12 Chapter 12.

"Surprise," dozens of voices shouted together as soon as the lights illuminated the living room. I was unable to move and stood frozen at my place, a small gasp escaped through my slightly parted lips as I took in the sight in front of me. The scene in front of me left me completely speechless and dumbfounded.

There stood in front of him were Niel Watts, Vince D'costa, Hadley Drew, Ken Stuart and of course Mia and Ryan and...Alexio and Miss Kate Wilson. I can understand the presence of my friends but I never expected Alexio and Miss Wilson to be there.

"Happy birthday Mel," they all but shouted simultaneously.

And the only word that escaped from my mouth was "wow."

"Guys.... I can't believe it," I gasped out once again, still trying to take in everything.

"How can we miss out on your 17th birthday, you are almost an adult, maybe we don't have to babysit you anymore," Ryan teased me.

Mia slapped Ryan on the back of his head on this and Ryan let out a loud groan which made all of us erupt into a fit of laughter.

I once again scanned the entire room, and I was astonished by the fact that they were able to do this much in such a limited time. The living room was decorated with fairy lights and balloons were hanging from every corner of the room and numerous balloons were sprawled across the floor and a big HAPPY BIRTHDAY sign was hanging from the ceiling. Everything looked perfect.

"It's the cake cutting time, now let the birthday girl cut her cake," Miss Kate cheered and at the same time, Alexio walked out of the room with a heart-shaped chocolate cake in his hands.

"Did you baked it?" I asked him, my mouth wide open in surprise.

"Actually Miss Mia baked it, I only helped her decorate it," Alexio admitted and that surprised me even more. Mia can't even bake to save her life and the fact that she managed to bake a cake is completely unbelievable.

"How did you do that?" I asked her.

"I asked your mum, she was quite descriptive," Mia shrugged her shoulder casually.

"Now c'mon let's cut it," Vince insisted.

I blew the candle while everyone sang the Happy Birthday song. I cut one piece of the cake and held it out for Mia to eat and then did the same with Ryan and the others. And then they all took turns in feeding me or more like smearing the cake on my face. By the time the cake was finished, my whole face and part of my hair were covered with frosting, and loads of pictures were snapped, which I'm pretty sure is going to end up being uploaded on Facebook or something.

"Now it's the gifts opening time," Hadley cheered as she pulled out a gift from her bag and handed it to me. I opened it and saw that it's a beautiful galaxy-themed iPhone 7 case and I totally fell in love with it. I took out my phone and replaced the old case with a new one and it went well with my phone. "Thank you so much, Hadley," I said.

"Now my turn, Ryan cheered and handed me a small shoe-size rectangular box. I opened it and saw that it was pink clothe, I held it out in front of me to examine it properly and realized that it was a pink shirt where 'baby' is written with a panda print and pink and white polka-dotted pajama pants.

"Baby pj's for the baby," Ryan teased me and I backhanded him lightly which earned a roar of laughter from others. Next was Miss Wilson gave me a solid black georgette fit and flare dress. After that it was Mia's turn, she handed me two boxes, I decided the open the first box which was slightly heavier and bigger than the other one. I unwrapped it and saw that it's a light pink Wooden desk makeup organizer and some makeup was already stocked there. Then I proceeded to the other one and saw that it was letter print cami and frill trim shorts PJ set.

Vince gave me the Lord of the ring book set and Neil gave me the John Greene collection and Alexio gave me Soiree Formal sheer black beaded dress and Ken gave me the Alexa bot from Amazon.

"Thank you guys for everything," I said truthfully. They all have gone out of their way to make me happy in the absence of my parents.

"So, we will head out and now, it's already 1 am," Hadley said while getting up and pulled Ken with her. "Yeah, we should get going, I need to complete my physics assignment," Vince said as he pushed his glasses higher on the bridge of his nose, "C'mon dude, we gotta go" Vince pulled Niel with him and they walked out of the door followed by Ken and Hadley and then by Alexio and Miss Wilson, but Miss Wilson stopped and turned to face us, "we will meet you in the at 9 tomorrow night," with this being said she walked away.

Why does she want us at 9 tomorrow night? I'm so confused right now.

"What was she talking about?" I asked Ryan and Mia.

"Nothing you need to worry about Mel," Mia quickly silenced me and sent me back to my room. As it was too late and my body was too tired to argue so I decided to hold the interrogation till tomorrow. I walked into my bedroom and quickly changed into my PJs and as soon as my head hit the pillow I was out like a light.

"Morning sunshine," someone whispered as I felt someone shaking me.

"Wake up tiger, it's your special day."

After mumbling a few incoherent words which felt a lot like swearing, I slowly sat up, rubbing my eyes. Once my eyes adjusted to the bright sunlight that was streaming through my glass windows. I noticed that Mia and Ryan were sitting at the end of my bed, in their pj's, with three cups of coffee and Ryan handed me one cup as he slowly sipped from his. I looked down at my mug and slowly took a sip from mine.

A good way to start the day. I thought to myself as I took another sip.

After I finished my coffee, I placed the empty mug on the nightstand and glanced at Mia and Ryan, they were nervously fidgeting and talking in hushed voices.

"Snap out of it guys, what's the matter?" I asked, eyeing them suspiciously.

"Get ready in 10 minutes, we are going out after breakfast," Mia declared and marched out of the room, Ryan trailing behind her.

I huffed out in annoyance and pulled the duvet off of me and then headed straight to my bathroom. I picked up my brush and started my oral hygiene routine and then proceeded to do my other personal things.

I walked into the room, a fluffy towel wrapped around my body and another small one wrapped around my wet hair. I quickly dried my hair and put on my clothes which were a simple navy blue crop top and faded jean short-shorts. I completed the look with a long chain.

I walked out of the room to see that Ryan and Mia were already there, Ryan was sitting on the counter, scrolling down on his phone and Mia was in the kitchen flipping pancakes.

"Mel, you're ready, come have some breakfast," Mia ordered as she handed me a plate of pancakes and a glass of orange juice, and then Ryan sat down with his plate, followed by Mia. We all dove into our food and within minutes, all the food was gone.

"Now let's go it's already 10, they must be waiting for us," Ryan said as he got up and took the dishes to the kitchen.

"C'mon let's go," Mia got up and told me to pack my phone, charger, and other small necessities so I did exactly what she had told me to do. After preparing all the things I went into the living room and saw that Mia was stuffing eatables in her bag.

"You ready?" Ryan asked me as he walked out of his room and I simply nodded my head in response.

After gathering all the things we needed, we slipped out of the door and went down to the lobby Once we reached the lobby I was surprised to find that all of our friends were already present there.

"I have already booked us a cab that will accommodate all of us, so need to worry about transportation," Niel announced as tapped on his phone. "It will be there in 5 minutes" he added quickly.

"Where are we going guys, please tell me," I whined, instead of answering my question, they all burst out in laughter.

Once the laughter died down, I turned to do something of the remaining 5 minutes but all seemed pretty busy, Mia and Vince were acting all lovey-dovey and Ryan was busy flirting with Hadley and Niel was busy with his phone, which left only Ken and me, standing there awkwardly without uttering a single word.

"The ride's here," Niel suddenly announced, pulling me out of my reverie.

"Let's go, let the show begin," Vince shouted and dragged Mia with him as he ran towards the cab and we all followed behind him.

Well here goes nothing....