Dedicated to pOsekafore

She bumped into Grace a few days later.

Ifechi was elated that Friday afternoon, for reasons beyond her. She skipped giddily to the sports arena when suddenly her mood dampened.

Grace was catwalking in her direction, a frightened junior student on her tail. When the sassy girl saw Ifechi, her indifferent look was replaced with a mischievous smirk that made Ifechi a bit concerned.

Should she run?

Deciding that Grace was nothing but a pencil in the hand of the creator, Ifechi maintained her poise and only came to a halt when Grace stopped a feet away from her.

"Hi Ifechi"

Hian!

This one Grace was greeting her, was she safe?

"Good afternoon"

"I can see you came back from your trenches. Some guts you have"

Ifechi rolled her eyes at this. "This is my school Grace, why won't I come back?"

Grace let out a dry laugh. "You seem to have forgotten our little discussion from last year. When I'm talking, you listen. Doing other wise has grave consequences"

Ifechi sighed and folded her arms. "Whatever. So why are you here? Do you need something?"

"From you?..." Grace burst into laughter.  "...what can I possibly get from you that I don't have?" Grace said derisively, Ifechi held her lips shut.

"Anyways..I want you to do something for me. Here..." She said grabbing the short pile of books Ifechi had not noticed the junior student carrying.

"Drop this in my locker"

Ifechi looked at her confused. "Excuse you?"

"Did I stutter?"

"Who do you think you're sending, do I resemble a junior student in your eye?"

"Does it look like I care? Don't make me shout Ifechi, take....it!" She said through gritted teeth.

Ifechi looked around her. A handful of students had started to look their way probably wondering what the two who were obviously rivals were discussing. Grace looked around as well and then faced her again with a wicked glint.

"Go on...we don't want everyone knowing your little secret now do we?" She mocked.

Ifechi heart raced faster as she saw the stares increasing in number. Exhaling deeply, she rolled her eyes and snatched the books in one move. "Whatever.."

"Good girl" Grace laughed. "Now make sure you get it to my locker safely, and I don't want to look for anything, not even my pen"

"I'm not a thief Grace"

"You better not be. Hurry along now, I've got better things to do" the girl said with a tone of finality and sashayed off with the junior student still on her tail, leaving Ifechi with a pile of books and a bruised ego.

Life was unfair

She arrived at her class swiftly and walked over to Grace's locker at the back.

Their school had lockers which were like rectangular metal boxes standing vertically and piled up next to and on top of each other. They were thirty in her class and hers was at the bottom on the 5th column. The lockers came with locks, but they were barely used as theft was unheard of.

She pulled the handle of Grace's locker to reveal a customized pink and white wallpaper decorated with several girly stickers. The theme was just like her room, there was even a little mirror in there.

Ifechi hissed and threw the pile of books inside and shut the locker. On second thoughts, she opened the locker to arrange the books. She couldn't do anything to infuriate that spoilt brat now, could she. It was after she shut the locker the second time that the realisation hit her.

Grace was blackmailing her.

No Ifechi, she's not blackmailing you, you just did this because you don't want trouble. Next time if she tries this nonsense you won't take it again.

She tried to assure herself but even she knew she was lying. She would take more and more to come because deep down she knew she was afraid- afraid of what Grace could do to her, afraid of what would happen if Grace told everyone her secret.

Very few people could be both pretty and scary at the same time and Grace Okigbae was one of them.

Ifechi returned to the field some minutes later to find Damilola staring into space.

"What's up?" She asked but Dami answered without turning.

"Since when did Anita start famzing with the class snobs?"

"Eh?" She followed Dami's gaze and true to her words, Anita was gisting with Aliyah and Rachel.

"Haa...are you sure it's her?"

Dami eyed her and hissed.

"Sorry oh" Ifechi recoiled at her friend's sudden anger. "But it shouldn't worry you sha, they're just gisting"

"I'm going to talk to her after" Dami replied ignoring her statement.

Ifechi only shrugged in response.

Throughout the next week, Anita was constantly hanging out with her supposedly new crew, leaving Dami and Ifechi to wonder what went wrong. She was around their seat corner too often during breaktime or when a teacher wasn't in class to the extent that Sarah, the quiet girl who sat behind Grace once had to leave her seat for her.

Speaking of Grace, the rude girl seemed to welcome Anita into their group even inviting her to seat with them at the cafeteria and exchanging waves with her in the hallway.

The only time Anita remembered Ifechi and Dami was when a teacher was in class and she was on her seat, or when she needed to borrow notes from either of them, mostly Ifechi.

Dami was fed up of her friend's new attitude.

"Abandoning us for your new clique again?" She asked when Anita was applying some lipgloss with her wallet tucked in her armpit, they had a free period.

"What do you mean?"

"Don't pretend as if you don't know who I'm referring to. Since when did you start calling Rachel 'Ray' and why are you and Aliyah making matching hairstyles?"

"Is it your business?!" Anita fired. "Plus, why do you even care, or are you jealous?" She said smirking.

"Psst...me jealous? Of what? Of hanging out with those overgrown Barbie dolls, abeg let's not even go there" Dami said throwing a look over to the girls' seat, they were not in class.

"Don't call them that! They're way more beautiful and classy than you'll ever be!"

Dami's mouth hung open while she stared at her friend.

"Sorry.....I didn't mean it like that, just don't call them that, its not nice." Anita said.

"I'll see you guys later" She said tossing the lipgloss into her bag and zipping it. Dami's eyes moved from her face to her purple, glitter-stone bag

She had even changed her bag.

Ifechi watched the two girl from her seat which was behind theirs. She could not say anything because her and Anita were still not on talking terms and adding mouth to the matter would only aggravate their already sour friendship.

"She's nuts" Dami shook her head when Anita finally left the class. Ifechi had a feeling she was going to the game room.

"Who knows what they've said to her. Maybe she has decided she wants new friends, you know she doesn't like me anymore" she spoke for the first time.

"Well yeah, but I didn't quarel with her." Dami said and then sighed. Ifechi looked at her with a raised eyebrow. Why was she so worried about this?

"She seems to have forgotten what those girls did to Deji"

Ifechi sat up involuntarily.

"Who's Deji?"

Dami sighed. "Don't worry sha, you won't know him and it's not important" she said and placed her head on her desk preventing Ifechi from asking any further questions.

*********"

Ifechi had just come down the stairs after they rang the school closing bell when she met Charity.

"Senior Ifechi!"

She smiled. "How are you doing?"

"I'm fine, thank you. Hope you're well too? Happy new year! How was your holiday? Hope it was nice?" She said over-excitedly in one breathe causing Ifechi to giggle.

She would never understand the girl's attitude towards her. "It was well, thanks" she replied refusing to think about a certain day she spent at a certain someone's house.

"Is it true that you beat senior Grace and came first in your class last term?"

"Haaa!" Ifechi said and burst out laughing. "Who is giving you all these gist?"

"....Sophia"

Ifechi raised a brow and the girl added. "A girl in my class...you won't know her, she has a brother and sister in SS3 and she usually over hears them gisting about your classmates"

"Ooookk...that's weird, but alright"

"So it's true then?" Charity replied with a mischievous glint in her eye to which Ifechi shook her head amused.

"You too like gist" she said and turned when she noticed Charity's gaze on someone behind her.

"Can I talk to you?" Damien asked hoarsely.

Ifechi was genuinely confused but she nodded her head anyway. "Sure"

The boy looked between her and the junior student at her back before adding gruffly "Alone."

Charity took the hint and scurried off in fear leaving only the two in front of their class building.

"Come with me" he said taking hold of her hand.

He led her behind the building walls to a half secluded area in between a short fence and the small pathway that led to the sports arena.

Ifechi folded her arms and stared at him, Damien rubbed the back of his neck nervously.

"I came to apologise, for last week. I shouldn't have walked out on you like that"

Ifechi's scowl melted and she let her hands to her side. "Oh..."

"Yeah"

"But what's up with that and why have you been acting weirdly around me? Is something wrong? Is there something you wanna tell me?"

He took a deep breathe. "Actually yes.."

Ifechi raised an eyebrow waiting for him to continue.

"My girlfriend doesn't want me to talk to you anymore"

It took Ifechi five seconds to comprehend what he said and when she did she burst out laughing.

"Are you for real? You're joking right?"

"Why would I be joking?"

"Wow..that is the craziest thing I've heard this year" she said still laughing.

"You mean Aliyah doesn't want you to talk to me anymore, like she forbade you?" She added when she finally found the strength to stop.

He looked around clearly embarrassed "kind of.."

"...What are you? A kid?" Ifechi blurted. "Plus it's not as if the both of you are even married, what sort of childish play is this?"

"Look, I just don't want trouble okay? Aliyah may be crazy sometimes but I gotta respect her decisions. She's my girlfriend and I really like her, a lot"

Ifechi felt a punch in her heart. "Oh okay.... fine then. I won't talk to you anymore.

"Hey hey..I didn't say that okay. We can still talk, I mean when she's not around or..." He shrugged, Ifechi stared at him in wonder.

"You're kidding me right?" She said and then paused, looking at their surrounding.

"I see. That's why we're playing hide and seek like little children afraid of some obsessed teenage drama queen" she said with a mirthless laugh.

"Don't say it like that, we...."

"Just forget it Damien. I'll do as she says, I'll stay as far away from you as possible. Besides, I can't be dealing with any of....these" she waved him off and left.

Few minutes after, she saw Damien leave the spot, clearly not wanting to be seen coming out right after her. She shook her head pitifully.

Another friend lost, she just had two left.

A/n

Is Damien starting to annoy you cause he's starting to annoy me😏😏

Grace has succeeded in getting little Ifechi wrapped around her finger. Let's see how it goes in the next chapters.

What do you think Anita is doing with the class snobs? Do you think they're planning something together?

Sorry for the late upload guys, I did a minor rethinking of this book and noticed a few things I wanted to change and some I wanted to add. I've decided to finish this book first though and then make the major changes during the editing process so I hope you'll stick around till then.

Please don't forget to vote, comment and share. (Tag your wattpad friends in my story so that they can check it out)

God bless you ❣️