Playing With The Star

Chapter 1

I'm sitting in the kitchen editing my essay for English, waiting for my blueberry muffins to finish baking. It's hard to focus because my mouth is watering at the smell of the muffins. I just finished my sentence as the timer goes off. Yes! I hum the song playing in my headphones as I take the muffins out and turn the oven off. I let them cool down for a few minutes and don't even get to take my first bite as what sounds like elephants stomp down the stairs.

A brunette head peeks behind the wall to look in the kitchen. I roll my eyes as he saunters his way into the kitchen with a smile. "How nice of you to make my favorite!" Nick says looking at the muffins in the pan, then the one in my hand. A wicked grin crosses his face. I don't notice what he's doing until he steals the muffin out of my hand. "No, no no! Give it back!" I jump up as he holds the muffin up. What a little shit. "That's mine you ass," I put one hand on his shoulder and the other one reaches up to grab the muffin. I jump and wrap my legs around his waist to try and take it. I grab the muffin, then look down at his face. His expression is blank, and only then do I realize that I'm literally on top of him. I look to his face, then to my legs wrapped around his waist. Oh. I hear steps coming down the stairs and quickly climb off of him. My brother comes around the corner and takes two muffins. "Nick, what took you so long?" He walks towards him and takes one out of his hand. "I was in the bathroom." I quickly snap back into place and grab my homework from the counter. "I'm heading upstairs, I have a few things to finish." I tell my brother, walking up the stairs.

~

Drop everything now meet me in the pouring rain "Bella, Aurora's here!' Ethan calls from downstairs. I turn the volume in my headphones up a little louder. Just need a couple more paragraphs and then I'm done! I see sparks fly whenever you smile. Two more words...knock knock. Huh? I slide my headphones to my neck and walk to my bedroom door, and open it to see Nick about to open the door. "Yes?" I ask impatient. He looks into my bedroom and then back at my face. "Your friend is here." "Oh thanks!" I rush past him but he grabs my arm. I look up at him with a what the heck? look. He stares at me for a few more seconds then shakes his head. "Nevermind." I pull my arm away and find Aurora downstairs.

What did Nick want? Was he going to talk about earlier? I didn't mean to make things awkward between us but I barely know him so it's probably nothing. I walk into the kitchen to see Aurora eating a blueberry muffin. What is it with my blueberry muffins? Everybody always steals them! "Hey Bella! Congrats on your win!" Aurora rushes over to me, wrapping me up in a big hug. "I heard you scored the last point, I'm so proud of you!" She takes a bite of her muffin,"I'm so sorry I couldn't be there. I would have loved to but my coach told me I couldn't leave early." Aurora is the captain of the school's cheer squad. They have a big tournament coming up soon so they didn't come to my game. "Oh no, don't worry I understand." Aurora's smile goes so big it honestly scares me. "So what are we going to do for your birthday!" Hmm, the movies would be fun? Maybe we could bake a cake and then watch The Little Mermaid. Just as I'm about to tell her my idea she speaks first. "We should go to the bar! Don't look at me like that, besides I've already got the fake ID's!" She squeals. I look at her, really look at her. She looks like she's been planning this for a while, and I don't want to disappoint her."Sure, sounds fun.." She immediately wraps me in a huge hug, "you're not going to regret this, not one bit!" I already am.

~

Practice ended ten minutes ago and Ethan's still not here, what the hell? I glance at my phone for the fifth time and finally see a message show up. "Sorry I'm running a little late so Nick's picking you up. I left your present on your bed." Great. Of course Nick has to pick me up out of all his friends. Not even a minute later, Nick pulls up in his black SUV. He rolls down the window and smiles at me, "Happy 18th Bells." I roll my eyes. Bells? My head tilts to the side and I give him a weird look. "Don't like the nickname?" He grins. I tighten my ponytail on my head and walk over to his car. I put my volleyball bag down by my feet and look out the window. "Not so talkative today huh?" He looks over at me. "Can you please drive faster? My boyfriends picking me up in twenty minutes, and I still need to shower." I look at him through the reflection of the window, his jaw is clenched really tight. "Did you wake up with that stick up your ass or was it always there?" I snap my head towards him. "Were you born an ass or is it something you developed?" "Well I do have quite a nice ass," He smiles over at me, "thank you very much." Why is he always this insufferable? "Whatever." I turn my head back to the window. But I can't get more than five seconds of peace in here because Nick opens his mouth again.

"How was practice? I heard you won finals," He glances at me for a few seconds then looks back to the road. I smile instantly at the thought of Wednesday's game. "Yeah finals was amazing, it was just I don't know how to describe what I was feeling but it was incredible the moment we won, and practice was great. It was really just my coach going over every thing." I turn to look at him nodding his head. "How is Coach Anders anyway? I know he misses me." I roll my eyes. Nick was his favorite, he still talks about how he was the best player he ever coached. "Oh of course, he always mentions how you were a real shit, and how you suck at the sport," I smirk, watching him look and me and roll his eyes. We sit in silence for a few more minutes before he pulls up into my driveway. He turns the car off and starts walking to my front door. "Um what are you doing?" He opens the front door for me. "Your brother said I could hang out here while I wait for him to come home." "Okay, I'll be upstairs if you need anything."

I drop my bag beside the front door and head up the stairs. I quickly change into a pair of loose ripped jeans and a lacey black tank top. I place the gift my brother got me off to the side because I know he'll want to see my reaction. I walk into the bathroom to put some make up on, I decide to do natural eyeshadow with sparkly highlighter. I put a few curls into my hair and glance at my phone to see if James texted me. He's supposed to pick me up in five minutes and hasn't texted me that he's on his way. I walk back into my bedroom and put on a gold bracelet and black heels. I sit and wait a few more minutes until I finally text him. "Hey, I was just wondering if you are on your way? You were supposed to be here a dew minutes ago." I click send and it takes another five minutes for him to respond."Sorry babe, can't go tonight have fun though." I stare at my phone in shock. Are you kidding me?! He's blowing me off on my birthday to do who knows what! I don't even bother to respond, I'm fuming with anger as I text Aurora if she can pick me up. The whole plan was for her to come a little later so James and I could have dinner before, but that plan is ruined now. He's such an ass. "Yeah sure, I'm almost ready so I'll be there in ten." I grab my purse from my dresser and head downstairs to wait.

When I get downstairs I see Nick lying on the couch watching tv, eating the last blueberry muffin! I plop down next to him to watch...The Princess Diaries? Nick...is watching this movie? I turn to him in shock. "You like The Princess Diaries?!" "Uh yeah, who doesn't?" I try to control my expression but I'm just so confused. He seems like the Fast and Furious (I love that movie), super boring action movie guy. "Okay." He looks over at me and smiles, "What did you think I watched? Super boring action movies? I hate those. I only like action movies when there's romance or if it's funny." He turns back to the tv. Okay wow, that was really unexpected. But now that he's said it, I can't get it out of my head. Romance movies?! Him? Nick? Nick Drews?! I look at him skeptically, "what's your favorite romance movie?" He replies with his eyes still glued to the tv, "uh probably 27 Dresses or 10 Things I Hate About You." What. The. Flip. No, he's not allowed to like 10 Things I hate About You. That's my favorite romance movie. "What I love 10 Things I Hate About You!" He turns to me with a contemplative expression. "Really? I thought your favorite movie was The Grinch or Gremlins." He looks at me with a smirk I would love to slap off his face.

We both turn to watch the movie. A few seconds later the doorbell rings and I get up to see Aurora smiling, holding a gift out to me. "Happy Birthday gorgeous! Open your gift!" I lead her to the kitchen and we both take a seat at the island. I unwrap the beautiful light purple gift wrap to see the new Taylor's Version vinyl! "Oh my gosh! It's gorgeous!" "It says it has a poster inside too! Keep unwrapping." I open the next box to see a few books that were on my list. "This is amazing, thank you so much Aurora!" I wrap her in the biggest hug ever.

As I rest my head on her shoulder, I look over to see Nick staring at me intently. As soon as I look, he immediately snaps his head back to the tv. "Ready to go? And you better tell me what happened with James." I frown, I really didn't want to talk about him right now. "He blew me off for some reason, said he couldn't come," "what an ass!" She comments, as we start walking to the door. "Who's James?" Nick calls from the couch. "My boyfriend." "And where are you going tonight?" Why does he want to know? "The bar in the town over." He nods his head. Just as were about to leave, I steal a glance at Nick who's already looking at me, with an expression on his face that looks like he's trying to make a decision.