Stars and Stripes (Reggie)

[Amber Krasenski]

"It's almost the fourth, it's aaaalmost the fourth."

Amber looped one arm about Reggie's shoulders, gesturing broadly at all the patriotic displays in the mall windows. Stars and stripes were everywhere, on tank tops and shorts and bikinis and sandals and store signs. It wasn't quite the sort of holiday fervor that accompanied Halloween or Christmas, but it was still festive, and it made Amber smile.

"I feel like I need to get all decked out in stars and stripes." But he was still living in girl mode, and the options there were, while abundant, rather more revealing than he would have liked. Not that he hid his body, but he didn't want to highlight it quite so much.

He was pretty sure that Reggie asked him to hang out at the mall with her because she thought he was a girl. Which would have been more of a bummer if he had been trying to present as a cisgender male. He wished that he had the nerve to do that, but he was still worried about what his parents would say.

And also about how the other students would react. It wasn't as if he could transfer schools, unless he wanted to go all the way to Europe.

No, thanks.

So instead he was living in girl mode, and that meant hanging at the mall with Reggie. At least he liked her; she was a lot of fun.

"Are you doing anything?"

He hoped that there would be a parade; there hadn't been one last year, because the police department was too small to provide security, but there had been one the year before that. He didn't know if they could provide this year; given the economy he supposed it would make sense if they couldn't, but he couldn't go all the way out to Burlington, because he couldn't drive.

[Reggie Earle]

Catching on Amber's enthusiasm, Reggie tightened her hold on her friend's arm, grinning as they passed store after store that had very patriotic colours on display. She loved national holidays and her favourite had to be the Fourth of July simply because of the fireworks.

She giggled at Amber's words and nodded. "Me too! That always happens whenever I go to stores so close to the holidays." She replied, looking around and soaking in all the colours.

She didn't particularly like going to the mall, in general. She just had to leave the dorm because she was having mixed feelings about RC. Not about him as a boyfriend because he was simply divine and she couldn't have asked for anyone better. But he was graduating and graduation meant he was going away. They haven't talked in awhile. Not after their kiss, and she was scared that she had moved on that too soon. RC hadn't been negative about it but that was RC. He was too good for that.

So going to the mall and immersing herself with all this celebration was as much a distraction as it was to hang out with Amber. She was a fun girl and never a dull moment was had whenever she was with the shapeshifter.

"Don't know. Hope I get to spend it with my boyfriend." She grinned and pulled Amber gently towards one of the stores displaying a really cute red, white and blue striped vintage skirt. "Oh wow, that is adorable!" She squealed and patted Amber's arm. "Are you going to get anything here?" She asked as they entered the shop.

"Are you going to do anything for the holidays? Go back home maybe?"

[Amber Krasenski]

"I dunnooo...." Amber frowned at the skirt on display. Definitely not what he would choose to wear, if circumstances were more ideal. Maybe he could talk to Dr. Neville about that; he liked the therapist, even if he didn't think he exactly needed one. It wasn't as if he was depressed or anything! But it was nice, sometimes, to be frustrated about the mask he wore.

"Oh, yeah, you're dating whatsisname, aren't you?"

That was unfortunately vague, as he realized as soon as the words had left his lips.

"I mean, uhhhhh, Arty? On the swim team?"

He knew the senior by face, but not by name. It was unfortunate; anyone dating Reggie was probably pretty cool.

"Nope, not going home for this one. My parents were talking about taking us all down to Florida for break though! I haven't seen them since December. It still seems so long...."

But some students rarely, if ever, saw their families during their stay at Hammel, so he supposed he should consider himself lucky there.

[Reggie Earle]

Reggie, not realising this was not what Amber had in mind when she said she wanted to hang out, flitted about the store, trying to pick something for herself and also for Amber. She spouted off nonsense like "Ooh this would look good on you." and "Your legs would really show in these, Amby!" every now and again.

Laughing at Amber's vagueness, Reggie shook her head in amusement. "RC. RC Manne. Yeah." A shy smile dusted Reggie's lips before she was bombarded by silly thoughts about RC leaving.

"Florida! Oh fun!" Reggie beamed, glad for the change of topic. "I totally understand about the distance though. I haven't seen my family for practically a year. Who knew linguistics was so demanding?" She shrugged and picked up the skirt she saw on display and paid for it.

"Hey, if you see something you like, just let me know okay? I don't want this to just be for me." She bumped against Amber's thin shoulder with a smile.

[Amber Krasenski]

Amber was grateful that Reggie accepted the change of topic (and also a little jealous that her name could shorten to the traditionally masculine Reggie instead of....Amby. Which was not very dignified.)

"Linguistics sounds hard!" He opined. In fact, he greatly admired the college student for her abilities there. "Don't you have to, like, learn other languages? And figure out what old, dead languages might have been, based on stuff? And translate? That's not easy!"

He didn't think he would be capable of any of that, certainly not taken together.

"Of course I'll tell you! I just haven't seen anything I would wear more than once yet!"

That was legit reasoning, he hoped. Sometimes this charade was difficult; he wished he didn't have to pretend to be a girl.

"But even if only you buy stuff, it won't be all about you, we're talking and hanging out, that counts for both of us! Although I guess we're mostly talking about how you're really freaking smart, but that's only cause it's true."

[Reggie Earle]

It was sort of ironic that Reggie, the typical every day squealing girly girl had such a masculine name while Amber, obviously not that type of girl had such a feminine name. But Reggie was blind to this irony as she linked arms with the shapeshifter and walked about the shop with her oohing and aahing over dresses and skirts.

"Linguistics isn't that hard." Reggie downplayed it with a small smile. "Latin is actually pretty easy to grasp because the words are sort of graphic representations of what it is in English, if I make any sense at all right now. But basically it's not too tough to understand." She shrugged.

"Oh, okay!" Reggie decided to drop the subject of clothes until Amber actually showed some form of interest.

Reggie chuckled lightly at Amber's compliment. "Amber, I'm not! It's not smartness if you're already passionate about it. I've always loved languages, even as a kid so that was what drove me to even do linguistics in the first place." She explained. She realised they really had talked a lot about her so she decided to change topics.

Very boring topics.

"How's training?"

[Amber Krasenski]

"Yeah but!" Amber protested, determined to attribute all of Reggie's success to intelligence, if only because this meant his own failures weren't his fault. "But doesn't Latin have ten million endings?"

It sounded impossibly difficult, even for someone who enjoyed linguistics and sought it out on purpose. "I'll bet even the Romans had a hard time with it." He posited in fervent belief.

The topic of training caused him to shudder in mock horror. "Ugh, training stinks. Who decided we had to use our powers?"

He was well aware of the reasoning behind this, but it seemed wholly unfair that some people got to have fun powers, and he had to turn into something creepy.

"And Ms. Sayers remains terrifying. Who let her around kids, anyway?"

[Reggie Earle]

Reggie chuckled once more, charmed by Amber's insistence before nodding just to appease the other girl. "Yes. Okay...don't ever repeat this to anybody because I will sound disgustingly smug. A little bit of it is intelligence." She couldn't even say it all with a straight face and she was in a fit of giggles almost immediately. "Sorry, can't keep a straight face while saying things like that."

When her laughs reduced, she gave a quiet disapproving noise when Amber's complains about training sort of reflected how she had to go through it.

"Oh gosh, Miss Sayers is still there? I don't understand how Hammel doesn't just fire her. She's insane that one." Reggie shuddered. She remembered Miss Sayers. She was just lucky she never had to train with her. Poor Amber.

A little grumble in Reggie's stomach made her chuckle. "Oh gosh, someone needs taking care of. Wanna grab a bite?" Reggie asked, having to look up a little at Amber.

[Amber Krasenski]

"Does Hammel fire people?" Amber asked, scrunching up his face in thought. "Wait....there was that art teacher, Mr. James...I heard he got fired. But I don't know if that's true. Maybe he just got tired of working in the school his sisters go to."

To be honest, he didn't think he would be able to teach at a school if his brother was a student there.

The growling stomach caused him to giggle in return. "Needs taking care of?" He repeated, shaking his head at Reggie's wording, "Riiiight. So to the food courts I assume?" He asked, edging out of the store and back into the halls of the mall.

[Reggie Earle]

"I have no idea." Reggie shrugged but listened intently at the news. She didn't know a Mr. James. She knew a Mr. James Campbell but he wasn't the art teacher. "Maybe." She grinned a little sympathetically. To be fired was not a feeling Reggie would want to feel.

"Yes." Reggie laughed, realising she had made a rather weird phrasing but she was glad Amber went with it as they headed to the food court. "I'm going to get the fish and chips from over there. Grab us a seat? I'll help get you what you want." Reggie offered.

[Amber Krasenski]

"Okay!" Amber agreed, scouting out an empty table for two and plopping down into a seat gratefully. He flung his purse across the back of the chair, then rested his chin in his hands while he waited for Reggie to return with her food.

Waiting was perfectly fine with him; he enjoyed watching the other people in the mall, mentally cataloging the different fashion styles he saw.

When his friend returned he half stood, casting his gaze around the food court. "I was thinking of grabbing some Chinese. Hold down the fort?"

[Reggie Earle]

When Amber didn't ask her to get her food, Reggie didn't argue. She got her food and returned to the table, nodding when Amber asked her to guard their table.

"With eyes wide open, ma'am." She saluted Amber ridiculously and waited for the girl to come back. She was used to waiting for people before eating, as was what she was taught since she was a child.

With Amber returning, Reggie grinned and looked at what she got. "Oh wow, that looks good." She grinned and gestured for Amber to sit down. "So if you're not doing anything on the Fourth, you should come and hang out with me and a bunch of my dorm mates. We'll probably just go to the lake to see the fireworks."