Dedicated to Teefabulous as per my newest reader.😂❤️

°°°°°

“Let’s do something crazy.”

❦︎

~[VICTORIA]~

Is it true you're Kevin Kanayo’s daughter?

Are you really dating Jude?

Are you and Jude really a thing?

Why did your father keep you a secret all along?

It was like they had planned it out; the hallway was full of classmates with their inquisitive eyes. Despite my effort to arrive extra early to avoid this, they still had me hooked. I could barely move, they were all in my face, asking me question after question.

Like someone turned them mute, they stopped, all at once. For a moment, I thought time froze or something. It became so damn quiet, save for the sound of my heavy breathing. Their eyes seemed to be fixed on one single point of concentration on something behind me.

Maybe it’s a teacher?

I turned. It was not a teacher.

Tracy was there, looking around slowly, her face stoic, void of emotion. But if you looked closely, you'd see the anger in her eyes, a kind of anger that no one dared to challenge.

“All of you should really mind your god-damned businesses.” Her voice came out with an unapologetic authoritative tone. “You all should know better than inquiring about someone’s personal life. If she’s not saying anything, then she simply doesn’t want you to know. You guys are not too dumb to know that, are you?” She paused, as if waiting for a counter. When none came, she went on, “This nonsense y'all just pulled better not happen again.”

She was done talking, because she was now pulling me towards the entrance of our class. The cluster of students that initially didn't give me space cleared the way in less than five seconds. And then, someone from the crowd asked,

“Who do you even think you are?”

Tracy chuckled, shaking her head. She did not even bother to turn back as she gave her response, “Just when I thought you were beginning to develop some sense, you do this.”

The sound of footsteps approaching us was heard and I felt a presence behind me. Whoever it was had gotten closer, the shadow looming at my right proved it.

“You can’t just give everyone orders, you're not all that, you know?” the person said. I didn’t need to look at her to know she was glaring at us; I could feel the burn at the back of my skull. “And you?” I was sure she was referring to me now. “You're going to be her puppet? Who would have thought? The Victoria Kanayo, as Tracy’s minion,” she tsked mockingly, “How degrading.”

“Oh, you buffoon.” Tracy huffed, tsked too. “I don’t give orders; I only teach sense. Were you guys really going to pressure her to speak? Now, that’s just dumb, isn’t it?” she sighed, tilted her head as she stared ahead. “And for the record, Esther, I don't gather useless minions like you. I actually have real friends."

Then we were headed to our class again. Not once did Tracy even turn to even grace the girl with a glance. Definitely, the moron at our backs was dumbstruck. Honestly, I would cry if someone said that to me.

By now, I should have been used to Tracy's little switch in character; But it always still got me everytime. Really, Fidel was not being dramatic when he called her 'The Almighty Tee'.

°°°°°

                                        
I was seated on one of the wooden benches in the garden, near the parking lot. Tracy had Geography and as usual, I just roamed around alone. Some students were outside too, perhaps, they also had a free period like me.

Jason also has a free period…

I snickered at that thought. The guy would claw my eyes out if I went anywhere near him. I had intentionally avoided the library because I knew he'd be there.

“One really has to get a ticket to see you these days.” Charles’ voice interrupted my thoughts. I looked to my left to see him grinning at me.

“Well, where’s your ticket then?” I joked along, giggling at him.

“No really, it’s been days since we spoke, Tori.” He tilted his head to his right, slowly scanned my face. “How have you been?”

“I’ve been good, just a lot of things going on. These rumours about Jude and I dating and the revelation of who my father is… all these questions I get everywhere, it’s tiring.”

“It’s difficult to picture you and Jude in any way romantic though.” He doubled up in laughter and then paused suddenly, looked at me with wide eyes, “Wait, you guys are really dating?”

“No!” I shook my head profusely, brows furrowed. “I just met him in front of a store and the paparazzi took photos.”

He sighed, placing a hand on his chest. “Well, it’ll have been disastrous. Cause you wouldn't have been able to manage him and Tracy at the same time, Tracy’s enough crazy for one person.”

“Tell me about it.” I chuckled.

“So, this is what you guys do? Gossip during your free periods?” We heard Chris’ chastising voice and Charles rolled his eyes at his brother. “Tori, I expected more from you.”

Charles dragged a long hiss as Chris sat by my right, trying to keep a straight face.

“I also expected you to mind your business.” Charles spat, eyeing his twin.

Chris laughed, snorting in the process. “Don’t be so butt hurt, dear brother.” He shook his head. “But you guys are right, Tracy is crazy.”

“You left Jay alone?” Charles asked, cocking a brow at Chris.

“Don’t worry, he’s alright, he wanted to study and I could not be a part of that.” Chris gagged in mock disgust.

“Wait, when did you even drop Geography?” Charles frowned at his brother.

“Oh, I didn’t drop it.” Chris shook his head. “The class was too boring, so I left to meet Jason, that one was studying, so I came here.”

“Midterm exams are beginning next week, Chris.” Charles pursed his lips. “You can’t be missing classes now.”

“Ugh! You sound like Jason right now, leave me be, please!” Chris complained. And then he looked down at me with a slight frown, “You're just sitting here like a ghost, say something.”

“Well, what am I supposed to say?"

He huffed and rested his back on the bench, stretching out his left arm across my back.

Silence reigned amongst us. We watched the students loitering around, the occasional entering and exiting of vehicles and listened to the soft whoosh of the nearby trees. Until Chris said,

“Let’s do something crazy.”

“Chris, please, I don’t have the strength to indulge in truancy today.” Charles wasted no time to decline. And honestly, I thought the same.

“Come on, it’s not truancy, it’s just fun.” Chris argued, scooting forward to look between Charles and I. “What do you say, Tori?”

“Tell me what this crazy thing is first.”

“We’re going to set up a blind date for Jason.” He smirked, rubbing his palms together like those villains in cartoons. "It's just a little fun, there's no harm."

"Never." I was not going to willingly sign myself up for trouble. "I'm not going to do that."

°°°°°
 
                                     
I

don’t know how he did it, but Chris had somehow managed to convince Charles and I to take part in his, indeed, crazy plan.

He had rang up Jason, telling him to meet him at the indoor pool after school hours. "We have to talk," he  said.

He also managed to steal Jason's phone to text Jemima to meet him there. How he knew the password, I didn’t know. Perhaps, Jason told him himself.

As for Charles and I, all we had to do was make sure that nobody came into the indoor pool. We had to think of a way to keep out whoever wanted to go in.

We were presently at our positions, hiding. Jemima was already waiting inside, Jason just had to arrive for the 'fun' to begin.

It was kind of too late to back out at this point, so I opted for saying a little prayer for my soul.

°°°°°

                           ~[JASON]~

“We have to talk.” Chris had said over the phone. It sounded pretty urgent and I was doing my best to keep myself from overthinking it.

I quickened my steps as I took a turn into a hallway, the entrance to the indoor pool was just down the hall. He had asked me to meet him there.

I stopped in my tracks when I got inside. I had found the least person I wanted to set eyes on, the person I had been actively avoiding all day. I turned around, deciding to call Chris to tell him to meet me somewhere else. And then she asked,

“Where are you going?”

“I'm leaving.” I said through shut teeth, looking over my shoulder.

“So, you made me come here and you're just going to leave? What was your aim with this?”

I turned around, eyes narrowed at the idiot. I was struggling to comprehend what she had just said. “I made you come here?” I gave her a once over, shaking my head. “You’ve finally gone insane.”

“Oh, I'm the insane now? When you picked up your phone to message me, you didn’t know that?” she glared at me, her voice rising.

“I never messaged you, stop lying.” I defended, internally concluding that she had indeed gone mad. “I even blocked you on WhatsApp.”

“And that’s why you sent me an SMS.” She brought out her phone, unlocked it and extended it out to me. “See?”

I refused to take it, instead, I brought out my own phone, went to my message app and received the shock of my life when I found her number at the top of my contact list. Worst so, it was saved as Mima with two heart emojis.

May God forbid bad things.

Is this a dream? I asked myself.

Never in my life would I save her number like that.

I opened the message. Meet me at the pool, it read.

This must be a sick prank, I concluded. And I was sure that she had everything to do with it.

“This is your doing, isn’t it? You did this so I’d look stupid right?” I accused, eyeing her with great contempt.

“Oh, don’t flatter yourself. I have better things to do with my time.” She scoffed.

“You're just bitter,” I spat. “You're bitter that I rejected you!”

“I was a fool for approaching you.” She shook her head, chuckled bitterly. “But you're a bigger fool for rejecting me because of Victoria.”

A loud gasp halted me from firing back my response. We fell silent, listening closely. There was the sound someone’s loud breathing coming from somewhere amongst the bleachers.

I listened carefully, trying to trace the sound. I followed it keenly, letting it lead me behind the fifth row of bleachers. Sure enough, there was someone there. And boy, was I shocked. I knew this boy was mischievous, but not to this extent.

“Chris?” I looked at him incredulously. He was laying on the floor, back to the floor with his palms pressed against his mouth. “What’s this? What are you doing here?”

He released his mouth, stood up from the floor and wiped dust from his uniform. “It was a little prank, I didn’t know y'all had history.”

“We don’t have history.” I sharply corrected. “And what kind of senseless prank is this? Texting that one with my phone.”

“Chill, man.” He playfully punched my shoulder, chuckled. “I meant no harm. I didn’t expect things to turn out like this. We just wanted a little fun.”

“We?... who did you work with, Chris?”

Just then, I heard scrambling from outside and then quick footsteps, like people were running away.

“There's no use in knowing them now, let’s just go.” Chris sighed, turned me around, pushed me out the row of bleachers and down the stairs. “You should leave too.” He said to Jemima.

“I don’t even know why I let you miscreants waste my time like this.” She grumbled and brushed past us, stomping her feet aggressively as she walked away.

“Well, that’s new.” He laughed to himself.

“You know nothing, bro.” I told him matter-of-factly.

“What really happened between you guys?” he asked as we stepped into the hallway, now walking side by side.

He listened silently as I explained the happenings between Jemima and I. I didn’t leave out anything, he really needed to hear everything if he was going to understand what just happened.

“Wow,” he breathed, “she’s really not the quiet Jemima everyone sees her as.”

“Absolutely not.” I breathed out.

“But bro,” he nudged my elbow, wiggling his eyebrows at me. “Did you really reject her because of Tori?”

“No!” I screaked, eyeing him in terror. “I don’t even like her!”

“Are you sure? I saw something different the other day in your room, you know? You couldn’t even hear me call you because you were too busy ogling at her.”

“I wasn’t ogling!” my hands flared in the air. “I was just thinking of poses, I've said this before.”

“It’s alright, dude. Don’t get all defensive on me, I just asked a stupid question.” He raised his hands in surrender.

“Well, it was truly a stupid question.” I fired back.

He continued taunting and teasing me, saying that I was getting all defensive because I knew that what he was saying was the truth.

At some point, I had to stop arguing. My guy wouldn't keep quiet and give me breathing space. The madman even accused me of blushing.

Nonsense.

Me, Jason Chibuike Ugonna, blush on Victoria Kanayo's account? That was just about the craziest thing anybody had said to me. Chris must have been high on some kind of substance.

"Please, get the fuck." I huffed and quickened my steps so that I was walking ahead of him.

My guy covered the distance right back up and freaking continued with his annoying teasing. At that moment, he was the word 'annoying' impersonated.

So, I tuned him out. His words were now like background noise for the thoughts in my head. And amongst those thoughts were ones trying to figure out the reasons Jemima and Chris would think that I had any kind of romantic feeling for Victoria, my biggest rival. The girl whose sudden appearance scared me shitless, to the point I had to hide my face in shame. The same girl that was slowly but surely winning over my own friends, and left me helplessly waiting for when they would no longer even remember that I exist.

Why would I ever like her in that way?

I failed to come up with a reasonable and valid answer. So, I decided that Jemima and Chris were both insane.

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A/N

E be things. 🙂

A penny for your thoughts? Is there even hope for this Jason and Victoria ship? Me I know that my guy, Fidel, is very available 😌... Just saying sha😂.

Did y'all peep the new character? Esther. This one sef go cause small trouble later🙂.

Anyways, the next chapter comes on Sunday/ Monday. I promise. So anticipate 😗❤️

See you in the next chapter,
Love ya!😗❤️