Chapter Five: Invitation

~Kena~

"Hey, everyone! Gather here for the latest!" Many gossip-hungry delinquents gathered around Greenwealth secondary school's largest hallway as the queen of tales, Ella, broke the latest of all news.

"Check this out. So, according to a very reliable source, Crown Prince Raymond may start attending our school as early as next week!" The queen squealed and the crowd went wild.

Imbeciles.

Privileged bunch of shits! They all had this belief that they owned the entire school and could do whatever they wanted with it. Ha! Worse, they were all under the impression that Greenvale was the inheritance of their forefathers. Imagine that! And do you want to know the most heartbreaking aspect of it all? It's the fact that I can't say they weren't entirely correct.

Anyway, while the rest of the school rejoiced over the royal family's 'fabulous' news, I felt nothing but irritation. Their ridiculous excitements only fueled my resentment towards this island and its moronic sets of citizens.

As an orphan who was attending a school for the wealthy, I was regarded by the school as an act of charity, and so I had to play my part in demonstrating my gratitude by being the school's servant. So forgive me if I wasn't swept up in the excitement of the prince's arrival because it simply meant more work for me to do.

With the feeling of extreme annoyance surging through my veins at their senseless chattering and happiness, I walked into the fourth class of my day, already hating every second of it.

"Hey, why do you look like you want to murder someone?"

Paul resumed his usual pestering as soon as my ass was resting on my chair. With the way I was feeling, I would have bashed his head on the table if I didn't love him so much.

At the cafeteria, I ran away from him claiming that I needed to use the restroom, even when I knew that he would not let it go and would be waiting eagerly in English, a class that we both shared, to bombard me with questions about my outburst and attitude earlier on. But I wasn't in the mood to respond to him right then, nor did I believe I would ever be.

"Kena, what..." he started to say but I quickly placed my hand over his mouth which cause his eyes to widen slightly.

"Could we please not talk about the cafeteria ish? I'm just not feeling it right now." I took my hand away from his mouth and looked up at him with pleading eyes. He stared back at me, a worried look danced around his pretty face, and then just nodded.

I smiled at him in appreciation and then turned just in time to see Mr Simon enter the classroom to begin his lesson.

Barely five minutes into the lesson, I could tell that Paul was already itching to say something to me. Funny enough, people saw Paul as this cool, man-of-few-words type of guy, but when he was around me, it was always difficult to shut him up, not that I tried very often. I always liked hearing him talk because it made me feel like I was important to him, and his voice always sounded like music to my ears, so it was fine. But after my morning with Jessica, I wasn't in the mood to hear him talk for the time being.

I know this might sound silly, but after this morning, I was terrified that Paul was going to tell me with his own mouth that he was going to finally ask Jess out. I knew he'd been planning it for a while, but until this morning, I was convinced Jess would reject him because she was always saying how much she despised him simply because he hung out with me. That was one of the reasons he held on asking her out for this long. I couldn't figure out what had caused her to suddenly change her mind.

"Fine." Paul finally spoke up after attempting and failing miserably to remain silent. I sighed and rolled my eyes, waiting for him to continue.

"Since we obviously can't discuss your depressed state, how about you come out with me to a party tonight?" My head quickly turned in Paul's direction, and I'm sure my eyes were rivaling those of an owl at the time.

"A what?" I asked again to make sure I had heard it correctly the first time, and this time Paul rolled his eyes. He leaned in closer to me, his face close to mine, and he whispered,

"Kena, you heard me the first time. "I'd like to take you to a party." We were both seated in the back of the classroom, and his chair was very close to mine, so you can imagine what that little bit of space was doing to my already twitchy heart. It wasn't amusing.

"Miss Mason!"

My head snapped to the direction of Mr Simon, and I was surprised to see him glaring at me.

"One more word from you and you're out of my class." In disbelief, my mouth sagged. I wasn't even the one talking! When I turned to face Paul, he was snickering at my expense. I bit down hard on my lips and turned to look down at my notebook, and Mr Simon went back to his lecture.

Why was I even surprised? Mr Simon would rather scold me instead of Paul, who had quickly become the school's golden child. I wasn't complaining though, I didn't want Paul to be chastised either, so I guess it was a win-win situation.

*****

Steadily chewing on my fingernails, I kept looking from left to right outside the gates of the Mason's mansion, praying with all my heart not to be caught out there at such an hour. Paul had asked me to wait for him here, and he had already texted me that he was only a few blocks away.

Sneaking out of the house to attend a party with Paul was not something I did often, despite his convincing. Every time he asked me to accompany him to a party, I always had an excuse or the other because I was afraid of what Mum would do if she found out, but when he asked me again in class today, I don't know how to explain it, but my heart just skipped a beat at the offer.

I guess I was desperate at the time, with Jessica hovering over Paul like a dark cloud, I was now praying for a glimmer of hope that I hadn't completely lost him to her yet and that I still had a chance to man up, or woman up in my case, and finally tell him how I felt about him. So when he mentioned the two of us going out and having some alone time, even if it was at a party, my mind told me it was finally time to let go of my fears and do something.

Anyway, something about the way he invited me to the party seemed off though, but I couldn't put my finger on it so I decided it was best not to duel. Like I said before, I was feeling desperate.

A few minutes later, Paul came to a halt beside me on his very famous power bike that I hated so much and put the dreadful thing in park, then his golden eyes met mine and I noticed them come to life as they sparkled like a mischievous kid on a sugar rush, and to top it off, his lips stretched and metermophoused in what I could only describe as a creepy Cheshire grin, and I instantly knew deep down that I was fucked.

My suspicions were heightened a few seconds later when he opened up his damn mouth to ask, "Are you ready for tonight, dude?" Yeah, my best friend of two years sometimes refers to me as dude. Now, let's move on. I nervously looked up at him, allowing my smile to fade and give way to a solemn expression. Don't blame me; by now, I knew him too well. He was definitely up to something.

"Are you certain we should do this? Couldn't we just go to a nice coffee shop or any quiet place and hang out? Do we have to go there tonight?" I looked up at him, allowing the glimmer of hope in my mind to shine through my eyes, despite the fact that I knew it was pointless to even ask. Gosh, I could already feel a mild headache forming in my temples at the prospect of where Paul and I were about to go.

Paul reached out and took my hand in his. "Come on, Kena we've already talked about this. You cannot back out at this point. Remember you promised you'd go with me?" He was now staring at me, all sad as if I had refused to get him a puppy or something, and all I could do was sigh in surrender. Manipulative jerk.

I yanked my hand away from his and glared at him.

"Fine, I'll go with you, but keep in mind that you owe me a lot for this. If mum or Jessica discover what we're planning to do, I'll be grounded for the rest of my life! So make sure we don't get caught or I'll sever your balls, okay?" His face instantly lit up with a bright smile, and he quickly charged at me, engulfing me in a bear hug so tight that I had to gather all my strength just to fend him off.

"Let's just get this over with." I pretend to be mad but mehn, I was nervous as hell.

"Relax, dude, we still have...," He glanced down at his wristwatch before returning his gaze to me. "We have a bit of time before the party officially starts so let's go find something to do while we wait, shall we?" He beamed and swept his brows up and down like a complete moron.

I rolled my eyes and walked around his bike eying the death trap suspiciously, "Why couldn't you come with a car like a normal person?" Paul paused and stared at me for a moment like I had suddenly grown two horns, and then the next thing I knew, he was crouched over laughing his pretty head off like a mad man.

"Get on the damn thing, let's get out of here before we get caught," I said, deciding it was best not to respond to his laughter. At the very least, he was happy. I enjoyed seeing him laugh, even if it was at my expense.

Even though that didn't stop his hysterical laughter, Paul climbed on the bike and started the engine, while I climbed behind him and held on tight to his waist much to my pleasure and for dear life of course. We were already out of the neighbourhood a few minutes later, on our way to a guy's party that he promised would be nothing but fun.

Despite my suspicions that there was something fishy about him inviting me to this particular party, I kept my mouth shut and let him lead the way.