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“This is positively barbaric,” Elizabeth Webber scoffed. She folded her arms tightly and glared at her best friend. “I mean, what purpose is this supposed to serve?”
Brenda Barrett giggled–an eternal giggler, sometimes Elizabeth wanted to rip her head off. “Come on, you’re being too cynical about this. It could be a lot of fun.”
“Ha!” Elizabeth snorted. “It’s barbaric,” she muttered. She sat back against the tree and stared across the courtyard to the group of lunch tables where the popular kids ate.
Just once…before she graduated in the spring…just once, she wanted to sit at that table. Just to prove that the power structure in high school was imaginary and only held up as long as people adhered to it.
“Who do you think I’ll get?” Brenda broke in. She flipped through their yearbook in junior year. “It’s only kids in Mr. Murty’s class so…the possibilities aren’t bad.” Her eyes lit up. “Oooh…could you imagine getting paired with Sonny Corinthos or Dillon Quartermaine for a whole month?” she sighed dreamily.
“Brenda, it’s a stupid project,” Elizabeth told her scathingly. “He expects us to throw our names into a hat and let the guys pick it out and then we have to spend a whole month getting to know them? I mean…I can think of a hundred other things I’d rather do with my time.”
“Right. Like hole up in your room with your paintings.” Brenda rolled her eyes. “Come on, Lizzie. Part of you is excited because part of you thinks this might be fun.” She smacked her on the shoulder. “Don’t say you’re not.”
“Knowing my luck, I’ll end up with Justus Ward or Lucky Spencer, or one other math club nerds and I’ll spend my whole month talking about the probability theorem.” She blew her bangs out of her eyes. “Thanks, but no thanks.”
“What if you get Kyle Radcliffe? Or…ooooh Jason Morgan?”
Elizabeth snorted. “Yeah, because I want to spend time with Kyle-porno-is my middle-name-Radcliffe.”
“Please, those were just rumors.” Brenda frowned. “You don’t think he really tried to broadcast sex with Maxie on the internet do you?”
“Why else do you think Maxie switched schools? All the idiots were laughing about it for weeks. You missed it–that was the month you had mono last year.”
“Oh, right. Well, anyway, he’s hot. And I notice you’re not denying how hot Jason Morgan is. Man, what I wouldn’t give to see what he has inside those jeans.” Brenda giggled. “Do you think he’s got a shot gun or a pistol?”
Elizabeth threw her a bemused look. “Someone’s been watching their Dawson’s Creek DVDs a little bit too much.”
“Well, there’s something to be said for it,” Brenda remarked. “I mean, he does have long fingers.”
“Okay, stop channeling Joey Potter and finish eating. Lunch will be over soon and then we have to go auction ourselves off for the good of history.” Elizabeth bit into her ham and cheese sandwich and brushed some of the crumbs from her blue jeans.
“Hey, if practicing a barbaric custom in the spirit of Lupercalia gets me some alone time with Kyle Radcliffe, I am so there,” Brenda said, slurping up the rest of her Hi-C.
—-
“Okay, ladies, write your name clearly on these slips I’m handing out–ah, Miss Webber, Miss Barrett, nice of you to join us,” Mr. Murty said, pausing in the middle of the aisles when Elizabeth and Brenda entered the classroom.
“Sorry, Mr. Murty,” Brenda chirped. “Elizabeth had a minor run-in with a hot dog and we had to–Ow!” She rubbed her elbow and glared at Elizabeth. “Well, it’s not your fault someone threw it at you,” she hissed.
“Just take your seats.” He finished handing out the slips of paper. “Fold them over twice and then drop it into the hat at the front of the room.”
Elizabeth hastily scrawled her name and folded paper. “Here, put this in for me,” she said to Brenda.
Brenda dropped both of theirs in and returned to her seat next to Elizabeth. “Who do you think threw it anyway?” she asked thoughtfully.
“Brenda, it came from the football team’s table. Gee, I wonder who it might have been,” Elizabeth remarked sarcastically, throwing a glare at a smirking Richard Lansing.
“He’s still mad you wouldn’t go down on him, huh?” Brenda asked, recalling Elizabeth’s painful fall from popularity during the fall of their junior year when she’d refused to have sex with boyfriend Ric and he’d dumped her.
“Thanks for bringing that painful memory up. Why don’t we talk about your parents divorce next?” Elizabeth demanded. She slunk down in her chair and started to doodle in her notebook.
“Okay, gentlemen, line up and we’ll get these names picked.” As the guys were forming a line, Mr. Murty went on to repeat the legend of Lupercalia, which they were mimicking. “Now just be thankful that we’re not actually doing this for real. Couples formed by this method had to stay together for a year and almost all of those matches ended in marriage. Yours probably won’t last past the end of the project but hey, we might make some new friends.”
Kyle Radcliffe withdrew Carly Benson’s and he high-fived some of his friends. Carly was long known for her loose morals and was probably the one girl in high school he hadn’t charmed into bed. Or tried to, anyway.
Justus Ward stepped up and almost all of the girls cringed until he fished out a slip of paper giving him the company of Robin Scorpio for the month. Brenda couldn’t hide a large smile at the idea of popular Robin having to spend the whole month of February with the president of the math club.
Dillon Quartermaine withdrew his and frowned as he opened it. “I can’t read this,” he said, handing it to Mr. Murty.
“Dillon, your new best friend will be…” Mr. Murty frowned and squinted. “Ms. Barrett, haven’t we talked about your penmanship before?”
“Sorry, still working on it,” Brenda said, fighting to contain her giggles. Her foot was tapping desperately against the floor, an telltale mark of her excitement.
“Whatever. Just go move next to Dillon.” Brenda gathered her books and made a beeline for Robin’s recently emptied seat. Dillon sat right around Kyle, Sonny and Jason and she nearly swooned.
“Alexis Davis,” Sonny Corinthos announced focusing on the mousy brunette in the back of the room. Alexis squeaked but moved to an empty seat next to the wrestling star.
All of the still single girls in the room held their breath as Jason Morgan stepped up to the hat–except Elizabeth that is, who was busy sketching Brenda drooling.
“Elizabeth Webber,” Jason read. He looked to find her but her head was down and she was completely absorbed in her work.
Mr. Murty cleared his throat. “Ms. Webber?”
“Present,” she remarked absently. The class giggled and it broke her out of her trance. She glanced up. “I’m sorry, what?”
“Mr. Morgan, why don’t you go and take Ms. Barrett’s recently emptied seat?”
Elizabeth paled and quickly looked at the beaming Brenda who was giving her a thumbs up. No, no, no. This just made it worse. It was common knowledge Jason and Ric were best friends–had been since the day Jason Morgan had moved to Port Charles in kindergarten. They’d been friends while she dated Ric but once that relationship ended and she’d fallen from grace so to speak, their friendship had died. Abruptly and harshly.
Jason grabbed his book bag and sat next to her. “Hey.”
She studiously ignored him and continued with her sketch. He scratched the back of his neck. “What’re you drawing?”
Silence. Jason sat back and decided to give up for now. Meanwhile Lucky Spencer was paired with Courtney Matthews, Georgie Jones with Lucas Stansbury and last but not least, Ned Ashton with Chloe Morgan, Jason’s cousin.
“Okay, now that you all have your partners, it’s your responsibility to choose a topic. The theme is famous couples throughout history and I expect to know your decisions tomorrow in class. Other than that, you’re to spend as much time as possible getting to know your new best friend. Go to the movies, study together, do homework–you don’t have to fall in love but I expect you to at least make an effort.” He looked in Elizabeth’s direction but the brunette was still sketching.
The bell rang and Elizabeth jumped from her seat and was out of the classroom before anyone else. Brenda hurried after her and surprisingly, Dillon Quartermaine was hot on her heels trying to pin down a time to meet with her.
“Elizabeth Imogene Webber,” Brenda screeched finally catching up to her at her locker. “What is wrong with you?”
“Okay, I really appreciate the warm up before track practice but did you have to run right through a pack of football players? They’re big and burly–it’s not easy,” Dillon demanded, slightly out of breath.
Brenda turned around. “Oh my God. What–what are you doing here?”
“Uh…I don’t know if you missed that little announcement at the end of class, but we have to tell Murty our topic tomorrow and I figured we’d get it done as soon as possible. We have study hall together this period right?”
“Right,” Brenda remarked faintly.
“Okay then.” Dillon looked at an almost furiously silent Elizabeth who was shoving books into her locker. “Elizabeth…I figure since you’re Brenda’s best friend, we’ll be spending a lot of time together this month so I wanted to say on behalf of my friends…they’re idiots.”
Elizabeth glanced at him. “You got that right.” She zipped her bag and slammed her locker shut. “Bren, I’ll see you later. I’m gonna ditch eighth and go home.”
“But–” Brenda was cut off abruptly when Elizabeth stalked down the hall.
“She certainly doesn’t seem happy about this turn of events. Of course, if I just got paired with my ex’s best friend–who used to be one of my best friends–I’d be a little pissed off too.”
Brenda glanced at Dillon. “How do you feel about giggling?” she asked.
Elizabeth was halfway to her car before she recognized Jason leaning against it. “What the hell do you want?” she hissed pushing past him and shoving her key into the lock.
“Look, I’m not exactly thrilled about the turn of events either, okay? But I have to keep my GPA up so why don’t we just decide on a topic and get it over with?”
“How about Romeo and Juliet?” Elizabeth said harshly. “They die at the end, kind of fitting, I’d say.”
He lowered his voice. “I understand that you’re still mad at me for what happened last year but come on, you know I didn’t have a choice–”
“I know that you were supposed to be my friend. I know that I went to you, hoping for your support but you just called me a liar and threw me out of your house.” She yanked her car door open but he slid into the opening before she could get into the car.
“How was I supposed to believe that my best friend was a date rapist?” he demanded.
“How were you supposed to ignore my torn clothes and bloody arms?” she asked hoarsely. She shoved him out of the way and got into the car. She started the car and pulled out of her parking spot, nearly nicking a convertible next to her.
She peeled out of the parking lot, eager to get away from Jason Morgan and her entire life.
Hey! Just a little FYI on how 
