Chapter Three

Chapter 3

Leah's P.O.V

"Leah, mom said to tell you to get quickly ready and have your butt down for breakfast now!!" My little brother Derek yells through the door.

I let out a groan, drowning myself in my duvets.

I hated school days sometimes.. especially when I didn't feel like going to school.

I know I'm the nerd and have no right not to like school, but sue me!

I don't like school all the time!

My cell phone vibrates beside me, and I check who is texting at this ungodly hour.

Its 7:13am.

Grace☆

Be there in 20. Be ready.

Shoot. Stumbling up from bed, I rushed to the bathroom and had a quick shower, wondering why she was picking me up today. It wasn't 'our' Thursday yet. I guess she was moving a bit forward.

I grabbed one of the nice tops I owned and paired it with my 'fashion jeans' and AF1's.

Checking my hair in the mirror, hoping my roots haven't started fading out but then again, one can only hope.

I decided to wear my hair in a sleek bun today instead, put on my glasses, and then I looked in the mirror.

Fat arms and thighs.

Round waist.

Brown hair.

A tear slid down my cheek, but I wiped it off immediately. I wasn't going to cry for something I couldn't change.

I leave my room and go down the stairs, trying to look enthusiastic.

Derek and my parents had already started eating before they noticed me.

"Poo bear," Dad says to me, opening his arms wide for me to hug him, and I feel better already.

I smile and go to him, hugging him tightly.

"Good morning, old man" I greeted, kissing him on the cheek, but he let out a dramatic gasp.

"Honey? Did you hear your daughter? She called me an old man." He dramatically says, clutching his chest. Mom just pats his shoulder lovingly, winking at me while doing that. Derek joins in on the drama and runs to him, holding his shoulder, before looking at me in fake shock.

"How could you, sister?! He loved you like his daughter!!" He yells, and they look at me.

They're all waiting on me to join in on the drama and then I give in. I go down on one knee before clasping my hands together.

"Oh... my poor father! How I have wronged you! Will you ever find it in you to forgive me?" I said my line, and when he smirked, I smelled trouble.

"You'd be on my team for games night this week!"

"Nooo!!!!" Derek lets out before dramatically dropping on the floor.

"Yay! It'd be like old times, Der!" Mum says happily, and Derek smiles back before giving her a sloppy kiss. When mom isn't looking, he makes a crying face, which makes me roll my eyes, but it brings a smile to my face.

I could never leave the house sad with my pals here. They always made me feel better without ever doing much. I loved my family so much.

"I'll see you guys later."

"You haven't had breakfast, sweetie" Mum else with stops me. I smile and grab an apple from the bowl on the counter, biting into it and waving it at her.

"Now I have.. not hungry right now. I love you guys." I leave the house as quickly as possible, and on cue, Grace arrives at the same time.

She changed the color of her Lambo again. Last time I was in here, which had been last week, it was purple and now it was pink.

She had also worn a pink outfit today.

Everything pink.

"Your dye is fading." Those as her first words to me as 'IDGAF' by Dua Lips blast through the radio.

I touch my hair consciously, letting out a nervous chuckle.

"Yeah! I didn't have time to dye it this week but I'm going to when I'm back. " She glances at me with a smile, and it brightens my day. Getting a smile from Grace Walters was something I looked forward to.

Being popular at Bayter's High was the highlight of that school because you got a lot of privileges handed out to you by the people at the bottom of the food chain. For example, I help Leah with her assignments.

I want someone to do my assignments for me!!

Yeah, right.

Grace has been a good person to me ever since I started here. Well, not exactly since I started here. She didn't even know I existed until a class in my first year in senior year, when I corrected her answer to the question a teacher asked. Correcting her had not been intentional- it was more of a reflex answer because I was so used to everything being correct or accurate.

I had expected Grace to be mad about it and hate me, but she didn't even show an ounce of animosity towards me. Instead, she asked if I could help with her assignments and told me she would like for us to be friends. We met every Thursday. I had named it 'our Thursday'. That was the only she could give me out of her time, and she became my only friend after my ex- friend showed her true self- a jealous person.

Now, Grace was my one true friend and I wouldn't risk our friendship for anything or anyone.

"I have an assignment due on Monday and I need you to get it done." I looked at her and she smiled, bringing out the puppy lips.

"Please.. It'd mean a lot if you can help me out."

"Do your friends know that we're friends?" I asked.

"Of course they do. You're like my best friend. Do you really think I wouldn't tell them about you?" Hurt shows on her face, and I feel bad immediately.

"I'm sorry.. I'm sorry. I don't even know why I asked that question."

"Its okay for you to think I wouldn't tell them, but I did. You're my best friend, Lisa."

"Leah." She's always gotten my name wrong.

"Its Lisa I know." She blows me a kiss and parks in her spot. The literally had a lot covered with glitter spelt in a 'G' which stood for 'Grace'.

Damn! This really was a good life for her.

"Well, our conversation was interesting as always. See you next Tuesday! You can leave the car now." She says so, and I smile at her before coming out.

"Right- why Tuesday now? It's always been Thursday. What happened?"

"Oh- I have this thing coming up soon, and I need to prepare for it, so Thursdays aren't really free for me right now, but we'll continue Thursdays again afterwards."

"Okay then. Have a nice day, G."

"You too." I smiled at her and then walked into the school. I felt my phone vibrate in my pocket, and I checked who I had received a text from.

Old man ♡

Just venmo'd you 20 dollars. Get some snacks for me on your way back.

Of course he'd ask me to get them when he could just get them on his way back from work, but no- I have to get them.

I looked up, smiling, but it immediately turned to a glare when I saw who was standing at my locker. He smiles at me but realises I wasn't going to reciprocate that and immediately shifts backward, away from me.

"You! If you know what's good for you, you'll run away right now, except you want your cause of death to be 'strangled by a nerd.'" He raises his hands in surrender.

"Woah- candy, I know you're mad but if you can just give me a chance to ap-" He tries walking towards me again, but I raise my hand like I'm going to hit him, so he steps back again.

"I got a detention slip because of you!! My perfect academic record is going to be ruined because of you!" I didn't know how annoyed I was at this, but now, seeing him after our detention that he didn't show up for because he had a game and as the quarterback of Bayter's football team, he could be excluded from detention, I had to suffer listening to Mr. Wilkinson talk about the 118 elements on the periodic table. Come on, make it sound interesting, and make me regret dropping this class. Gimme a joke like-

What do you do with dead elements?

You Barium!

That's a good joke now!

No it isn't.

Shutup.

Two hours of my life were wasted listening to that and when I got home and was asked the questions of my whereabouts, I had to lie to my parents, which made me feel so terrible and now here Mason was, by my locker, not looking like me, who had to suffer those two hours of torture alone with his green eyes and perfectly styled, soft - looking brown hair and-

What in the world am I doing?

"Look Candy- I'm-"

"Stop calling me candy!!" He raises his hands in surrender again.

"Okay! Okay! Christ!" "Look, I'm sorry about getting you detention. I really tried getting you out of trouble with Hollins." His eyes looked sincere, and that might have melted my heart, but because I admitted I was lonely,.

"You didn't show up for something that YOU did. I had to listen to Wilkins talk about periodic table elements.. for 2 hours." His eyes softens and he smiles wistfully at me. He gets that I wasn't going to strangle him anymore and walks towards me.

"I must have missed a lot. 2 hours of Wilkins on chemistry? You got the good part of detention. " He says it in mock sadness, and I roll my eyes, a small smile creeping up my mouth.

I guess he wasn't an asshole as a while person. He still had a bit of niceness in him and it was cool to know that I could interact with him like this. Maybe-

"So Candy I was wondering if you could help me with an assignment." I looked at him.

"What?"

"I need to get my Lit assignment done, and it would be really great if you could help me out." He says it with a smile, which I thought was a swoon worthy smile but right now, I was disgusted.

"Your assignment"

"Yeah.. what I just said" and he even has it in him to be sassy.

I scoffed and pick my books from my locker.

"You're an asshole." I tell him and start walking away and on cue, the bell rings for the first class.

"Candy wait" I ignored him and keep on walking but almost immediately, he grabs my arm and turns me towards him.

We were now standing at a really close proximity and I could feel my heart beat skip numerous beats. Being with the opppsite gender this close was something I wasn't used to. Chandler Brize was the only boy I had been this close to- this was in sixth grade and the only reason we had been this close was because Angela Shayton had pushed me towards him. That experience was the worst because I puked right on his shoes out of excitement and anxiety which resulted to the whole class laughing at me after Chandler shoved me off him.

Now, being this close again with someone, the good thing about this was that I didn't want to puke on Mason's shoes. I was just speechless.

"Woah.. you're brunnette. " and that was more than enough to kick me back to reality.

I yank my hand away, glaring at him before jogging away, hoping that he might think what he saw, was a dream.