The Other

By Ruby Alien (aka Beth)

Disclaimer: I think the fact that this is a fanfic
should tell you that I don’t own any of Jenny
Carroll/Meg Cabot’s characters but I have to put this
dumb disclaimer on my fanfic anyway, because she might
sue me. I don’t know why she would, though. First of
all, why would Jenny Carroll/Meg Cabot even be reading
fanfiction? I’m sure she has better things to do with
her time, like write masterpieces! And besides, if she
did sue me, what would she get? My four-year-old CD
player (*clutches CD player*, Don’t take Clyde!) But
I’m putting this stupid disclaimer here anyway!

Author’s note: I suck at fanfiction but what the hell
right? I know that Jenny Carroll/Meg Cabot usually
starts the story then the next chapter explains the
whole plot of the series, but I’m not going to do that
because you’re Mediator fans and should pretty much
know the scoop, right? Right!

                 “Susannah Simon, to the admissions
office, Susannah Simon to admissions.” I had just got
to my homeroom desk when I heard the announcement. I
didn’t think much of it, really. I had no clue why
admissions’ was calling me. Sure, Father Dom called me
to his office all the time, to talk about mediator
stuff, but I didn’t connect me having to go to
admissions’ to mediator stuff. So, as I said before, I
had no clue why I was going to admissions. I went
quickly to the admission’s office without talking to
anyone.
            “Ah, Susannah,” Father Dominic was sitting
in the admissions’ office, “please, join me in my
office.” He opened the door to his office and I
stepped in. He closed the door behind us.
                     “So, Father Dom, what’s up? Why
did you call me to the admissions’ office first?” I
asked, a bit icily. I wasn’t exactly thrilled. How was
I going to explain having to go to the admissions’
office to everyone. And I knew I was going to have to.

            “Well, I keep calling you to *my* office,
I thought it would be easier to explain.” I just
raised my eyebrows. How did he figure that? Oh well, I
let it slide.
                       “So, is there anything we need
to talk about, in particular or are we just wasting
time?” I asked. Father Dom smiled. Uh-oh. When Father
Dom smiled it could only mean one thing: there was
someone, somewhere extremely dead and extremely
troubled and I usually ended up extremely injured.
              “Can’t I just have some off time? Some
ghost-free time? Is that too much to ask?” I thought
out loud.
                         “Actually, Susannah, this has
nothing to do with ghosts, well actually yes it does,
but not directly, only indirectly, which is still
involved, but…”
               “Father Dom, you’re babbling, get to
the point.” I said firmly.
                          “Right. There is this boy,”
He looked at a file that I had just seen, “A Thomas
Carson, and he’s applying to the school. I want to see
if you think we should accept him.” Um, alrighty,
then. I know since I met Father Dom we’ve been a
*little* dependant on each other, but this was just
ridiculous.
                 “I’m pretty sure you’re capable of
deciding who should come here, Father Dom,” I pointed
out. Father Dom sighed.
                               “You don’t understand,
Susannah. I think this boy is another mediator.” Well.
There was a silent pause. I took a deep breath.
                 “Well.” What could I say? Another
mediator? That would be kind of cool. Less work for
Father Dom and me. “What makes you think he’s a
mediator?”
                               “Well, he has all these
police reports and…” For some reason, I got mad. I
don’t know why.
                                                “Well,
maybe he’s just a trouble maker,” I spat.
     “His record is almost identical to yours,” Father
Dom pointed out, “if you’d just take a look…”
                               “Look, Father Dom, it’s
up to you, okay? Take this Thomas kid in, whatever you
want to do? Turn the school into Hogwart’s School of
Mediator-ing, Okay? I don’t care.” And with that I
left. Why was I so pissed? What did I care if Father
Dom took in another lost young mediator in? That’s
what Father Dom does. He takes the poor and suffering
under his wing. So what was my problem?  
                                                     
                    *
Maybe it was PMS or something, because the rest of the
day I still couldn’t figure out why I snapped at
Father Dom. A couple classes later, during history I
got a note from Cee Cee.
              *Why did you get called to admissions?*
                            *Father Dom wanted to talk
to me* I scribbled back.
                *Talk about what?* She persisted. I
didn’t know what to say. Fortunately, the bell rang.
Then I remembered Cee Cee and I had lunch. Just great.
Now, I’d have to explain to Cee Cee *and* Adam, and I
still had no clue what to say.
                           “Well?” Cee Cee asked when
the three of us sat down.
                “Well, what?” I played dumb, hoping it
would buy me some time.
                           “Well, what did you and
Father Dom talk about?” Well, she wasn’t eager girl
reporter for nothing, now was she?
                 “Oh, that,” Think, Suze think! There
was a pause.
                           “Suze, anytime now,” Cee
Cee persisted.
                  “Just about how I’m adjusting and
stuff,” I said lamely. I don’t think Cee Cee believed
me but she didn’t push it. Adam, of course, never
shuts up.
                            “You know, if Father Dom
wasn’t old, I’d say you guys were having an affair,”
Adam ventured. Cee Cee snorted and even I, with my bad
mood and all, had to laugh.
                   “Yeah, not to mention he’s a
priest,” Cee Cee pointed out.
                           “Well, if he was willing to
have an affair with a student I don’t think he’d hold
much to his priest vows,” I laughed.
                   “Good point, Suze,” Adam said
jokingly, “*Are* you and Father Dom having an affair?”
I didn’t take that comment seriously enough to answer
it with an evil look of death or anything.
                    “You know, Cee Cee, that would be
a good article. I can see it now. Father Dominic:
Priest, Principal, Pervert,” Adam replied.
                              “Hmmm,” Cee Cee
pretended to consider it, “I got one I like better.
Adam: Freak, Psycho, Paranoid,.” Cee Cee and I cracked
up. Adam mocked hurt. At that moment I was really glad
Cee Cee and Adam were my friends. They had cheered me
up, without even knowing I was upset.
                         “Wait a minute,” Adam
interrupted our laughing, “That’s not three P’s!”
                                                     
                                    *
The rest of the day went by as regularly as always
and finally I got to go home. It was Friday and for
the first time since I moved to Carmel, I had made
sure I had absolutely no plans. Seriously, it’s no
joke being a mediator *and* keeping up a new social
life. In New York it was easier, because the only
social life I had was Gina. These days, I not only
have to deal with psycho ghosts, I have to make small
chat with Kelly Prescott, and, honestly, I’m not sure
which is worse. So, earlier that week I said to myself
decided, you know what, Suze? You work too hard. You
need a break. So, I declined all three of the party
invites I received, all of the beach invites, and
planned on doing nothing more than going home, getting
into my ugliest pair of sweat pants and becoming a
couch potato. Who knew when the next ghost would
plague Carmel. As, I was sitting in my room, okay the
room I share with Jesse, Spike came in. Uh-oh. I knew
exactly what this meant. This meant Jesse was going to
materialize.
                    “Hello, Susannah,” I saw Jesse
standing behind me in the mirror. Now, usually I’d be
thrilled to see Jesse, but did I mention I was in my
ugliest sweats?
                            “Um, hi,” I creaked. My
heart did a little thud. Oh, so what! I was still
happy to see him.
               “Anything interesting happen at school
today?” He said it as though he knew the answer. But
how could that be? I didn’t know the answer!Nothing of
any importance did happen.
                             “Not that I can
remember…” I shook my head. What the heck was going
on? I hate it when Jesse pulls all that Mr. Mysterious
crap. It’s so not fair!
               “No, conversations with a certain
priest…?” How did he know?! There were not one but TWO
mediators in that room! How could he have spied on us,
without our knowledge? I continued playing stupid.
                            “Nope.”
                 “Susannah,” his eyes narrowed. That
scar completely ruined his entire face. Okay, I was
lying to myself. But, hey, would *you* want to admit
that your only one and true love in life was going to
be a ghost? A ghost that will never know that you love
him in that special way? I didn’t think so. So,
forgive me for searching for Jesse’s every fault.
They’re just so hard to find.
                 “Jesse,” I mimicked his tone right
back. He sighed.
                          “Look, I heard that the
priest thinks that there is another mediator in the
area,” He admitted.
                  “And how did you do that?” A guilty
expression came on his face.
                           “That’s not important,
Susannah, what’s important is…” Up until that point I
was still talking to him facing the mirror and
brushing my hair, but at this I turned around to him.
                  “Not important to you, maybe. You’re
not the one with someone spying on your personal
conversations.”
                           “I wasn’t spying, really…”
I raised an eyebrow quizzically.
                 “Oh, you weren’t?”
                            “I don’t need to put up
with this,” Jesse answered, “If you don’t want to know
what I know about Thomas Carson…”
                  “What do you know?” I spat. I took
the bait.
                             “Now, why should I tell
you? There’s nothing you can do for me,” Jesse teased.
I was *not* in the mood for teasing.
                   “Fine! I’m in no mood to argue with
you! I don’t care! Do whatever you want, Jesse!” It
felt like deja-vu. Hadn’t I said the exact thing, or
close to it, to Father Dom that morning, and then, I’m
not even kidding you; he touched my face. For the
second time ever, Jesse touched my face. I was put, in
yet, another situation where it looked like Jesse was
going to kiss me. Only this time was different. This
was the first time he actually did. I kid you not,
Jesse placed his perfect lips on mine and kissed me!
No open mouth, just a simple kiss. I think I would’ve
had a heart attack and joined him on “the other side”
if he had kissed me open mouthed. As it was, I’d
stopped breathing. I stopped feeling anything except
his kiss. However, all good things come to an end, and
this phenomenally good thing came to an end *very*
quickly. Too quickly. I would’ve liked him to stop the
Tuesday after Never! As you can guess, there was an
extremely awkward pause. What could I say? I guess he
somehow thought I didn’t *want* to be kissed, my
expression of utter confusion may have portrayed that.

                      “I…I…I’m so sorry!” He muttered
quietly and then disappeared. No fair at all! He left
before I could say anything! He also left before he
could tell me anything about Thomas Carson. And that
proved to be bad in the end…

Sorry about the spacing, it's gotten screwed up since
I posted it on my site and fanfiction.net! *glares at
fanfiction.net* Grrrrrrrrrrrrrr! Anyway, I hope you
like it...I'm not very good at ficcies... I'm better
at *reading* fanfics as opposed to *writing* them!
Anyway, have a good evening!
            -Beth