up in their garden was real. "I never told him about Hunter," she said. "And I'm like, does he deserve to know? I think it'd only hurt him, you know. And he'd never let me leave the house if he really knew how bad it can be out there."
For a long time in the McCarthy house, they hadn’t talked much about magic. Well, she and Bash had, but their parents had made it a fairly forbidden subject. Brianna didn’t want them to actually learn, and that was the final word on that. Until it wasn’t. And now she couldn’t imagine being in Jen’s shoes and not peppering her dad with questions about everything he saw and believed. Maybe Sheriff Barrett had made it clear he wouldn’t share, who knew. Phee was still curious. “Yeah, we can’t have that, I need you free and on the outside,” she said, looking over at Jen with a little grin. “Probably a smart move. But yeah, people’s denial can be totally insane. And obviously like, my parents believed in all kinds of shit, but I dunno, they never really warned us about a lot of it.”
"See, that weirds me out," Jen said with an incredulous smile. "It's like not teaching your kids about traffic safety or something. Hey Phee, look both ways before crossing the street, don't drink poison, don't play with ouija boards. Like it's just basic knowledge by then instead of superstition. But maybe your dad had you loaded with magical protection from the start so I don't know." She shrugged and turned the signal light on while she waited to get into the parking lot of Dino's. Point Pleasant could be so dead at times but it was busy hour now with everyone pouring out of school and work, heading home or getting food. It made it feel so much like a normal town that their conversation suddenly felt hilarious to Jen. "Man, if I didn't know for a fact it's all true I'd think we sounded legit insane right now."
It was like teaching your kids basic safety stuff, Phee agreed. But it was like trying to teach them without giving them the benefit of shoes or a bike helmet or something -- the tools they could’ve been using the whole time to keep themselves safer had been kept from them. If Brianna had given in on teaching them at least some magic sooner in their lives, maybe Bash never would have been possessed by Baron. Or maybe they could’ve recognized what happened to Hunter sooner. Maybe they could’ve actually helped their mom. There were so many what-ifs, it was maddening. “Yeah well, they kept a lot of stuff from us,” she muttered sourly, then gave a little snort. “We totally do, but the whole world is legit insane, so whatever.” Phee rolled her eyes. “It’s better than being clueless, at least most of the time.”
"To me it felt like a justification of my beliefs," Jen replied. "Like I always knew there were things out there but science and rationality and blah blah blah... But I was right. So I'm not crazy." She'd gotten them safely into the parking lot and now turned off the engine as she spoke, glancing over at Phee with a little smile. "My family is pretty rational so I was the odd duck. My mom's ex was all about hauntings just being sound pollution and hallucinations just because someone proved it in some cases but that's like saying all marriages end in divorce just because some do, you know? Sure, some of it is fake but... Not all of it. I'm all for science but that kind of rational mansplaining just made me want to scream."
Phee rolled her eyes in sympathy -- at least her parents hadn’t tried to pretend that magic didn’t exist at all or anything. She thought she would’ve wanted to kill them now if that was the case. “It would be totally justified screaming,” she agreed, bending a bit to unzip the side pocket of her backpack. Phee took her wallet out of it, ready to go in and get some food to take with them to the park. “My parents never like, denied it? And we knew about magic because of our cousins, before Mom kinda cut us off from them. But they didn’t like to talk about it, and they definitely didn’t sit us down for like, a Monsters 101 lecture or anything.” Phee opened the car door and moved to get out, but paused to shoot Jen a grin. “I knew you were the smart one in the family.”
"In my family it's not a huge competition," Jen retorted and laughed. It wasn't really fair, her family wasn't stupid but ... god they could be. Plus, Phee only really knew Hunter and he could be dumb as a pile of rocks. She joined Phee and walked into Dino's, still grinning a little at the thought. Joke or not, it was nice to be told she was smart. "Do you wanna eat here or at the park?" she asked at the door, eyeing the tables inside. There were some decent ones available but eating at the park could be nice too, provided they didn't get swarmed by seagulls or something.
She didn’t have anything truly against Hunter, but Phee was under sisterly obligation not to like him, and the indication he was dumb made her laugh. She walked into Dino’s with Jen and breathed in the delicious smells. “Park,” she said without hesitating. “I wanna be out in the fresh air.” Sure, it smelled good in there at the moment, but Phee was dying to be outside in the sunshine with her ass planted in the grass. Maybe growing a ring of little flowers around them or something. She just wanted to be connected to her element after being trapped in the school building all day. After looking over the posted menu for a second, Phee stepped up to the counter to order.
Jen understood that urge to be outside very well. She often regretted living in a place where winter was as harsh as it was because she loved being outside. She might not have Phee's affinity for the earth but she loved it all the same, especially all its little creatures that hibernated throughout the coldest winter months. They got their food to go and Jen realized the only downside to this plan was having to wait to eat, she was a lot hungrier than she'd thought and it became very clear to her when she smelled all the food in there. That was okay though, it wasn't far to the park, their food was still hot when they got there and soon enough they were finding a good picnic table to lounge on. "I need to find a job for the summer," Jen sighed as she got comfortable and ready to eat. "I'd love to get a job with the vet but I'm sure they're full up and it's all about connections. I just really don't want to serve hamburgers all summer, you know? You got any plans?"
Phee was hungry too, but she didn’t mind waiting, since they were going to one of her favorite places. Once they were there, she almost suggested they just sit on the ground, but Jen was already settling in on the picnic table, so Phee joined her. She could plant her ass in the grass once they were done. She did take a moment to toe out of her shoes and peel her socks off underneath the table too, so she could at least put her feet on the bare earth. Gods, it felt so nice. “I’ll probably just keep working for the Castells,” she answered, giving Jen a small shrug as she unwrapped her sub. “My pare-- ... my dad really doesn’t want me to work-work until after I graduate, so ... yeah. I’ll be doing greenhouse stuff and doing summer homework, I guess. Hope you find something that doesn’t suck, though.”
Jen winced a little when Phee corrected herself, as if her mom was already dead and in all honesty, she probably was. It still hurt a little to hear that utter lack of hope, no matter how casual it sounded. Jen didn't think getting all heart-to-heart about it would help though so she smothered her urge to reach out to take Phee's hand and give her some placating drivel about how her mom was going to be okay. Instead she focused on what they were really talking about, letting that slip-up slide. "You're so lucky you've got that job, it seems so cool. Maybe I can use my awesome cop-connections to scare the vet into giving me a job." She put on a menacing expression for a moment, quirking a brow. "I'm definitely applying everywhere cool though, the museum and the vet's to start with. Maybe the library."
Whether Brianna was dead or not -- and Phee was fairly sure she was -- she wasn’t coming back anytime soon, so Phee was doing her best to accept that she only had one parent now. James was it, and as much of a daddy’s girl as she’d been, she was very unhappy with the whole arrangement. Maybe if her father wasn’t disappearing as often as he was, like he was trying to avoid both of them and reality itself ... but he was, and she and Bash were left essentially alone with their grief. Phee didn’t want to be a downer about any of it though, so she hadn’t been talking about it much with anyone. Greg got to be witness to her crying fits sometimes, that was more than enough. So she built up walls around it in her mind and heart, to keep it as separate from the rest of her life as she could. Phee laughed over Jen’s ‘scary’ expression. “That’s it, throw that name around town,” she said with a grin. “The Overlook people do it all the time, why not you too. But I could so see you doing great at the vet’s office, hope they need the help. You have to let me come play with like, any super-adorable puppies that come through.”
"Of course," Jen replied with a little smile. She knew working for a vet wasn't all cuteness and cuddles but she could deal with the hard stuff and the cute puppies and kittens and possibly exotic animals were just a bonus. She also knew she didn't have to throw her father's name around, she got special treatment a lot of the time simply because people knew she was the sheriff's daughter. It was convenient but also a little gross at times, like she would purposefully get people in trouble with the law if she didn't get her way? That wasn't her style at all. But she supposed they couldn't know that. "If not the vet's then the museum or something, I just really don't want to work nights and I really don't want to go home stinking of hamburgers." She would, if nothing else turned up, but she could still try her best to get something better. "I think we deserve cute puppies in our lives though."
Phee nodded a bit, able to understand why Jen would want that kind of job. Phee didn’t want to flip burgers either. So far working in the Castells’ greenhouse had been a blessing, and she’d been there more and more lately, just for the escape into what she loved to do. Things seemed a little rough for them -- Phee had heard some screaming coming from the house next door where Nic’s girlfriend lived -- but that wasn’t her business. She just cared about the plants and learning more magic. “We totally deserve cute puppies,” she agreed, grinning before she started to eat more of her food. It felt nice to sit there with a friend, the cooler breeze around them and her bare feet on the grass. Phee was feeling better than she had in school now, more grounded. “So are you ready to graduate?” she asked after a moment, arching a brow at Jen. “Is it weird to think you’ll finally be out of high school?”
"Weird, yes," Jen replied. "But I can't wait. I hate high school." Maybe one day she'd look back on it fondly but she doubted it, she really couldn't wait to be grown up and independent, doing whatever she wanted to do without having to deal with adults treating her like a child. Given that, maybe she'd hate college too, she just hoped not. At least the education would be more tailored to her interests than high school was. "I'm sorry you have to go on for another year without me," she added and reached out to pat Phee's hand in what was only partially a joke. It had to suck, especially having a boyfriend who was graduating and wouldn't be around in Phee's senior year. "At least you'll have Liam."
Phee hadn’t really hated school until fairly recently, and now she couldn’t wait to be out from under anyone’s authority. Since it was all but gone at home, it was difficult to take anywhere else. She felt too smart for school now, and like her life wasn’t going in an academic direction anyway. What did she need geometry for if she was just going to make a living off of magic? She laughed a bit at Jen’s ‘comfort,’ then nodded. “I do have Liam, which I’m glad about,” she agreed. She would miss having Jen and Greg and Bash around, all of them. “Do you have plans for after the summer? Where are you going to college?” she asked.
"I want to go to Cornell," Jen replied with a wry smile. "But for now I'm starting off at community college so I can do some of it online and commute for the rest. It's cheaper." She didn't love it and she knew Hunter was - in his usual flashy manner - going to some LA college but he had the whole extracurriculars going for him where she did not and was apparently getting some scholarship. Maybe she low-key hated him for that right now but it was her own damn doing that she hadn't excelled in sports and taken part in every little thing at school. "So you'll get to see me on the regular even if I'm 'away' at college."
It was purely selfish of her, but that made Phee happy to hear. She smiled brightly back. She didn’t have an abundance of friends, and she really liked Jen. Phee loved Liam too, but sometimes a girl just needed another girl to talk to. “Yay,” she said, giving a little wiggle where she sat. “I mean, of course I wish that money didn’t matter and you could go where you wanted, but yay for me. I would miss the hell out of you.” Phee finished up the last of her sub and crumpled up the paper to tuck it back into the bag. “I don’t even have a plan yet. I know I’ve got another year, but like ... yeah, I dunno. I kinda feel like ... like Mom disappearing kinda changed things, you know?”
Jen nodded. "You're kinda legally allowed to fuck shit up right now," she said. "I mean, I don't want you to fuck up your life or anything but nobody would bat an eye if you go absolutely crazy for a couple of months." She knew all about Brianna's disappearance by now and how James hadn't succeeded in finding her. It was disheartening, Jen had always kind of thought of her friendship with Phee as having this bonus content of powerful witches who could fix things that went wrong. Phee had helped her put up wards in her own home after that strange man who wasn't really a man showed up outside the window, Jen felt safer knowing she had that connection. But this couldn't be fixed, it was too big and too crazy and that really ripped that safety feeling away from her.
“If you ask my grandmother, that’s exactly what I’m doing, fucking up my life,” Phee said, giving a mighty roll of her eyes. “By just like, staying the night at Greg’s a lot. You would think I’m out there opening my legs to the entire town. I’m not getting knocked up, so just ... shut up, you know?” It was so stupid and lame. What was she supposed to do, just sit around in her room being sad the entire time? Greg gave her an escape she didn’t otherwise have, and she needed it. She had to feel good sometimes, and Phee didn’t understand the old-fashioned resistance to it. Her dad didn’t care, so why should anybody else? She sighed a little. “I really only care about hanging out with Bash anymore, as far as family goes. He’s the only one who gets it.”
"Well as long as you wild kids aren't having actual sex or anything," Jen said sarcastically, then feigned shock, pressing a hand to her chest. "You're not having sex, are you? That will ruin you, Phee!" She could understand why parents didn't want their kids to have sex up until a certain age or with people way older than them, but Phee was seventeen and Greg was only a year older. Hell, Phee was way more mature than he was and they were very obviously - blatantly even - in love so why was it such a big deal? She thought that Bash was pretty much the only one Phee could hang out with since her dad was gone so much and her other brother was away at college but man did she not need to rub it in that her mother was missing. "So is she just never ever leaving or what?" she asked instead, well aware of how annoying Mrs. McCarthy was.
Phee made some mocking sounds of old-fashioned distress and fanned herself like the very thought of unmarried teens having sex would make her faint, then snickered. They weren’t kids anymore, even if they weren’t exactly adults. It was so weird how prudish grownups were -- Phee knew the risks of sex, that was why she was on birth control. She and Greg were monogamous, he was the only boy she’d ever been with, so what was wrong with it? It was one of the very few things that made her feel good anymore, and she didn’t want to give it up for anyone, especially not her stuffy grandmother. She sighed at Jen’s question, pushing some hair off of her forehead. “I don’t even know,” she said. “I dunno what she’s waiting for, we’re not going to like ... have some Hallmark happy ending or something. This sucks and it’s just gonna keep sucking until we die, so.” She shrugged. “Hopefully she’ll get bored or pissed enough at us to just go away.”
"I think you'll have to work for the pissed off part," Jen said with a wry smile. "Have you considered taking some inspiration from classic Christmas movies such as Home Alone?" She tittered and quickly shook her head because no, they weren't going to go that hardcore on an old lady no matter how annoying she was. "But no seriously, she's gotta have a life back home, let's hope she gets bored soon." At least Phee's grandmother didn't seem to have much say in what Phee did with her time. She might try but Phee was doing a good job of ignoring her and so far there had been no consequences. "If you ever need to get out of the house and Greg is busy with boy stuff, you're always welcome at my place."
The first bit made her laugh, and a few mean scenarios that she would never actually follow through with ran through Phee’s head. She wondered if she could sprinkle some herbs or something in her bed and give her hives bad enough to send her home. That was kind of a lot though, so Phee put the idea on the back burner. If things got any worse ... “Thanks,” she told Jen with a smile. “I would say you’re welcome at my place too -- which is totally true, you are -- but y’know. Things are lame there.” Phee rolled her eyes a bit and then smiled. “Let’s walk around, yeah? I’ve been on my ass all day.” She wanted to move around and feel the breeze and touch the limbs of trees they passed.
"Let's," Jen agreed and got up, gathering the food containers to throw them away. It was weird but knowing Phee's grandmother wasn't a witch made her a lot less intimidating and so Jen didn't mind coming to the house when she was there. She was just a 'vanilla human' like Jen and easily ignored as such and she didn't seem very mean, at least her overbearing presence didn't extend to guests. Once they'd thrown away their trash Jen let Phee lead the way as they strolled toward the trees. She hasn't spent a whole lot of time in this park and maybe she was terribly morbid but she knew the cemetery far better.
It felt good to stroll along the winding path, dappled sunlight shining down on them. Phee liked taking walks in this park when the weather was good -- there were good trees around and she always saw at least a couple of cute dogs being walked. She didn’t feel the need to fill the silence with Jen, able to let her mind wander as she absently reached up to brush her fingertips over the low hanging branches. There were all kinds of new bright green leaves on them, and just for practice Phee concentrated on getting flowers to bloom around those leaves as she passed under them. She turned her face up to watch them sprout and bloom with magical speed ... but completely missed how each flower withered and blackened before falling off of the trees behind her.
It didn't escape Jen's notice but she wasn't sure if it was just because those flowers weren't supposed to be there in the first place or if this had something to do with Phee's grief. She caught one of the flowers on the sleeve of her jacket and watched it wilt away with some morbid fascination before she hurried to catch up with Phee. "Wrong season for flowers," she pointed out and nudged Phee's arm lightly before hooking her own around it. "Slow your roll, magic girl." She didn't mind decay, it wasn't that; falling autumn leaves were a haven for some of her favorite creatures and in decay there was new life to be found. But this wasn't natural and she couldn't help but feel a little put off by it. There was no way she was revealing that to Phee though, grinning at her as she pulled her phone out of her pocket. "I think we'll be disowned from gen-Z if we don't take a selfie, it's such a beautiful day."
Phee’s mind was wandering as she walked, and she was oblivious to what was happening behind her until Jen spoke again. Confused, she looked back over her shoulder and saw the trail of overly dead flowers that she’d created in their wake. She kept walking, but that sight put an uncomfortable feeling in her stomach. That wasn’t how it was supposed to work. Every time she’d made flowers bloom out of season before, they’d just shrunk back down and disappeared once she wasn’t concentrating on them anymore. She couldn’t remember any ever withering like that. She didn’t say anything about it to Jen, but she had a perturbed expression as she faced forward again and glanced over at Jen. Right, selfie. “Yeah of course, can’t have that,” she said, pushing a little smile out. She stopped walking so they could take one together.
Jen leaned against her and angled the phone to get them both in frame, snapping off a few shots to make sure at least one of them was okay. Then she sent the best one to Phee. She wasn't oblivious to the fact that Phee didn't look all that cheery in the photo but neither did she expect her to be. "That one's good," she murmured. "I expect you to like, frame it." She made an exaggerated move with her arm as she spoke to show just how big Phee should frame it, then tittered with amusement at the thought of it. "Put it above the fireplace. It's way better than whatever art work your parents picked out."
She pulled her phone out, trying to let the silly normalcy of taking a pic with one of her friends distract her from fretting about what had happened with the flowers. She could dig deeper into that once she was home. Phee laughed softly along with Jen, picturing mounting herself over the fireplace. “I mean, we are art, sooooo ... it still counts,” she said with a soft huff. “It is good, though. Mind if I put it on Insta?” Phee’s fingers were already pulling up the app to make a new post. She didn’t consider herself abnormally hooked on social media, but hanging out with a friend on a gorgeous day deserved to be posted online. It was the modern equivalent of framing it.
"You're the sweetest person I know," Jen said honestly, giving Phee a somewhat surprised little smile. "Actually asking if you can put it on Insta instead of just... Yeah, go right ahead. Tag me!" She did use social media somewhat, especially since she didn't see her mom and Hunter often, it was a way to keep in touch, though most of her pictures and videos were of her pets or interesting things she found outside.There were of course a lot of interesting things she'd found in Point Pleasant that she didn't dream of putting online and in that way she supposed she did sort of understand the people who were willing to look the other way and forget about it all. Maybe if they stayed quiet the evil wouldn't notice them.
Phee rather enjoyed looking through Jen’s social media, and she always hearted everything she posted. It was never the same old duckface selfies that a lot of other people filled their timelines with. All of the snail and insect pictures were kind of neat, even if she didn’t want to actually touch any of them. She glanced up from her phone with some amusement at Jen’s reaction. “You need to know better people then,” she quipped, though she felt kind of pleased to be the sweetest. “Sometimes I hate pictures of myself, so I always like to ask.” Phee finished the post and tucked her phone away, giving Jen a smile and trying not to think about the dead flowers behind them. “There, Gen Z duty done. What now, should we like, go destroy the housing market or the diamond industry or something?”
"That is our plight," Jen replied with a serious nod. "And our duty. To be the villains in a villain's autobiography." She was rather proud of her generation for all the things people bitched at them for even if it was more commonly aimed at millennials. The whole generation thing was so dumb. "Dismantle the patriarchy, end capitalism, eat the rich." She wiggled her phone at Phee. "And look stupid cute doing it." But of course. They weren't the most popular girls in school by far and Jen didn't think she'd want to be but in her mind they were beautiful, they just didn't play the stupid game enough to fall into favor. Maybe because beauty wasn't number one in their lives and Jen was very thankful for that. It seemed exhausting.
That made Phee laugh. “The villains in a villain’s autobiography, I love that,” she said, grinning. She wasn’t sure she was at that level yet, but there was a part of Phee that was sure she was coming into her own now. It wasn’t a normal, natural blossoming, but it was what she had to do at this point in her life to survive. It was crazy how losing one parent and effectively losing the other in quick succession would make you grow up. “I’m still kinda full though, so the rich get spared for another little while,” she said. It occurred to Phee that she was rich, or at least her family was, but she didn’t think they were bad rich ... or were they? It was something to concern herself with another day, there was enough darkness clouding this one. She slipped her arm through Jen’s to start them walking again, determined to enjoy this outdoors time with her closest girlfriend.