Fandom: Popular

Series: Three Times Table

Title: Semantics

Author: Carla

Pairing: Brooke/April

Disclaimer: Not mine, never have been, never will be. No profit made, no harm intended.

Archive: This and other delusional flights of fancy can be found at The Realm: http://www.realmoftheshadow.com/carla.htm

Author’s note: When I started writing this series in 2003 I had never seen the show, now that I have, I must say that I am glad I hadn’t when I decided to write this pairing. Yes, it is an unlikely one, yet it isn’t because my vision of this ‘ship has always been modeled on a very similar relationship I had the privilege to witness in high school. Sometimes the geek does get the girl, sometimes we rise above the pettiness of the social pecking order to truly revel in one we had not previously considered.

Feedback: Truthfully I don’t expect that I will get much of it but I will ask this: Please do not flame me personally, or call me crazy or anything else of a personally attacking nature. I don’t need my already crappy existence aggravated by faceless critics who don’t critique the work but rather the writer. That being said if you choose to feed me please feel free to do so either on list or directly to me at cmfloresfd@yahoo.com

T3 – Semantics

Brooke

“You did not just order that?” I may not be able to see her, since she’s standing behind me, but I can hear the sneer in Nicole’s voice. “Don’t you get enough of that as it is?”

I turn to smirk down at my best friend, “Obviously not.”

“Doesn’t she get enough of what?” Sam asks as she joins us at the counter. She’s drying her hands on her jeans, a disgusting habit that I absolutely hate.

“She ordered the tuna taco,” Nicole whines.

“I ordered the fish taco.” April would appreciate the subtle difference since she insists that the fish taco is made with the aquatic version of beaks and feet like McDonalds nuggets.

“Oh that.” Sam smirks. “No, this is her first weekend of freedom in a month.”

“Oh for God’s sake what did you do now?”

Nicole is looking at me like I’ve grown a third head. It’s true though I can’t believe some of the ways fate seems to conspire to keep me and April apart. First, we got caught in SF when we went to visit my mom. Rather, April got caught. I was supposed to be there. April got grounded for a month but since we were able to see each other after school it wasn’t so bad. Okay, I had to join the chess club but those are the sacrifices one makes for love.

“Nothing, I swear.”

As if that wasn’t bad enough, for once, my father decides to actually look at my credit card statement. Apparently it was not alright for me to charge a weekend getaway with April when I was supposed to have been cheering at an away game and then spending the weekend with Nicole. I’ve had that card for three years and he’s never looked at it, this time he looks, go figure. Anyway, he blew a gasket, cut up my credit card and grounded me for two weeks.

Nicole’s right eyebrow appears to have disappeared into her hairline. The look of utter disbelief on her face needs to be slapped off but, responsible, law-abiding citizen that I am, I don’t. Also Sam, having just administered a slap upside the back of Nic’s head, has beaten me to the punch, as it were.

“Watch it Spam,” Nicole growls out, “I paid more money than you can hope to earn in a month on this haircut.”

“And you look adorable now that I’ve given it the finishing touch,” Sam shoots back. I swear those two are flirting only they’ve regressed to about age twelve to do it.

“Okay you two, kiss and make up.” They both give me looks that could melt glass. “Oh please you know you want to. Why else would you two be at each other’s throat at the drop of a hat?”

“Not in a million years Brooke.”

Sam doesn’t see Nicole wince and I wonder if Nic’s affections are beginning to turn elsewhere; like onto my sister.

Just then our number is called so we collect our tray and begin the search for the holy grail of the food court, a clean table.

“Over there,” Nicole points to a free table and we make like rats in a maze race for the cheese. As soon as we sit down my cell rings, it’s April, she can’t find us amongst the horde. “She’s hopeless you know she couldn’t find her way out of a paper bag, right B?”

“Shut up Nic at least she doesn’t have to print out MapQuest directions from her house to school everyday.”

“Hey, if I didn’t fax those directions to Mary Cherry’s Hummer every morning she’d never get to school.”

“And we all know what a loss that would be,” Sam says drolly.

“What would be a loss?” April drops a kiss on my head and slides into the seat next to mine.

“Mary Cherry getting lost on her way to school and never making it in,” Sam supplies while trying to snag a fry off of my plate.

“A tragedy actually,” April says in a voice so dripping with sarcasm it’s like she’s channeling Nicole.

“Hey steal Nic’s,” I slap Sam’s hand away and she starts griping about how April gets to share and she’s my sister and so on and so on.

“God stop whining Spam I’ll buy you fries.” Nicole stands and heads for the French Fry Shack.

Sam throws me a smirk and stage whispers, “She is so my bitch.”

“I heard that.”

Sam

“That would be something I wouldn’t mind watching,” April says with a wink once Nicole is out of earshot.

Okay so maybe referring to Satan as ‘my bitch’ in front of April wasn’t such a great idea, she’s got that same pervy, glassy-eyed look she had when Carmen was running for Homecoming Queen and she asked me what Brooke looked like naked. It makes my skin crawl and not just because of my history but because it’s just plain weird.

“I thought you had a terminal fear of video equipment April.” For some reason Brooke looks as if she would like to cut my tongue out and feed it to me. But April is laughing, though it is a little forced sounding, so Brooke’s hackles go down and I relax a little. “Just kidding April, I’m strictly a behind the scenes kind of girl though. I’ve no aspirations to be the next Jenna Jamison.”

We spend the next few minutes talking about porn until Nicole comes back with the fries, which immediately become the sole focus of my existence.

“What are you guys talking about?”

“Porn stars we’d do a Pro-Am scene with,” Brooke supplies breezily, “What about you Nikki?”

“That’s easy, she’s not in the business anymore, and when she was it would have been illegal, but I have to go with mid-eighties Traci Lords,” Nicole says and my blood runs cold. “Talk about making it look real.”

“That is sick. She was like fourteen, fifteen maybe, when she did those movies.”

“HELLO Spam, I’m seventeen. It’s age appropriate.”

“She has a point,” Brooke says putting her two cents in.

I’m starting to get really upset; thankfully, Brooke notices and deftly begins to steer the conversation in another direction. Unfortunately it’s not in any direction I wanted her to go in either.

“So when are you two going to acknowledge the UST issue?”

April coughs thereby showering Nicole, and I, with a fine spray of cherry Coke and extremely well masticated French fry. Brooke starts pounding her back while Nicole stands, throws April a dirty look and heads in the direction of the bathroom.

“You know I was kidding when I said she was my bitch, right?”

“And you know I’m right.”

“No, what you are is blind. She still pines for you, Brooke. Who can compete with that, I can’t.”

April

Sam’s right. You don’t see it but it’s pretty clear to everyone else that Nicole is still hung up on you. Sometimes it’s awkward, sometimes it’s not, mostly though I try to give you the space to keep up your friendship with her sans my presence.

Sam I notice hasn’t disavowed being attracted to Satan which is interesting because I had the distinct impression that she was pretty much asexual. I asked you about it once, why she didn’t date, I know guys have asked her but she always says no, and all you had to say was ‘Sam doesn’t date’, which isn’t quite true she used to go out with that football player, George. But he moved away more than a year ago, almost two, I think, and she hasn’t gone out with anyone since. I asked about Leo Ferrara once, we saw them that one time, but she insisted it was just friends hanging out.

Anyway I’m almost done getting ready for bed which means it’s time to call you. I’m nervous. There’s something I want to talk about, something Sam said, and well I don’t want to think you betrayed my confidence. But what if you did? What then? How could I ever trust you again? Maybe I should take the high road and just trust that Sam’s comment was an innocent one. Surely you wouldn’t have done that to me. You love me and you don’t do something like that to someone you love.

Showtime.

“Speak to me my love.”

I have to smile, you never answer the phone the same way twice, yesterday it was ‘Polyurethane Polly’s Pleasure Chest’ and the day before that it was just ‘I miss you’.

“I had a nice time today.”

“Me too except for…”

“DidyoutellSamaboutCharlie?”

I hope you understood that because I don’t think I could ask it again.

“What! No! I would never, I swear.”

“Then why did she make that comment, you know, about me being afraid of video equipment. How else could she have known?”

“I don’t know but I swear, April, sweetheart, I swear I would never…I promise.”

“Are you sure I mean maybe you said something inadvertently, I don’t know.”

You’re silent. I can almost hear the gears in your head turning, straining, trying to remember what if anything you could have said.

It’s been over a minute. I’m getting impatient.

“Look, forget I said anythi…”

“No, no…I mean, I don’t know, the only thing I can think of is that she noticed…”

“Noticed what?”

“My room.”

“What about it?”

“That must be it. We used to watch movies in my room - her room is such a sty - anyway ever since New Year’s…I never changed it back. She asked me about it the other day. I joked about not trusting her not to tape us since she’s such a perv, right. She said she hadn’t realized I was camera shy and I said it wasn’t me, it was you. But it was a joke, I swear.”

Your voice breaks. I think maybe you’re crying.

“I wouldn’t do that. I swear, April, I wouldn’t do that. You know I wouldn’t.”

Oh God you are crying. I’m such a shit. How could I have thought you would betray me like that?

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry. I know you wouldn’t do that Brooke. I’m sorry.”

Now I’m crying too. I’m so stupid. I should know better than to listen to that little paranoid voice in my head. I should have trusted my heart and you, trusted that you wouldn’t purposefully hurt me.

“Brooke I’m sorry. I was being paranoid I know. I trust you Brooke really I do…I just…it just…that Sam would….”

“I know. I can see where you might get that idea.”

We’re quiet again. The slow cadence of your breath in my ear is lulling me to sleep, also the adrenalin rush of my earlier anxiety attack has receded and I am beginning to crash.

“April”

“Mmm-hmmm”

“You awake?”

“Barely”

“Then go to sleep. I love you.”

“I love you too. What were you going to say?”

“Can you come over tomorrow, early in the morning, like before nine maybe?”

“If I’m lucky I’ll still be asleep at that hour.”

“If you’re really lucky you won’t be alone.”

“Oh?”

“I know we can’t spend the night together…”

My parents have flat out said that I had better be in my bed every night by midnight until I leave for college or face the wrath of God; God being my grandmother, the puritanical old bat, who’s paying for college. Parental blackmail sucks but what can I do? “I miss sleeping next to you.”

“Exactly, so I was thinking I could come pick you up early, like at 7:30 or maybe 8o’clock, and we could come back here and go back to sleep. It’s not the same but still…I thought it would nice.” I hear you take a deep breath and then you continue. “I need you to hold me. I want to hold you. I want to fall asleep like that and I want to wake up like that, even if it’s just for an hour or two. Please, sweetheart.”

“Call me when you are on your way.”

“Okay. Goodnight.”

“G’night.”