[center][img]https://i.imgur.com/6JE61t4.png[/img]

[img]https://i.imgur.com/Y2vBPb8.gif[/img]   [img]https://i.imgur.com/9h0aTcl.gif[/img]

[color=slategray][sub]Collab Featuring:[/sub][/color] [color=86c67c][sub][b]Riff-Raff[/b][@Silent Observer][/sub][/color] [color=slategray][sub]&[/sub][/color] [color=9999ff][sub][b]Gib-Gab[/b][@Silver Carrot][/sub][/color]
[color=slategray][sub]Location: Skulking outside BHHS → Anime Club[/sub][/color]

[img]https://i.imgur.com/WGzuSoN.png?1[/img][/center]
[indent]It was a good day. Truth be told, most days were good days in Rafael’s world. School was over, and he had anime club today, [i]and[/i] he didn’t have to work at the diner tonight. That’s a triple dope trio of facts, right there. To top it off, he had a pocket full of kush and his favorite [url=https://i.imgur.com/7Yc5bSh.png]board[/url] in hand. If he remembered correctly, which was a big if, Raf still had some time before anime club started.

Riff would be the first one to tell you that japanese animation is best enjoyed while high. With reefer vision, you saw everything the way that it was meant to be seen. It made the art tangible, and the action scenes extra exciting… almost 3-D? Way cool. So, it was about time for him to pregame for the club. Rafael didn’t even bother to get all the way off of school property before lighting up. He lazily rolled through the back parking lot, near the dumpsters, and occasionally did jump tricks off of the curbs while he smoked.

Satisfied with his post-class bake session, Riff snubbed out his joint on the pavement and flicked the stub into one of the dumpsters. The long-hair burner pushed off of the ground to gain speed and coasted along the parking lot, back towards the school. Once at the sidewalk, Raf stepped off of his board and stomped on the back end, causing it to jump up towards his outstretched hand. Despite being faded as fuck, Raf caught it with ease, and buckled the board into the straps of his backpack. Rafael might suck at a lot of things, but he was pretty darned good with a skateboard.

Upon walking into the classroom in which anime club was held, Riff found that the entire room was staring at him. He was probably late, but he was always late. This wasn’t really out of the ordinary. Not thinking too much of it, Rafael took his usual seat and settled in. Everyone kept staring.

[b]“Uhm, Raf?”[/b] One of the regular attendees, a sophomore named Phil, spoke up.

[color=86c67c][b]“Sup, dude?”[/b][/color] Rafael replied with a calm smile and a nod, still not picking up on the social cues that something was off. He did realize, however, that nothing was playing on the screen, and the club president wasn’t at the computer setting things up like she usually did. [color=86c67c][b]“Where’s Alice?”[/b][/color]

[b]“Don’t you rememb— scratch that, of course you don’t remember. She’s in [i]actual[/i] Japan right now, through the foreign exchange program. Weebin’ it up. You’re supposed to be running things today.”[/b]

[color=86c67c][b]“Me?”[/b][/color] Riff looked genuinely surprised. Sure, he was on the leadership board or whatever, but he was the Public Relations Rep. That was the goofy arts and crafts role, he made flyers and posters to advertise for the club because he was relatively good at art. He wasn’t actually entrusted with money or responsibilities like the treasurer or the president and vp were. Speaking of the vice president, [color=86c67c][b]“What about Mike?”[/b][/color]

[b]“He’s still out, extended vacation with his family or something.”[/b]

[color=86c67c][b]“Oh… okay!”[/b][/color] Rafael said cheerfully and stood up from his chair. He probably should have done so slowly, because the world spun around a little bit as he did so. This latest strain he bought off of A Dubs was some real good shit. Too good. Riff swayed as he made his way up to the front of the room. Once there, he looked around at all of the faces and realized that some of them were new. [color=86c67c][b]“Hey, I’m Riff. Do, uhh, the new people wanna say hi?”[/b][/color]

Gabriela was stoked when she’d first heard there was an anime club. This more than made up for the fact that the school itself didn’t have DnD sessions. She signed up in a heartbeat, got through her lessons with ease in the knowledge of the reward that lay in wait. And then...she spent almost seven minutes sitting in a room with fellow nerds, never the most sociable or confident of peoples, waiting for somebody to take charge. Maybe this wasn’t going to be fun. That’s when a guy waltzed in, with long hair, a skateboard in his backpack, absolutely reeking of weed, and confesses that he’s no authority figure…

This was going to be fun after all.

Gab didn’t stand up to introduce herself. This seemed like too chill a place for that. Or if it wasn’t, it certainly was with Raf running things. [color=9999ff][b]“Hey. I’m Gabriela. Gabriela Garcia. Just call me Gab, or Gabby, or G.G., or Gib-Gab. I’m not really picky!”[/b][/color] she spoke to the whole classroom, introducing herself in a very relaxed and casual manner, as if she was chatting to friends instead of making introductions to an extracurricular group.

A couple of newbies introduced themselves, but most were too shy to speak up. Such was the usual in a nerd club like this. What was surprising to Raf was the last person to say something. [color=86c67c][i]Woah…. Pretty.[/i][/color] He flashed a smile when she spoke up and laughed a little at the last nickname. [color=86c67c][b]“Gib-Gab. I like it. My pops calls me Riff-Raff, so I got one of them double nicknames too.”[/b][/color]

Rafael looked over to the computer and powered it on. [color=86c67c][b]“So… any suggestions on what we should watch? Newbies get first vote, it’s tradition.”[/b][/color]

[color=9999ff][b]“Gib-Gab it is, then!”[/b][/color] she cheerfully replied, as she sat back and prepared to watch some good old animu. Then she got a curveball thrown at her. The newbies picked. She looked around. Was nobody going to suggest something? Then it would have to be up to her! What about...No, but maybe...She wanted something that was good. Funny, but not too wacky, too serious, too combat oriented, too character oriented, too ecchi, too ‘kiddy’, too much of an acquired taste, too generic, too obscure, and nothing too mainstream, or she’d look like a fake anime fan. She eventually decided on something that subjectively ticked all these boxes; A classic.

 [color=9999ff][b]“Hmmm, what about Ranma ½?”[/b][/color] She suggested finally.

Riff pondered the name as the computer booted up. It sounded familiar, but he couldn’t recall having watched it. He very well might have watched it and just simply wasn’t remembering, that was a distinct possibility. When no one else suggested anything or vetoed that, Raf shrugged. [color=86c67c][b]“Cool,”[/b][/color] he said as he typed the name into the site that they frequently used to stream. Three typos later, he managed to get the name right and show search results. [color=86c67c][b]“Looks vintage, I fucks with that.”[/b][/color] Raf clicked the first episode link — sub, not dub — always sub, and then he turned to face the screen.

The screen was blank. [i]Huh[/i]. Rafael hadn’t thought about that part of it. He scratched at his head through his beanie and studied the computer settings. It looked like it [i]should[/i] be displaying through the projector, maybe something was wrong with the projector itself. Riff stood up and slowly made his way to the piece of machinery. He clicked a button… nothing. He tried another one… still nothing. 

[color=86c67c][b]“Hmm…”[/b][/color] He mused in a hum and got eye level with it to read the descriptions. Oh, the lens protector was still in place. Riff pushed the button to remove it, whilst still eye level, and was greeted with a blinding stream of light. [color=86c67c][b]“Acckkk, shit!”[/b][/color] Raf exclaimed and dodged away before rubbing at his dilated eyes. He blinked rapidly, but it did little to shoo away the stars that danced across his field of vision.

Passing the remote off to Phil, he said: [color=86c67c][b]“You’re in charge now, volume control’s on you.”[/b][/color] Riff then headed back to his seat, next to the newbie girl. [color=86c67c][b]“Did you just hear about the club? With a choice like that, you must be an anime fan, so where you been?”[/b][/color]

Watching Raf struggle to overcome several hurdles in the herculean task of playing a movie on a projector, whilst the other members or the room got a little annoyed and restless, Gab found kind of endearing, like watching a dog try to run on a treadmill. Eventually he got it working, and came to sit next to her, before asking her about why she had only just now came along to the anime club.

[color=9999ff][b]“I’ve been busy up til now. My family moved here just for me to come to this school, so I’ve had to go home and help them upack things and set things up and move furniture and stuff. We finally settled in a few days ago. Not having a social life’s been killing me, and there’s no DnD sesh either!”[/b][/color]

Raf nodded his head slowly. She was talking pretty fast, which always tripped him up, unless the conversation was taking place in spanish. He could understand and speak surprisingly rapidly in spanish, primarily because that was the only way that his mother communicated — fast, loud, and in her native tongue. Riff was about to ask where she moved here from, but she shifted topics to something that caught his attention far more than anything else she’d said so far. [color=86c67c][b]“Oh mannn, you play DnD? That’s awesome, my dudes and I play sometimes. Mostly… we kinda say we want to play and then we spend a few hours making super cool characters only to end up getting reeaallly baked and eating snacks instead. But, we’ve played some too. You should come to Dreamland sometime.”[/b][/color]

Gab’s eyes lit up when Raf mentioned that there is DnD here after all! Why was she scouring Beverly Hills High School for an official club? She should have just asked around the nerds from the beginning! Though, she’d never been baked before in her life. Would she have to try it if she joined in? Is that even a bad thing? The thought was actually quite exciting. [color=9999ff][b]“I’d love to join you guys if you have a sesh! But we’d have to start playing earnestly. The fun part is the actual playing. What’s the fun in making characters if you can’t use them and utilise how broken they are to infuriate the DMs?”[/b][/color] she asked, giggling. [color=9999ff][b]“Also, what’s this ‘Dreamland’? Does it have anything to do with… you know… getting baked?”[/b][/color] Gabby’s voice had trailed off and gotten quieter at the end of that sentence. She didn’t want the rest of the classroom to hear them, and she felt a bit of a nerd traitor even thinking this, but they all struck her as squares. The intrigue and impish excitement was clear in her voice, as was the glee at which she talked about the kush.

[color=86c67c][b]“Oh yeah, usually. You don’t even have to try that hard, it’s basically part of the atmosphere.”[/b][/color] Rafael smirked at her as he responded to her inquiry about getting baked. How was that even a question? Of course you get ripped at Dreamland, that was part of the charm. Gabby had asked another question, however, and Raf addressed it. [color=86c67c][b]“It’s A Double’s place. Basically paradise. He’s got old video game systems and movies and beanbags. Man, I love beanbags. But we hang out there a lot, I’ll take you. Don’t worry, they’ll like you for sure.”[/b][/color] Nodding his head in a agreement with his own words, Raf beamed a wide smile at her.

The more Gab heard about this Dreamland, the more it was beginning to sound as such. By the end of his description, her eyes were sparkling, and a wide grin was plastered on her face. [color=9999ff][b]“It sounds like literal heaven and I’m not even kidding. You’ve sold me on it. There’s no way you’re getting out of taking me now! Oh! Who is A Double, and what’s he like? I don’t think I’ve heard of him. Not that I really know who anybody is yet besides Hailey, and even then, all I know is several Sophomores and Juniors give her the prefix ‘watch out for-’. We’ll probably never speak to each other, and I doubt she’ll even know who I am before she graduates, so I’m not worried.”[/b][/color] Damn, this girl was a motormouth!

Raf’s eyes grew wide as he slowly nodded and tried to follow along with her. Fast words were especially hard when you were as high in the clouds as he was. The easiest thing to focus on, and truly it was the only thing that he could focus on, were her eyes and how shiny they got before she started talking. And then they stayed that way. It was like they were smiling along with her mouth. [color=86c67c][b]“Wow, you’re really pretty.”[/b][/color] Raf mused quietly whilst she was mid sentence.

[color=86c67c][b]“Oh, Hailey is alright. I dunno why people say stuff like that ‘bout her. She’s nice to us. And uh… A Double is, like, my friend? He’s got two first names so we all kinda call him A Double, or Double A, or A Dubs. Whatever, really, just as long as it’s not his names. He’s the best hookup for some green, and he skateboards n’ stuff.”[/b][/color] Raf shrugged, not really knowing what else to say. [color=86c67c][b]“D’you skate?”[/b][/color]

[color=9999ff][b]“I’m definitely calling him A Dubs!”[/b][/color] She replied, not addressing the Hailey part of what Raf had said. That conversation was over in Gab’s mind. She also, whilst she was busy talking, didn’t notice his mutterings. She had noticed he had muttered, but didn’t know what he had said. She decided to chase him up on that after she addressed his other points, to sate her curiosity.

[color=9999ff][b]“I don’t skate, no. I’ve never tried, but I’d probably suck at it. Wouldn’t mind trying to learn, but even for a newbie, I’d probably inventant a whole new level of suckage. By the way, when I was talking just now, you muttered something. What did you say?”[/b][/color]

[color=86c67c][b]“Oh…”[/b][/color] Riff crinkled his nose as he tried to remember what he had said. You could practically see the wheels of his mind spinning as he attempted to rewind the conversation mentally. Oh, right, duh. [color=86c67c][b]“I said that you’re really pretty. Your eyes did a thing, and I mean I thought it earlier too, because you are. Really pretty.”[/b][/color] 

That caught her off guard. Before her brain could get kicked into gear and start processing that, she could feel the heat radiating from her face, and knew that she was suddenly blushing as she stared at him with the kind of shock a child would express getting caught by an adult doing nothing wrong, but getting caught for it suddenly. Her brain then started to work. Was he trying to hit on her, or being sleazy? She took in his face. No, he was just being completely transparent and honest, likely on account of the weed. 

Gabby smiled, though it was a smaller, shyer smile than before, and brushed some hair behind her ear. She knew she wasn’t ugly, but she’d never actually been called pretty before. Then again, she only started wearing makeup last year. But that’s not what Raf had been talking about. He’d been talking about her eyes. He thought [i]she[/i] was pretty! She wondered if she should return the compliment, but she wasn’t sure handsome was the right word. It wasn’t untrue. He wasn’t bad looking, but there was a better word for his looks than ‘handsome’. He wasn’t a lantern-jawed heartthrob, and she preferred him for it. She liked his hair, too. In the end, she gave up trying to compliment him in return. Too much could go wrong. Her meaning could get lost.

[color=9999ff][b]“Thank you!”[/b][/color] she replied instead, her smile growing wider. [color=9999ff][b]“Nobody’s called me pretty before.”[/b][/color][/indent]