-THIRTEEN-

"I can expect this from Chase, but Kyra, you too?" Madison scolded, making me look down embarrassed.

Meanwhile, Lucas stood behind her, trying to control his laughter. His body was shaking so much that I wondered how long his control was going to last. Well, in his defence, it was kind of funny. Imagine coming to open the door with three teenagers stuck and finding them drenched with white powder, making them unrecognisable, especially Chase who had faced the brunt of it.

You could say it was somewhat justified, considering we wouldn't have been in that predicament had it not been for him.

I stole a glance at the culprit who stood there, his hair and face completely white. One move and powder flew from him, making it even funnier.

After Coach and the person he was with had left, Chase had found his phone and had enough sense to call Lucas for help (who ended up bringing Madison along). Since they were taking a few minutes to come, I had gotten slightly uncomfortable with the position I was in, so I'd moved a bit, trying to adjust it into a sitting position. But while doing that, my foot had accidentally grazed Chase's making him think it was a rat.

He'd immediately shrieked, accidentally banging against the rack behind him, causing the field chalk powder to fall right on his head. Kade and I were the collateral damage. Chase had gotten the worst of it, while Kade had the powder mostly towards his back and head. I had ended up with the white powder on my hair, the side of my face and of course my uniform.

Luckily, Lucas had quickly sneaked the keys into Coach's cabin before any of us could get caught, so that worked out well.

All three of us looked comical, Chase the most. The only colour his face had was of his eyes. Kade was glaring at his friend while I bit my lip, trying not to laugh.

Chase opened his mouth to say something but came up short. He blew out a breath of air seemingly because of the loss of words but instead hilariously created a huge puff of the powder that made him let out a wild sneeze. Cue more powder.

It seemed like Lucas's self restraint went out the window because he burst out laughing. He was guffawing so hard that he had to take the support of the wall so that he didn't lose his balance. It was contagious so I ended up following suit, despite trying to control it to my best. Seeing the both of us laugh, Kade shook his head before chuckling and even Madison gave into a grin.

After a few moments of laughing at our absurd situation, the noise died down. It took a couple of seconds to catch out breaths before Madison spoke up.

"I'm taking Kyra with me. You guys see what you wanna do with that," she announced, motioning towards Chase.

She shook her head before grabbing my hand and leading me towards the opposite side. I was surprised at the gesture but smiled and followed her without question. I turned around just to catch a glimpse of what was happening.

Kade caught my eye and winked at me discreetly, making me go warm. I quickly turned back to the way both Madison and I were heading instead.

***

"Has it gone?" I asked, bent over awkwardly and staring at my legs upside down.

Presently, Madison, Mae, Allison and I were in the girls locker room trying to get the powder off me. They had locked the entire room for this and had made me change into my PE uniform. While Mae took up the task of getting the powder off of my uniform, both Madison and Allison were blowing my hair with a hairdryers to remove any obvious stains of the chalk.

Hence why I was bent over.

"It's still there but it shouldn't be that noticeable I think," Allison said, switching off her dryer.

I stood up straight and winced a little at my slightly stiff back. Both the girls scrutinised my face, trying to check their handiwork. Thankfully, the powder hadn't stuck to my face that badly. Whatever the residue, I could fix with a bit of makeup.

I turned to check out my reflection in the mirror while the girls decided to check on how Mae was doing with my uniform.

My hair was a little all over the place because of being blown dry and I still had a bit of powder in the inner corners of my right ear and a few white spots on my cheeks and chin. Thankfully, my hair was way better than before and I decided to braid it, just in case if there was some left, it won't be obvious.

Thanks to Allison's makeup, I quickly corrected my face in no time.

Satisfied with my appearance, I decided to follow the girls to where Mae currently was. As I watched both Allison and Mae fuss over something, an involuntary smile spread across my face. It hadn't been a very long time since we met but how they were open to accepting me was really heart warming.

I had thought that it would take a lot of time for them to even consider me their acquaintance partly because of their reputations and popularity and their tight knit group, but I was really moved by how they didn't even bat their eyes when it came to helping me out of this tiny problem. My preconceived notion of the popular people being rude snobs had flown out of my mind and I felt a little bit guilty about judging them, even a little. I guess I owed it to my previous school.

Madison had texted both Mae and Allison on our way to the lockers about the situation and both the girls were there even before we reached. If they decided to accept me and I could have them as my friends, I knew in my heart that I would give it my all.

It had been a while since I had anyone to call my friend and I was really looking forward to some true ones.

"I think it's good," Madison's voice snapped me out of my reverie.

Mae dusted it off once again before inspecting the skirt. "Yeah. I think this is the best we can do with what we have, anyway," she replied before collecting my uniform and handing it out for me.

"Here you go, Kyra. It's not the best but I hope it works," she said, smiling sheepishly at me.

I took the uniform from her with a grateful smile. "Not at all, Mae. I should be thanking you guys! Really, though, thank you so much for helping me out. It means a lot," I said gratefully, smiling towards all the three girls.

Allison waved it off, returning my smile. "Don't worry about it, Kyra. It was the least we could do, especially since Chase was the one who put you in that spot."

Madison snorted at that. "I still don't know how he manages to get into trouble all the time. And to think he dragged both Kade and Kyra into it with him this time," she mused, making Mae and Allison chuckle.

"Oh, I really wanted to see that. It would've been a great addition to the album," Allison added.

Madison opened her mouth to answer but was cut off by the bell going off.

Lunchtime.

"Ah well, Kyra you better change into the uniform quickly. The soccer team is gonna wanna use the lockers," Madison said and I complied, immediately.

I went into one of the bathroom stalls and quickly changed into the clothes. I took a quick glance at it to see how bad it was. Surprisingly, Mae had gotten most of it off. The only bits of powder that remained was in the seems, which was totally fine. Other than a little white fade, it was almost as good as before.

I exited the stalls and quickly kept my PE uniform back. I turned to see that the girls had already left along with their stuff.

Was this going to be another library lunch?

The thought did pinch me slightly, making me wish that the previous period lasted longer, so that I could hang out with them a bit more. Trying to to be too upset by the fact, I went out of the locker rooms as the hallways started to flood with students.

None of the Elite members were anywhere around which confirmed my doubts.

I was low-key hoping that they would be waiting outside.

Even if they had started to accept me, they weren't going to go full public with the friendship so soon, were they?

I shook my head immediately, trying to push these thoughts out. Stop it. They've just started to be okay with you, don't go too ahead of yourself.

Letting out a small sigh, I headed towards my locker to take one of the assignments out. Might as well work while I'm in the library. There was a little more to catch up with Chemistry and considering how badly I needed to stay on track with the subject, it was better if I didn't waste my time.

Keeping that thought in mind, I went straight towards my locker.

"Alone as ever, I see," A very familiar and annoying voice interrupted my thoughts as I opened my locker.

Masking my obvious displeasure, I look at the source of the voice to my right. Lillian stood with her goonies snickering at me.

I gave her a flat look. "What do you want, Lillian?" I asked, my tone implying that I was bored.

She snickered, folding her arms to appear bold. "Has the loser finally given up her desperate attempts at being a part of Elites?"

I raised my eyebrow at her. "Are you asking me or yourself?"

It fuelled my satisfaction when I saw her face go red. Her jabs were the least of my concerns right now. Her weak intimidation strategies might've worked on others, but I was not going to let her be in control. I knew her type, all bark and no bite. She could only rely on the status her parents provided her with. Strip that from her and all you would be left with was a bully.

"Listen you bitch, I know you think you're all that because the Elites talked you once but know this, you're probably just roadside trash to them. A charity case they might have felt pity for, just like the loser scholarship wannabe they adopted. They will never consider you their equal because you're just another attention whore," she spat, sneering at me. Her two cronies were giving me sinister smirks from behind her.

I didn't want to admit it but her words did manage to hit me right in my little seeds of insecurities but I didn't show that. Even though I knew it was just a tiny speck of a doubt, the fact that they might not consider me as their equals had crossed my mind and Lillian spitting that right into my face did do a little damage.

But it angered me more that Mae was also being dragged down by the likes of her and it overcame the words she had just spewed at me.

I opened my mouth to defend the both of us when the sound of my locker shutting with a loud bang startled me.

Allison stood there with her arms crossed and her jaw clenched. Her eyes were set into a hard stare and she was glaring ferociously at Lillian, whose face had gone a shade lighter.

Allison's stare was strong enough to make me thank the lord for not being at its receiving end. I had never seem this expression on her. Usually she always had a smile on her face. It was either a small half-smile or a full blown one but this was the first time it wasn't either.

"You wanna say that again, Lilith?" she said, her voice cold enough to make me shiver.

I turned to look at Lillian who had frozen. Her eyes had gone wide and she her mouth was opening and closing like a fish out of water. Her expression made me smirk a little but I suppressed it. All her confidence went away the moment she faced Allison.

But then again, the Elites seemed to have this effect on almost everyone.

She must've realised that Lillian was not going to be speaking anytime soon so she started, instead.

"Anyway, Kyra, why weren't you answering your texts?" Allison spoke up, turning to face me while totally ignoring Lillian's frozen state.

"Texts? I didn't have my phone on me," I said a little confused, remembering that my phone was in my locker.

I opened my locker to retrieve it. Turning it on, I saw what Allison meant. There were three texts from Mae and two from an unknown number. The texts said that both Madison and Allison had to go meet our respective teams for a few minutes so they left Mae to get me to the cafeteria. Apparently, Mae had gotten called to her teacher so she had thrown me a text to informing me and asking me to wait there for her without realising that I didn't have my phone on me.

How stupid of me. Of course Mae wouldn't have ditched me without a word.

"Ah, that explains it. Anyway, let's go. Today's lunch menu had lasagna and its to die for," Allison snapped me out of my daze and hooked her arms with mine and pulled me in the direction of the cafeteria.

To say I was surprised, would be an understatement. I stole a glance at Lillian who seemed to have recovered from her frozen state and had now resorted to throwing daggers at me, instead.

"Thank you for that," I said to Allison, referring to what had just gone down. She simply threw me a smile in return.

"You don't have to thank me for that. I know we can come off as stand offish or indifferent at times but trust me, when we make friends, it's either all or nothing for us," she said, leading me towards the cafeteria.

I smiled at her. It had been a while since anyone other than family stood up for me.

I also didn't fail to notice the wide eyes and the sudden increase in the whispers among the students in the hallway. Some of them who saw us walking together almost choked in surprise. I guess it wasn't a common sight for the students. While some whispers were discreet, some weren't, which made me wonder if they were intentionally being loud.

Who the fuck is she?

Is she with the Elites now?

Why is Allison walking with that new girl?

Is she related to them or something?

It was weird to hear so many people scrutinising me and gossiping about me but Allison seemed like she didn't even hear them. That or she was deliberately choosing to ignore them.

An astonishing realisation dawned upon me, just then. My earlier conflict of being in the spotlight versus not seemed to have resolved when I recalled the events of today. I realised that I didn't mind people talking about me or judging me because their friendship seemed to be worth it. As I walked with the raven haired girl, arm in arm, a genuine smile of happiness spread across my face and I knew that it was all or nothing for me too.

But before I jumped to conclusions, I just wanted a confirmation of this. I just wanted to know for sure if they were accepting me into their friendship circle and not just being nice to me for the sake of Mae or any other reason. I needed that little weed of a doubt to go away for once and for all.

"Um, Allison?" I called out, making her look at me quizzically.

I bit my lip, wondering how to ask the question. I really should have thought about this before I tried to ask.

"Uh, I just-um, I mean are we..." I trailed off, my mind abandoning all sense.

Allison seemed to have an idea of what I was trying to say because she paused mid-way, right outside the doors to the cafeteria and turned to face me.

"I'm guessing I need to say it out aloud," she chuckled. "Well, I know it's a little late, but welcome to Hedgeview High. I hope you'll accept me as your friend."

I let out the breath I was unknowingly holding an an ear splitting grin made its way across my way as a huge burden lifted off my chest.

"I would love to."

***

If I thought the attention I got in the hallway was a lot, let's just say I had underestimated the amount of attention I would be getting from everyone else.

Every single human being in the big and pristine room stopped what they were doing to look at Allison and I as we made our way to the table where the rest of the group sat, which thankfully wasn't right in the middle.

It was a table towards the corner of the room, which did seem to offer some sort of privacy since it was at more of a distance from the other tables. But the downside of it being where it was, was the distance you had to walk to get there.

With the intensity of the eyes I had on me, I was almost scared that I would trip on my own feet. There were so many mixed reactions, shock and surprise being one of the most common. I was inwardly thanking Allison for providing me a little support, without which I was sure I was going to face-plant. I was so cautious of the eyes bugging out as well walked past, that I didn't even bother to look around the cafeteria, especially since it was my first time there.

My eyes landed on Mae, who was waving at me excitedly. Seeing her reaction seemed to relax my nerves a bit.

I tried my best to keep my focus towards the group as we quickly made our way there.

The moment I reached, Mae pulled me down, right beside her. I was grateful for the seat because my legs had turned into jelly. One more minute and I would have definitely made an ungraceful landing.

"I can't believe we finally get to hang out with each other and everyone," she squealed, excitedly and tackled me into a hug.

I laughed at her enthusiasm and hugged her back. "I'm really glad too, Mae."

"Okay, Mae. Let the girl breathe," Lucas said from the other side, gently prying her arms off me.

I chuckled as Mae pouted at Lucas who shrugged. It was then I noticed that Kade and Chase were missing. Were they still struggling with the powder?

Madison pushed a plate of food towards me, grabbing my attention. I looked at her questioningly and she smiled. "Ordered one for you. I thought you'd be hungry."

"Thank you," I smiled sheepishly as my stomach chose that exact moment to agree with her.

As I delved into a mouth-wateringly delicious meal, I couldn't help but feel really happy. I could finally have a place where I belonged.

********

The friendship dynamics seem to be getting better :)

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Q: If you were to choose, what do you find the most attractive at first glance in the opposite gender (or the same one)? (Physical feature)

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