DISCLAIMER: Popular and its characters are the property of Ryan Murphy and Touchstone. No infringement intended.
ARCHIVING: Only with the permission of the author.
SPOILERS: Slumber Party Massacre.
Tear Down This Wall
By carpesomediem
"I don't even know why I try with her," Brooke seethed angrily. She tried being nice, she tried being cool, calm and collected, she'd even tried opening up to the brunette and had nothing to show for it. No words of encouragement, no smile, not even a nod of real acknowledgment that she bared her heart and soul for someone else to see. Even though that was a bit of an exaggeration, Brooke still tried to let Sam see just a little more than she showed the rest of the world in the hopes that the journalist would notice. So far, Sam McPherson seemed oblivious to who she was for real; if only Brooke knew better.
Sam walked in on her while she was removing her lipstick. Brooke was tired, emotional and just not in the mood to deal with anyone let alone Sam McPherson. This week was adding up to be just hell, and she was sure it was about to take a turn for the worst. Then, Sam walked in, froze and just stared at her with one of those looks she gave off in waves. Brooke just started back, taking in the type of look that sears right through you, cuts you down the middle and exposes you in a glorious light of all your flaws for the world to see.
It was in these moments, when they were alone, that Brooke felt the most vulnerable to Sam. Even when she didn't think, she thought that Sam could see her for all she was worth, and Brooke often thought that wasn't much. The fact that she wanted Sam's approval more than anyone else should've warned her she had chosen the wrong fork in the road.
But who's to argue when your heart, and not your head, is in the driver's seat. That was always the route of the problem when you're taken out of your element. You're thrown a curve ball when it should've been a fastball, and you can't see straight, because it hit you in the head and broke you down into a million little pieces. Brooke laid before Sam broken and vice versa, and neither girl was none the wiser.
'She is so shallow,' Sam thought to herself, watching before the blonde noticed she was there. When Brooke began to speak, trying to extend some sort of olive branch. Sam didn't know what to make of the sudden insight into the center of Brooke's psyche, and it made her nervous. So, she looked away as she often did to avoid having to meet Brooke's eyes and possibly have someone capture a glimpse of her soul. When Sam finally did speak, she paralyzed Brooke, because instead of reacting with kind, compassionate words of comfort, she attacked. She attacked, and continued that attack, because the only thing worse than being defenseless was letting the one person who might be able to break down your walls actually, physically, tear them down.
Sam wanted to break them down. Deconstruct her until there was nothing left, because then that meant she didn't have to deal with the multitude of emotions flowing through her at any given time. Just Brooke's name, let alone presence, was enough to make her blood boil. She wasn't sure if that was entirely a good or bad thing, yet.
"I can't stand her..." Sam said under her breath as she bolted. Brooke McQueen solicited so many different emotions from her during the day, it was hard to keep track of them all, let alone try and sort through them and figure out what it all meant. She knew what it could mean, but she wasn't quite ready for that just yet. Or possibly at all. Sam wasn't sure if she wanted to let somebody in. Her mom was enough. For now. Forever. It was all the same to her.
By the time Sam left, Brooke felt even worse. She knew it would keep progressing. Murphy's Law was tailing her, and if she didn't lose him quick, she was sure things would continue to spiral out of control. Something worse was coming, and she couldn't quite put her finger on it. Brooke tried to be an optimist, but Sam was the eternal pessimist, and the blonde couldn't quite shake the feeling that slowly she, too, was becoming a bit of a pessimist by just surrounding herself by the brunette.
She tried to convince the other girl she was a good person. Sam would have nothing of it. Down inside, she knew that Brooke was really no different than she was, albeit on the popular side of the equation. Still, it wasn't enough for the brunette. She didn't want to believe there was somebody on this Earth strong enough to challenge her, and that alone was cause to make her run. Alas, there's only so far you can run in the world, and being trapped within the walls of the same high school made it close to impossible to run that far.
All Sam wanted was for her not to go to Carmen's party, but she had to go. It might be the one chance to put a stop to all the rumors swirling around her and Josh. She didn't want to give it up, but she knew that she really didn't have a choice now. Besides, if she went, she could spend time with Carmen and Josh, and she would show everyone that she truly was friends with Josh as well as a good girlfriend to Josh. 'Sam would see that, too,' she thought. That's what mattered most to her.
Brooke groaned, connecting a fist with the counter and dropping her lip gloss on the floor. She sighed, bent down to reach for her lip gloss and knocked her head on the counter as she came back up.
"Oww!" she grabbed her head and rubbed where she hit it until the pain dulled. "Could this day get any worse? I guess Carmen's party will tell me that... Oww."
The End