𝟙.𝟙𝟚: 𝕋𝕙𝕖𝕣𝕖'𝕤 𝔸 𝕄𝕦𝕞𝕞𝕪 𝕆𝕟 𝕄𝕒𝕚𝕟 𝕊𝕥𝕣𝕖𝕖𝕥

—Narrator's perspective—

"You threw it in a river." Arabella pointed out, her fingers pinching the nose of her bridge, legs crossed in annoyance.

"Slug drunk." Alaric reminded her again, glaring a bit at his friend besides him while driving. "How come you didn't get infected? That's unfair."

Arabella snorted, looking out the window in a bad mood. Lately, her and small cars has been a problem but atleast she's not hauled up in the back seat with talkative witches. Except Hope.

"I brought snack." Hope said and sat back up, pulling a plastic of snacks, giving it to the very back where Emma and Dorian is.

"Oh sweet. Did you pack them before or after you decided to FOMO your way onto our trip?" Lizzie spat, smiling irritatingly to the tribrid besides her.

"Like I'm gonna let you guys chase monsters without me?"

"I would've thought you wanted to spend the break canoodling with your hipster boyfriend." She remarked and turned to the vampire on the front seat who rolled her eyes.

Hope rolled her eyes, seeing how Arabella reacted. "Not my boyfriend." She deadpanned said and turned her attention to the siphoner. "Sorry for wanting to protect the outside world from my mistakes. You know, there's currently an urn on a river cruise spreading plagues across America because I thought a unicorn was cute. It's called accountability. Maybe there's a bracelet for it."

Arabella put her earphones on to stop herself from laughing on Hope's remark. She looked in front of her while she boredly thought of way on how she was suppose to spend her spring break with Hope and now got pulled into another monster hunt. The past week all she's done was spend time with the tribrid but a week wasn't enough for her.

"Girls? We're gonna be in this classic automobile for six hours all right? So, no bickering." Alaric said, looking at them through the mirror.

"It would help if it wasn't a thousand degrees in here. I'm burning up." Hope complained, using her hand as a fan to cool herself down.

"You're burning up. Now, that's ironic." She scoffed, looking at Hope in disbelief and hinting something.

Hope looked at her weirdly. "What does that even mean?"

"Don't play dumb. I see you. I see right through you."

"I don't know what you're talking about. What happened to playing nice?" She reminded, looking at Ric and back to Lizzie.

Lizzie inhaled. "Over. Done. I'm getting back to me. I am who I am. Right Josie?" She asked and turned to her twin who was humming to a song while having her earphones on. "Josie." Lizzie nudged her leg.

"Sorry?" She asked, taking off one side of the earphone and looked at the blonde in confusion.

"Josie. You cannot leave me alone with just her for company." She eyed her down, gesturing to Hope who was busy looking at the girl in front of them blankly.

"Well, I get carsick if I don't listen to music." She shrugged and placed the earbud back.

"Josie! No." Lizzie complained and hit her and then Hope got involved creating an arguing, bickering mess behind.

Alaric exhaled in frustration. "Girls!" He looked back and got sidetracked on driving when they almost hit a car. "Girls! There's no reason to be tense or awkward, okay? Now knock it off." He scolded and the three stayed quiet again. "We're gonna get through this together. God help us all."

Arabella seconded what he said and pulled her earphones off, getting bored of the same music repeating over and over again. She immediately regretted it when Ric turned the radio on. She sighed and just looked out the window in peace.

What seems like 45 minutes of them driving, Alaric jamming to random music on the radio, Hope complained.

"I'm boiling." She said, wiping sweat off her forehead.

"I'm freezing." Lizzie added.

"I'm starving." Josie said nonchalantly and pulled her earphone off.

Alaric turned the ac on while still looking out the road to drive. He pulled over to the side of the road, earning many confused looks to the people in the car.

"Don't think you're just gonna sit there the whole ride. We're changing." He said to Arabella who looked at him in disbelief.

She was about to protest but the human already got out and rounded the car to her side. "Fantastic." She whispered and changed seats. "Atleats a warning would have been great." Arabella said, glaring at Ric before driving off to the road.

"Punch buggy." Lizzie said out of no where, punching Hope on the arm and looked away like nothing happened. Hope frowned at her behaviour of immaturity.

Arabella felt her phone went off, a random number appeared time and time again. She rolled her eyes annoyingly and placed the phone on the cupholder.

From days has this been going on and yet the number keeps sending death threats. She assumed it was a wrong number but Arabella was starting to realise it might be directed to her.

"No, I'm not hungry." She said when Ric offered her a sandwich. He shrugged and ate it for himself peacefully.

"Nice try." Hope butted in and forcefully gave her a sandwich. Arabella was about to protest but the tribrid gave her a look making her sigh and just take it.

Alaric eyed them, mostly wanted to tease but knew it wasn't the right time seeing as the other people in the back also wanted to say something about their relationship. Lizzie wanted to say something but Alaric gave her a warning look, making her back off with a pout.

"Is there a chance that I can go back to my seat now?" Arabella asked, munching on the bread while talking freely.

"Ha." Alaric scoffed and shook his head. "Not a chance."

She whined and kept driving professionally with one hand while on the other she was holding her food. After, Lizzie punched Hope saying 'Punch baggy, no returns.'. The blonde snickered and went back to focusing on the road.

With another few minutes went by of Alaric  singing some random rythm, Josie leaned on the seat where her dad is and began to feel woozy.

"I think I'm..." She stopped and leaned on the floor to puke, everyone groaned and someone even shrieked by the surprise. Lizzie yelled in disgust and turned her body to the other side.

"Pull over, now." Alaric said and tried his best to not do the same thing. Arabella groaned and did what she was told, pulling on the side of the highway and opened the window. "Josie, go get some fresh air for a minute." He said making her nod and open the door.

Arabella also exited the car, trying to gather any sense of humanity she has left before entering the car. "Ric! You're bloody driving." She ordered and went to the passenger seat, shutting the door before he can even have time to protest.

When Josie was done puking some more, Arabella sighed and covered her face with one hand while leaning on the door. She was suppose to just close her eyes to gather her thoughts but she didn't notice that she already fell asleep.

Hope took note of that and internally smiled, looking out the window to distract herself on not waking Arabella up so she can have someone to talk to. She listened to Josie finish the song, Alaric singing the rythm again and again, Lizzie asking if they were there yet and Hope wondered if she can just throw herself out of the car to end her misery.

"So what is going on with you and Arabella." Lizzie started with a teasing look that made Hope roll her eyes.

"Not like it's any of your business, Lizzie." She replied, clicking her tongue and giving the blonde a fake smile. "Why do you care about my love life anyways."

"Oh I really don't." Lizzie said, looking out the window before she can even say something that would upset the vampire, didn't realising that she was asleep.

Hope give her a weird look, again, before focusing on the road and Dr. Saltzman getting lost. She just wished that the girl she loves is besides her, not away from her.

"Are we there yet?" Lizzie asked in an exaggerated tone, gripping her head like she was about to go insane if this car doesn't stop moving.

"Yes!" Ric answered, haulting just by the sign of Maple Hallows, and also waking up Arabella who almost flew to the window because of the brakes.

Arabella sighed and closed her eyes again, ignoring Ric who almost killed her. She opened her eyes and looked around from where they were.

"Oh great. We're here." She mumbled and exhaled to wake herself up.

☘︎︎