Chapter Text
The warning bell for Bay Area High School's final period sounded throughout the school hallways. The mingling students began to file out of the hallway into their different classrooms. Among these students was a tall young teenage girl. Her light brunette hair was pulled back into a ponytail. Stray dots of acne were barely distinguished under the layer of makeup that covered her face. Riley Anderson smiled brightly at the sea of student faces she passed by, her shiny straight teeth showing the results of her newly removed braces.
Inside this girls head, was a large tower that was headquarters. Headquarters overlooked a set of islands that were called Islands of personality; and below the islands were the glowing maze of corridors of long term memory. This was the inside of Riley's mind. Headquarters was run by a set of five emotions-
Ok there were technically nine of them. The five core emotions were Joy, Anger, Fear, Disgust, and Sadness. They were the main emotions in charge, but they were often aided by Envy, Embarrassment, Ennui and Anxiety. Despite all the drama that happened when the new emotions arrived after Riley hit puberty, the whole group has learned to work in harmony together. At least for the most part. Even Anxiety.
Speaking of the orange emotion, she was promoted to management. It came with all sorts of perks which included her own management office and a desk which housed a desktop computer that allowed her to have minimal use of the console. This actually worked out very well; since now she had her own space to work on her various plans, and do what she could to protect Riley without having to completely take over the console. She also stored her special chair in the office, along with various stress relieving items. All in all, it was a perfect haven for the nervous emotion.
Of course it was still a very common occurrence for her to suddenly burst from the room in a state of worry, demanding to take the wheel. Sometimes they agreed with the anxious emotion and allowed her to drive, but most of the time they would have to coax her back into the office, because it was still better for her to backseat drive.
Joy was the one currently behind the wheel, as she was usually the default driver. Today had been a great day for Riley. She nailed her math test that morning, participated in some great gossip in the girls bathroom, and even chose a healthy salad at lunch time. With the hockey season over, Riley always had to watch what she ate to make sure she stayed fit for next year. She just had one more class to get through before school was over and then it was time to head home.
Oh yeah! Mom was also cooking her famous lasagna for dinner tonight. Life at 15 couldn't get any better.
Once Riley made it to her class she sat down at a desk and began making idle conversation with a friend that was sitting next to her. A couple minutes later the final bell rang and her teacher began to announce the start of class. Joy stepped away from the console with a satisfied sigh, “Well that about does it for me. Ennui you're up!”
The other purple emotion that was currently sprawled out on the couch, only sighed in response, and began to drive using her phone. The other emotions all stepped away from the console, as class time was usually break time for most of them. Joy got the set of daydreams she ordered this morning ready for distribution. This particular class usually required several daydreams to get through, so it wasn't surprising when Riley needed one within the first fifteen minutes.
Things were going boringly slow until the teacher suddenly made an announcement. “All right, clear your desks of everything but a pencil. Pop quiz time!”
This was followed by a chorus of groans from the students. Inside headquarters, Anxiety’s office door crashed open and she came out in a flurry of motion. A warped stress ball was clenched in her hands. “Did he just say Pop quiz!” she cried out and ran over to the console, pushing her way into the driver's seat. Joy just barely managed to not fall over into her rear end. “Oh my goodness! We have barely paid attention in this class. Do you know what one failed grade could do to our GPA?”
Before anyone could stop her, Anxiety started to press buttons and turn knobs on the console at a very fast pace. Riley began to bite at her nails in nervousness as she returned everything to her backpack. Joy attempted to regain control of the situation. “Let's not panic before we've even seen the questions on the test,” she optimistically said while placing a gentle hand on Anxiety's shoulder. “Riley is a smart girl, she will do fine.”
“But we could have been more prepared for this!”
“It's all water under the bridge at this point. So there is no reason to stress about it now.” Joy picked up the stress ball that had been dropped on the floor and pressed it into Anxiety's shaking hands. She has managed to pull the orange emotion a few steps away from the console at this point.
In the classroom, Riley accepted the stack of tests that was passed to her. She took one from the top and passed the stack to her friend next to her. A relieved smile painted the girl's lips when she looked at the test.
“Look at that!” Joy excitedly announced, grabbing the levers on the console to start driving. “Multiple choice! We’re going to do fine. Go on back to your office, we can handle this.”
“O-Okay,” Anxiety reluctantly agreed, squeezing the stress ball with both hands. Embarrassment took the liberty of escorting the orange emotion back into her room.
Luckily the test seemed to go off without a hitch. Riley turned it in, feeling confident that she got a decent score. The final bell rang to signal the end of the school day, and with it came the usual rush of students trying to leave as fast as possible. Riley quickly bid her friend good bye, and joined the mass of students exiting the classroom. As she was walking down the hallway, the young girl kept getting stopped by various teachers and other students to talk about one thing or another.
As a result, she was one of the last students leaving when she exited the building. Just as she began making her way down the steps a voice called out to her. “Hey Riley.”
The teen turned to see who had spoken, and her eyes fell upon a young man with wavy brown hair that perfectly framed his chiseled face. The eyes that Riley already knew glowed hazel green; were hidden behind dark sunglasses. “Oh my God!” Envy unexpectedly popped up in front of the control panel next to Disgust.
“It's Ray Johnson!” Both Envy and Disgust said at the same time. Both also had a look of great admiration on their faces.
“He is such a hunk!” Disgust commented looking at the screen dreamily.
Envy meanwhile continued to stare at the guy with high admiration in her large turquoise eyes. “I wish I looked as good as he did…” she began to stretch her little body forward so she could reach the controls.
“Oh no you don’t!” Disgust managed to stop her just before she reached the lever, and pulled the smaller emotion back. “You are definitely not the emotion Riley needs at the moment. Joy, you take the wheel.”
With a satisfying smirk on her face, Joy cracked her knuckles before getting ready to grab the levers. “Are you sure that's a good idea?” a nervous voice broke into the conversation. Hands still a millimeter from touching the console, Joy turned to the orange emotion that had once again left her management office and was now standing next to her.
“No offense Joy, but if we just run up to him all happy go lucky like you normally do, we could look really uncool.” Anxiety brought out her personal screen, and then proceeded to ramble on the way she normally does with high speed, while typing on on the keyboard. “He’s part of the football team, think of what could happen if he goes around telling the team how dorky we are. First, the whole school starts talking about us behind our back. Next, our friends dump us because we’re an embarrassment to be around. We graduate high school without a boyfriend, flunk out of college, earn our wage working at the local hotdog stand, and live out our days feeding pigeons in the park!”
By this point Anxiety was practically pulling chunks of her own hair out while hyperventilating. Joy had to resist rolling her eyes at this point. It had been over a year since the new emotions showed up, and these absolutely off the wall, worst case scenarios that Anxiety would come up with on a daily basis got a little wareing after a while. “Ok, calm down,” Joy gently told the orange emotion. “You know that we can’t actually predict if that will happen.”
“I know that,” Anxiety quickly responded, and attempted to push Joy out of the way. “But just in case, I should probably drive.”
The yellow emotion quickly planted her footing more firmly on the ground to stop Anxiety from completely moving her body. “Yeah… and having you make Riley ramble on, isn’t going to make us look like a dork?”
“Um… guys. The very fact that we are standing around staring at Ray right now, is making us look like a dork,” Disgust finally pointed out.
A collective gasp followed this realization, and before anyone at the console did anything, the table suddenly turned purple. Since fear wasn’t currently touching the machine right now, everyone knew who had taken control. “I ahlways hahve to fix everytheeng…” Ennui muttered under her breath, where she lay sprawled out on the couch looking at her phone.
With Ennui now firmly at the controls Riley was able to nonchalantly approached the older guy, “Hey…” she greeted with smile. “Ray, wasn’t it?”
“Yeah, that’s me,” the older boy responded with an arrogant smile. Riley and Ray continued the conversion with Riley’s emotions taking turns at the console and piggybacking off each other in order to get her through the conversion as smoothly as possible. Just as things were wrapping up something unexpected happened. “Where are you off to right now?” Ray asked her with a glint in his eye that only Anxiety seemed to get an odd feeling about.
“I’m just heading home,” Riley responded offhandedly, indicating that Ennui was back at the wheel.
“Well… me and the other guys were going to go out and grab a burger. Want to come?”
“Oh my God! Yes we have to do this!” Disgust immediately responded pushing a button to get Riley to say yes. Anxiety opened her mouth in protest, as going out with a bunch of guys she barely knew didn’t seem like the smartest thing to do. The orange emotion could already think of 5 different scenarios where this could end terribly for Riley. But before any words fell from Anxiety’s lips Riley’s sense of self glowed, and an echoing of the teenage girl's voice surrounded the room. “I’m an obedient daughter…”
“Sorry Disgust. Mom and dad told us that we had to be home for dinner tonight,” Joy spoke with a patronizing look on her face. Anxiety couldn’t help but feel some satisfaction that someone other than her was receiving that look from Joy. The green emotion just pouted with her arms crossed over her chest.
“Sorry Ray, but I already told my parents that I’d be home for dinner,” Riley responded kindly, with a hint of regret in her voice.
“Aw that’s too bad,” Ray replied, sounding disappointed. Anxiety suddenly felt a shiver run down her spine. What was happening?
“Maybe another time,” Riley suggested.
“Sure…” the older boy said. “But, let me at least give you a ride home.”
“Yes, yes! And yes again!” Disgust shouted excitedly. Joy agreed. We may not be able to go out with Ray at the moment, but getting a ride home with him seemed safe enough. So she pressed a button on the console.
“Sure, that would be great,” Riley responded with a smile.
The other teen retuned her smile, “Great, let's get going.” Ray began walking away, presumably toward where his car was parked. He motioned her to follow.
Riley started to move forward but halted after a moment. Inside headquarters the console had turned orange. “Guys, I'm not sure if this is a good idea,” Anxiety stated, one hand on the control panel's steering wheel. “We barely know this guy! Do you know what could happen if we go off with a stranger-”
“Anxiety, you're over thinking again.” Joy interrupted and gently pushed Anxiety away from the console. She had reached the end of her patients with the orange emotion, at least for the moment. “Ray is not a stranger. We see him every day, and he's just driving us home. What could happen?”
“Come on Riley, what are you waiting for?”. Ray asked with confusion in his voice.
The young girl still didn't move. Joy attempted to move her forward but that didn't work. Behind the emotions, Riley's sense of self transfigured orange, indicating that Anxiety had gotten to it. Joy couldn't help but send a slight glare in the orange emotions direction. Anxiety always tended to take the joy out of Riley's life. “Come on Riley, this is fine.” Joy encouraged pressing more buttons on the consol.
“We already said yes, if we back out now; we’ll look like a dork,” Disgust added, pressing more buttons.
“We definitely want him to like us!” Envy chimed as she squeezed in next to Joy and placed one hand on the wheel. At once Rileys sense of self turned a turquoise blue. Riley smiled at the older teen and confidently strode forward.
Anxiety was still hanging behind everyone, wringing both hands around the stress ball. All her attempts to reach the console were thwarted by Joy who was semi aggressively pushing the orange emotion out of the way. There had been so many times Anxiety took over the console and caused Riley to panic uselessly. Joy was getting tired of it, and assumed this was going to be another one of those times. Might as well save Riley the stress. “I still don’t think this is a good idea guys…” Anxiety again pointed out. This was responded with a torrent of shushes from the other emotions.
With a dejected look, the orange emotion backed away from the console. The stress ball in her hands looked ready to burst with how much she had been squeezing it. She helplessly watched the large screen, showing that Riley was following Ray to his car. She just couldn't shake the feeling that this was going to be a terrible mistake.
TBC