agata-almeidaĀ·:
Agataās neck craned forward slightly when he first attempted to unlock the phone. The slight smirk on her face had been wiped off by his accusatory tone after his attempt had failed. Her face had scrunched into a scowl before she mimicked his sentences in childish response.Ā āOh, Iām sorry.ā She quipped sarcastically and pouted at him.Ā āItās not like I stepped on your phone on purpose?ā She pointed out before gesturing to the spot where she recovered his phone.Ā āI didnāt just see the phone on the crowd and thought hmm look!ā She gasped, acting surprised.Ā āI found a lost phone! Best step on it before picking it up!ā She demonstrated with an unsettling cheerful tone before her expression had fallen monotonous. She rolled her eyes and shook her head slightly in exasperation. Although she had always retaliated against the adversity that was shrouding her those past few weeks, that was the first confrontational interaction wherein the accuser insisted her culpability of the past event.Ā
With a heavy sigh, Agata gave the boy opposite of her a look of annoyance.Ā āI donāt know why I even bother. No one ever believes me.ā She muttered. āAnd I do believe I have a reason to suspect you. You lied to my face about looking for your phone.ā She contended. āYou can be an Arsonist and be the Academyās photog. Even if you werenāt, one thing is for sure..ā She trailed off and stepped towards the young man, bearing a look of suspicion. āYouāre up to something tonight.ā She finished before turning on her heels to leave. She took a few steps towards her objective - now the drinks and snacks table, instead of searching for Reeseās tent - before looking back at the photographer.Ā āOh and F-Y-I.ā She began, with her chin jutted upwards again to assert her condescension.Ā āI do read the school paper. I just donāt know who you are.ā She asserted then left. Agata marched toward the beverages. Out of irritation, she didnāt even notice she was being handed a drink by a student she wasnāt well acquainted with. After thanking the leering boy for handing her a cup, she took a sip only to discover that someone had cunningly laced the juice with an absurd amount of hard liquor. She looked at the boy who served her with furrowed brows, immediately suspecting it was another Arsonist scheme to alcohol poison a few of their peers, or get the ball rolling for a wild night. She, however, chose not to confront the boy as she had enough confrontation for the night. Instead, she continued to drink and decided to make herself a Smore on the table. If the Arsonists didnāt spike the juice, everyone was bound to slyly drink their own poison anyway.
He scoffed at how childish she was being. Their whole exchange was becoming ridiculous to him at this point, and the fact that she was accusing him of being an Arsonist was absurd. It was almost offensive, really, and he had absolutely no idea why he felt that way. He didnāt have to prove his innocence to her, and yet, he couldnāt help it.Ā āYou sound really childish right now,ā he pointed out.Ā āFine, fine, you didnāt purposefully step on my phone, but that doesnāt mean you didnāt step on it anyway. And I would think you would feel enough remorse over stepping on my phone to just apologize. Instead, here you are, pointing fingers at me.ā He almost felt bad enough to drop the whole thing when she said nobody believed her, but Mason thought about how suspicious she was behaving. Really, who goes around warning people about the Arsonists? He didnāt know that much about Agata Almeida, but didnāt she have better things to do with her time that worry about some stupid group of troublemakers? He sighed and placed his phone back in his pocket, wanting to leave the conversation at that moment before she said another thing that made his head feel hot in annoyance. He opened his mouth to speak-- to tell her that she must have been living under a rock for not knowing who he is-- before she left without much preamble, and Mason only watched, vexed, as she disappeared in the crowd.
He spent the next half hour or so taking pictures for the paper, trying to get Agata Almeida out of his head. Mason hadnāt expected to be so irritated that evening, and if things had gone a completely different way, he would definitely have flirted with her. He thought she was pretty, and heād heard her talk outside of the library once to know that she was smart, but obviously wildly unreasonable, judging by the exchange that took place between them. He swatted any thoughts of her like an annoying fly and focused instead on taking pictures, only stopping to congratulate Nate under his breath for a job well done, and celebrating by drinking some of the spiked punch. He wanted to take some more pictures before calling it a night and settling in a tent when he saw Agata once again, this time with the group of people in a tent who called out to him so they could have their picture taken. Annoyance began to bubble up in his chest, and, as he held the camera to his face to take photos, he said,Ā āYou should maybe step aside for this.ā The words were directed at Agata, his lips forming a smirk.Ā āYouāll just ruin the group picture if youāre in it anyway.ā













