C5 Chapter 5

“Good afternoon class!”

He placed his coffee on the desk and leaned against it, crossing his arms.

“Have any of you read The Catcher In The Rye? Show of hands.”

Zack and two other people held their hands up.

“Good. Because we’re going to go through it this year.”

There were groans and mumbles, and after everyone had calmed down, Mr. White continued.

“But to make things more interesting, I want you to read it at home and make a PowerPoint for it. You have three weeks to do so, and to make things easier, you’ll be working in pairs.”

Everyone started talking then, obviously excited about the whole ‘working in pairs’ thing.

“But I will make the pairs for you, so there won’t be any difficulties. Everyone please write your names down on a piece of paper and I’ll come to collect them in a minute.”

This made people groan once again but everyone ended up obliging anyway. After Mr. White gathered small pieces of paper from everyone, he let them fall in his cup of coffee (which was apparently empty), before he shook it a bit.

“Okay. Here we go.”

He pulled out a piece of paper.

“Harry Sampson and…Zachary Macqueen. Emma Smith with Luke Black.”

His eyes drifted up to look at Luke for a second, before looking back down in the cup. And I was completely panicking, because this meant that I would end up with someone I didn’t know or like.

“Danielle Piper…”

He pulled the piece of paper and unfolded it.

“And Noah Hudson.”

I rolled my eyes because this was so fucking cliché. The quiet girl in class was assigned with the school’s bad boy for a project and fate would make them fall in love. Give me a fucking break. I knew that nor Noah or I didn’t like to read, so this would be an especially difficult assignment, not to mention the fact that he probably hated me already. That is, if he knew who I was.

And he seemed to know who I was, because he turned his head and rolled his eyes at me. I knew this project, or whatever, would be a complete and utter disaster.

“I want you to discuss technical matters with your partner after class, not right now. You can get the book from the library or buy it, it doesn’t matter. What’s important is that you read this in three weeks. It’s not that much to read and it’s interesting.”

“What happens if we don’t read it?” Noah asked and I frowned. So he was already planning on slacking off.

“Both you and your partner get an F.”

I wasn’t going to let that happen, even if it meant that I’d have to do everything by myself.

When Mr. White said that class was dismissed, I stood up, determined to get some things straight with Noah.

“Hey, um, wait a minute!” I called after him in the hallway and he actually turned around, rolling his eyes at me.

God please make him get stuck like that

“So what are we going to do about the project? Because we both know that neither of us like to read.”

“Look, you can read it and then just let me in on it yeah?”

“Excuse you? I am not one of those girls that will fall for your charm and do the project to get into your pants, okay?”

“You wish you’d get to see my cock princess.” He laughed and turned around, walking away. I stared at his back in awe, not believing my ears. But I wasn’t going to give up on this; there was no way I was failing in English because of him.

***

“Noah Hudson is officially the most annoying human being I’ve ever met. And I live with my mother.” I said when I met up with Emma, Harry and Carly in the hallway.

There was a big crowd by the pin boards, so that meant that all the results had been put up; who got on the football team, the cheerleading squad and other clubs that apparently weren’t as important as these two.

“I MADE THE TEAM BITCHES!” Jake screamed when he saw the list, then came over to us, almost knocking us on the ground.

“What was that about Noah?” Emma asked once Jake had calmed down and we were on our way out of school. The second day of senior year was officially over and I was already having a problem with the most popular boy in school.

“I was saying that he’s the most annoying person I’ve ever met.”

“What did he do?”

“So we were partnered up for a project in English and he’s expecting me to do all the work.”

“Aw, that’s too bad. You could’ve gone over to his house to study on weekends.

“Why would I want to spend more time with him?”

“To study.” He said, and I shook my head at his innuendo.

“I would never to anything with him.”

“He’s got a big dick though.” Carly said and I looked at her surprised.

“What?”

“I dated him back in freshman year.”

“He’s had girlfriends?”

“Just me.”

“And how long did you guys last?”

“About three months.”

“How come you broke up?” Jake butted in.

“I fell in love with him and when I finally got the courage and told him, he said thanks. So I realized that I should get out of the relationship before I’m in too deep.”

“What I don’t get is how could you fall in love with Noah Hudson?”

“He’s actually really cool with the people he knows. He doesn’t open up often. At all, actually.”

“Well he’s still a prick to me, so that won’t change my mind.”

“I’m offended princess.”

I turned around to see Noah approaching us together, with Lucas, Liam and Zack behind him.

“Well then, we’re off! Bye guys!” Jake said when Zack let him know that they had to be home to babysit their little sister since their parents were leaving. Carly went with them, and now I was 100% sure she was dating Zack.

“You should watch your mouth yeah? Or it’ll get you in the bad kind of trouble.

“What’s the good kind of trouble?” I asked, crossing my arms over my chest.

“You wouldn’t know.” He said, eyes drifting down to my mouth, then at his own crotch.

“You disgust me.”

“How am I going to get over it I wonder?” He spoke sarcastically, before he took his keys out and pressed a button on them.

The Bentley next to us beeped and I should’ve known it was his. Of course it was.

“Whatever, let’s go.” I told Emma and her head snapped towards me. She was exchanging looks with Liam when I interrupted her. There was something going on there and I needed to find out what.

We left without another word and Harry turned his head to look at them one more time before saying goodbye to us and walking away towards his car.

Literally everyone had a car except for me. My eighteenth birthday was coming up in February, so I had to suck up to my parents in order to get one. That would be torture.

“So what’s going on with you and Liam?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean I saw the looks you gave each other. They were almost as hateful as Noah and I.”

She sighed as she unlocked her Mini Cooper and we both got in.

“You know that I got transferred here because I got in a fight with someone right?”

“Right.”

“Well, that person may or may not have been Liam.”

“Liam?! You got in a fight with Liam?”

“Well, technically. I was blamed for starting the fight because he kind of cheated on me with this other bitch so I jumped her in the cafeteria and it got really bad. He was the one to pull us apart.”

“But he came to our school a year later.”

“He did, because his parents got divorced. They were fighting while we were together so I think that must be it.”

“Oh. Maybe it’s destiny that you guys are together now.”

“We go to the same school together, but we’ll never be together together.”

“Never say never.”

“Stop quoting Justin Bieber right now or I’ll leave you on the side of the road.”

“Sorry.” I laughed, knowing that it annoyed her. I didn’t like Justin Bieber either to be honest, but some of his songs were catchy. His personality however…no thank you.