Oh, Heather

Chapter Thirty-one

Leo called to tell Heather he’d be by soon, she was actually really excited to see his car. He was pretty vague with the details. She played with Corey as she waited for him to pull into the driveway. The damp ground from the rain the night before made it a task to walk in her white shoes. She’d gone almost a year without getting them dirty, at least where it was noticeable, but most of the ground was muddy. Leo pulled into the driveway before she had to walk into the grass. 

“Hey Corey!” Leo said, climbing out of the car.

It was a white jeep wrangler, it looked fairly new. It was a really nice car, she liked it a lot more than she thought she would. 

“Hi Heather’s friend.” Corey replied, grabbing onto Heather’s arm.
“CC, that’s Leo, remember? He stayed the night and we went trick-or-treating with him.”
“Oh yeah. Hi Leo.”
“Go inside and get momma okay, I want her to see the new car.” She laughed.

Corey ran inside, slamming the screen door behind him.

“Does he not like me or something? He seemed pretty fond of me when I stayed the night.” He asked, leaning against the car door.
“He’s just tired. And he has a hard time remembering people.”
“Ah okay. Do you know if Jada will meet us at the mall or should I pick her up?” He asked.
“I’m not-”
“Jada? Isn’t that the girl you told me about Heather.” Alyssa interrupted, poking Heather’s side.

“Stop, don’t poke me.” Heather smiled.
“You told your mom?” Leo said.
“I tell her a lot of stuff. Not everything but I usually tell her about girls.”
“Oh okay.”
“But yes mom. That’s the girl I told you about.”

“Did you get everything cleared up?” She asked.
“Not exactly. But she asked me to be her date to prom.” 
“That’s great, sweetheart.” Alyssa replied, rubbing her back.

Leo’s phone rang and he climbed back into his car to answer it.

“Is that his jeep? It’s nice.”
“Yeah it is.”

Leo got back out of the, gesturing his head toward the front seat.

“We gotta get going, I want to be at the mall before it gets too crowded.” Leo said.
“Okay. Love you mom!”
“Love you too honey.” She replied, walking off into the house.

Heather climbed into the passenger seat. The car smelled like strawberries and lysol. 

“I’m gonna guess that you cleaned this recently?” She said, rubbing her nose from the smell.
“Yeah I did. Sorry, the spray is kind of strong.”
“Maybe a bit more than kind of.” She joked, buckling her seat belt.
“So, am I picking up Jada?”
“Let me text her really quick.”
“You got her number?” Leo asked.
“Yeah! I didn’t see it before but it was on the back of the note she gave me.” She answered.

She texted her and almost immediately received a reply.

I’ll meet you guys there.

“She said she’d meet us.”
“Perfect.” Leo said, driving to Miley’s house.

When they made it to the mall, the first thing they saw was the football boys. They were gathered at the entrance, almost completely blocking the door.

“You’ve got to be kidding.” Leo said, trying to push himself through the crowd.
“Just don’t acknowledge them.” Heather replied.

They made it into the mall but none of the three really felt like that would be the last of the loud group. Vance kept staring at the three of them as they waited for Jada. 

“Message her really quick and tell her we’re at the front entrance waiting for her.” Miley said.
“Miley, how did you go from completely hating her to actively wanting her to hang out with us?”
“Well, you like her. And I never hated her, I strongly disliked her.” 
“I’m pretty sure those are the same thing.”
“What store do you guys want to go to first?” Miley said, avoiding Leo’s statement.
“We can just check them all. We’re bound to find something.”

They looked around the bottom floor, trying to think of a plan. They didn’t want to be walking around for hours. 

“Hey guys,” Jada said, walking up behind them.

Heather jumped, hiding her face in embarrassment.

“Did I scare you?” Jada laughed.
“Just a bit.” 
“Hey Jada!” Miley smiled.
“Hey Miley. Do we have a plan for where we’re going?” She asked, messing with the strap of her purse.
“Not yet. There’s a dress and suit shop a couple stores down that we could go to first and if we don’t find anything there we can search for dress or suit specific stores.” Leo said.
“Are you gonna wear a dress or a suit, Jada? I know you’ve said you aren’t a big fan of dresses.” Miley asked.

“I might wear a dress anyway. It’d be nice to step outside of my comfort zone.”
“So you’re gonna wear pink too?” Leo joked.
“Not that far out of my comfort zone.” She replied, sticking up her hand.
“Do you guys want to go shopping now?” Miley said, impatiently tapping her leg.
“Okay, okay. Let’s go.”

Heather and Jada searched through the dresses, showing each other dresses they liked. They found a ton that they liked, but not that they really wanted. Miley and Leo were searching for suits. Leo found a white dress shirt, a black waistcoat, a black tie, and a pair of black dress pants for the same price as the suit Miley was going to buy. Leo was the only one who decided what he wanted by the first store, and probably spent the least amount of money. They moved on to two other stores that were on opposite ends of the mall. Leo went with Miley to the store she found, and Jada and Heather went together to the only other store with dresses they might want. They found a few more dresses and they both decided on something entirely different than they thought they’d buy. Heather bought a velvet green, long sleeve, off the shoulder, dress with lace along the collar. 

“Do you only wear off the shoulder dresses?”
“They’re pretty. And it gives me a better reason to wear a jacket over it.”
“True.”

Jada found a black long sleeve, square cut mini dress that definitely went against the dress code.

“Won’t you get in trouble for wearing that?”
“I break the dress code daily, I could wear something much worse.” 
“I don’t understand how you're not expelled yet.” Heather joked, paying for her dress.
“It’s because they’ve given up on dress coding me. It never does any good.”
“Let’s go find Miley and Leo.”

They peered into the store that Miley and Leo were at, tapping them on the shoulder as they snuck in.

“You guys find anything?” Heather asked.
“Leo found something, but I haven’t found anything I like yet.”
“Why on earth do you have 3 bags? How much was all of that?”
“1, it’s because these bags are small. 2, like 70 dollars.”
“Jesus christ. What all did you buy?”

“A waistcoat, a new dress shirt, new dress pants, a tie, and I think that’s it.”
“You bought more than us, and you managed to spend less than us?”
“Most of what I bought was on sale.” He shrugged.
“And so was this dress. It was one item, half off, and I still spent just over 200 dollars.”

“Are dresses really that expensive?”
“Pretty ones are.” Heather said, pursing her lips.
“I bet you could find a pretty dress for way less than that.”
“No, you can’t,” She said, “There’s one more suit shop on the first floor that I know of, let’s go look around in there.”

The other three nodded and they headed toward the store, scouring the racks for something that Miley might want to wear. When they reached the back of the store, Miley finally found something she wanted to wear. She bought three items. The first was a dark blue dress shirt with thick buttons. The second was a pair of black loose-fit dress pants. And finally, the third was a black blazer with white lining all around the jacket. 

“You’ll look amazing in it.” Leo said, opening the passenger side door for Miley.
“Thank you Leo, I know I will.” She replied sarcastically.

They all chuckled at Miley’s tone, placing their bags comfortably between them. The drive back to everyone’s houses was peaceful and silent. The exact opposite the last few weeks had been for Heather. When she made it home, she placed her bag onto a small table in her room. She grabbed a hanger from her closet as she took the dress out of the bag. She hung the dress in the far back of her closet, away from her other clothes.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Finallly a new chapter LMAO
I meant to publish this yesterday but my alarm didn't go off