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foreveralwaysanauthor · 6 months ago

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Same Trailer, Different Park

(Season 1, Episode 2 - Shopaholics Not-So-Anonymous)

June 7, 2024

Notes - Happy birthday, Dr. Eleanor Jubb!!! You have no idea how insanely proud and happy I am for you! I hope that, now that you're able to take time for yourself, that you have a fun birthday; you deserve it! I'm so glad I was able to be a small part of your journey and got to support you on your way to becoming a dentist. You're an incredible human being and I'm so incredibly happy for you! Just know that I adore you and wish you all the best! Happy birthday, El! Here's to another wonderful trip around the sun! 🥳🎂🦷💕

Thin, cotton sheets rustled against the mattress as Vivien kicked the covers off for the umpteenth time since she initially laid down hours ago. Despite spending enough time working on setting up her room that Bentley had fallen asleep on the floor with his head on her suitcase, Vivien had yet to fall asleep. Kept awake by her thoughts as well as her anticipation for the next morning, she had found herself tossing and turning so much that she worried the creaking of the old, wooden bed frame would wake Royce in the room kitty-cornering hers.

The old bed had, according to Miles, been passed on to him not long after he had bought the house by a friend he worked with. Supposedly, the man had upgraded due to his girlfriend moving in, but now that she knew how noisy the frame was with every move and every breath she took, Vivien wondered if the guy had simply had enough of the noises it made and given the frame to Miles to rid himself of it. The mattress itself was comfortable - one of the few things Miles had brought with him from Butchy’s house to his own once he moved - but the creakiness of the wooden frame set Vivien’s nerves on edge. Her bed back home had a wooden frame that she and her grandfather had worked on together over spring break years prior, but even with the storage cubbies they had carved into it, the hardwood frame never once creaked and groaned like the one she was currently struggling to sleep on.

Vivien knew she should have been asleep hours ago, but with the bed groaning with every move and her excitement for the next day mingling together like shooting a cocktail of Red Bull, Monster, and 5-Hour Energy directly into her veins, sleep felt as though it was no longer an option. She was tired earlier in the evening, and rightfully so, but now, time had melted into nothingness, and she was wide awake. She could have sworn that when she said goodnight to her boyfriend and his brothers, she was practically teetering on the edge of dreamland. However, now that she had exhausted all efforts to fall asleep, she wondered if there was any hope of getting to sleep at all. The sheep had long since stopped jumping over the fence, she had tried and failed a deep breathing technique that had worked for her in the past, and the ASMR videos she had saved to her phone’s camera roll had done nothing but keep her more alert than when theft had initially started. It was pointless.

After all the cleaning they had done - or rather, the hour and a half of cleaning they tried to do whilst also singing and dancing along to whatever songs came over the transistor radio they perched on the windowsill, followed by a pizza Miles made from a Chef Boyardee box kit that had Vivien enraptured for far longer than she cared to admit, and then another long stretch of shoving things to the far side of the room to deal with another time as the teens struggled to keep themselves from yawning - Vivien found herself wide awake, staring at the gently circling ceiling fan above her bed.

It wasn’t fair. She could hear Bentley snoring even with their bedroom door mostly closed, and although she had no idea how Royce could sleep with Bentley’s chainsaw-like snoring across from him, she knew her boyfriend had long since fallen asleep, presumably still cradling the cat to his chest. From her experience that night alone, Vivien knew Binx liked to roam the house while his owners slept. The golden-eyed cat had spent at least an hour with her, curling into a ball beside her and purring contentedly as she ran her nails along his silky fur, but had left her side after giving her cheek a few gentle licks. Though she wasn’t sure how long the feline had been gone for, Vivien knew she missed him. His companionship was a welcome distraction, and his soft purrs had almost lulled her to sleep when he arose and left the room. She hadn’t seen him wander past her room yet, but given how long she had been tossing and turning to get comfortable with him gone, Vivien knew there was a possibility that he may have crept by without her knowing.

Glancing at the analog clock beside her bed, she rolled her eyes and allowed her head to drop against the pillow once more. Normally, being up past midnight was nothing to her. She had pulled so many all-nighters reading fanfiction, working on schoolwork, or rehearsing with Riven, Jade, and Erica that staying up late was second nature. However, this was no normal all-nighter. Regular all-nighters were filled with energy drinks, fun playlists, and cheesy smiles directed at her phone, not the mental gymnastics that came with her coming to terms with her emotions. On top of that, the knowledge that she would have to be up and somewhat alert for her shopping excursion with Carrie and Lela made Vivien wonder if she should have insisted on going to bed after Miles carried Bentley off to bed.

As far as she could recall, she hadn’t brought any melatonin with her on her trip - something she was deeply regretting at that moment despite knowing how her body would have reacted to the medicine - but as she pulled her headphones off and heard faint voices from somewhere in the house, she wondered if Miles was still awake as well. From what she remembered of his time staying at the Birch family’s cabin, it wouldn’t surprise her if he was. He was just as bad as she was. In the back of her mind, she wondered if he had anything in the house that she could take to force her body to get some rest. Taking a deep breath and sighing through her nose, Vivien glanced at the clock again and decided it couldn’t hurt to ask.

Grateful for the light her lamp provided, Vivien pushed herself to sit up on her bed once more, running a hand through her hair and tugging strands out from under the slightly oversized t-shirt Miles had loaned her for the night. Though she couldn’t be certain, Vivien felt as though the heat of her thick hair pressed against her neck instead of held back in a neat braid had contributed in some way to her lack of sleep. Vivien had always found it difficult to sleep with her hair down, but being in the warm Florida heat was certainly not helping matters. She was hot and sweaty, and her brain refused to shut off for the night, a perfect recipe for a zombie-like Vivien the following day. She had already tried tying it up in a half-hearted bun, but her worn-out elastic had chosen violence and snapped against her scalp, only adding to her mounting frustration.

Pushing herself to the edge of the bed, Vivien’s feet met the cool wood floorboards, and she stood slowly so as to not affect her blood pressure from the sudden shift in perspective. Grabbing her glasses from the nightstand and tucking her phone into the pocket of the gym shorts she had borrowed alongside the t-shirt she pulled from Miles’ closet, Vivien took in a breath and quietly left the room. Padding into the hallway and inching past the room Royce and Bentley shared, she slowly made her way down the stairs to the main floor of the house. Upon entering the living room, Vivien smiled as she spotted an old - or, in their world, new, she supposed - show her grandfather loved on the TV across from the couch.

Miles appeared to be in his own little world as Hogan’s Heroes played before him, his hands occupied with a certain black furball who purred contentedly in his lap, but Vivien only felt mildly conflicted about interrupting them as she neared the back of the couch and leaned against the back. The old World War II period sitcom was based on a group of prisoners of war who were being kept in a Nazi camp, and Vivien had watched a few episodes here and there with her grandfather over the years, but she had no idea Miles was invested in the show as well. Maybe there would come a time when she could sit them both down and let them chat about the show. She knew her grandfather would love it; after all, he was a professional gabber, and she knew Miles was a great listener.

Smiling, she watched as the German Colonel Klink spoke with the lead character, his prisoner, Colonel Hogan, “Hogan, just because you’re wearing my uniform, doesn’t mean you’re me!”

As Hogan began replying, Vivien echoed the quote alongside the character and delighted in the surprised jump of Miles’ shoulders as she did, “Good. I was afraid this uniform might be contagious.”

Turning his attention to the younger girl as she climbed over the back of the couch to sit beside him, Miles asked, “What are you doing up, kiddo?”

“I could ask you the same thing, buddy boy,” Vivien shot back lazily as she ran her hand over Binx’s back. “It’s midnight-thirty.”

“Midnight-thirty?” Miles quoted with an amused grin. Shaking his head as the brunette beside him nodded, Miles draped an arm over the back of the couch behind Vivien and sighed, “If you must know, I usually go to bed around one on weekends since I don’t have work. Now, what are you doing up?”

“Can’t sleep,” Vivien shrugged. “My brain won’t turn off, and, even with the fan on, I’m too hot.”

“Well, aren’t you conceited,” Miles teased gently.

Vivien let out a tired snort, rolling her eyes halfheartedly as she breathed, “You know what I mean, moron.”

“I know. Would you like something to help you sleep?” Miles offered. “I don’t know if we have anything medicinal, but I’m pretty sure Mick keeps a box of tea somewhere in the kitchen cabinets.”

Brushing off the offer with a somewhat thoughtful shrug, Vivien eventually shook her head and slouched to the right, curling herself into Miles’ left side. “Can I just hang out with you for a while? I don’t want to be up in my room all alone with my thoughts right now.”

“That’s fine,” Miles allowed, bringing his arm around Vivien’s shoulders and waiting for her to make herself comfortable as she rested her head on his shoulder. “Just don’t stay up for too long. You have a busy day tomorrow and you should at least try to get some sleep.”

“Pft,” Vivien breathed as she brought her attention to the television set before them, “I’m not even tired.”

Miles chuckled sarcastically, “Sure you aren’t.”

Vivien rolled her eyes and grinned, relaxing into the couch cushions as the show continued. She was determined to at least finish the episode Miles was on, just to prove him wrong. Petty spite was something she could work with. Sure, she could claim that she wasn’t even remotely tired, but as she struggled to keep a yawn as silent as possible, Vivien wondered just how long it would take for Miles to admit defeat. Two episodes? Three? Whatever it was, Vivien was willing to fight for her victory over the eldest of her boyfriend’s siblings, regardless of how long it took. Besides, the show was too riveting.

As the credits began to roll and the clock ticked over to one o’clock, Miles glanced down at the girl whose head had slid from its perch on his shoulder to his chest and grinned smugly at her closed eyelids and soft breathing. She had gone silent halfway through their time on the couch, and if the pair of circle-frame glasses guarded by Binx’s paw as he observed the girl was anything to go by, she had been asleep for a while. Under his breath, Miles muttered, “So much for not being tired.” Glancing down at Binx, he asked, “She’s been out for a while, huh, Binx?”

The cat’s attention turned to Miles, and he blinked slowly up at his owner in silent agreement before he quietly jumped from the couch to the coffee table, giving Miles space to move if he chose to. Taking a deep breath, Miles pocketed Vivien’s glasses and slowly shifted on the couch, crossing Vivien’s arms over her chest, wrapping an arm around her shoulders, and slipping an arm under her knees before carefully rising from the couch, lifting her with him. Glancing at the television, he sighed as he realized he would need to go back downstairs to turn it off, but as Vivien shifted, looping an arm around his neck with a nonsensical mumble, he realized he had more important things to worry about.

Slowly making his way up the stairs so as not to wake Vivien or his brothers, Miles stepped into Vivien’s room and looked around at the glowing lights flitting around the room. He hadn’t recalled seeing her plug anything in apart from her phone, but he supposed it wouldn’t have been unusual. As he set Vivien down on the mattress, the bed creaking lightly at the new pressure, Binx jumped up with her, curling up on the girl’s spare pillow once she had settled on her side. Miles tugged the flat sheet over Vivien’s form and pulled the rest of the blankets to the foot of the bed before reaching up to the ceiling fan and tugging the string to set it up another level. With her curled up on her side, Miles took one of the elastics from Vivien’s toiletry bag on the nightstand and wove her hair into a hasty braid before securing it with the elastic and stepping away, leaving the girl to sleep as he set her glasses on the nightstand. Miles glanced around once more, the amount of light in the room making him wonder how Vivien slept at all with it, but as Binx softly meowed at him, encouraging him to leave the girl alone, Miles left, muttering a final goodnight to the girl before slipping out of the room to turn everything off downstairs.

What felt like only moments after she had allowed her eyes to slide closed during their late-night Hogan’s Heroes watch party, Vivien’s eyes peeled open as she jolted upright, instantly upset with how easily she had lost her battle with sleep. Despite her frustration, she was somewhat grateful for the sleep she had gotten as she glanced at the clock beside her bed. Her usual wake-up time of 5 a.m. had forced her body awake like a defibrillator on some corny hospital drama, but with at least four hours in her system, Vivien felt as though she could take on the day once she had some caffeine in her. Giving Binx an apologetic scratch as he blinked up at her, Vivien pushed herself out of bed and pulled on her glasses, taking her hair out of a braid she didn’t recall making and turning off her lamp before making her way over to her suitcase to find something to wear for her morning walk.

Although she didn’t have much - and wouldn’t until the girls took her to the mall in a few hours - Lela had tossed in a swimsuit for her to wear if she decided to join Mick on her morning surf. It wasn’t much as far as options went, but Vivien had worn swimsuits as shirts over the summer before, so really, what was the harm? Tugging the one-piece on, she pulled the striped lavender shorts from the day before on over top of it and threw on her sneakers before grabbing her toiletries and creeping into the hallway. From the sound of things, the Murphys were sound asleep still, and Vivien hoped it would remain that way as she stepped into the bathroom. Despite not taking a shower the night before, Vivien didn’t bother trying to take one before her jog, instead settling on pulling her hair into a half-hearted bun and brushing her teeth before heading back to her room. After setting her bag down, grabbing her phone, wallet, and headphones, and giving herself a quick glance in the mirror, Vivien headed downstairs as quietly as possible.

Crossing the gap between the stairs and the front door was easy, but as she realized there was a knife wedged into the door frame, the handle pressed firmly against the door as the blade disappeared into the wall beside it, she wondered why Miles would have done such a thing. Was deadbolting the door not enough protection for him? Tugging the knife out of its designated slot was no easy feat, but Vivien managed to do so after a bit of wiggling, placing the knife that was about as long as her forearm onto the table by the door where Miles’ and Royce’s keys had been set sometime during the afternoon. Glancing back at the door, she reached for the top deadbolt and realized that the locking dial simply spun in her hand, a free spin that did nothing to either lock or unlock the door. As the realization that the door dagger had been there for a reason, Vivien sighed and unlocked the door knob before pulling the door open and stepping outside.

Salty sea air filled Vivien’s lungs as she slowly closed the front door, locking the handle before pocketing her key. Looking up to the sky, she grinned. The sun had yet to begin rising over the horizon, the almost navy blue sky lightening the closer it got to sunrise. Slipping her phone from her pocket, Vivien jogged to the end of the street where Gulf Winds Drive met 64th Avenue, snapping a picture of the skyline before tucking an earbud into one ear and starting up the first song on her morning music playlist - a Kate Bush song she hoped never lost its popularity. It was odd, in a way, listening to eighties music whilst living in the sixties, but Vivien couldn’t bring herself to care.

Using her phone’s map, she placed a pin over the house she had left before making her way down 64th until it met Gulf Boulevard, looking up and down the street in search of places to explore. A lot had changed, if her map was anything to go by, but a few small restaurants and shops lined the main street, filling her with a sense of familiarity as she realized how similar it could be to her hometown. Following the sandy sidewalk to her left, Vivien looked around at the small shops, finding many of them closed due to the early hour. A small diner across the street with stereotypical stools and a checkerboard floor had just flipped their sign to open, their doors opening to a handful of bikers and truckers alike, all seemingly in search of breakfast before they hit the road in one way or another.

A few doors down, on her side of the road, Vivien watched as a woman who had to have been in her late sixties struggled to slip an “OPEN” flag into its holster on the wall outside of her shop. Hastening her step, Vivien jogged up to the woman and tucked her earbud and phone into her pocket, calling out to the woman, “Would you like some help, Ma’am?”

The short woman turned, her dark eyes widening as she took in Vivien’s appearance. However, her surprise was short-lived as she lowered the flag and nodded, “Please.”

Taking the flag from the woman with a smile, Vivien raised the flag and slotted it into the hole, tightening the screws on either side of the pole to keep it in place. Taking a step back, Vivien eyed the flag as it waved in the wind before she nodded to herself, “That should hold it.”

“Thank you,” the woman said, her thick accent alerting something in Vivien’s mind as it faintly reminded her of the actors in West Side Story. Puerto Rican, maybe? “My husband would do it for me, but he broke his arm.”

“I’m so sorry,” Vivien breathed, offering the woman a sympathetic smile. “I guess it was good that I was in the right place at the right time.”

The woman’s eyebrow raised just enough for Vivien to notice before it disappeared, and she clasped her hands together, “I must apologize for interrupting your walk, young lady.”

“Oh no, no,” Vivien said with a wave of her hand, “it’s nothing. I’m just glad I could help.”

As though searching for something, the woman glanced around the relatively empty streets before stepping closer to Vivien and placing a hand on her arm, lowering her voice as she questioned, “Are you Cuban?”

Slowly shaking her head, Vivien answered, “No, ma’am. I’m just Native with a little bit of European mixed in.”

Placing a finger under Vivien’s chin, the woman shook her head with a fiercely determined look as she gently scolded, “Nobody is ‘just’ anything. Your heritage is just as rich as mine. I only ask because it is uncommon for whites to come near our bodega, and you, my love, look very white.”

Vivien chuckled, “I’m a lot darker in the summer.”

“Aren’t we all,” the woman chuckled. Patting Vivien’s cheek, the woman stepped back and offered Vivien a hand, “My name is Aletha, but most people around here call me Abue.”

“Vivien,” she introduced as she latched onto the woman’s hand. “It’s nice to meet you.”

“You as well,” Aletha greeted. Gesturing toward her store, she offered, “Come in. My Ernesto will make you something for breakfast.”

Looking up at the store’s name as the woman stepped inside, Vivien smiled, “You don’t need to do that. I’m sure anyone would have helped you.”

“And I would do it for them, too, but you are the one who stopped, no?” When Vivien resigned with a nod, Aletha grinned, “You stopped, so you deserve it. Now, come, we will make you something.”

Taking in a breath, Vivien nodded and followed the dark-haired woman inside, helping her prop open the door before taking the chance to look around as she called out for her husband. Though most of the signage was in Spanish, Vivien could understand some of what was written as she had managed to learn enough Spanish in school to get by in basic conversations. A few rows of groceries and typical convenience store merchandise lined the room from the register to the back wall. If Vivien’s Spanish was right, coolers containing milk, juice, eggs, and a few types of alcohol capped each aisle, and as Vivien peered into one containing juices with labels in Spanish too advanced for her to read, a man’s voice cut through the silence.

“¿Tenemos un cliente?” the man asked as he entered from the door behind the counter, hastily tying an apron around his waist. “¿Ya?”

Gesturing to Vivien, Aletha spoke, “Darling, this is Vivien. She helped me put up the flag. Make her whatever she wants.”

Looking up from the knot he tied around his stomach, the graying man’s eyes found Vivien, and his smile faltered slightly before he forced it back into place. Turning to his wife with a smile that Vivien could tell was strained, he asked, “¿Por qué les das cosas gratis cuando ya lo tienen todo?”

Stopping the man with a hand, Aletha spoke firmly, “¡Haz lo que te dicen!”

“¡Pero-!”

“Ernesto,” Aletha interrupted as she sent her husband a look, begging him to argue with her further. “Esta dulce chica no hizo nada malo. Nuestra gente y su gente son primos. Hazle algo para mí, por favor.”

Attempting to piece together what she could understand of the conversation, Vivien glanced between the two and softly spoke up, “Yo también hablo español.” As the man’s gaze landed back on her, the dark eyes behind his glasses widening as his native language left her mouth, Vivien explained, “Solo un poco, pero puedo entenderlo. I, uh, I can leave, if you’d like.”

“Ignore my husband,” Aletha attempted. “We deal with bad people a lot here. Mostly whites. Forgive him.”

“It’s alright,” Vivien offered with a smile. “Can I, um, could I maybe buy some stuff to make for breakfast before I go?”

Gesturing toward the aisles, Aletha nodded, offering the girl an apologetic smile, “Please.”

Slowly turning back to the shop, Vivien took in a breath and looked around a bit, taking her time looking around as she heard the couple begin arguing in hushed, quick voices. Her prior Spanish lessons went out the window as Ernesto got a verbal lashing from his wife, her words sharp and pointed as Vivien looked over their merchandise. As her arms filled with things she could use to make a nice breakfast for herself and the Murphys, Viven overheard Ernesto apologizing to his wife, but couldn’t make out anything after that as the heels of Aletha’s shoes clacked against the tiled floor whilst the woman left the vicinity. After allowing the older man some time to cool down, Vivien headed to the register and placed her items on the counter, offering Ernesto a small grin in the hopes that they would have a peaceful exchange.

Thankfully, the man didn’t seem too keen on chatting as he began punching in the price of her items and pushing them aside one by one. She offered to help him bag her items, but after he silently shook his head, Vivien stood on the opposite side of the counter with her hands folded in front of her, silently praying the interaction would be over soon so that she could leave without any further words from either of them. However, after giving her the total and accepting her money without much fuss, a pointed cough from behind the sandwich counter forced Ernesto to speak as he counted the girl’s change and handed it over.

Pushing the cash drawer back into the base of the register, the man hesitantly spoke, “Lo siento.”

“It’s alright,” Vivien brushed off, ready to simply grab her things and get out of the older man’s hair so that they both could go about their days in peace.

“No, no está bien,” Ernesto replied with a shake of his head. “You helped my Aletha. I was rude.”

Hoping to brush the whole matter aside, Vivien shrugged, “It’s water under the bridge.”

“White people don’t come often unless they want trouble,” Ernesto sighed, tucking the package of bacon against the side of the bag. “You look white like arena de playa.”

Vivien chuckled lightly, knowing just how pale she had gotten over the dreary winter they had gotten rammed with that year, “I’m from New Hampshire. Up there, it’s more snow than sunshine.”

Glad the girl seemed to take his comment lightly, Ernesto grinned, his mustache lifting as he spoke, “The sun will give you summer skin soon. Still, it is good to see light-skin people have good souls.”

“I think everyone has good in them somewhere,” Vivien claimed with a small smirk. “Some people just have a harder time finding it than others.”

Trying to make the girl before him understand where he was coming from, Ernesto gestured to the front windows of his shop, the rolling gate still covering the outside of the window despite the beautiful display hidden within. “White people came and painted the windows. Hard to trust people.”

Vivien eyed the window, smears of dark red and black streaking the glass. “Vandalism,” she breathed. Turning back to Ernesto as he placed the container of eggs on top of the items in her brown paper bag, she said, “Not every white person is so horrible.”

“I know,” Ernesto muttered, sliding the bag across the counter toward Vivien. “Sorry again.”

“Thank you,” Vivien said with a smile. “Maybe I can stop by another time and help get rid of the paint. I have some acetone that would probably do the trick.”

Stepping up beside the girl with a sandwich wrapped in parchment paper, Aletha said, “We appreciate the offer, but don’t go out of your way. We can manage just fine.”

“I know you can,” Vivien admitted with a grin, accepting the breakfast sandwich with a smile. “I just like helping people if I’m able to.”

“We’ll think on it,” Aletha smiled, cupping Vivien’s cheek with a hand. “Now, go. I’m sure you have better things to be doing this morning than listening to an old man ramble to his wife about the front page of the news paper.”

“Mira a quién llamas viejo,” Ernesto argued, taking a copy of the daily paper from the stack on the counter, folding it in thirds, and tapping the top of his wife’s head. “You’re older than me, mi vida.”

“But you look older, mi amor,” Aletha brushed off with a wave of her hand. Turning her attention back to Vivien, she said, “Go, sweet girl. Before he makes you listen to the headlines and traps you here all day.”

Chuckling at the older couple who, if Vivien thought more about it, sort of reminded her of another older couple she knew, she thanked them for the fresh produce she had bought and the sandwich she hadn’t asked for before heading back into the Florida heat, the sun’s rays just barely peering over the horizon, casting rays of gold and orange beaming through the shades of navy that filled the morning sky. Rearranging the paper bag so that the bottom rested on her left hip, Vivien checked her phone for the time before slipping it back into her pocket. Though she still wanted to explore the area, she knew that if she headed back to the Murphy house, she would have time to make something for breakfast without the boys - or, rather, Royce - interrupting her. With a grin, she adjusted her grasp on the bag and began her walk back to the house, already eager to get into the kitchen and begin cooking before Royce would get the chance to.

In the nearly six months they had known each other, Vivien came to love how similar she and Royce were. Both of them had a deep love for books, had two siblings they adored more than life itself, and both were early risers. Although Vivien loved their early-morning phone calls and video chats while Royce stayed with the Birch family, now that they shared a roof, she hoped he would stay in bed long enough for her to make everyone breakfast. She wasn’t entirely sure what the boys had in their pantry - if they kept much of anything other than cans of soup and vegetables in there in the first place - so she had bought a handful of things she knew she could make into something for them before they started their day.

The coffee she had bought was unlike anything she was used to - some type of Costa Rican coffee in a glass jar that only had Spanish instructions on the back - but she was determined to try, at the very least. Miles would probably drain most of it, if given the chance, but Vivien didn’t really care; it would be worth every penny even if he did. With any luck, she’d have a cup for herself before he made his way downstairs to demolish whatever was left. Bentley and Royce, to her knowledge, weren’t big fans of coffee, so the majority of the coffee would be used up by herself and Miles, but hopefully, the boys would enjoy the juices she had picked out for them in place of the coffee they would miss out on.

Turning onto 64th Avenue, Vivien began to think of recipes she could whip up - omelets, quiches, maybe even her grandpa’s famous cheese and bacon strata cake! The list of possibilities, while not entirely endless as she only had enough ingredients for so much, was long. Although she was somewhat tempted to go all out and make her Grandpa George’s strata cake, she knew that she didn’t have nearly enough time to do all of the preparations, let alone cooking, before Royce would be downstairs.

As she neared the end of Gulf Winds Boulevard and checked the time once more, Vivien settled on French toast - something relatively quick that she knew the boys liked. The vanilla ice cream she had purchased in the hopes of making root beer floats that night with her hosts would, most likely, be melted enough by the time she got to their house that she could use that instead of hoping the boys had enough flour, sugar, salt, and milk for her usual recipe. All she would need to use from their house would be butter, something she hoped they would have enough of. She would replace what she used, of course, but that was the only thing she hadn’t picked up on her little shopping trip.

Taking a deep breath as the Murphy house came into view, Vivien hoped they were all still sleeping - or, at the very least, that they were all still in their rooms. At home, she liked to listen to music or sing to herself while she cooked, as she knew her parents and siblings couldn’t hear her. However, with the relatively open floorplan the Murphy’s home had, Vivien didn’t particularly feel like forcing them to listen to her singing like a beached whale at barely six in the morning. The only audiences she didn’t mind having while she cooked were her grandparents, their dog, Ding, and her own dog, Loki - the latter two being walking trash compactors who would eat anything and everything offered to them, regardless of how charred it was, and had no regard for her terrible singing.

Although she adored Roye and knew he cared about her too, she felt as though she was at a total disadvantage when it came to singing around him. He was from a world literally fueled by music, people singing to pass the time or tell their story, whereas she came from a world where people only sang publicly if they thought they had a chance to become the next viral something or other. In a way, she hoped he would never have to hear her sing apart from the select few times she sang in the car on long rides, but she knew the inevitable would happen sooner or later during her stay. Mick had warned her in passing that singing was damn near unavoidable no matter how hard one tried, but that wasn’t going to stop Vivien from trying as much as physically possible to avoid breaking into a spontaneous song or dance.

Shifting the bag onto her hip once again as she reached the front door, the peeling paint leaving chips of red on her shorts as she leaned against the door, Vivien pulled her key from her pocket and slipped it into the lock. Setting the bag down on the table by the door, Vivien fought the inanimate object for her key for a moment before yanking it free and shoving it into her pocket once more with a huff. Once the door was closed and the handle was locked, Vivien picked up the bag and made her way to the kitchen, setting the bag on the counter and pulling things from within. Once everything was laid out before her, Vivien put the ice cream in the sink to continue melting, took the loaf of day-old bread over to the counter, and began shoving the rest of her purchase wherever she thought it belonged.

After struggling to open the borderline-antique General Electric refrigerator, Vivien tossed the package of bacon into the meat drawer, took out the container of butter, and closed the metal beast with the hope that she wouldn’t have to open it again any time soon. Of all the things she had heard Miles ramble about needing to repair or replace over time, how the refrigerator hadn’t made the list was beyond her. After putting the rest of the items away in some place or another, Vivien began looking for the cooking utensils. Unlike the oven back home, the drawer underneath the Chambers brand Model C stove and oven was nonexistent. The stovetop was somewhat similar to the one she was used to cooking on back home apart from the griddle-slash-broiler on the left-hand side, and the oven took up a very small portion of the appliance, but the only storage cubby had a large metal pot and nothing else.

With a huff of mild frustration, Vivien turned on the oven to preheat it before looking around at all of the cupboards she would have to scour through in order to find anything to cook with. With how scatterbrained Miles tended to be, it would be a miracle if anything was in a somewhat normal place. She tried the cupboards on either side of the oven, to no avail - the right side holding a bunch of household tools she assumed Miles used around the house for minor repairs while the left was host to a tower of teetering Tupperware that leaned precariously toward the door which she quickly shut. Straightening up once again, she tried looking above the stove in the hopes that one of the cabinets would have something she could work with.

Soft taps on the tiled floor drew Vivien’s attention to a particular feline as he entered the room, hopped onto one of the stools from the floor, and sauntered his way across the counter to where she had left the paper bag. Reaching out a hand to pet the cat as he sniffed at the brown bag, Vivien sighed, “Morning, Binx.” In return, the cat purred, nuzzling her hand contentedly. With a slight grin, Vivien looked around at the cabinets and joked, “I don’t suppose you know where the boys keep their pots and pans, do you?”

After receiving his fill of attention, Binx hopped down from the counter and padded over to the counter on the wall where the sink was, pawing at the leftmost door below the countertop where the drying rack resided. Eyeing the cat with a raised brow, Vivien followed him over to the counter and crouched before it, allowing the black cat to wander a few steps away before pulling the door open. Much to her surprise, a haphazard stack of pots was braced against the back wall, a slanted array of pans pressed between the pots and the cabinet door.

Turning to Binx as she slowly pulled out a few pans, Vivien breathed a soft, “Thanks.” As though the cat had understood her, Binx slowly blinked, nodding at the brunette before lifting a paw to his mouth and licking it. Setting her selection of pans on the counter by the sink, Vivien pushed herself to her full height and closed the cabinet door before glancing back down at the cat and chuckling, “Any idea where they keep the bowls?”

As the housecat peered up at her, his golden eyes sparkling in the light overhead, Vivien smiled and went back to her search. Looking through some of the overhead cabinets with no luck, she listened as Binx wandered off, presumably heading to the boys’ room to beg for breakfast. If she knew where his food was, she would have given him some, but given her lack of luck finding the bowls and silverware, Vivien didn’t particularly feel like tearing the room apart in search of Binx’s food.

Turning her attention back toward the stove in the hopes of finding something there, Vivien froze as she realized Binx had yet to leave the room. Instead, he sat on the counter to the right of the stove, watching her like a silent judge. With a ghost of a grin, Vivien ran a hand along the cat’s fur and said, “You know, it’s times like this that I think it might be a good thing that cats can’t talk. Your eyes do all the judging your mouth can’t.”

Meowing loudly, Binx moved from under Vivien’s hand and made sure she was watching him before stretching up toward one of the upper cabinets, kneading the door with his claws briefly. Settling on the counter once more, he blinked up at Vivien and batted her hand with his paw, a silent encouragement for her to open the door. Glancing up at the door, Vivien swore she had already looked through it, but found herself reaching up all the same. Before she took the handle, she pointed at it, looked down at the cat, and asked, “This one?”

Binx slowly blinked - a yes, if Vivien had to guess.

Taking in the fact that she was taking instructions from a cat - of all things - Vivien latched onto the handle of the cabinet and pulled it open, lifting her gaze from the cat before her as the door swung open. Emerald eyes widened behind round glasses as Vivien realized, for the second time that morning, that Binx had understood her enough to show her where things were in the house. Mentally wishing she could have taught her perpetually lazy pup the same thing, Vivien hesitantly took a few bowls down and closed the cabinet before turning to Binx again.

Swallowing the last shreds of her common sense, Vivien asked the cat, “What about the silverware?”

In response, Binx’s golden irises flickered over to the sink where the dishes Miles and Royce had scrambled to clean the night before were still sitting in the drying rack. Venturing back over to the sink, Vivien waited for Binx to hop onto the counter and lean over the edge, his eyes pointedly staring at a drawer with half a handle still connected to the wood. Tugging the drawer open, Vivien pulled a fork, a pair of tongs, and an ice cream scooper from the tray within before smiling at Binx. The cat, seemingly indifferent, merely stared up at her, soft purring betraying his aloof stare as Vivien allowed her nails to comb through Binx’s silky fur.

“Are you sure you’re not a talking cat or something?” Vivien wondered aloud as Binx nuzzled into her hand.

“Pretty sure.”

Jumping back from the cat at the sudden voice, Vivien nearly dropped the utensils in her hands, shaky hands clamoring to snatch the tongs from midair before they could clatter to the floor. Once she was sure she had a solid grip on everything apart from her sanity, Vivien whirled around, hoping that someone else had simply ventured into the room without her knowing. Seeing her boyfriend standing in the doorway in his pajamas with an amused grin and a knowing gleam in his chocolate eyes, Vivien let out a huff and placed a hand over her chest to calm herself.

“You scared the shit out of me,” she breathed, glaring halfheartedly at Royce as he stepped into the room.

Royce chuckled, pulling open the fridge with far more ease than Vivien had and filling a small bowl with water from a pitcher they kept on one of the shelves, “I guess I could say the same to you.”

Curious as she set her utensils on the counter and pulled the ice cream out of the sink, Vivien watched Royce place the bowl of water on a towel on the floor as she asked, “How would I have scared you? I didn’t even know you were up.”

As he pulled a can of cat food down from a cupboard, Royce admitted, “I usually get up around six to start making breakfast, but when I went by your room to see if you wanted to join me, you weren’t there. You also weren’t in the bathroom, but when I checked the living room, you weren’t there either, so I was starting to get worried when I heard you talking to Binx.”

Watching Binx as Royce opened the cat food and placed some in a small ceramic bowl covered in little cartoon fish, Vivien claimed, “He’s a smart cat. He was helping me find stuff to cook with.”

“I think he’s memorized where everything is just so that he can tell us that he wants food.” Glancing at Vivien as he moved to put the food down for Binx, Royce thought for a moment about her words, distracted only by Binx’s meow telling him to put his food on the floor before he got claws to the wrist. Setting the food down, Royce returned to Vivien’s side and brought his arms around her middle, watching her shovel vanilla ice cream into a bowl from over her shoulder as he said, “You know, if you were hungry, you could have come to me. I would have made something, so you didn’t have to go through all this hassle.”

“I know you would have,” Vivien said with a smile, “but I wanted to make something to thank you guys for letting me stay here.”

Stepping away from Vivien and taking the second pint of ice cream from the sink before she could reach for it, Royce spoke softly, “You don’t have to do that. We want you to be here.” As Vivien watched him scoop ice cream into the bowl, Royce turned to her with a small smile and said, “Besides, you’re not just our guest, you’re my girlfriend. I don’t want you to feel like you owe us anything for staying here.”

“I know,” Vivien said before licking some melted ice cream from the back of her hand. “I just wanted to surprise you guys.”

Scraping the inside of the container with the spoon, Royce raised an eyebrow and asked, “What were you trying to make, anyway?”

“French toast,” Vivien admitted. “I was hoping to at least get some of it done before you came down, but I had a hard time finding anything to cook with.”

“Yeah,” Royce sighed, reluctant to admit just how poorly stocked their food supply always seemed to be. “We haven’t gone grocery shopping in a while.”

“I meant the cookware,” Vivien said as she took the bowl from Royce, watching him toss the empty container into the trash at the end of the counter. “I don’t know how you guys find anything. I mean, I get the silverware drawer being by the sink - that’s the way it is at our house, too - but the pots and pans being on the other side of the kitchen, away from the stove? That’s a decision that should send someone to an asylum.”

Raising his arms in surrender, Royce chuckled, “Don’t blame me. That was all Bentley.”

“And you let him?” Vivien pressed with a laugh. “Mister organized let his baby brother wreak havoc on the kitchen?”

“I didn’t exactly get much say,” Royce admitted. “I was busy helping Miles with his Jeep when all this happened.”

Hoping that, sooner or later, she would be able to help Miles with fixing up the rolling rust bucket that sat in the garage, Vivien sighed and shook her head, “You know, I’m half tempted to buy him a new Jeep so he doesn’t have to deal with that cruddy old thing.”

Royce chuckled, shaking his head, “He won’t let you do that.”

“I know, but the thought is there,” Vivien shrugged. Smoothing out the ice cream with a spoon, she asked, “Could you grab the bread for me?”

With a soft hum, Royce turned, taking the loaf of bread from the counter, pulling the twist-tie off, and pocketing the yellow tie before setting the bag of bread close to Vivien and asking, “Anything else?”

Pulling a slice of bread from the bag and placing it in the ice cream, Vivien glanced over at Royce, drinking in his gentle expression and half-asleep appearance with a smile as she asked, “Would you mind buttering a skillet for me? And, uh, could you put it over medium heat too?”

Royce nodded with a smile, maneuvering around the kitchen with practiced ease as Vivien gingerly carried the bowl of vanilla ice cream and the bag of bread to the countertop closest to the stove. As he watched Vivien slather the bread in ice cream, Royce placed the skillet on the stove and turned it on before taking the twist tie out of his pocket with a grin. Vivien placed the first slice of bread on the skillet with a smile, her fingers sticky with ice cream as she reached for another slice of bread and began humming softly to herself as she slathered a fresh slice of bread in ice cream.

Stepping up to Vivien’s left with a small smile, Royce took a paper towel from the roll on the counter and asked, “Can I see your hand for a second?”

Glancing over at her boyfriend curiously, Vivien asked, “Huh?” Connecting the dots as he held a hand out to her, Vivien quickly said, “Oh, yeah, sure. Here,” and held out her hand before turning back to the breakfast she had begun cooking.

Taking Vivien’s wrist and attempting to ignore the slight electric tingle running up his arm as his fingers twisted her hand palm-up, Royce wiped the melted streaks of white from her fingers before flipping her hand back up and sliding the bread tie around her finger. Twisting the ends together in a sort of lopsided heart against the top of his girlfriend’s ring finger, Royce grinned proudly and said, “There.”

Tearing her gaze away from the pan as she flipped the first piece of bread and placed the second in it, Vivien peered down at the hand Royce still held, examining the bread tie ring with a confused grin. “Cute,” she chuckled. “What made you think of that?”

Royce shrugged, “I can’t exactly give you my class ring or a letterman sweater since I don’t have one, and I can’t afford a fancy promise ring, so I figured this would be the next best thing.”

Vivien smiled, albeit with a hint of trepidation, as she slowly asked, “I’m sorry, but what exactly are promise rings?”

“You don’t have them in your world?” Royce asked in return, confusion lacing his words as he watched Vivien shake her head. “W-Well, I guess, for most people, it’s sort of like a way for a couple to show that they’re serious about each other.”

Raising a brow, Vivien wondered, “I thought we were serious about each other already. Are we… were you not serious about us?”

“What?” Royce breathed, finding hurt in Vivien’s eyes as he watched her scrutinize him. Realizing what his words had implied, he quickly shook his head, eyes widening as he exclaimed, “No! No, I am, I promise!”

Smiling at how easy it was to get Royce scrambling, she squeezed his fingers in her grasp and asked, “Then what does this mean to you?”

“I don’t know, really,” Royce breathed, examining the makeshift ring as he brushed his thumb over it. “It just felt right.”

Examining Royce’s expression as he traced the ring with his finger, Vivien grinned and lifted their joined hands, pressing a kiss to Royce’s knuckles and whispering against his skin, “Thank you.”

Fighting to ignore the surge of goosebumps that rushed up his arms, Royce smiled - a captivating grin that Vivien loved every time it appeared. Whilst Royce had admitted to her that he was never really fond of the way his smile stretched the thin scar on his upper lip into a white line, Vivien found it all the more appealing and had told him as such more than once. Pulling her hand to his lips, Royce reciprocated her earlier kiss by pressing one to the back of her hand before saying, “You’re welcome.”

Taking in a deep breath, Vivien tried to think of something, anything, to say in response, but found herself quickly distracted by the food as the smell of French toast wafted through the air. Whipping around to the stove, Vivien quickly scrambled to flip one slice and take the other off of the heat, wincing at the blackened state it was in. Royce grabbed a plate from the cabinet and handed it to Vivien, matching her expression as she set the first slice on the plate.

“Great,” she breathed, making a mental note to add the charred slice of bread to her plate later on.

Hoping to make light of the situation, Royce grinned, “At least the house smells good.”

“Yeah,” Vivien sighed, setting the plate aside as she grabbed a fresh slice of bread and coated it in ice cream. As Royce took the plate from her other hand, Vivien said, “You can just put that aside. I’ll have that one.”

Eyeing the burned bread with a raised brow, Royce slowly spoke, “But it’s burnt.”

“Only on one side,” Vivien said as she placed the bread in the skillet. “I can scrape that off and it’ll be fine.”

Though he still felt the need to chuck the piece of bread into the trash, Royce set the plate down and resigned himself to helping his girlfriend with breakfast as she handed him the tongs and began coating another slice of bread. After making sure they had enough for everyone, Royce turned off the stove and helped Vivien place the French toast on a baking sheet before stepping away to start making coffee for Miles. Vivien put the breakfast in the oven to keep it warm before asking Royce if he knew how to make the Costa Rican coffee she had placed on one of the counters. Once the percolator was on the stove and coffee had begun brewing, Royce and Vivien sat down at the table with some spoons and the bowl of leftover ice cream to discuss all she had done that morning.

Their peaceful morning was soon interrupted, though, as the smell of warm breakfast filled the house. Bentley stumbled his way downstairs, rubbing the sleep from his eyes with a loud yawn as he reached the kitchen, looking around for whatever smell had lured him out of bed. Spotting his brother and close friend at the table, he muttered, “Morning.”

The pair replied in kind before Vivien teased, “Do you always look like you stuck a finger into an electric socket when you get up in the morning?”

Still half asleep as he wandered through the kitchen in search of food, Bentley grumbled, “Ask your boyfriend; he looks like this every day.”

Mildly bewildered at how easily he had been thrown into the conversation, Royce asked, “What did I do to you?”

Opening the fridge to look inside, Bentley huffed, “Well, you’re hiding my breakfast, for one.”

“It’s not hidden,” Royce chuckled, watching with a grin as his baby brother turned toward him and gestured to the kitchen with disbelieving eyes.

“Where is it, then?”

“It’s in the oven until Miles gets up,” Vivien said with a smirk. “I suggest that, if you want something to eat, you go wake him up.”

Bentley groaned, dragging himself across the room and dropping into a chair as he groaned, “That’ll take forever.”

Vivien watched with amusement evident in her eyes as Bentley folded his arms on the table and dropped his head onto them with an exaggerated sigh. Smirking, Royce placed a hand on Bentley’s head, ruffling his brother’s hair as he said, “You know, you could always bribe him with coffee. That usually works.”

“But all he’s got is that stuff from the gas station,” Bentley muttered into his arms. After letting out a yawn, he lifted his head slightly and sighed, “From the sound of it, it tasted like mud yesterday.”

“I guess it’s a good thing I bought some coffee while I was out, then,” Vivien said with a grin, watching as Bentley’s attention latched onto her.

The blond’s sleep-riddled brain took a while to piece together Vivien’s statement, but as realization filled his baby-blue eyes, Bentley found himself confused. “You didn’t get coffee when we were out last night.”

“No,” Vivien agreed with a shake of her head. “I bought it this morning at this cute little bodega while I was on my morning walk.”

“You’ve been out already?” Bentley asked, exhaustion lingering in his bones. When Vivien nodded, Bentley made a face and turned to Royce, “I was right; you two really are made for each other.”

Though Vivien seemed curious as to what Bentley meant, Royce was quick to backtrack as he fought the urge to slap a hand over his brother’s mouth, “Anyway, I just started making the coffee Viv got, so if you want breakfast, go harass him. Maybe he’ll get out of bed if he knows he’s got good coffee waiting.”

“‘M too tired, RJ,” Bentley yawned, closing his eyes and resting his chin on his palm as he struggled to keep himself awake. “Can’t you go wake him?”

Meeting his girlfriend’s haze from across the table, Royce rolled his eyes with a smile that Vivien seemed to share before shrugging and pushing his chair back from the table. “Just this once,” Royce sighed as he stood, pushing his chair back in and placing a hand on Bentley’s back as he rounded the table.

“You said that last time,” Bentley muttered with a tired grin, his eyes just barely open as he watched Royce head toward the hallway, Binx trotting along behind him.

Sparing a last glance at his baby brother, Royce said, “And one of these days, I’ll mean it. Now, why don’t you get the plates and silverware out while I get him.”

“Fine,” Bentley groaned dramatically, nudging his chair away from the table as Royce smirked and headed toward the stairs. Once he was sure his brother was out of earshot, a knowing smirk tugged at Bentley’s lips as he turned his attention back onto Vivien. “So,” he began with a drawl, “you two spent the morning together, huh?”

“Not really,” Vivien shrugged. “I went out for a walk on my own, helped a lady put up a flag, did some shopping, and came back. Royce heard me making breakfast and decided to help.”

Despite the hint of skepticism in Bentley’s eyes, the blond brushed off her claim and said, “You know, I meant what I said. You two are perfect for each other.”

“We are, are we?” Vivien asked with a grin, watching Bentley stand and drag himself away from the table.

He hummed as he began pulling plates from the cabinet, “You two both wake up at the crack of dawn like a couple of freaks.”

Vivien snorted, rising from her seat to grab silverware as Bentley set the array of mismatched plates in a stack on the counter, “And that means we’re good for each other?”

“It’s one of the ways, yeah,” Bentley nodded. Thinking for a moment, Bentley slowly asked, “You remember when we met you on Halloween, like, forever ago?”

Intrigued yet amused, Vivien nodded, “It’s only been six months, but yeah, why?”

“That’s when I knew you two would be together,” the blond admitted.

Vivien raised an eyebrow, “Right off the bat like that?”

“Mhm.”

“How?”

Leaning against the counter, Bentley ran a hand through his hair and sighed, “He kept smiling at his hand like an idiot. Even when we got back to the cabin and he got the chance to send you a message, he would not stop looking at your handwriting like it was a first-edition copy of some fancy book or something.”

“He was that bad?” Vivien snickered. She knew for a fact she hadn’t been any better, but the thought of Royce, her sweet, usually composed boyfriend, being so eager to strike up a conversation without romance being on the table at the time, sent warmth fluttering across her cheeks as giddiness settled in her ribcage.

“Worse,” Bentley scoffed. “When we got home and he had no way of talking to you, it was far worse since you were all he wanted to talk about. That was when I figured that, if Royce had any say in it, you two would be together sooner or later.”

An adoring smile tugged at Vivien’s lips as she helped Bentley set the table, memories of that Halloween night flitting across her mind as she breathed, “You know, if it weren’t for Riven, I never would have said anything to Royce.”

“Riven?” Bentley echoed thoughtfully. “That’s the guy that you skate with, right? The tall one who started the karaoke thing at your Christmas party?”

“That’s the one,” Vivien chuckled. “When we were handing out cookies and stuff, Riven kept teasing me for staring at Royce while you were trick-or-treating. He tried encouraging me to talk to him or ask him out, but I was too nervous to do anything.”

Curious, Bentley sat in his usual chair and asked, “If you were too scared, how did he convince you to give Royce your number?”

“You guys had started walking away, and Riven came up to me and asked if I was - oh, how did he say it?” Vivien thought for a moment, thinking back on that night and attempting to recall her best friend’s statement. After a while, she chuckled and confessed, “He, uh, he asked if I was going to grow some balls or if he was going to have to ask Royce out for me.”

Bentley let out a snort, “Y’know, I think Butchy and Miles were just shy of doing the same for Royce when you came over.”

“What did I do for Royce?” a deep, groggy voice mumbled from the archway of the kitchen.

Turning toward the edge of the kitchen with a lopsided grin that reminded Vivien of her partner in crime back home, Bentley chirped, “We were just talking about how you had to help RJ give Binx a bath last week after the ice cream incident.”

With an exhausted face and a heaved sigh, Miles glared at the black furball in Royce’s arms and huffed, “Little demon cat.”

Reaching up to pet the cat as Royce passed and smiling as Binx leaned into her nails with a gentle purr, Vivien peered over at Miles and teased, “He’s just a baby, Miles.”

Fixing his tired cerulean eyes on Vivien, Miles pointed at the cat and emphasized each word as he repeated, “Little. Demon. Cat.”

Royce grinned, “Miles is just upset that Binx wouldn’t sit still while we washed him.”

Grabbing his mug from the counter and pouring himself a cup of coffee with a yawn, Miles shook his head, “No, Miles is upset he was turned into a human pincushion, but Royce got to snuggle his little demon spawn while Binx was all snuggled up in Miles’ towel.”

“Since when does Miles speak in the third person?” Vivien wondered with a smirk as Royce sat down and allowed Binx to wander the kitchen. “’Cause Vivien thinks it’s kinda weird.”

Without turning to look at the girl, Miles set the percolator back on the stove and turned the burner off before raising a hand and flipping her the bird as he sipped his coffee. Stopping to take a breath, Miles stared into his cup of coffee as the flavor finally settled on his tongue. The bitterness of any black coffee would typically make him wince, but the soft, smooth taste of the coffee had taken him by surprise - a pleasant wake-up call in comparison to the harsh slap in the face his gas station coffee had been the last couple of days. Since he had bought it after a long work day without so much as looking at the label, Miles’ tongue had been violently assaulted by the sheer nastiness that was his first cup of coffee that morning.

It was his own damn fault, sure, but he had given it the benefit of the doubt, hoping he hadn’t wasted his money on nasty coffee. However, after taking some to work in the hopes of trying it in the new coffee maker his boss had put in the waiting room for customers, Miles found himself out of luck. The coffee was disgusting no matter how you made it, and, to his dismay, he discovered that no amount of cream, milk, sugar, or flavoring shots could rid him of the motor oil that clung to his taste buds all day afterward.

Staring into the dark liquid, Miles began to wonder who had gotten the disastrous coffee to taste so good. Slowly turning as he made his way to the fridge, Miles asked, “Which one of you made my coffee?”

“Royce did,” Vivien claimed as Royce lifted a hand.

“But Viv helped make it taste good,” Royce tacked on.

Glancing warily between the girl and his coffee, Miles slowly asked, “The hell did you do to it?”

With a smirk, Vivien feigned innocence as she stood from the table and asked, “Whatever do you mean?”

Setting the mug down, Miles stared right through Vivien’s acting and said, “It tastes good. What did you do to make that sewer water taste good?”

“Wouldn’t you like to know,” she fired as she neared the stove.

“I would,” Miles retorted blandly. “That’s why I asked.”

Vivien looked ready to continue stringing Miles along, but Bentley, eager to get some food into him, spoke up, “She bought you some good coffee this morning. Now, can we please have something to eat before I starve over here?”

Turning back to Vivien, Miles asked, “You bought coffee?”

“I did,” she nodded. “I hope it tastes alright.”

“It’s great, thank you,” Miles responded, his gratitude instinctual. However, he couldn’t contain the urge to ask, “How much was it? I’ll pay you back after.”

Vivien rolled her eyes, reaching for a mug to pour herself some of the coffee, “It’s not just for you, so no, you won’t.” Lowering her voice, Vivien muttered, “Right now, I have more money than I know what to do with, so how about we let it slide and you can spend your money on something else?”

Though Miles looked reluctant to back down, the firm kindness in Vivien’s eyes made it impossible for him to do anything more than softly ask, “You sure?”

“Positive.”

“Thank y-”

“You know what I’m positive about?” Bentley asked, cutting off Miles’ statement of gratitude from the other side of the room. “I’m positive that I’m starving over here.”

With a sigh and a not-so-subtle roll of his eyes, Miles turned back to his brothers with a tired grin, “And, thus, the drama queen of Murphy house has finally made an appearance. What do you want for breakfast? I think we still have some of those quiches Lela made the other day.”

“Actually,” Vivien began, drawing Miles’ attention back to herself, “I already made breakfast.”

“You did?” Miles asked, a wave of concern weaving through his chest as he wondered what on earth she could have used to make anything. There wasn’t much in the pantry, and the fridge had the bare-bones necessities he made sure were always in the house, but he was going to take the boys grocery shopping while Vivien was out with the girls so that they would have enough food in the house for everyone. Apart from the knock-off brand cereals in the pantry and the handful of toaster pastries Bentley liked that sat in a box on the counter; there wasn’t a lot in the house when it came to breakfast.

Vivien took a pair of oven mitts from a hook on the wall behind the stove and slid them on. Then, she opened the oven and pulled out the tray of French toast she and Royce had set inside to keep warm. Placing the tray on the unused burners of the stove, Vivien turned off the heat and set the mitts aside, gesturing to the food with a grin. “We made French toast.”

“We?” Miles echoed.

“Royce helped,” Vivien shrugged.

“Not really,” Royce chuckled as he grabbed a spatula from the utensil drawer and handed it to Vivien. “If anything, I think I was more of a distraction than anything.”

“A very welcome distraction,” Vivien said with a smile. Turning to the food before her, Vivien said, “Now, come on. I only have so much time to eat and chill with you guys before the girls get here.”

Not needing to be told twice, Bentley rose from his seat with his plate and crossed the room, nearly plowing Miles over in the process as he scurried to the stove and waited for Vivien to shovel food onto his plate. Once his brothers had food on their plates, Miles handed Vivien her own and waited for the boys to be seated before lowering his voice and asking, “How did you make all of this?”

Vivien shrugged as she set her own plate aside and began filling Miles’, “It’s just some vanilla ice cream and bread, Miles; it’s nothing spectacular.”

Miles thought for a moment, glancing at the refrigerator he knew was just barely cold enough to keep their milk stable before turning back to Vivien, “I’m pretty sure we didn’t have any ice cream, kiddo.”

“I bought the stuff this morning on my walk,” Vivien said with a grin. “There’s this adorable little shop on the next street over that’s run by this sweet, older, Cuban couple, and while I was checking it out, I figured I’d make breakfast to thank you guys for hosting me.”

Placing a hand on Vivien’s arm, Miles said, “You didn’t have to do that.”

“I know, but I wanted to,” Vivien retorted, handing Miles his plate with a smile. “Now, go finish making your coffee and then eat. I want to hear how terrible my cooking is this time.”

With a reluctant chuckle, Miles rolled his eyes, “First of all, that was one time, and I was sick, so nothing tasted good. Second, how are you still holding that over me? It was, like, a year ago.”

“What can I say? I’m petty,” Vivien grinned, taking her plate and heading back to the table as Miles grabbed the creamer from the fridge and poured some into his coffee. Using her fork to cut into the first slice of bread on her plate, Vivien asked the boys, “How is it?”

Although Royce took the time to swallow his food before telling her how much he enjoyed her cooking, Bentley had no qualms with holding a hand over his mouthful of French toast and mumbling, “So good!”

“Ben,” Miles gently reprimanded as he set his coffee and plate down and took his place at the table.

“Sorry,” the blond muttered, too distracted with stabbing into the bread again to actually mean what he said.

With a heaved sigh, Miles turned to Vivien and said, “It must be good if Bentley’s too busy stuffing his face to bother putting maple syrup on anything.”

Vivien chuckled, watching as Bentley’s gaze slowly rose from his plate, locking quickly on the golden brown bottle of Vermont maple syrup. Snatching the bottle from the center of the table, Bentley popped open the cap and let a thick stream of syrup drench his plate, soaking every last crumb in the liquid before capping it and returning the bottle to its original position. Snorting as she watched Bentley practically inhale his food, Vivien shook her head and went back to eating, allowing a comfortable silence to fill the air.

By the time the food was gone from everyone else’s plates, Bentley was long since finished and had begun chatting with the others around the table, his plate still coated in a thick layer of syrup on the table before him while he used a laser pointer Mick had given him to play with Binx. Once the table was cleared of plates and the dishes had been unceremoniously tossed into the sink to be washed later on, Bentley all but dragged Vivien to the living room to introduce her to his favorite Sunday morning cartoons while Royce headed upstairs to get dressed and Miles worked on figuring out a grocery list. It didn’t take long for Royce to join them again, still half-heartedly carding his fingers through his tangled curls as he jogged down the stairs. Halfway through an episode of The Jetsons, with Royce rubbing circles into the back of her hand with his thumb and Bentley explaining the show’s main characters to her while a segment of commercials aired, Vivien jumped as a series of knocks rapped on the door.

Without allowing anyone to get up from their positions, the door swung open, Lela’s jet-black hair flowing like a drop of ink in water over her shoulder as she hip-checked the door from its heat-swollen frame. With a laugh she shared with Carrie as the pair entered the house, Lela beamed, “Hey, hey! Who’s ready to blow through our paychecks?”

Vivien chuckled, pushing herself from the couch with a grin, “Is that what I volunteered for?”

As Vivien rounded the couch, Lela sauntered over to meet her, wrapping the brunette in a hug and rocking her from side to side as she giggled, “It absolutely is.” Pulling back to hold Vivien by the arms as Carrie worked on shoving the door closed, Lela explained, “Carrie and I brought you some clothes to try on before we go, so that you don’t have to borrow some of Miles’ clothes and end up reeking like motor oil and gasoline all day.”

“I can hear you, you know,” Miles huffed as he left the kitchen, writing pad and pen still in hand.

Lela turned to him with a grin, “Good.”

Crossing over to meet her boyfriend and shifting the bag of clothes she carried into the crook of her elbow, Carrie smiled as he wrapped his arms around her waist with a yawn, “Good morning to you, too.”

“Morning,” he muttered against her as his forehead came to rest against her shoulder.

Rolling his eyes from his spot on the couch, Royce scoffed, “Really? First thing in the morning?”

Turning to her boyfriend with a somewhat amused stare, Vivien retorted, “You say that like you weren’t just as clingy with me this morning while we made breakfast.”

Taking in a breath, Royce looked ready to argue, but as he met Vivien’s eyes, he deflated, sulking back into the couch as Bentley snickered, “Your girlfriend has bigger balls than you do, RJ.”

“Shut up.”

Vivien snorted, rolling her eyes as she turned back to Lela, “So, about those clothes?”

Practically shoving the half-asleep Miles away from her shoulder, Carrie held up the bag with a smile, “Right here.”

Converging in the middle of the living space, Carrie opened the bag and allowed Lela to dig into it and pull out a myriad of colored fabrics. “I pulled a few things from my closet and so did Carrie, so feel free to pick whatever. There isn’t much, but we thought you’d like to blend into the crowd a bit more. There are some pants for comfort’s sake, but since it’ll be in the eighties today, we picked out some shorts and skirts as well.”

“There’s also a ton of patterns and colors for you to play with,” Carrie added with a smile. “And I may or may not have thrown in some shoes for you, but I wasn’t sure if the sizes in your world are the same as they are here, so don’t worry if they don’t fit you.”

Peering into the bag with a smile and examining the array of material within, Vivien glanced between the two girls and giggled, “What am I supposed to do with all of this when we get back from shopping?”

Lela chuckled, “These are for you, silly. You get to keep them.”

“What? Why?” Vivien asked. “I can’t just take your clothes.”

“Consider it a gift,” Carrie said with a wave of her hand, brushing off Vivien’s concern with a comfortable smile. “Besides, we both have more clothes than we know what to do with. It makes sense that we’d pass some stuff down to the next girl in line.”

Though Vivien had, of course, borrowed clothes from family members before - and stolen a handful of clothing from her aunts and father over the years - she had never been given direct hand-me-downs before. Her only older cousins on her dad’s side of things were boys, and the only other girls around her age were younger, making it nearly impossible for her to receive anything second-hand. Feeling a surge of familial fondness spread through her chest as Lela all but shoved the bag into her grasp, Vivien grinned at the pair and breathed, “Thanks, guys.”

“Don’t thank us yet,” Carrie chuckled, nudging the girl toward the stairs. “Just try to find something you like in there and we’ll wait down here.”

“Yeah, so get a move on,” Lela said with a wink. “The sooner you get dressed, the sooner we can go shopping.”

“Alright, alright,” Vivien laughed, hefting the bag onto her shoulder as she began jogging up the stairs, “I’m going!”

Once she was back in the room she now called her own, Vivien deposited the bag of clothes on the end of the bed and began pulling things out of it, tossing them into piles on her bed. Thankfully, the shoes were the last items in the bag, clunking to the floor in a heap as the bag tumbled off the end of the bed. Pushing the chunky go-go boots and heels so high she knew she’d break an ankle even trying to walk in them aside, Vivien grinned at the collection of sneakers and beach shoes Carrie had gifted her. Picking up a pair of shoes she felt would be comfortable roaming through stores all day, she froze as an envelope tumbled to the floorboards with a soft tap.

Picking up the envelope, Vivien flipped it over to find her name scrawled across the front in glittery ink, both of the dots above the I’s in her name turned into tiny hearts. Inside the envelope was a small, folded note alongside a thin necklace with a small, purple rose dangling from it and a pair of matching earrings. Unfolding the paper, Vivien smiled as she read Carrie’s swirling handwriting.

‘Vivi, I wasn’t sure if you have your ears pierced or not, but I wore these in an episode of Find Your Voice, and thought you’d like them, so I took them home with me. I hope you like them. xoxo, Carrie. PS, Miles told me that you don’t like accepting random gifts, but I won’t take no for an answer, so don’t even try giving it back to me!’

Resigning to her fate, Vivien set the envelope of jewelry on the bed and began attempting to find something in the pile of clothes that would match her new accessories. Although her outfit of choice had enough purple to make a purple people eater froth at the mouth, the brunette could bring herself to care. Vivien smiled at her reflection in the mirror, pulling her hair down from its elastic and slipping the tie around her wrist as she debated on whether or not leaving her hair down was a good idea. Choosing to ask the girls later, Vivien returned to the bed and grabbed the envelope, pulling out the jewelry and slipping them on.

Picking up the envelope and setting it on the nightstand, Vivien found herself glancing over her shoulder at the suitcase propped against the wall. Hadn’t her dad said something about Abby putting something in there while they were packing? Shrugging, Vivien decided she would clean up the mountain of clothes when she got back that afternoon and stepped over to the suitcase, kneeling on the floor in front of it. Pulling back the zipper, she pushed aside the clothes she had intended to give back to Lela and Carrie, her shower bag, and her bag of chunky crystals she had yet to put in her windowsill before pulling an envelope from the bottom of the plastic lining.

Her dad’s handwriting was usually anything but neat, but Vivien found herself smiling at the familiarity of it - reminded faintly of the one and only time she ever tried forging his signature to get out of detention when she was in seventh grade. Of course, with her dad being the junior-senior high school’s principal, she was screwed from the start as he would have had to approve of her release slip, but she never was one to think ahead when it came to things like that. Opening the envelope and pulling out a piece of construction paper folded to resemble a card, Vivien smiled at the hand-drawn cartoon dinosaurs on the front - a signature of Oliver’s presence, no doubt - and opened it, a smaller, yet thicker envelope thumping into her lap as they were released from their confines.

Not wanting herself to be distracted by the new item, Vivien read through a small note from her dad - his well-wishes and love apparent as he told her to accept what they gave her and take loads of pictures for them - followed by short messages from her siblings - Oliver’s teasing remark telling her not to get pregnant on spring break starkly juxtaposed with Abby’s sweet message reminding her to take a break for once and telling her they loved her. Vivien found herself smirking at the differences between her siblings before setting the card aside, intent on setting it somewhere she could see it every day. Picking up the extra envelope, Vivien’s mouth fell open in shock as she found a stack of dollar bills inside. Tugging the cash from the plain white envelope and finding a sticky note placed atop the first bill, she let out a disbelieving breath - it was all hundreds!

Giving it a quick count, Vivien nearly dropped the money. There had to have been at least two grand in her hands. Vivien felt panic wash through her; she could have sworn she told her dad how much she had saved for the trip! What gave him the idea of giving her so much? Pulling the sticky note from the money, she read her dad’s quick note - “Your aunts and I have been setting money aside for your future escapades. Have fun in paradise, pumpkin, and don’t spend this all on crystals and dog toys! Loki has enough of those. We love you, baby girl. Always.” - and felt her eyes begin to burn. She hadn’t had the chance to swing by her aunts’ place before leaving, but as she took a deep breath to calm herself, Vivien felt almost grateful they claimed they were busy that night. If she had seen them before leaving and not thanked them, she would have felt so much worse. At least her phone call on the plane had consisted more of yawns and tired ramblings about activities she was looking forward to than anything meaningful.

Digging into the back pocket of her shorts, Vivien tugged out her phone and unlocked it before remembering exactly where - and, more importantly, when - she was. Even if she called her dad and her aunts to thank them for their overly expensive gift, the call wouldn’t go through. Not only were the phone numbers probably not in use yet, but even if they were, the only people in her immediate family tree who were even alive in the sixties were her grandparents, and they would only be around seven or eight - certainly not old enough to be accepting phone calls from some random girl claiming to be their granddaughter. Letting out a sigh, Vivien pocketed the phone once again and stood, setting the card and sticky note in the drawer of her nightstand and adding the money from her family to the already absurd amount of money in her wallet.

Now possessing far too much money than she knew what to do with, Vivien took a purse from the pile of items she now owned and shoved her phone, wallet, and blood pressure medication into it before securing her smartwatch around her wrist and leaving the room. Heading downstairs once more, Vivien smiled as Lela and Carrie turned to her with a question, “Ready?”

“As I’ll ever be,” Vivien replied. Turning her attention to the trio of brothers on the couch, Vivien asked, “What are you guys going to be doing today?”

“Grocery shopping,” Miles grumbled, letting out a yawn as he peered over the back of the couch at the young girl. “We should be done by two or three, if I can pry a couple certain someones away from the bookstore next to the Winn-Dixie.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Roye claimed innocently despite the glimmer of anticipation in his caramel eyes.

“Mhm, sure,” Vivien drawled as she made her way behind the couch, wrapping her arms around Royce’s shoulders from behind. As he placed his hands over her arms and squeezed them in return, she lowered her voice and smiled, “I’ll see you later.”

“Have fun,” he replied.

“You too,” Vivien chuckled. “I just know it’ll be so hard to pry poor Bentley away from that darn produce aisle.”

The aforementioned blonde let out a sarcastic snort, “Yeah, about as hard as pulling teeth.”

Vivien smiled and, feeling somewhat more at ease now that she felt more welcomed by the girls she would be spending the day with, said a quick goodbye to the Murphy brothers before following Carrie and Lela outside. Tugging the door into the frame with a yank, Vivien turned to the girls and asked, “So, what now?”

“Now,” Carrie began, swinging her keys as she sauntered over to her car, “we go shopping.”

Raising an eyebrow, Vivien chuckled as she asked, “What happened to getting coffee?”

“We’ll get it at the mall,” Carrie shrugged as she slipped into the driver’s seat.

Looping her arm into Vivien’s and pulling the girl toward Carrie’s Mustang, Lela smiled, “The coffeeshop we usually go to is closed for a family vacation.”

“Those bitches,” Carrie huffed, taking her sunglasses from the visor and placing them on the bridge of her nose.

Laughing, Vivien climbed into the back seat and buckled herself in as Lela rounded the car, “How dare they take a vacation during spring break!”

“I know, right!” Carrie exclaimed, smiling at Vivien in the rearview mirror. “Anyway, they have this little coffee place in the food court that sells cookies and stuff, so I figured we could head there first and then shop around for a bit.”

“Sounds good to me,” Lela sighed as she settled into her seat, turning to Vivien with a grin.

“Yeah,” Vivien nodded, “sounds good.”

“Great!” Clapping her hands together, Carrie beamed, her brilliant smile nearly blinding as she turned the key in the ignition and began backing out onto the street. Nudging her glasses up the bridge of her nose, the blonde put the car into drive and pressed the gas pedal, “Let’s get this show on the road.”

Lela was quick to turn on the radio, Wipe Out by The Surfaris blaring over the speakers as the car turned left onto Gulf Boulevard. Vivien found herself bopping along to the music as she looked out the side of the car, her hair whipping in the wind and her smile growing as she took in the downtown area of St. Pete Beach, simply excited to see more of the small city. As they flew through the city, turning onto Pinellas Bayway across the street from some ritzy hotel on the beach, Vivien smiled as she took in the palm-tree-lined streets, the warm, oceanic air filling her lungs as the sunlight warmed her skin.

Maybe her dad was right; this place really was paradise.

After slowing down so that Carrie could pay the toll, they pulled onto the highway, picking up speed as they took to Route 275, The Beach Boys’ song Little Deuce Coupe playing over the whipping wind. The half-hour-long drive felt as though it flew by as Vivien drank in the view from the back seat, her eyes flitting between the other cars on the highway and the buildings they drove by. However, once they pulled onto the Howard Frankland Bridge, Vivien found herself enraptured by the glow of the sun on the rippling waters of Old Tampa Bay, pulling her phone out to snap a few quick pictures of the water and the other old-school cars on the bridge with them before tucking it in her purse again to admire the view.

All too soon, the ride was over, and Carrie had pulled into the parking lot for the Sunny Shore Shopping Plaza, rolling into a parking spot midway between the first-floor entrances of JCPenney and Saks Fifth Avenue. Climbing out of the convertible, Vivien looked around with an awestruck smile; the mall was on the larger side in comparison to most shopping areas back home, but she couldn’t bring herself to care. After all, she had somehow survived the Natick Mall - the largest in all of New England - with just a pair of very sore legs, and if the Sunny Shore Mall was anything like it, she could manage just fine so long as she had some pretzel bites and lemonade.

As Carrie sidled up beside her, Vivien beamed, “I have a feeling I’m going to like it here.”

The blonde chuckled, placing her sunglasses atop her head with a smile, “I knew you would.”

Placing her purse strap on her shoulder, Lela took Vivien’s hand and added, “Just wait until you see the inside. There’s a Woolworth’s, a Marshall Field’s, a few five-and-dime stores like Kresge’s, and even a few record shops.”

Allowing the older girls to pull her toward the JCPenney entrance of the shopping mall, Vivien smiled although she had only ever heard of one of the aforementioned stores. Feeling excitement bubbling in her chest as Lela jogged up to the door to pull it open for herself and Carrie, Vivien found it nearly impossible to wipe the smile from her face as she said, “I feel like I’m stepping into a Bright Sun Films YouTube video or something.”

“A YouTube video?” Carrie echoed. “What’s a YouTube?”

“It’s-” Vivien cut herself off, suddenly hit with the fact that YouTube didn’t exist in the sixties. “It’s a video platform where people share things like music and movies and stuff. Maybe I can show you on my phone later.”

“I’d like that,” Carrie smiled, taking Vivien’s arm in hers and pulling her into the store.

Though, as a whole, JCPenney’s departments hadn’t changed much since its original format - clothing, home goods, jewelry, and appliances - the style of, well, everything took Vivien aback far more than she realized it could. Not only were the styles of clothing different, but the store itself was entirely different from any JCPenney Vivien had ever visited. Mid-century-style chandeliers hung from the ceiling, casting warm, golden light on the store as workers in pastel uniforms flitted about with cheerful smiles on their faces. Vivien smiled in return as a woman passed by with a rack of clothes, the two sharing a wave as the woman went about her day.

“It’s funny,” Vivien breathed, gaining the attention of the girls on either side of her as they guided her further into the store.

Looking around curiously, Lela tipped her head to the side as she asked the younger girl, “What is?”

Snickering, Vivien admitted, “I’m not used to seeing people happy to be at work. Most workers in my world are standoffish and grumpy when you approach them in a shop.”

Sharing a laugh as Vivien looked around in amazement, Lela watched as Carrie moved to stand in front of the young brunette with her signature, dazzling smile and said, “Well, Vivi, most people nowadays actually like the jobs they have. From what little experience I have, I can tell you the people are, usually, a lot nicer here because they have other work options to choose from.”

“I don’t doubt it,” Vivien agreed with a nod. Looking around the store, she wondered, “Where do we even start?”

“Why don’t you pick?” Lela offered. “It’s your first time in the sixties, and not like we’re on a tight schedule or anything, so we can go anywhere you want to go.”

Smiling at the idea, Vivien looked around at the different departments, the music playing from the speakers on the walls filling her with a sense of familiarity as she took in the clothing selections around her. Turning from the junior-miss department to the ladies’ department, Vivien found herself not looking at the clothes as a head of blonde hair caught her attention. Watching as the girl turned, her arms filled with various hangers of clothing yet to be tried on, Vivien stepped away from Lela and Carrie and made her way to the blonde.

“Hey,” she called out, smiling as the girl looked up, “you’re Jules, right? The girl from the restaurant yesterday.”

“And you’re Vivien,” Juliet said, smiling as Vivien nodded in agreement. “What brings you here?”

“A shiny, convertible Mustang,” Vivien offered with a tentative laugh. Attempting to brush off her awkwardness with a shake of her head, she gestured to Lela and Carrie as they followed her over and explained, “Carrie and Lela wanted to take me shopping.”

Juliet let out a soft chuckle, smiling over Vivien’s shoulder at the familiar pair, “Not even two whole days here and this one’s already got you two chauffeuring for her? Damn.” Nudging Vivien with an elbow, she smirked at Carrie and teased, “If I’d known it was that easy to hitch a ride in that fancy car o’ yours, I’d have used my - oh, what did you call it, Carrie?” She tapped her chin thoughtfully before thickening her accent with a playful grin. “My ‘southern belle charm’? - on you the day I met you.”

In a bid to appear unphased despite the tinge of pink flushing across her cheeks, Carrie laughed, “You’re one to talk about fancy cars, Julie. You’ve got an Aston Martin.”

“Not today, I don’t,” Juliet said with a wink. Turning her attention back onto the brunette before her, she lowered her voice, “Today, I’m just an average girl with her Thunderbird.”

“I thought you were an average girl,” Vivien chuckled in a breath. “Are you, like, rich or something?”

“My dad owns a few motorcycle manufacturing plants in Texas and Tampa as well as a few country clubs and luxury car sales places,” Juliet admitted with a shrug.

Thinking for a moment about how at ease the girl had been at her place of work the day before, Vivien asked, “I take it you only work at Big Momma for funsies?”

Juliet laughed, smiling brightly back at Vivien, “Well, more for the drama, but yeah, I guess that works too. I don’t really need to work anywhere, but Daddy said I should get some real life experiences and stop stickin’ my nose so high in the air I could drown in a rainstorm, so I picked the only place nobody really knew me at.”

“And, now, everyone loves her,” Carrie chirped as she examined a rack full of skirts with funky patterns.

“I wouldn’t say everyone,” Juliet said with a grin - lopsided, but still somehow perfect. “I’m sure I pissed off a few people by takin’ up space at their favorite hangout.”

“Only those who knew you from before had any issue with it,” Lela admitted. “But now, they love you.”

“And the feelin’s mutual,” Juliet smiled. "They weren't so fond of me before."

“‘Before?” Vivien wondered aloud. “What happened before?”

Juliet heaved a sigh, rolling her eyes at the memory, “It’s a long, twisted story starring my shitty ex-boyfriend and his gaggle of lunatic shitheads he considers friends.”

Eager to learn more about the seemingly sweet and innocent blonde before her, Vivien’s eyes glittered as she asked, “What did they do?”

Leaning close to the girl, Juliet took Vivien’s hand and lowered her voice, “It’s probably not a good idea to get into it here, but he’s a jerk.”

“Worse than just a jerk, if you ask me,” Lela huffed. “He’s an attempted murderer, in my opinion.”

“And you’re right to think so,” Carrie agreed.

Wide-eyed, Vivien looked between the three older girls before saying, “Okay, now I really want to know!”

Juliet glanced around before jerking her thumb toward the large opening that led from JCPenney into the rest of the mall, “Why don’t we go down to the food court? It’s louder down there, so nobody will hear us.”

“I saw in the paper that they’re giving out free milkshakes this weekend at The Crazy Cow,” Lela suggested.

“That’ll work,” Juliet agreed with a smile. Following the girls away from the clothes to the main pathways of the store, she turned to Vivien and said, “Before anything else, though, just know that it happened a while ago, and I’m still fighting with Xander to this day.”

Placing a hand on Vivien’s shoulder as she and Lela began guiding Vivien and Juliet through the store to the main concourse of the shopping mall, Carrie explained, “The scumbag still has a bunch of her stuff that he refuses to return.”

As her mouth fell open, disbelieving rage filled Vivien’s expression as she breathed a soft, “That asshat.”

Juliet snorted, “Welcome to the slader Xander club. The girls and I get together every Friday to rant about him and his bullshit. It’s like a book club, but with more threats of violence.”

“Count me in,” Vivien said with a smile. “I’m always down for a bit of shit-talking toxic exes.”

“It’s not just him, though,” Lela claimed. “Carrie’s ex, Eric, is also on our list of nasties.”

“And don’t forget that arrogant piece of crap you were with for, what, a month, a few summers before you and Tanner got together,” Carrie added. “What was his name, again?”

Lela rolled her eyes, a scoff falling from her lips as she recalled her absolutely shitty summer romance from what felt like a lifetime ago, “William. Ugh, don’t even get me started on him.”

As the other girls let out soft laughs, Vivien recalled a line from a clip of a show she’d been recommended during one of her mindless scrolling sessions, “Why is every inbred, rich, white guy named William?”

Turning toward the brunette with a raised eyebrow, Lela asked, “How did you know that about him? Did I show you a picture of him or something?”

Vivien was confused for a moment, shaking her head slowly, but as realization dawned on her, she let out a bark of surprised laughter, “Wait; he was actually a rich, white guy?!”

“And I wouldn’t put it past that family to have some serious inbreeding issues under the surface,” Carrie confirmed.

“I was just quoting a show,” Vivien laughed as they stepped out into the main hallways of the mall. A few steps away from the store, she found herself asking, “Was he really inbred?”

“Most generationally wealthy families end up marrying off their children to continue the family businesses or whatever,” Juliet explained. “It’s not completely out of the realm of possibility that somewhere down the line, someone married a cousin or something.”

Lela shrugged, hoping to brush the conversation aside as they guided her through the mall, “I don’t know whether he was or wasn’t, but he was a jerk, all the same.”

“And you went out with him?” Vivien asked. “I can’t imagine you with anybody like that.”

With a sigh, Lela nodded, “He wasn’t horrible at first. After a while, though, it was like a dumpster fire flying down a ski hill.”

“I guess we’ve all been there,” Vivien shrugged as the girls led her down a short set of stairs to the sunken area of the main floor where the food court was. “Everyone has a relationship they’d rather not recall.”

“Speaking from experience?” Juliet asked as she guided the girls to an empty table in the middle of the chaos.

Vivien nodded, “My last relationship was alright at first, but, like Lela’s, it went downhill. It happens, I guess.”

“I didn’t know you dated anybody before Royce,” Carrie said as Vivien dropped into the chair beside her.

“Yeah,” Lela piped up, “me neither.”

“What was he like?” Juliet asked.

Not wanting to correct the older girl she had only met the day before and have to explain to someone from nineteen-sixty-four that her previous relationship wasn’t with a boy, Vivien shrugged and said, “Alex and I were actually friends first. We went to the same figure skating rink, liked some of the same movies and music, and we got along great. But, toward the end of things, we stopped talking as much.”

“How come?” Lela asked.

Vivien heaved a sigh, “Alex’s family was moving, and they weren’t sure how to tell me, so they just, sort of, didn’t. Every time I tried calling or anything, it was like talking to a brick wall. They didn’t really listen to anything I had to say, and, when I tried talking about feeling ignored, they finally came clean about the reason, and we ended up breaking up that same day.”

Placing a hand on Vivien’s arm, Carrie sighed, “I hate that it happened to you, but I think I’d take an amicable breakup over a cheater anyday.”

“It wasn’t exactly amicable,” Vivien admitted slowly. Feeling three sets of eyes on her, Vivien hesitantly admitted, “Alex sort of threw an ice skate at my head when it was all said and done.”

“Like, blade and all?” Lela wondered. As Vivien slowly nodded, Lela shook her head, “What the hell; that’s insane!”

“Well, damn,” Juliet breathed. “And here I thought having Xander keep a box of my things hostage was bad.”

“Please tell me you got revenge or something?” Carrie pressed.

Vivien shook her head, “I was too in shock to think of anything like that. Plus, we were friends before we were anything more; I couldn’t do that.”

“Obviously, he didn’t feel the same,” Carrie scoffed, shaking her head.

“You’re a helluva better person than I am,” Juliet claimed. “I would’ve torn his arm clean off and beat him with the bloody stump if I’d been in your position.”

Raising an eyebrow at the girl beside her, Lela softly breathed, “That’s a bit violent, don’t you think?”

“’S a southern thing. I wouldn’t’ve actually done it,” Juliet shrugged, taking in a breath before smiling across the table at Vivien. “What I mean is, he would’ve had hell to pay if I’d been there.”

“Agreed,” Carrie seconded. Then, with a deep sigh, she leaned back in her chair and huffed, “Some men are just asses.”

“Yeah,” Vivien sighed. Taking a moment to think about how far she had come from her first relationship, she smiled and admitted, “I’m just lucky that Royce is like an angel in comparison.”

“And he’s lucky to have you as well,” Carrie said with a smile. Patting the table with a hand, she glanced around at the other girls before saying, “Now, enough talk about boys; this is supposed to be a girl’s day. What does everyone want to drink?”

Juliet’s quick request for something called the “Death by Chocolate” milkshake gave Vivien pause, but as she looked over at the small outlet shop with a handful of workers behind the counter wearing sailor getups, she smiled. Squinting to see the sign better despite her glasses, Vivien found herself chuckling at the names of the milkshakes - each a pun or subtle nod to a song that Vivien could appreciate. Requesting a “Peanut Butter Bomb” with rainbow sprinkles instead of the chocolate ones the sign claimed came with the frozen drink, the brunette watched as Carrie and Lela rose from their seats, Lela offering to order them something for lunch from the pizza shop in the corner of the food court.

Suddenly alone with the blonde she hardly knew, Vivien found herself smiling hesitantly at the older girl. “So…” she drawled cautiously, now immensely aware of how little she could talk with the blonde. Juliet was - by Vivien’s standards, at least - very pretty and seemed to be very kind, but one look at the older girl reminded Vivien that she couldn’t bring up much of anything she liked. Her music choices and movie interests wouldn’t make sense to someone stuck in the sixties, any meme references she would usually make to bridge the gap between herself and a potential new friend wouldn’t land if the meme never existed, and she couldn’t exactly whip out her cell phone and show the girl her newest favorite TikToks. Vivien was, for all intents and purposes, stuck. “How’s it going?”

“It’s good, I suppose,” Juliet chuckled, smiling reassuringly at the girl across from her. “Y’know, you don’t have to be so stiff.”

“Stiff?” Vivien wondered aloud, feeling the tension in her spine twitch as the urge to slouch took over. “I’m not stiff.”

Sending the girl a knowing look, Juliet smiled, “Tell that to your rigid, dancer posture. You take ballet classes?”

Slowly, Vivien nodded, taking in a breath to relax herself a bit as she explained, “I’m a figure skater. My partner, Riven, and I do ballet to help us have nice lines on the ice.”

“Riven, huh?” Juliet asked. “Is he that tall boy Mick says you’re in a band with back home?”

“I guess so, yeah,” Vivien beamed, eager to finally have something to discuss with the blonde. “He’s kind, always considerate, and super smart, but I’d never tell him that - oh, and he always smells like this really nice, watermelon-y cologne his dad got him for Christmas that’s a knock-off of some really expensive Ralph Lauren one, but he refuses to tell me what it is because he’s an ass. But, then again, he’s my ass, so I love him anyway.”

“You love him?” Juliet questioned softly as she curiously tilted her head. “What about Royce?”

“Oh, it’s not like that,” Vivien brushed off. “Riven’s like my brother, basically. We’ve been skating together since I was, like, four, and although I adore him, and vice versa, he’s my brother. As amazing as he is, I would rather jump from the tallest skyscraper without a parachute than date him.”

Letting out a soft laugh, Juliet nodded, “Good to know. Do you have any pictures of him on your phone?”

Eyes glittering like freshly polished emeralds, Vivien nodded emphatically, reaching into her purse and pulling out her cell phone. Unlocking the device and swiping over to her photo albums, Vivien’s fingers froze millimeters above the screen as she slowly looked up at Juliet, who smiled softly in return. Realizing the blonde had tricked her, Vivien quietly asked, “You knew?”

Juliet nodded dutifully, her smile never wavering, “Word travels fast at Big Momma’s, and Mick is always talking about her little sister who she wants to show off to everyone if she ever gets the chance. It wasn’t hard to piece together who you were once I knew your name, but I wanted to form my own opinion of you before I told you what I knew.”

“And?” Vivien asked. “What’s your opinion?”

“I’m still working on it,” Juliet admitted. “But so far, so good.”

“That’s reassuring.”

Juliet chuckled, reaching across the table to place a hand on Vivien’s arm. “You don’t need to impress me, darlin’. Just be yourself, and I’ll tag along for the ride.”

“Thank you,” Vivien said, finally feeling herself relax enough to find the metal chair she sat on somewhat comfortable.

“What’re friends for?” Juliet asked rhetorically, her smile nearly blinding. “Now, show me some pictures of this brother of yours. He sounds like a catch, and I’m in the market for a new beau.”

Snorting at the idea of someone as beautiful as Juliet finding Riven - of all people - attractive, Vivien opened her phone once again and began scrolling through her pictures as the other girls made their way back to the table. Combating Lela’s wide eyes and Carrie’s raised brow with a smile and a shake of her head, Vivien accepted her milkshake from Carrie and explained to Juliet who some of the people in her pictures were. Once Lela had set down the pizza she had ordered and Vivien tucked her phone back into her purse, the conversation seemed to flow with relative ease.

All too soon for any of their liking, the meal was over, and they were tossing their trash in one of the overly ornate trash barrels on their way out of the food court. However, instead of parting ways with the girls, Juliet decided to stick around, far more interested in having a group of friends to shop around with than wandering the large shopping center on her own. Juliet was eager to show her friends some of her favorite shops, guiding them through locally-owned shops like Durand Sisters, Zig to Zag, and Missy’s Closet. Though they didn’t find much that Vivien was interested in, they all left with something from each store before letting Lela drag them into a dress boutique, which she said would have just what Vivien needed. The girls spared no time at all pushing her into the nearest changing room and throwing dresses over the door at the poor brunette, urging her to try on anything she liked once they figured out her size in different brands.

After spending a few hours floating between stores and trying things on, Vivien was more than willing to sit around at a smoothie shop on the far end of the mall. Sipping at her watermelon smoothie while the girls divvied up their purchases and handed items to each other across the small table, Vivien found that she was simply glad for a break. She never believed there would come a time when she would be out-shopped by anyone - hell, she spent most of her summer the previous year in the mall, bouncing between shops with Erica and Jade while they filled out applications, did interviews, and just hung out - but there she was, sitting around a tiny metal table to rest her aching feet, smiling as she listened to the girls chat about everything and everyone they could think of. It was nice.

Once they had finished their drinks and relaxed for a while, Vivien admitted that she wanted to find a place that could fill her closet with more than just the practical fashion of the day - she wanted to find clothes that were just as comfortable and relaxed as she was. After examining the mall’s directory map and eliminating a couple of handfuls of stores from her potential list as the older trio picked apart the selection with practiced ease, Vivien found herself hand-in-hand with Lela and Carrie as they headed down the concourse to a store called Woolco. The mannequins in the shop’s windows were dressed in a range from the wasp waist dresses and puffy skirts worn by the older women in the area to mod dresses, shift skirts, and colorful jeans with matching sweaters that were, Vivien supposed, commonplace for teenagers and young women. Upon entering the store, Vivien was mildly confused by the lunch counter near the door, the smell of soups and grilled cheeses wafting through the air as a teenage boy around Vivien’s age greeted them.

Grabbing a shopping cart and pulling Vivien toward the juniors department despite her insistence that, due to her height, she was in the women’s section back home, the older girls began pulling things from the racks and draping them over the side of the cart in a pile. At Lela’s urging, Vivien split off from the group, heading across the path to the shoe department in search of something to match a majority of what the girls had picked for her. Though the shoes Carrie had already gifted her would definitely be making their way into her rotations, she knew for a fact that anything with a heel higher than the ones on her figure skates would require some getting used to. In the meantime, she needed something practical and easy to walk in.

Though she usually searched the men’s section first in the hopes of finding some Converse that would last longer than the ones in the women’s section, Vivien found herself drawn to the ladies’ section. Among the saddle shoes and shoes that appeared to be copies of her favorite iconic sneakers, Vivien found a pair of Keds Champions - the same shoes she remembered Baby wearing in Dirty Dancing. Glancing over at the girls and the stack of clothes they had accumulated for her, Vivien sighed and shook her head with a smile. Yeah, she had time.

By the time she had set aside a few boxes of shoes, the girls had gathered enough clothing to fill a new store, making Vivien wonder if she would’ve been better off going shopping with Miles and the boys. Examining the pile as she placed her trio of boxes inside the cart, Vivien asked, “You guys do realize I’m only staying for, like, a month or so, right?”

“Oh, please,” Lela scoffed with a grin. “It’s the sixties, Vivi, you need an outfit for every occasion you come across.”

“Especially dance nights and pool parties,” Juliet suggested with a smile.

Shaking her head with a smile, Vivien sighed, “Somehow, I doubt I’ll be going to many parties. I’ve barely left my house all year apart from school and skating practice.”

“Then isn’t it time that you did?” Carrie asked, gentle music floating through the air from seemingly nowhere as the blonde smiled warmly at the brunette before her.

Looking around in bewilderment, Vivien wondered aloud, “Where is that coming from?”

“Besides,” Lela began, ignoring the girl’s question, “this world is different from yours.”

“Yeah, Vivi,” Juliet agreed, smiling at Lela and Carrie as she began singing, “look around! Everybody’s groovin’ to a brand new sound.”

Beaming proudly as the music began to swell, Lela took Vivien’s hands and pulled her toward the dressing rooms as she sang, “Hey, Vivi, hey, Vivi, follow me, I know something’s in you that you wanna set free.”

“So let go, go, go of the past now,” Carrie sang with a wink, waving her hand as though she was, quite literally, brushing off the past. “Say hello to the love in your heart.”

“Yes, we know that the world’s spinning fast now,” Juliet chimed in, helping Carrie pull aside the curtains that separated the changing rooms from the rest of the store, “but you gotta get yourself a brand new start.”

Vivien allowed Lela to pull her inside the dressing rooms, looking around briefly at the fancy chandeliers and various mirrors lining the walls before jumping in surprise as the changing room attendants began singing along, joining in the familiar song as the backing vocals Vivien sang in the car all the time, “Hey, Vivi, welcome to the sixties! Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh~! Oh, Vivi, welcome to the sixties! Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh~! Go, Vivi, go, go, go!”

Finding herself pushed into a cubicle by the girls who had brought her to the store, Vivien let out a startled “Hey!” as they filled her arms with clothes and all but slammed the door in her face. Huffing as she set the overwhelming stack of clothes on the bench inside the room, Vivien scoffed, “Not cool, you guys!”

Ignoring the girl’s remark, Carrie softly sang, “Hey, Vivi, hey, Vivi, have some fun.”

Looking over the pile, Vivien muttered, “It’ll take me twenty years to try all this stuff on.”

“Hey, Vivi, hey, Vivi,” Lela joined in from the other side of the door, “take a chance.”

Picking up a dress that the girls presumed she would need for some fancy night on the town, Vivien rolled her eyes, “Guys, I think I would’ve preferred a few more pairs of pants.”

“So?” Juliet asked. Without letting the girl get a word in edgewise, the blonde continued singing, “Let go, go, go of the past now.”

“Say hello to the light in your eyes,” Lela added, her smile evident in her tone despite keeping her voice soft.

Carrie leaned against the door, preventing Vivien from pushing it open to leave as she sang, “Yes, we know that the world’s spinning fast now.”

Then, as a joint effort, the girls sang in unison, “But you gotta run the race to win the prize!”

Taking in a deep breath as the music lulled, Vivien sized up the pile of clothes and shrugged, kicking her shoes off, pulling a few selections from the pile and setting them aside to try on. “Fine,” she huffed, “you win.”

Just like that, the music swelled once more as the girls outside the changing room and the attendants began singing the chorus once again. Allowing herself to get pulled into the swing of the song, Vivien changed into a checkerboard dress that faintly reminded her of Tracy’s finale dress in the Hairspray movie and knocked on the door to ask Carrie to step away from it before poking her head out. Though the people outside the changing room still sang along to the Hairspray song, Vivien found herself smiling and humming along as she slowly stepped out to look at herself in the mirror.

“Welcome to the rhythm of a brand new day,” Carrie sang with a beaming smile as she stepped up behind Vivien in the mirror.

“Take your newfangled fears,” Juliet sang, sidling up on Vivien’s left, “and just throw them away.”

Looking over the younger girl’s outfit, Lela placed a hand on Vivien’s shoulder and smiled gently at her as she suggested, “You should add some color and a fresh new ‘do.”

Joining the raven-haired girl in singing the last of her statement, Carrie and Juliet nodded and smiled, guiding Vivien back to the dressing room and pushing her inside, “’Cause it’s time for a star who looks just like you!”

However, as the song continued, Vivien felt herself drawn to a particular dress that hung on the back of the door. Though she wasn’t usually one for green, and the skirt was nowhere near as long as she would have preferred, the dress nearly matched her eyes, encouraging her to take it down from the hanger and at least give it a shot whilst her friends and the workers sang. Almost as though the people outside her dressing room knew she had gotten the dress on and into place, a knock sounded on the door, and Vivien called out, “Yeah?”

Without warning, the door swung open, and a pair of fitting room attendants stepped into the small room, encouraging Vivien to sit on the bench as they took turns showing her things they had brought with them. The older one, a redhead with streaks of white framing her face, started singing as she pulled out a tube of lipstick, held Vivien’s chin to keep her in place, and started applying it to her lips, “Don’tcha let nobody try to steal your fun, ’cause a little touch of lipstick never hurt no one.”

“The future’s got a million roads for you to choose,” the other attendant, a dark-skinned woman with curly hair and a graceful smile, sang as she knelt beside Vivien and slipped a pair of shoes on her feet, buckling the strap over the top of her foot before moving away, “but you’ll walk a little taller in some high-heel shoes.”

“And once you find the style that makes you feel like you,” the redhead sang.

“Something fresh, something new,” the curly-haired attendant added.

Opening the door and stepping out of the fitting room, the pair sang in unison, “Step on out, hear us shout!”

After a pause of complete silence, Vivien heard Carrie knock lightly on the door as she called out, “Vivi, that’s your cue!”

Propelling herself to her feet and giving herself a quick once-over, Vivien stepped out of the dressing room and made her way to the mirror, finding her reflection with wide eyes. Though the dress looked small on the hanger, it fit her perfectly, the shade of green complimenting her eyes nicely. The soft pink on her lips was the only makeup she remembered receiving, but behind her glasses, she could see traces of eyeshadow and mascara that, for the first time in years, didn’t make them uncomfortably clumpy or stick to the lenses of her glasses. Then, to top it all off, her hair had been teased into a small bump just behind her bangs, separated by a solid white hair band she didn’t recall wearing. Overall, she looked like something out of a vintage magazine - a look unachievable without the help of movie magic.

Feeling as though she had stared at herself long enough, Vivien took in a deep breath, glanced at the trio of girls who had moved to stand beside and behind her, and began hesitantly singing along to the song, “Hey, Carrie, hey, Lela, look at me; I’m the cutest chickie that ya ever did see.” Surprising herself with how good she sounded, Vivien let out a chuckled breath and sang, “Hey, Julie, hey, girls, look at us! Where is there a team that’s half as fabulous?”

“There she is!” Carrie cheered.

“Yes!” Lela squealed.

“Sing it, girl!” Juliet beamed.

Determined to enjoy the moment while she had it, Vivien smiled reassuringly at her reflection before turning to the girls and continuing the song, “I let go, go, go of my past now; said hello to this red carpet ride. Yes, I know that the world’s spinning fast now - tell Lollabrigida to step aside!”

As the music pulled them out of the dressing room area and back toward the entrance of the store, the lyrics of the chorus encouraging them to leave, Vivien found herself handed bags upon bags of clothing she had never tried on. Though she felt a hint of concern as the workers guided them to the exit, the repeated singing of the chorus swelling with each step they took, Vivien found herself smiling as she - like the other girls she had gone into the shop with - was pulled into a sort of involuntary musical number once they exited the store, finding everyone else in the mall dancing along as though it was the most normal part of their day.

Once the music finally ended, however, and they were stood by the water fountain in the middle of the concourse, Vivien panted to catch her breath as she laughed, turning to the girls on either side of her with wide eyes. “What was that?”

“A makeover montage,” Lela explained, beaming proudly at the brunette. “At least, that’s what Mick calls it.”

Looking over her outfit, Vivien smiled, “I can’t believe I actually had fun with that.”

Draping an arm over Vivien’s shoulders, Carrie said, “I can’t believe how incredible your singing voice is.”

“The power of movie magic, I guess,” Vivien chuckled. “Normally, I sing like a beached whale.”

Raising a brow, Juliet asked, “Aren’t beached whales dead?”

“Precisely.”

Lela scoffed as she took some of the bags from Vivien’s arms, “Vivien, I’ve heard you sing in the car.”

“Then you should know, better than anyone,” Vivien began, taking a moment to point to herself. “Beached whale.”

As Lela rolled her eyes and shook her head, Carrie began guiding them toward the mall’s exit with a sigh, “We have got to work on your confidence while you’re here.”

“I’m confident I sing like a beached whale,” Vivien tried. “Does that count?”

“Nice try,” Juliet chuckled, “but no.”

Vivien sighed, shrugging as they made their way outside. The mid-afternoon sun was warm on her skin as they stepped out of the air conditioning. “Well, can’t blame a girl for trying.”

Following the other girls over to the parking lot, Juliet pulled the keys to her car out of her bag and asked, “So, where to next, girls?”

“Well,” Carrie began, placing her sunglasses on the bridge of her nose with a sigh, “I was going to try bringing Vivi to the studio to show her around before we head home for the night, but turns out, nobody’s there to let us in the gate.”

“I could hop the fence,” Vivien suggested. After receiving nothing but silence and bewildered stares, Vivien asked, “What? It wouldn’t be my first time?”

“You break into places often?” Juliet wondered.

“As I tell Mickie all the time, it’s not breaking and entering if you don’t break anything,” Vivien shrugged. “Then it’s just entering.”

Lela snickered, “I don’t think that’s what the police would say.”

“Probably not, but I’ve never really gotten in trouble for it,” Vivien explained. “Abandoned buildings don’t typically have security.”

“I think that makes it a bit different than climbing the gate to a film studio,” Carrie grinned. “Besides, it probably wouldn’t go over well if we had to call Mick, Miles, or the Warden to bail us out of jail on your first full day here.”

With a sigh, Vivien admitted, “Yeah, I guess.” As they reached Carrie’s car, the brunette hefted some of her shopping bags into the backseat before climbing in and sitting, “So, any idea what’s in all of these bags? I didn’t try on much of anything.”

Peering into some of the bags over the side of the car as Lela placed more bags on the floor behind her seat, Juliet said, “Looks like most of the stuff we picked out for you.”

“But I didn’t pay for anything,” Vivien mused, glancing back at the mall entrance as though she expected some disgruntled manager to come running outside, demanding payment.

As though sensing the girl’s apprehension, Lela laughed, “Don’t question it. Free clothes and food come with the territory of movie magic. It’s kind of normal for us to get free things now and then.”

“Anyway,” Juliet started, bringing the conversation back to the items they had received as she looked through the bags, “it looks like there’s a few swimsuits, some shoes, and some everyday clothes as well.”

“And, hopefully, you got to keep some of the dresses we picked for when you and Royce go out dancing,” Carrie added, shimmying as she walked around the back of the car to the driver’s door.

“Dancing?” Vivien echoed with a laugh. “I doubt we’ll do much of that. He’s just as coordinated as I am.”

“Says the ballerina,” Juliet teases.

“And figure skater,” Lela chimed in.

Carrie looked at Vivien in the rearview mirror with a raised brow, “I would’ve thought you’d be one of the most coordinated people in this car.”

Vivien smirked back at the blonde, “Well, I have enough scars to say otherwise, but thanks.”

Turning in her seat as she buckled herself in, Lela said, “I remember Mick saying you were clumsy, but I thought she was just teasing.”

“Nah,” Vivien chuckled, “I’m graceful as hell on the ice, but the second I’m out of my skates, it’s like there’s a magnet slamming me into any surface that can cover me in bruises. So, yeah, I think dancing might be off the table.”

Juliet chuckled, patting the side of the car with a smile, “I don’t know, darlin’. You were dancin’ pretty darn well back there.”

Though her first instinct was to brush off the girl’s compliment and move on, Vivien found herself taking the time to actually think for a moment, pondering her statement. She had experienced a lot of firsts that day - her first interaction with people her friends didn’t already know, her first shopping trip in another world, and her first real taste of the movie world she now lived in. Whilst singing and dancing in public wasn’t something Vivien would usually find fun, she had to admit that, for her first time doing so, she actually enjoyed herself. With a small smile, Vivien softly said, “Movie magic, I guess.”

“We’ll let it slide for now,” Lela said with a reassuring smile.

“Just think about it,” Juliet added. “Who knows, maybe you’ll find you’re so good at dancing that Carrie here will convince the studio to take you on.”

Vivien let out a snort, “Yeah, I doubt that’ll happen.”

“Never know,” Carrie said from the driver’s seat. “They’re always looking for extras and one-off characters. Maybe they’d be willing to sign you on for a few episodes.”

Watching apprehension flood Vivien’s face as the younger girl stared wide-eyed at the mirror, Juliet smiled and said, “For now, though, let’s not get ahead of ourselves.”

“Thank you,” Vivien sighed under her breath.

“Anytime,” Juliet replied with a soft chuckle. “Well, I best be goin’. I’m meetin’ Daddy for tennis at the country club before dinner. You girls enjoy the rest o’ your night, and I’ll see y’all at Big Momma’s sometime this week.”

Sending the blonde another gracious smile, Vivien waved, “Bye, Juliet.”

“Later, Jules,” Lela said, offering the blonde a smile as she sauntered off to wherever her car was parked.

“See you, Julie,” Carrie said, wiggling her fingers in the other blonde’s direction as Juliet turned to the Mustang and blew a kiss to the trio within.

Once Juliet was out of sight, Carrie started the car, the engine roaring to life under the hood. The radio kicked on as they backed out of the parking space, encouraging Vivien to sing along as one of her favorite songs from Dirty Dancing began to play. Vivien allowed her head to tip back against the slot where the convertible roof was tucked away, finally finding herself able to relax into the leather seats as Carrie pulled out of the parking lot and onto the main street. After stopping at a traffic light and paying the few cents necessary to board the toll road, Vivien felt the car speed up yet kept her eyes on the sky above as clouds guided the sky closer to dusk.

Despite being energetic all day at the mall, as the radio personality announced it was now six in the afternoon, Vivien couldn’t help but let out a soft yawn. It was no wonder she was tired with her lack of sleep the last few nights, but she couldn’t help but feel it was rude for the universe to remind her of it when she had just had a fantastic day with her friends. As though taunting her, Vivien rolled her eyes as another stronger yawn forced its way out of her. Envisioning one of the clouds above the car shifting into a giant, fluffy middle finger, she breathed a chuckle and tipped her head to the side as they crossed the Old Tampa Bay, feeling the setting sun warm the otherwise chilling air as she soaked in the sight before her.

Distantly, she wondered what her friends would be doing, but then recalled her conversation with Mick and sighed, tearing her gaze away from the sun. Vivien knew that, sooner or later, she would adjust to the idea of her friends and family being in the same place they were stuck in when they left their world behind, but now was not that time. She sort of missed the daily updates from her friends - hearing about the Karens that flocked to the mall Erica and Jade worked at, or seeing pictures of tattoos Riven got to work on that day, or getting calls from her family members to check up on her. Granted, she had photographs of everyone and enough saved voicemails to fill her inbox with messages from her loved ones, but it just wasn’t the same as seeing them on her phone screen or hearing them tell her how much they loved her.

Turning her gaze to the sky again in an attempt to keep her face dry and prevent any potential tears from streaking the makeup she knew would stream down her face and make her look like a melted raccoon, Vivien took in a deep breath to steady herself, and she swallowed thickly. The sudden, overwhelming feeling of being alone in this strange, new world had hit her like a bus, sending surges of worry through her chest like someone had chosen to stitch her up with barbed wire. Running through her emotions as quickly as possible to clear her head before they got back to the Murphy’s home, she made sure to remind herself of a few things - she wasn’t alone, the people she was with were like her family and would be there for her regardless of whatever happened during her stay, and no time would pass back home, so even though they didn’t call, her family and friends in her home world still loved her.

Finally able to take a deep breath as she felt the car turn onto another stretch of road, Vivien lifted her head from the roof slot and listened to the radio, forcing herself to relax until she could get back to her temporary bedroom. Once she was in the safety of her room, she could sit on the floor with her pictures of her family, listen to their voicemails and the playlists she had created with them, and let her emotions free. However, until then, she was determined to enjoy the rest of her time with her friends, singing and humming along to the radio as Carrie turned to the right at the end of Pinellas Bayway and headed back up Gulf Boulevard.

Just as the song changed once more, the automatic street lights flickered on, casting the small city in a golden glow as the sun inched closer to the horizon. Eyeing the downtown area with childlike wonder, Vivien found herself comparing the view to Radiator Springs, briefly wondering if the fictional town of sentient cars was based on something similar to St Pete Beach in the sixties. Taking in the colorful neon signs and shimmering lights along the main street, Vivien found herself almost disappointed as they turned onto 64th Avenue and the lights of the main street turned to a few flickering street lamps with moths fluttering around the bulbs.

Letting out a half-content, half-disappointed sigh as they turned onto Gulf Winds Drive and further from the glow of Gulf Boulevard, Vivien scanned the houses along the street until the Mustang slowed, dragging the brunette’s attention to a particular turquoise house. Vivien felt her eyebrow lift toward her bangs as she spotted a red pickup truck parked in the sandy driveway. As they rolled to a stop beside the truck, Vivien spotted a sticker on the dash that she recalled giving to Butchy years ago - an image of the Fireflies logo from when they played The Last of Us together. She had whooped his ass in Factions, killing his character repeatedly until he got the hang of things, but when she needed help with a particularly frustrating section of the actual game, he brought her character through it in a matter of minutes. So, in exchange for his help, she had drawn and printed out a sticker for him at school.

Having never heard what he did with the sticker since, Vivien felt herself smile as she realized why she hadn’t seen it tucked into his phone case like his picture of Mick was. Wondering if he knew just how hard it would be to take the sticker off in the future, she bit back a laugh and began loading her arms with her shopping bags as Carrie and Lela climbed out of the car to help her. Laughing as Carrie and Lela joked about how many mannequins at the mall needed makeovers, Vivien pushed the heat-swollen door to the house open with her hip and called out, “Honey, we’re home!”

As the voices in the house died down and were replaced with laughter, Mick stood from the couch and rounded it to bring Vivien into a hug as she asked, “How was the mall?”

Vivien’s eyes practically glittered with excitement as she dropped some of her bags and began speaking, “Incredible! We went to so many stores, and the food was amazing, and we ran into Juliet while we were there. She was super nice and helped us find stuff, but she went to go play tennis or something, so she’s not with us, but she was really nice, and she knows about me being from the real world - or whatever we call our home world. Oh, and I think she might have a thing for Riven, but that’s a story for another time, and-”

Chuckling as he stopped the girl before she could ramble for another hour, Butchy turned toward the back of the couch and asked, “So, you had fun?”

Taking in a deep breath, Vivien beamed as she nodded, “It was a blast. I even got to be in a makeover montage like in the movies.”

“We see this,” Miles chuckled as he scanned over the girl’s outfit. “It suits you, kiddo.”

Striking a pose, Vivien flipped her hair over her shoulder and said, “Why, thank you. It was really weird, but I actually kind of enjoyed it.”

Joining his girlfriend with a small smile, Royce took Vivien’s hand and slowly spun her around before softly telling her, “You look beautiful.”

“Thanks, Rolls,” she breathed. Suddenly remembering something, she held up her other hand and showed him the bread tie still wrapped around her finger. “Look what they let me keep on in the chaos.”

Royce let out a soft laugh, feeling his face warm as he traced a thumb along the plastic, “Nice.”

Turning her attention back onto Mick as the older brunette began gathering her bags from the other girls, Vivien asked, “How did helping your friend move go?”

“It didn’t take long,” Mick shrugged. “They didn’t have a lot of stuff to unpack.”

“Well, that’s good,” Vivien smiled as she helped Mick pick up her bags from the floor. “I bet they appreciated the help.”

Bentley grinned as he turned the volume on the TV down and stood from his spot on the floor so he could see the people behind the couch, “Why don’t you go upstairs and see if they are.”

Confused, Vivien’s head tilted to the side as she glanced around at her friends. When their expressions gave her nothing to work with, she asked, “Upstairs? Why, can I see their place from there?”

“That’s one way to put it,” Butchy chuckled.

Still mildly confused, Vivien asked, “What does that mean?”

“The friend we had to move in,” Mick began, nudging Vivien with her elbow, “was you.”

“Me?” she wondered. “But I thought I was moved in already?”

“Living out of your suitcase doesn’t mean you’re moved in, Viv,” Bentley scoffed.

“Come on,” Mick said, nodding her head toward the stairs. “I’ll explain on the way up.”

Vivien spared a last glance at her friends, finding Carrie shooing her away with a smile while Lela gave her a pair of thumbs up. Letting out a breath, Vivien tentatively smiled and hefted her bags further up on her arms as she turned to follow Mick to the stairs. Halfway up the stairs, she heard the television volume turn back up as she asked Mick, “So, what happened?”

Turning toward the sixteen-year-old as she reached the landing, Mick explained, “When we were at the gas station last night, Miles asked us how he could make you feel more at home here, so we decided to step in and help.”

“Do I want to know what you guys did?” Vivien asked hesitantly.

Mick snickered as she led Vivien toward her room, “We fixed the rod in the closet so you can hang stuff up, and we put together a few things for you, that’s all.”

As Mick stepped aside to let Vivien enter the room first, the young brunette stepped up to the door, scanning the new addition of a hand-painted dreamcatcher on the wood, her initials painted in a calligraphic style on the feathers dangling from the bottom of it. Smiling as her fingers traced the outline of the dreamcatcher, Vivien asked, “Bentley?”

“Bentley,” Mick confirmed with a nod.

Letting out a soft laugh, Vivien reached for the doorknob and twisted it, pushing the door open and stepping inside. She had barely taken two steps inside the room before freezing as she took in the handful of subtle differences that changed the room’s energy entirely. On top of a fluffy, cream-colored, shag rug she didn’t recall having in the room before, the creaky wooden bed frame had been swapped out for a metal frame with intricate swirls on the head and footboards. Her eyes stung as she found that the spare bedding Royce had pulled from the linen closet for her was long gone, replaced by pale purple blankets and pillowcases covered in constellations. If that wasn’t enough already, Vivien found herself letting out a breath of disbelief as she realized the dresser Miles had been determined to fix due to it being swollen shut from the summer heat had been replaced with a white vanity that already had her small selection of skincare and her myriad of hair products organized on the tabletop.

Looking around the room as she deposited her shopping bags on her bed, Vivien found her bedside table sporting her lamp, her collection of crystals, her eyeglasses case, and a framed picture of herself, her family, and friends at the summer camp her grandparents owned. Though she wasn’t entirely sure where the image had come from, Vivien didn’t bother asking as she picked it up and sat on the edge of the bed, examining it with a small smile as Mick began listing all the things they had worked on while the girls kept her distracted at the mall.

“We weren’t sure what to do with your roller skates, so we put them with your shoes in the closet, but feel free to put them wherever you like,” Mick said with a smile as she closed the bi-folding doors. “Oh, and we also found your embroidery stuff and bracelet kits in your suitcase, so we put them inside the vanity for you so they’re easy to find.” Looking around the room one last time, Mick smiled and announced, “I think that’s about it, but… Viv, are you okay?”

Tearing her gaze away from the photograph in her hand at the older girl’s concerned tone, Vivien nodded and set the frame aside, rocketing up from her seat on the bed to wrap her arms around Mick. “Thank you,” she muttered into the girl’s shoulder.

Squeezing the girl close and rubbing a hand along her spine, Mick smiled, “Don’t thank me yet. Butchy still has to fix the ceiling fan for you.”

“The ceiling fan?”

“Mhm,” Mick hummed as Vivien pulled away. “Miles said you were feeling too warm last night, so Butchy checked it out and found that it’s not running right. We went back to our world to pick up some parts and got back here just a few minutes before you and the girls got back from the mall.”

“Oh,” Vivien breathed. Taking in a deep breath, she shook her head, “You guys didn’t have to do all of this for me. I’m only here for a little while.”

Mick shrugged, “So what? We all want you to feel at home while you’re here. This is the least we could do.”

Before Vivien could think of a good retort, Butchy made his way upstairs and into the room with a toolbox and a bag full of parts from Home Depot. Glancing between the girls as he entered the room, he asked, “Should I be worried that you two are so quiet up here?”

Mick shook her head with a small smile, placing a hand on Vivien’s shoulder, “This one was wondering why we did all of this for her.”

Finding Vivien’s emerald eyes as he set his toolbox down beside the edge of the fluffy rug, Butchy plainly stated, “’Cause we love you, you little shit. Is that not a good enough reason?”

Vivien’s mouth opened and closed noiselessly before snapping shut as she stepped away from Mick, wrapping her arms around Butchy’s middle. Though he had never really been outwardly touchy with the girl in the time he had known her - the pair sharing a few sparse hugs here and there as they both seemed to prefer teasing remarks as their way to display affection - Butchy found himself wrapping his arms around her with ease, placing a hand on the brunette’s head as she softly voiced her gratitude for all they had done. Insisting she had no need to thank them, Butchy allowed the girl to pull away on her own time before telling her that the others were making dinner if she wanted to join them while he worked.

Dinner came and went quickly as everyone shared how their respective days went, and after thanking everyone for what felt like the millionth time since her return home, Vivien waved goodbye to her friends as they left the driveway under the cover of the night sky. Spending a while watching The Andy Griffith Show with her boyfriend and his brothers, Vivien retired to her room when Bentley and Royce headed off to bed, making sure to bid the pair goodnight before their door closed for the night. She didn’t know how they could sleep like that - it always felt too enclosed to her whenever she tried - but after changing and turning on her lamp for the night, Vivien opened her door and sat under the covers of her bed for a while, reading a few chapters of one of the handful of fanfictions she had saved before her arrival in the sixties.

Before she knew it, she heard the telltale creak of the stairs groaning under someone’s feet, and leaned to the side enough to see who it was. As Miles rounded the banister, Vivien softly called out to him, “Miles?”

Jumping at the sudden voice, Miles turned, making up the distance between the stairs and her doorway in just a few steps, “Do you have a habit of scaring the shit out of people you live with, or is it just me?”

“Just you,” Vivien claimed as she set her phone aside and patted the empty space to the right of her legs. “You should be grateful.”

Letting out a short snort of laughter, Miles crossed the room and sat on the side of Vivien’s bed, “What’re you still doing up? It’s almost midnight.”

Vivien sighed softly, glancing around her room before settling her gaze on the older boy before her, “I wanted to thank you again. You really didn’t have to go through all this trouble for me.”

“Enough of that,” Miles said, brushing off the girl’s words as he placed a hand on hers. “Vivien, I’ve known you for - what? - three or four years now?”

“It’ll be three in June,” Vivien mused.

“Well, in that time, you’ve wormed your way into not only my brothers’ hearts, but you’ve also made it onto the short list of people I consider family,” he admitted, brushing a hair away from Vivien’s eyes with a small smile. “If you weren’t already the little sister I never knew I wanted, your relationship with Royce would have made me see you that way. You’re family now, kiddo, you get special treatment.”

Sharing the smile Miles sent her way, Vivien leaned forward, wrapping her arms around his waist and resting her head on his shoulder as she breathed a soft, “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome,” Miles chuckled, giving Vivien a squeeze before pulling away and standing, shifting the blankets back into place over her lap as she shifted back against the pillows. “Now, get some sleep. You’re coming with me to work tomorrow.”

“I am?” Vivien asked as she plugged her phone in and set it on the nightstand.

“Unless I get a call from the school saying you can join the boys for the week,” Miles confirmed with a nod. “I’m not about to leave you at home, bored out of your mind, so if I don’t get a call back before they leave for school, you’re going with me to work.”

“So, now, instead of sitting here, reading all day and playing with Binx, I get to be bored out of my mind at your work,” Vivien stated before sarcastically adding, “yay!”

Rolling his eyes, Miles placed a palm over Vivien’s forehead and pushed her back against the pillows as he snickered, “Quit being a sarcastic little shit and go to sleep.”

“Sure thing, Dad,” Vivien teased as Miles headed back out to the hallway. “I’ll get right on that.”

“Good night, Vivien,” Miles retorted, ignoring her jibe with practiced ease.

Relaxing into her mattress as Miles disappeared down the hallway, Vivien smirked and replied, “Night, Miles.”

#Same Trailer Different Park #STDP

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