Dirt Lifter | Craig of the Creek High School AU

I'm on a need-to-know basis (Epilogue)

C: KELSEY
C: KELSEY
C: KELSEY
C: KELSEY
C: LEKSWY
C: KELSEY
K: CRAIG
K: CRAIG
C: KELSEY
K: CRAIG
K: what
C: CALL ME
C: NOW

"Who're you texting?"

Kelsey looked up from her phone. "Craig. He wants me to call. I'm not going to!" she defended after Stacks' eyebrows stitched together. "Later. What time do you have to get back?"

"About an hour." Her girlfriend stared out the window into the Chickyfoot parking lot. She had taken her hair down the best she could, and now it was in messy locks down her back and in front of her face. Stacks had always been an introvert, and her eyes drooped as she stared, tired from the dance. Kelsey could tell she was deep in thought. "I'm surprised my parents let me stay out this long."

"Why, whatever do they suspect we are doing?" she asked, in her medieval-knight impression that had improved greatly (or became more insufferable, depending on who you ask) with practice. "I am simply taking my bestest friend since childhood to a school dance, in which neither of us have dates, and we are going out to dinner afterward." She dropped the knight voice, and said "Actually, we could've lied and said we were taking Jason and Craig."

"I don't think my dad would believe I was taking Jason. Not my 'type', or something like that. He's already suspecting," she admitted with a shy laugh. "Mom's still got no clue, though, thank God. Anyway, how'd their stuff go?"

Kelsey picked her phone back up, rereading the messages. "Either really good or really bad, not sure. Is all-caps text excited yelling or mad yelling?"

"I think it depends on the context."

She frowned. "That's no help."

K: not now
K: text me ab it

"Your haircut kind of tipped him off."

When Kelsey realized Stacks was talking about her dad, she laughed. "I know, isn't it great?" She ran a hand through it, which she had been doing all evening. It was like losing a tooth when she was younger, obsessively touching it to make sure it didn't grow back while she wasn't looking. It made her feel more like herself, although that might just be the headrush from having a new look. Maybe that's why she was so energized. Usually she would feel as tired as Stacks looked after these kinds of things. "It's so... dyke-y."

She laughed dryly. "Oh, yeah, it's pretty dyke-y."

Kelsey grinned. "Thank you. And this dyke wants a burger." She looked up to the counter by the register across the restaurant, which was still empty. It had been twenty minutes since they ordered. "Where's our food? I mean, it's called fast-food for a reason, right? They lied to us," she said, slamming her fist on the counter with 'lied'.

"Give it time, my impatient one."

"I have no patience!" she exclaimed. "I have hunger! Deep-seated, burning hunger at the back of my throat that can only be parched with the sweet... salty... meaty meat of a chicken burger!" She landed on a good enough adjective and smiled triumphantly.

Stacks didn't respond, instead choosing to gaze lazily back, one hand on her chin.

"What?"

"Even when you're complaining about our food being slow, you're so poetic."

"That's because you're in love with me." She could actually look at her girlfriend (unlike some people she knew) after being together for so long. "Everything I say is poetry to you."