AU MVB High School

Martin Van Buren High School was just as noisy as ever, with students arriving either via school bus, by car or by walking. John's light blue truck pulled into the parking lot with said Wilder behind the wheel and Patty in the passenger seat. Terry, Chuck, Fred and Buster were all in the back bed of the truck, holding onto the sides. Technically there were laws about not riding in the back of pickup trucks like that, but no one on the entire island followed them. Besides, the speed limits were low enough that even if someone fell out, they wouldn't get hurt too badly.

Provided there was no vehicles directly following them.

Nevertheless, as soon as the truck was parked, the boys scrambled out of the back of the truck, with Terry opening the door for Patty. She took his offered hand and gently kissed his cheek as he helped her step onto the blacktop. She stood at approximately five feet and eight inches tall and had thick, luscious black curly hair that fell to her shoulders. Her soft brown eyes twinkled at her enormous boyfriend as she smiled at him from behind a dainty pair of glasses. "Aren't you just the sweetest teddy bear on the entire island?" She teased, twisting one of his wild curls around her index finger.

"Shh, you'll ruin my reputation," Terry chuckled warmly, pulling her into a hug, "I'm supposed to be intimidating."

"Mmhmm." Patty hummed, unconvinced, "Don't forget you're having dinner with my parents and I tonight."

"Wouldn't miss it for the world." He leaned down and kissed her forehead.

As Chuck and Fred hopped down from the back of the truck bed, they overheard John and Buster talking about the previous Friday afternoon.

"I can't believe you paid me in pennies, you douche." Buster muttered, shoving his asymmetrical bangs out of his face, "What kind of sadist even does that?" He was freshly showered and rather floofy this morning, coffee in hand and backpack slung over his shoulder. Now that he'd actually put effort into his appearance, he was annoyingly attractive. And despite having darker hair and green eyes instead of blue, he looked like he could potentially have been a Wilder if things had gone differently.

"Hey, you deserved it, shithead." John shrugged, unbothered, "She was tired and already in a bad mood, and you made it worse."

"I'm guessing the bad mood was your fault." Buster quipped dryly.

"Eat shit." John replied.

"You eat shit." Buster fired back.

"Quit telling each other to eat shit." Chuck warned.

Fred rolled his eyes. "Oh, eat shit Chuck."

"Sounds like you all need me to knock your heads together." Terry was unimpressed. A chorus of apologies sounded from the lot and the group turned to make their way towards the building.

The group of hooligans - and Patty - made their way into the school and through the halls in a clump, tromping along in boisterous chatter amongst themselves until a random student shouted down the hallway, "Hey! The vice principal is giving a new student a tour of the school!"

Undoubtedly, the entire student body felt the man shudder.

With that announcement, Patty produced a wicker basket and an apple. "Oh, I'm glad we'll get to see him on the way to class! Did everyone remember to bring him a piece of fruit to add to the basket for his first day back after his sabbatical?" She asked kindly, looking behind her at their group. One by one, each Wilder produced a different type of fruit and held it up. Even Buster had brought a clump of grapes along today. She smiled brightly at them, "You boys are all so thoughtful. Let's go wish him, and the new student, a good morning!"

And with that, she turned and set off to greet them. The boys each exchanged less-than-wholesome grins and followed her down the hall. Patty was always such a sweet, considerate girl. They'd try to be as subtle about this as possible.

As they approached the vice principal, Celi and Mimi, Patty waved jovially and handed the man the basket, placing a delicious looking apple inside. "Good morning, Vice Principal Ennis. Good morning, miss! I hope you enjoy your time here at MVB. My name is Patty. If you need any assistance, you can always come to me and I'll be happy to help."

The man smiled as Patty moved aside so that the students behind her could greet him next, but his expression immediately paled when he saw just who those students were. The Wilders, all lined up in single file and each holding a different fruit. Presumably for the basket.

"Good morning Mr. Penis." Terry murmured quietly, placing a small round watermelon in the basket and joined Patty on her way towards class.

"Mornin' Vice Penis!" John greeted loudly, dumping in a coconut. He winked at Celi as he passed by.

"Good mornin' Mr. Penis." Chuck smiled in embarrassment and set some oranges in the basket before moving along.

"Morning, Vice Princi-penis!" Buster cheerfully added in the cluster of grapes. He grinned at Celi, but continued on after John.

"Gooood morning Mr. Penis~!" Fred sang - in a strangely harmonious, attention-catching way - and added some strawberries to the top.

"Fred, get back to the middle school." Mr. Ennis said flatly, "And the rest of you boys have detention!"

Celi blinked in bewilderment and gave an awkward wave to the nice girl who had introduced herself as Patty, it wasn't like she was trying to be unfriendly or anything, but she wasn't exactly expecting to come across the three stooges after such a short amount of time and she was still trying to wrap her head around it.

That, and the whole fruit basket thing was just plain weird.

Sure, a part of her had rationalized when she had met them that they probably weren't Valevay students, but MVB wasn't a small school by any means either! So she was thinking it'd be a week, or maybe a month or so at most before she saw them again, not three fucking days!

But she supposed life had other ideas? So after they had finished their little fruit parade, Celi had every intention of striking up a conversation with them, if only in the hopes of getting away from the most blow-hearted and long-winded Vice Principal she'd ever met. The man had been going on and on for an hour about his accomplishments as Vice Principal, and even Mimi who loved listening to people's life stories was falling asleep!

Before she could even get out a 'hello' though, the man in question proceeded to give the lot of them detention before going off on them for....something, Celi hadn't even the foggiest.

"Honestly, all of you troublemakers, especially you Wilders! Do you enjoy giving me a headache with your shenanigans?!" When one of them seemed ready to raise a hand in confirmation, he shut them up with a finger to the face and a stern look. "Not a word! Not a word from any of you! I'm over here doing my job as Vice Principal and trying to show our new exceptional student around her new educational facility and here you are acting like...acting like..."

At his fumbling, Celi used this as her chance to pipe in.

"Acting like a bunch of students looking to give their teacher some fruit?" She asked, giving the man a rather harsh look at his prejudicial behavior since she had no clue just why he had it out for these dunderheads specifically. Sure, she knew for a fact now that John was a dumbass, and the creepy barista was well, creepy, but Terry was a pretty decent guy. And the others didn't look too terrible either, so what's the deal?

Faced with her skeptical look over his judgmental behavior, the Vice Principal coughed slightly before righting himself. She didn't know so of course she'd misunderstand things, luckily he was here to steer this new student on the right path to academics and him to the position of 'Principal Ennis'.

"Now Miss Celi, as you are new here I'm sure you don't know, but this particular lot of troublemakers needs a firm hand to guide them and I am just the man to do so" He said so with such confidence and bravado, it surely radiated to the new student just how strongly he knew what he was doing. "And I must suggest to you Miss, that as an explementary student with such high marks and achievements, you'd best not associate with...them, if you know what's good for you"

At Vice Principal Ennis's last remark, Patty turned slowly towards him with a dark expression. Every local on Rai Island knew her parents not only ran the sole bank on the island, but also held regular fundraisers for the needy and for the local schools.

"I beg your pardon?" Her voice had gone from delightfully sweet to downright acidic, "Whatever do you mean by them?"

The boys in question had all clamped their mouths shut and were watching the young lady with wide eyes.

The Vice Principal gulped, he had forgotten that while an exceptional student herself, Miss Patty was also the beau of the oldest Wilder boy. Meaning that despite the boys unfavorable personalities and reputations, she remained steadfast as one of their strongest companions. A terrible choice really on her part if you were to ask him, but her parents were certainly not people he wished to get on the bad side of if he wished to have his own backing for the day he tried for the Principal's seat.

"I-I-I mean, they are certainly not the most punctual or rule abiding students s-s-so to speak, so my r-reasoning for judgmental behavior is q-quite founded, and M-Miss Celi is from a very p-prominent family! I'm s-sure that she and her parents would much p-prefer if she were guided to a m-much more advisable group of peers who-"

At his incredibly fumbled and stuttering mess of an excuse, Celi quickly interjected as soon as she heard that she was his 'reasoning for judgmental behavior'.

"Excuse me, Mr. Vice Principal, but if you'd read my files you'd know that I'm emancipated and as such, I don't give a rats ass what my parent's think of who I associate with so how bout keeping your prejudices to yourself and not get me involved?" Celi all but glared at him, she wasn't a fan of being used, especially as some sorry man's poor excuse to try and rationalize his own prejudices.

So flipping the bird in his general direction and motioning for Mimi to follow her, Celi decided to end the tour herself, walking over to small ragtag group with a huff and every intent of getting one of them to show her where her class was.

One of Patty's sleek black eyebrows arched as Celi soundly put the vice principal in his place and a smile curved her pink lips as she eyed the rosette. Being the sweet, wonderful boyfriend that he was, Terry had filled her in on everything that had happened last Friday. Namely, the hole that John - one of her future brothers-in-law - had dug for himself with this girl and how he'd managed to get mostly out of it.

It was no wonder that he liked her. She was more than willing to put people in their place when they deserved it.

Patty was absolutely delighted by this.

"I can see you and I are going to be very good friends, Celi." She reached into the breast pocket of her jacket and pulled out a business card, handing it to her, "Like I mentioned previously. Give me a call if you need anything. Anything at all, dear."

John couldn't help the victorious smile on his face when Celi and Mimi bailed on the vice principal and joined their little ragtag group. It wasn't that often that new students shunned the 'sensible locals' right away and decided to hang out with Rai Island's most notorious family. What made it even sweeter was that Celi had chosen him despite his offensive behavior the Friday before. Perhaps she secretly enjoyed troublemakers like him, or perhaps she was just sick of the fancy-pants snobs. Or maybe it was just that Terry's badass girlfriend had impressed her with that power play.

Either way, he'd take the win.

The group broke away from the sniveling 'Mr. Penis' and strolled through the hall with the pinkette sisters accompanying them, stopping every so often to point out areas, teachers and students of interest. Patty was extremely knowledgeable not only about the school and everything in it, but also about the gossip and how to use it to her advantage.

There was maybe fifteen to twenty minutes before classes began, so the gallavanting wasn't going to make them late. Not that the boys in the group cared much. John glanced at Celi out of the corner of his eye as they sauntered down the hall, and grinned. "Ah, you do like me." He teased lightly, "Enough to ditch the V.P. at least. And what a nice surprise that you decided to pick this school instead of Valevay. Did you miss me?"

Ugh, percentages.

And what kind of weird math was that anyway? That sounded more like an excuse for sass than anything else, but John didn't mind much. Any way he looked at it, Celi was his kind of girl. She was gorgeous and she had a smokin' hot body that had haunted his dreams at night and left him with a very noticeable problem when he'd woken up. Not that said problem couldn't be remedied with a little help from 'Rosie Palm and her five sisters', but eventually he'd like to have Celi wrapped around him instead.

Speaking of which, she was looking mighty fine today, and with him being a healthy teenager his mouth would almost surely get him in trouble with her. Especially when most of his current thoughts revolved around how he could use it on her. But no, he'd better not mention anything like that right now. It was too damn early in the morning to get himself in hot water.

And besides, Buster was still here.

Now that he was rested, clean and presentable, he was competition for Celi's affections. As frustrating as it was, his best friend also had every right to try to woo the new girl. John frowned at the thought as he glanced at Buster, who was smiling at the target of their shared affection. They had history class together for first period and John was sure the little sneak would offer to walk her to her first class. So he decided to preemptively intervene.

"Want me to walk you to your first class?" John asked.

John tilted his head to look at the printed schedule she was holding and lifted his brows. It looked like they had several classes together, though they wouldn't be starting off each day with History. Well, there was nothing he could do about that... unless she wanted to skip. He could always take her to the roof, where he and his family members hung out, but something told him he should bide his time and wait for that one.

"English, huh?" John asked, wisely omitting their shared classes for now, "Easy enough. Follow me." He led her through the halls to their destination and even opened the door for her. Despite his lack of gentlemanly behavior in any normal circumstance, acting like one wasn't so bad. Not that he'd make it part of his daily routine. He had an image to uphold, after all.

"You're going to need pens and a composition book." Buster's voice piped up, and he held out a few pens, "The class always starts with a journal writing exercise that the teacher picks out, and she likes it when students let their creativity shine through. If you write well, and write a lot, you'll be on her good side. But if you slack like some people, you'll be on her shit list." His green eyes locked on John at the last part, but he still had an easygoing smile.

"Need a composition book? I have a spare." Buster offered, to John's annoyance.

He had the grace to look a little sheepish. Pocketing the declined pens, he gave her a small shrug and rubbed at the back of his neck. "Oh, uh... the name tag is just to make nice with the tourists. And to stop tourists for making fun of me." He gestured loosely towards John, "Johnny here was right. My name actually is Buster."

The barista in question looked uncomfortable. "My mom grew up obsessed with Tiny Toons and named me after the male lead."

Of course, John's gut reaction to Buster's tried-and-true method of tugging on a girl's heartstrings was irritation, but when Celi had no idea he was referring to a cartoon it almost made him laugh. Now the conversation had turned awkward and both of them were looking to him for assistance. Celi clearly wanted his help to get out of the conversation, while Buster was hoping John would clarify for her.

Ha. Fat chance.

He looked between the two and idly wondered if he should bail either of them out. On one hand, he'd known Buster all his life. On the other, he'd love to get Celi all to himself. But should he keep pandering to her and risk damaging his reputation as one of, if not THE, meanest guy on the island? Hmm, decisions...

"Mmm... yup." John agreed readily with a curt nod.

Buster, for his part, rolled his eyes and shrugged it off. He and John had put up with each other's bullshit all their lives after all, so this was simply par for the course. The shorter boy simply exhaled in mild annoyance and it was as if the slate between them had been wiped clean.

Celi, on the other hand, looked like she wanted to deck him. Hard. And John knew in his heart of hearts that he shouldn't find her so attractive when her face was darkening with the desire for violence. Against him specifically. But the way her eyes widened and practically glowed with rage turned him on for reasons he couldn't even begin to fathom.

"Has anyone ever told you how pretty you are when you're about ready to strangle 'em?" John asked, grinning down at her, "Because I think you oughta know."

As it was, Buster was so caught off guard by John's bizarre compliment that the confusion was written all over his face. How on Earth could anyone be so enraptured by someone who was ready to punch him in the face?! He had absolutely no idea. And quite frankly, he didn't want to find out. Because unlike John, he enjoyed not throwing himself into fights serious enough to warrant a trip to the emergency room.

Suddenly Celi whirled to face him and Buster just about jumped out of his skin.

She was asking for his help. Honestly, he didn't know what to make of this situation himself, but he'd try anyway. He blurted out the first question that came to mind and hoped it'd work, "What does Bobby want for his birthday?"

John looked at him as if he'd grown another head, "His birthday's not 'til November, dipshit."

"No kidding." Buster frowned, "I'm asking now so I can save some cash, moron."

John's eyebrows furrowed as he thought about it and Buster made a show of checking his wristwatch. "Hey, lemme know on the way to History." He said and started walking off, "See you later, Celi." Upon realizing his friend was booking it down the hall, John nodded to Celi and jogged after him.

The majority of the day passed by in the typical way high school days tended to go. Since S and W were relatively close together in the alphabet, Celi and John had a bunch of their classes together, such as Science, Math, Physical Education, Music, and lunch. This was great for John since he enjoyed bothering Celi every chance he got. The taller boy made it a point to walk her to all of her classes. When Buster shared classes with the two of them, he tried his best to keep John from driving Celi up the wall... with limited success.

During the walk to third period, however, it was a completely different story. John - though he was escorting Celi yet again - had put a temporary hold on riling her up and instead looked excited about going to the auditorium. Buster also seemed pretty enthusiastic. Soon, they were joined by Terry and Chuck as well, who were smiling nicely.

And Terry was holding what looked to be a cookie tin.

With how large and intimidating he was it almost seemed silly, but no one dared make fun of him. When they reached the little old lady that taught the music class, Terry bent down and gave her the tin. One by one, the Wilders (and Buster) all greeted her kindly as Mrs. Harper and gently shook her hand. She seemed positively thrilled to see the lot of them and was all smiles.

As students began to filter into the back section of the auditorium, the four boys went right to the center area and started warming up without waiting for anyone. It was as if they were the only students in the room, as anyone who entered immediately stopped to listen to their barbershop quartet-styled rendition.

Of course, they were just fooling around with it, but the four of them harmonized incredibly well together.