Chapter Text
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Pearl navigates a new city and a new school.
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“Turn right onto Stony Leaf Street.”
“Turn left onto Turning Vista Boulevard.”
Light footfalls continued on their guided path, changing directions as instructed. This place was new, the whole city, and well she felt a little overwhelmed. A small sigh escaped her thin lips as she clutched her side bag’s strap. It was heavy with all of the text books and papers she had received today.
A new school…
“Turn right onto Bright Embers Way.”
She glanced up briefly from her phone to look down the next street she would be traveling down. It was a little dark; then again, it was getting late. Another soft sigh, it was the fastest way back home that was available, and that’s all that she cared about. Her feet continued down the street, determined to get home as soon as possible. The hairs on her lanky, pale, arms stood up on end as she kept on walking.
“Miss!” a distant voice called. Pearl ignored it; no one had a reason to talk to her.
“Miss!” the voice repeated much closer now, coming from right behind her.
“Miss!” the voice called out yet again, accompanied by a large hand on her shoulder.
She quickly turned around and took a defensive step away from whoever was apparently trying to talk to her. Her light blue eyes took in the tall female figure, her stance didn’t seem threatening, but the reflective sunglasses covering half of her face did little to ease the concern beginning to eat away at her insides.
“Yes?” she responded to the other.
“Don’t go down this street, take another route,” the woman’s deep voice stated.
“Why?” she really didn’t want to change her route.
“You’re new in town right?”
A light blush ran across her cheeks at the statement. “Yes…Why-!”
“Don’t go in this area, stay with the main street until you are past Cotton Log Way, then head up like you need to,” the tall individual interrupted.
She looked away from the woman with the sunglasses and began to survey the street they were currently on. Far down on their side was a huddled group of people, several others were scattered all along the sidewalks. Did she trust this stranger? Could they be trying to lead her away just so she could hurt her? The woman with the sunglasses stood there silently, waiting for her to make her decision. The more she looked around the place, the more her gut seemed uneasy with the idea of traveling through here, especially alone. The red head swallowed and looked back at the taller woman.
“Since it’s seems safe to assume you know this area better, I will take your advice and stick to the main street. Thank you,” she responded and then started walking back to the street she had just come from.
The other stood there and watched her walk by. She stole a glance back at the taller woman as she started her detour, the stranger was just standing there still, but this time she was looking down the street. The red head faced forward and picked up her pace, if she was going to have to go all the way to Cotton Log Way before heading up, she needed to move faster to get home within a reasonable time. Her fingers quickly revised the path on her phone with the suggested streets name.
“Recalculating route,” it chimed.
Light blue eyes looked with relief as her new home came into view. The detour didn’t take as long as originally anticipated, but she was still a whole thirty minutes later than planned.
A whole thirty minutes I could have used helping us all unpack or become familiar with the school’s requirements.
She shut the door and began walking towards her room to put her bag down. It had been a long week, and she just wanted to sit down and rest.
“Pearl!” her mom called from down the hall. “Is that you?”
Pearl stood up and walked towards her mother. “Yes it is, I just got back from the school. The counselor was able to give me all the books I’ll need and my schedule for the semester.”
“Oh good,” Pearl’s mother smiled as she walked over to give her daughter a brief hug. “I’m sorry for making you walk back; your father got a call from the shop letting him know that his car was finally ready to be picked up. The long drive gave it more trouble than we anticipated. So he was gone with the car and your uncle when you called for a ride.”
“Don’t worry about it, it gave me a chance to become more familiar with the area and map out a good route without having to worry about traffic. Plus with all of the driving with the move, my legs enjoyed the time to be active.”
“Well, once we get more settled in we’re going to look up the dance instructor here that your ballet teacher recommended. That way you won’t have to worry about sitting around too much.”
Pearl smiled. “That would be very nice.”
“Now how about you tell me about your meeting with the school counselor while helping me unpack the kitchen?”
“She was very nice, her name is Rose Universe,” Pearl began as opened up boxes and removed the dishes, pots, silverware, and more within them.
Monday came too soon for Pearl’s liking. Having to figure out where to sit in her first class of the day was even less to her liking.
Never mind that I will need to do this for all eight of my classes…
The teacher looked up from his desk as he noticed Pearl moving slowly from the front towards the various desks set in groups.
“Are you the new student Pearl Tancerz?”
“Y-yes,” Pearl slightly panicking at the couple of heads turning her direction at the words of “new student”.
“I’m Mr. Martin, we are all seated in groups of four or so to work on assignments together.”
“Oh…” the red head had no idea where she should go.
“I’ll put you over there with Lapis’s group, they are a trio right now and need a fourth,” he said as he motioned over to a table with a girl with glasses and a laptop sitting next to another who looked like she was sleeping. Mr. Martin began walking over to them, Pearl followed quickly behind.
“Lapis,” Mr. Martin addressed the sleeping tan student.
She slowly sat up and looked over at them. “Yes Mr. Martin?” Lapis had dark brown hair that transitioned to a striking blue as it reached its shoulder length cut. She wore a simple hoodie displaying the school’s mascot swimming and palming a ball aggressively. Her simple outfit was completed with a pair of dark blue sweat pants. Blue eyes looked tired and less than thrilled at being disturbed.
“This is Pearl Tancerz she’s a new student and she will joining your group; please help her out if she has any questions.”
“Yes Sir,” Lapis responded with a mock salute.
“Thank you.” He turned to Pearl. “Class will begin shortly; I trust that you will be able to catch up with everyone quickly.”
Pearl nodded. “Thank you.”
The teacher walked away as Pearl took a seat next to the sleepy Lapis. The girl with the laptop looked up briefly.
“I hope you’re not some clod who can’t understand basic calculus, I won’t have my grade dropped due to your lack of performance in the group tests.” A slight grimace was evidence on her face.
Pearl was about to reply when Lapis beat her to it.
“Lay off Peri, she just sat down. Besides she wouldn’t be in this if she didn’t have some mathematical inclination,” Lapis mumbled from her desk.
Peri, grumbled, but didn’t say anything in response. The teenager with the laptop had short light blonde hair that was spiked up in the middle and stuck out partially on the sides. Green eyes were glued to the screen in front of her. She was small, Pearl wasn’t entirely sure if Peri’s feet touched the floor when she sat down in her seat.
“That’s Peridot by the way, she’s not as bad as she can seem. Just don’t do anything to her computer,” Lapis spoke to Pearl. “What year are you?”
“I am a junior,” Pearl answered. “What year are you two?”
“Peri and I are also juniors. About half of the class are juniors, while the other half are seniors.”
Another student sat down in the fourth desk of the group, busily texting away on his phone.
“And that’s Chuck he’s the other member of our group, and a senior.”
He made a quick peace sign at Pearl before returning back to his phone. Mr. Martin stood up at the front of the class as the school bell rang.
“Alright everyone, put your phones away, class is starting. Today we are going to be starting Limits.”
The classroom door opened and a tall student walked in and handed a note to the teacher before making her way to her desk.
“That’s the second one already, please put more effort into arriving on time,” he said to the student.
She nodded, but made no other response. Pearl’s eyes followed the figure as she powerfully strode to her desk and sat down. She was taller than Pearl, with sunglasses covering half of her serious face, and thick curly hair poofed out in a cubish afro. Very much like the person who had stopped her the other day from walking down that one street. Pearl still had no idea why going down that street was such a bad idea.
“That’s Garnet by the way,” Lapis spoke to her in a quieter voice as the teacher continued on with the instructions for the day.
“What-” Pearl began.
“You were staring,” Peridot stated, still not even looking up from her computer.
A light blush covered Pearl’s cheeks. “I-I, she looked familiar that’s all.”
“It’s pretty common for people to stare at Garnet; she’s tall and has a mysterious air about her,” Lapis commented as she waved her hand around.
“She’s not as tall as Jasper,” Peridot replied.
Lapis just shrugged as she pulled out her note pad and began writing down the steps the teacher was writing out on the board. Pearl did the same. She stole one last glance back towards Garnet.
There’s no way it could be the same person; that would mean she would be around my same age.
Pearl stretched out her arms and legs as she walked towards the lunch area, she was a little stiff from sitting for the past 3 hours or so of classes. Her eyes scanned over the various groups of people gathered together eating lunch. She swallowed the lump in her throat, she didn’t have anyone to sit with or didn’t even know which areas were already claimed.
Not again, this is the worst…
Luckily she spotted a familiar individual and decided to try her luck.
“Hey, Lapis,” Pearl tentatively began as she walked towards Lapis and her other lunch buddy, Peridot.
“Oh, hey Pearl.”
Pearl nervously rubbed the side of her arm. “Would it be ok if I sat with you at lunch today? I don’t really know which areas have already been claimed…”
Lapis looked over at Peridot who just shrugged. “Sure, you can join us. Just don’t sit across from Peridot.”
“Thank you.” Pearl opted to sit in the seat across from Lapis.
Lapis grumbled as she took out her lunch, a half eaten sandwich, a small bag of carrots, and few wrappers that used to have food in them.
“If you’d stop eating your lunch before lunch you wouldn’t run into this all the time,” Peridot commented as she absentmindedly pushed the food on her plate around.
“I can’t help it, I don’t have enough time to pack more and I always get super hungry after morning practice for water polo. You know how many calories I burn doing that every morning.”
“Is that also why you were so tired in math this morning?” Pearl asked.
“Yeah, two hours of swimming while people are trying to drown you gets pretty exhausting,” Lapis answered as she wistfully looked at the remains of her sandwich.
Pearl made a mental note that the design on Lapis’s sweater had been a depiction of water polo. She internally chided herself for not realizing it sooner. A thick slice of pizza on a paper plate was plopped in front of Lapis as a large figure sat down in the chair across from Peridot.
“Hungry Lapis?” A powerful voice boomed. “Here, have something healthy as well,” they continued as they tossed an apple to her.
“Yes!” Lapis cheered as she caught the apple. “Thank you Jasper, you’re a life saver.”
Peridot made a face.
“Hey now Peri, if you were starving I would bring you food as well.”
“I know that,” she mumbled.
Jasper turned towards Pearl, just now noticing the newcomer in the group. “Who is this?”
Pearl looked up at Jasper and swallowed nervously. She was huge, tall, broad shoulders, muscular arms, strong chin, light hazel eyes, and a wild mess of sand colored hair that fell down her back. Peridot wasn’t lying when she said Jasper was taller than Garnet. Patches of her skin were a lighter pigment.
Vitiligo: the skin condition where pigment cells in parts of one’s skin die or are unable to function.
“Oh that’s Pearl, she’s new,” Lapis supplied as she chowed down on the slice of pizza. “Pearl, Jasper. Jasper, Pearl.” She motioned between them.
Jasper frowned as she continued to stare Pearl down. “Hmm…ok, I’m alright with her hanging out with us for now.”
“Your generosity is unbecoming of you Jasper,” Peridot sarcastically commented.
“Hey! Just because I can beat your face in doesn’t mean I always will!”
Pearl turned her attention back to her salad and fruits as the two had a brief mini argument.
“Don’t worry, it’s mostly harmless and you will get used to it soon enough,” Lapis directed towards Pearl.
“Oh, good, I was a little concerned there for a moment,” she nervously chuckled.
The conversation became a steady flow between the three friends as they all worked their way through their lunches. Pearl was content with just sitting back and learning more about the people she was with. Jasper always spoke in a loud commanding voice while Peridot was either half in the conversation or doing something on her computer. Lapis actively participated in discussions with both while stealing glances at any remaining food. It wasn’t too long before Lapis was trying to sneak some of Peridot’s food that had been left unattended. However, she wasn’t successful due to Peridot’s surprisingly good reflexes. A pair of sturdy hands was slammed on the table on the other side of Jasper as a shorter girl with wild, long, platinum, blonde hair took a seat on the table.
“Jasper! Want to go shoot some hoops after school today!” she exclaimed.
“Eh, why?”
“Why not?! Don’t you want to get all ready for the season this year? We are going to kill it, I just know it.”
“Conditioning isn’t for another month, school has just barely started, and you want to shoot hoops?”
“And you don’t?” The other exclaimed. “Well just so you know, I got a new ball and figured out a way to get into the gym so we can practice all kinds of shots on our home court. Without triggering any alarms,” she added with a sly grin.
“How’d you manage that?” Jasper raised an eyebrow at her.
“Well my original plan was to learn how to pick the locks for one of the side doors, but G caught me while I was practicing. So she went and just asked for a key from our coach and he said yes.”
“Classic Amethyst,” Lapis commented.
Pearl looked at the swimmer with slight confusion.
“Amethyst likes to do things that will get her in trouble, but usually before that happens Garnet comes in and either stops her or manages to keep her from officially getting in trouble,” Lapis explained.
“The same Garnet that is in our math class?”
Lapis nodded.
“Hey Jasper move your big mane! You’re blocking my view of the newbie.” Amethyst shouted as she shifted on the table so she could get a clearer view of Pearl. “Yo! I’m Amethyst, what’s your name?”
“Pearl, nice to meet you Amethyst,” Pearl said with slight hesitation.
“Nice to meet you P! Yeah Lapis is right, G-man’s always looking out for me. We’ve been friends for a long time.”
“That must be nice,” Pearl mused.
“So you’re new, huh? Where’d you come from?” Amethyst inquired.
“Keystone. We just barely arrived here last week.”
“Niiice.”
The five-minute warning bell rang. Amethyst groaned before hopping off the table and began jogging away.
“Good to meet you Pearl. Jasper I better see you after school, Garnet is going to be practicing her dunking, I don’t think you want to miss out!” she called back.
“What?! You bet your ass I’ll be there!” Jasper shouted back.
Pearl laid down on her bed after coming home from her first day of school. It was nerve-racking, but not as bad as she had anticipated it to be. There was potential for a good set of friends, an odd set of friends, but they all seemed nice. Her classes weren’t too bad, she would be able to make up the two weeks worth of missed work in no time. Overall, she was tired but content. She closed her eyes briefly before opening them and glancing at her clock. 3:13pm. She had thirty minutes before she needed to leave for a trial lesson with the recommended dance instructor.