For as long as anyone in Ashbourne could remember (at least, of the past 16 something years) the Oak Ave. kids all ran together. Stella and Phoenix, Charlie and Dean and Oliver, Claudia, and Brinley and Braxton. All best friends, all looking out for each other, and nothing could tear them apart.
Although, maybe because it didn’t fit conveniently into the small town narrative, everyone seemed to forget that Stella was an outright bitch to Braxton. When they were younger, she called him names, laughed at him, tattled whenever he did anything sort of wrong (and sometimes when he didn’t) and generally just made growing up a little bit harder than it already was with a father that hated him and mother that bolted.
He’d always been the one just a little behind the rest of them and Stella... oh boy, did she make sure he knew it.
Then when they got older, she got a little more creative. Her insults were disguised as friendly advice, her pranks minor but frustrating, and when he couldn’t get anyone to dance with him at the seventh grade semi-formal, he found out it was all due to Stella and her insistence that Braxton has super contagious nail fungus. Or maybe it was tongue fungus.
Either way, Braxton had always been the easier one to single out and Stella made sure she did. It really wasn’t until high school that she seemed to lighten up, or at least had other more exciting things to play with. Or maybe it was just because Braxton had started to really come into his own. He joined football, he joined baseball. He grew into his looks (hotter, like his sister, people told him) and even though he wasn’t a JOCK he wasn’t a nerd either. He started finding ways to make people laugh, starting making a few friends outside the Oak Ave. crew. Being around people made him happy and the people around him seemed to be happy to be there. So it was all good, most of the time.
Stella was still a bitch and once, last year, Braxton made sure she knew it.
It was a simple thing, really. A child’s prank. But it worked amazingly. During one of Brinley and Oliver’s swim meets, when they were all there cheering them on (and after Stella had “accidentally” kicked over Braxton’s soda), he’d walked down the halls to her locker. It wasn’t hard to figure out her combination. Stella had been a little more predictable back then.
The inside wasn’t anything like he thought it’d be. It was mostly empty except for her books a single photograph of her and the squad, Phoenix beaming proudly at her arm. And it just struck him. They’d learned about it in chemistry earlier that week. A little hydrogen peroxide, a little yeast... if he rigged up the yeast to fall when she opened her locker... boom. An explosion of messy but completely harmless foam.
The next day before first period, she opened her locker. And was covered with it. Head to toe, dripping globs of foam; and for once, people were laughing at her.
Everyone flocked to her when it happened, telling her how sorry they were, that she didn’t deserve it, that they’d find out who did it and pummel them, etc, etc. Even Braxton played it up for her sake, pretending to be horrified and out to avenge her good name. No one knew that he’d been the one to do it in the first place. Or if they did, they all agreed to keep it to themselves. A secret, unspoken pact that said: she might have had it coming.
It was actually one of the proudest moments of Braxton’s life, even if he had to listen to her bitch about it ruining her hair for three solid weeks.
When Stella disappeared, everyone started freaking out. Where had she gone? She was coming back right? Did someone take her? Where was Mr. Grayson? Where they together? (Did he kill her?)
And once again, Braxton found himself putting on an act. Of course he was worried. Of course he was scared. Of course he felt a little hurt that she’d left them. Of course, of course, of course...
(And of course he was worried, scared, hurt. He didn’t actually want anything to happen to her and of course, he’d feel incredibly guilty if it turned out something had and he hadn’t cared. He’d be as devastated as the rest of them if she-)
He knew she’d be back. He truly believed that. But the fact was, (his) life was just a little... easier without her. It always had been. Even when she was there, but it was just him and Charlie and the boys, or hanging with Claudia, or on the rare occasion Phoenix wasn’t tied to Stella’s hips, Braxton just felt like these people he called his friends were actually... his friends. Not Stella’s and then his by default. So it was fucked up, and it was something he could never say out loud but if he could be honest the next time someone asked how he felt about Stella being gone?
A little relieved. Selfishly relieved at least.
(He still wanted her home. As much as he hated to admit it, no one was the same without her. Even him.)
General Notes: Kurt and Blaine talk and go for a late night swim.
Kurt: Kurt felt alone today - more alone than usual. He really didn't have many people to talk to today. Blaine's been gone for a while, and everyone else seemed to be quite busy. So he's been alone, and he hasn't been distracted from his therapy session - or from anything else. But Blaine wanted to go swimming, so swimming Kurt would go.
He waited patiently on the bridge by the water, looking down at it with a lost gaze.
