ALL I DO
{ irl }

the bell just rang, announcing that school has ended. the hallways are swarmed with people, all of them rushing out of the building to get home as soon as possible. niola on the other hand is taking her sweet time as she makes her way to the front doors. she's not exactly looking forward to going home and having to put her full attention into taking care of rayne.

"hey!" she hears matt call from behind her. she turns around and spots him squeezing between the crowd of people, waving his hands at her. "silvers!" multiple people glance his way, glaring at him as she shoves past them to get to niola. she stands in the middle of the hall, crossing her arms over her chest and watching as matt comes over to her.

he finally reaches her, putting a hand on her shoulder and hunching over. he pants heavily, trying to catch his breath from running over here and pushing his way through everyone. niola simply watches him with an amused look on her face. "what do you want, matthew?" she asks once he's caught his breath.

"do you need a ride back to your house?" matt asks, standing up straight but keeping his hand on her shoulder.

niola's eyes widen. why would he ask something like that? driving her home would be such a burden to him – seeing as he and his brothers live in the opposite direction as her. she raises a brow at him before asking, "why? what are you going to get out of doing this?"

"i can't just be nice?" he asks, removing his hand from her shoulder and shoving his hands in the pockets of his cargo pants.

"no." niola responds simply.

"well, if you must know, i want to make sure you make it home safely." matt explains with a sigh. "i'm offering to drive you because i know that you normally take a bus home. and considering how tired you are, i just don't want you to miss your stop because you'd fallen asleep."

niola stands there for a moment, considering his offer. it's out of character for him to be so nice, but she knows it would be smart for her to take advantage of his kindness. because he's right, she probably will fall asleep and miss her stop. niola opens her mouth to tell him that she's made his decision, but someone bumps into her.

she impact makes her stumble forward, causing her to fall onto matt. he quickly grabs her waist and she grabs his arms, stabilizing herself. she looks up at him, their noses brushing due to how close they now are.

niola clears her throat, stepping away from him. "yeah. sure. you can drive me, i guess."

"alright," matt responds awkwardly.

when they get out to the parking lot, niola sees matt's van sitting in its usual space. she notices nick and chris by the vehicle, arguing loudly. their noise causes lots of people in the parking lot to give them weird looks. not that they care.

but someone else does. niola squints a bit and notices someone else standing with them. a girl with blonde hair and pale skin, shouting at them to quit acting like children. even though she's yelling at them to stop, she's laughing.

matt and niola approach the car, getting the attention of all of the people waiting by the van. in unison, nick and chris gasp at niola's presence whereas the blonde girl grins widely. she reaches out, grabbing niola's hand and shaking it frantically. "you must be niola! it's so nice to finally meet you, i'm camille!"

niola smiles at camille, shaking her hand in return. "it's nice to meet you too."

"i love your curls!" camille tells her, pointing at her hair. niola looks down at her hair sitting on her shoulder before looking back up at camille. "and your eyes. and your outfit. and your tattoos. and just you. ugh, you are absoluely gorgeous!"

niola smiles at camille's compliments. seeing as niola was never able to maintain a friendship, she never had anyone call her pretty like this – it's completely different from when zade calls her hot. camille's compliments actually make niola believe her and actually make her feel pretty. zade just makes her feel uncomfortable.

"and i'm nick!" nick says, grabbing camille's shoulders and pushing her into the backseat of the van. "now that we've got the introductions over with, can we get home? i'm sick of being here."

they all nod, getting into the car. matt hops into the drivers seat, nick slides into the backseat beside camille. chris opens the door and begins to get into the passengers seat when matt stops him. "niola is sitting there today."

"excuse me?" chris asks, offended.

"just let her sit in the front so she's not squished between strangers." matt urges. "be a gentleman for once."

chris sighs, looking over at the backseat where nick and camille are sitting, laughing about a joke nick made. camille notices that chris is looking at her and she smiles at him. in an instant, he's convinced. "okay. yeah. sure. i'll sit beside camille."

chris opens the door to the back and squishes beside camille, giving her a wide smile before closing the door behind him. niola reopens the passenger's door and plops down onto the cushion. once she's sitting down, matt pulls out of the parking space. he places one hand on the back of niola's seat and looks behind him as he reverses out of the spot.

for a reason unknown to her, niola's face begins to feet hot as she watches matt spin the steering wheel. she averts her eyes in front of her, looking ahead of them instead of at the boy beside her. suddenly, her seat is shoved forward as chris slams his arms around both of their seats, pushing his head between matt and niola. somehow he and camille switched spots – making chris sit in the center while camille sits behind niola and nick sits behind matt. "can we get mcdonald's on the way?" chris asks.

matt rolls his eyes, continuing to stare at the road as they leave the highschool's property. "only if niola wants to."

"why does everything revolve around her?" chris groans before quickly glancing at niola. "no offence, you seem great."

"because she's the guest and you guys get mcdonald's every single day." matt points out, making chris scoff.

"is it because she's the guest?" nick asks, joining into the conversation and leaning foward to whisper into matt's ear as they near a stop light. his voice is quiet enough that niola can't hear him as he says, "or is it because you've got a major crush on her?"

matt slams on the brakes as they get to the light. the sudden stop makes nick's head smack the back of matt's seat. "fine. we'll get fucking mcdonald's." the trio in the backseat begins to cheer as niola sits with her feet up on the seat, her knees curled up to her chest. she tips her head back, looking out of the window at all of the cars.

matt stares at her, admiring her beauty the same way he did in the library earlier today. everyone jumps as the car behind them honks. matt quickly looks away from her, noticing that the light is now green.

"what mcdonald's doesn't have fucking pepsi?" chris grumbles, crossing his arms over his chest and slumping back in his seat like an angry toddler.

"this is the same exact mcdonalds that we come to every day, chris." matt says. he reaches over to niola's lap and takes a nugget out of the box sitting on her thigh. he brings the food to his mouth and says, "maybe you cause them to sell out of it."

"they should have backups." chris adds.

nick groans loudly, covering his ears so he doesn't have to listen to chris speak. "can someone play music!? i'm fucking fed up with chris' incessant complaining!"

without waiting for anyone to answer, nick connects his phone to the aux and starts to play music at full volume. as the triplets begin to argue over his music taste, camille leans forward and says into niola's ear, "this is how it is everyday."

"really?" niola says with a chuckle, turning around to face the girl. "how do you deal with the constant yelling?"

"i've grown used to it." camille shrugs. "i've known them long enough to tune their arguing out half the time. but to be honest, it's normally nick screaming at them about random shit as chris and matt just laugh at him."

niola looks around the car, noticing that exact scenario is happening at the moment – nick is yelling at the top of his lungs, defending his music taste, while chris and matt laugh. niola catches herself staring at matt for a little too long and she shakes her head, averting her attention back to camille.

"i see that."

"even though they can be loud and sometimes a bit obnoxious, that's what makes them so lovable." camille admits. "their noisiness is what makes them them."

niola leans back in her seat, watching the siblings argue and yell. camille is right. this is what makes them so lovable. their humor and their loud voices make them who they are. but that's not what catches niola's eye. what grabs her attention is the large smile on matt's face. the sound of his laugh echoes through the car as his eyes thin from the size of the smile. admiring his smile turns into admiring him. his hair, his skin, his nose, his eyes, his hands, his shirt.

"checking out matt, are you?" niola hears camille ask from behind her. niola quickly looks at her then back at matt, making sure he didn't hear her. thankfully for niola, he didn't. "your guys dynamic is really confusing, to be honest. but i'm rooting for you guys."

"rooting for us?" niola repeats, turning around in her seat to face camille. "what are you talking about?"

"you two like each other, don't you?" camille says, genuinely confused.

"what!? no!" niola shouts a bit loudly, the triplets glancing their way now that their laughter has died down and they can hear the girls talking over the music. niola sighs, turning back foward but her mind is still reeling from what camille said. she mutters under her breath, "no, no, no."

"if you say so," camille teases before sitting back in her seat and leaving niola to be confused about her own feelings.

matt glaces over at niola, noticing how her mind is now stressing out about something. you see, with most people, niola is relatively good at hiding her emotions without the other person catching on to how she feels. but with matt, he can read her almost instantly. and it drives her insane.

he reaches over with one hand – keeping the other on the wheel – and places a hand on her knee. suddenly, all of her stress dissipates and all she can focus on his the feeling on his hand on her skin.

"what's wrong?" matt asks, softly. niola looks over at him in shock. his eyes are still pinned to the road as they turn into niola's nieghborhood. but she can tell that's not what he's focused on. he's worried about her and wants her to open up to him.

"nothing," niola says. "i just had a conversation with camille and she mentioned something i'd never thought of before."

technically, she's not lying to him. niola had never even considering romantic feelings for matt. all she sees him as is a rival. an annoying boy who won't leave her alone. someone who gets everything he wants without working for it.

he's her rival.

right?

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a/n : she's FINALLY doubting her feelings for him 🤭🤭🤭 but trust me, it takes her a lot longer than this to accept those possible feelings
also my fav trope is coming up in a few chapters 😍 im giggling and kicking my feet bc im SO excited for a specific scene to happen
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