"Alright class! For this month's project you will have to pair up and choose a period of history we have been studying. You need to create a model of how life was like in that era and write a paragraph to explain your design. Is that clear?"
The class murmurs an unenthusiastic response, mostly of grumbles and sighs. Mr Davis claps his hands together and grabs the attention of the half asleep class. Almost in every class we are all half asleep.
"You may choose your parterres," he goes onto saying. "But no more than twos."
That brings up the spirit of the class. Whenever we got to choose who we work with, there is a much more positive attitude. Because I will tell you now, getting paired up with the guy who 'apparently' drinks water out of the toilet isn't the kind of person who you want to work with.
Rumours are rumours but you can never be too careful.
But now the struggle that I face is finding someone to work with me. Lacy isn't in my history class. I turn around in my chair, at the front, and scrutinise the whole class. My eyes suddenly land on Nathan and a light bulb sparks in my mind.
"Hey Nathan," I approach his desk and smile down at him. The whole class is out of their seats and I don't want to be left stranded, alone.
"Hi Paige," his smile releases butterflies in my stomach.
"Would you like to be my partner for the project?" I am mentally crossing my fingers, hoping no one has already asked him. Being poplar and smart, I assume he is on the top of everyone's list to do the project with at the moment.
Maybe making him popular was a bad idea because otherwise I could have him all to myself. I mentally stutter at how wrong that sounds.
"Sure," his eyes sparkle. "I'd love to."
Yes! I silently cheer. Gosh, why am I getting so excited? I take in a deep breathe to calm my beating heart.
"Wait, Nate, I thought you were going with meeee," whines Jenny Kein from the desk behind him. She pouts over exaggeratedly with the batting of her eye lashes. I give her no pity with the roll of my eyes.
"Sorry Jenny," Nathan says to her as she pushes out her lips even more. "Paige just asked me. Maybe some other time?" Jenny huffs and storms out of her seat, probably to go bitch about me to one of her cheerleading friends. I don't give a shit. I was telling the truth to Bailey at dinner that we don't get on, but now with me stealing her hot partner away I think that is more so now.
"So, what do you want to do the project about? I was thinking-"
"Paige!"
My head spins to the left in the direction of the cry of my name. Sure enough, Josh strides over and laces his fingers briefly with mine. A pleading expression masks his face.
"You want to pair up?" He asks. Oh, so I don't hear from him all weekend, he ignores my texts, doesn't take any interest in me but as soon as we need to do school work, he acts like my boyfriend again. Ugh!
"Sorry Josh, I'm going with Nathan," I say blatantly, not even accepting his eye contact.
His hand leaves mine and shoves it into his jacket pocket. "Oh," our eyes connect for a second and his lip curls. "I'll go work with someone else then." He walks off with the shake of his head, not turning back. I don't want him to.
"Well that was cheery," sarcastically remarks Nathan, trying to shift my flat lips into a smile. It works.
We start off planning out what we are going to do. Nathan's idea was the Tudors and I happily agree.
I turn my head slightly, peering around the the classroom in search for who Josh has decided to work with. It comes as a shock when I see him giggling with Courtney. Her hand is almost in his as they laugh together with a blank sheet of paper on their desk, them not even concentrating on the assignment set. A light sigh slips from my mouth.
"You want to work on the project at mine or yours?" Nathan asks as the bell rings and we collect our bags from the floor. For some reason my eyes are still glued to Josh.
"You can come over tomorrow to my house?" I suggest, peering back over to Nathan then back to Josh, instantly regretting it as his eyes catch mine. I look away sharply, hoping he doesn't detect my hitch of breath.
"Awesome! See you tomorrow Paige."
I smile at Nathan then follow him out of the door. I wait outside of the next classroom, knowing Lacy will be out any minute from her religious education lesson. As I stand with my back to the wall, Josh walks past with Courtney by his side. I catch her eye and she smirks, a spiteful twist of her lips coated in scarlet lip gloss.
"You ok?" Lacy asks. "You look angry."
"No. I'm fine." I lie.
Nathan arrives the next day at my house when school is over.
Once again, Courtney had sent me the same ghastly look: piercing her dark brown eyes and poisonous red lips. To me her eyes look more like dirty dish water that had been drained down a pipe, but from the way I saw Josh looking at her, it was as if they were polished diamonds. Diamonds that made his eyes sparkle in reflection.
But her jealous butt can wait, because I am with Josh, and Nathan is my history partner.
"So do you have any lolly pop sticks?" Nathan unloads the black and white paint, ready for the decoration of our Tudor house model. I stand up from my bed and retrieve the shopping bag I bought after school the previous day.
"Sure do," I empty them out onto my desk. Nathan examines them with a smile of satisfaction.
"These are perfect. Let's get started!"
After an hour my hands are coated completely in paint. Nathan laughs as I moan that I got it on my clothes. My new denim jacket as well.
"It's not funny!" I laugh, trying to keep a straight face.
The whole desk has transformed from white to a Dalmatian, well a dog with uneven splattery spots.
"It kinda is funny," he chuckles, placing the now dry lolly pop stick roof onto the model house.
"No it's not, but this is," I go over to him and smear some paint from my fingers across his face. I let out a chuckle of laughter and step back, admiring my art work. "The white really goes with your skin tone. At last now you know your hair will age well."
"You think this is funny?" His arms extend and he waves his hands in front of me. I squeal like a little girl as Nathan begins to tickle the life out of me, leaving hand prints of paint all over my shirt.
"Ok, ok I'm sorry," he releases me and I gasp in shock at my outfit. "Thanks for ruining my clothes," I scoff.
"It will wash out," he smirks. "Well, I hope so." I send him a warning glare which only makes him laugh more, making me laugh too.
"All joking aside, is it done?" Nathan nods, smiling down at our little Tudor house, made entirely out of lolly pop sticks. It is pretty cool. "All we need to do now is to write that paragraph."
"I'll do that," he says, grabbing a pen from my pencil case. "You go get changed."
"Really? Thanks."
Once I have a clean set of clothes on, I return from the bathroom into my bedroom to see Nathan still working on the paragraph. I settle down on my bed and take out my phone. He is by my desk, hopefully found a clear spot that isn't covered in paint.
"Did you know that Josh is now playing football for the Rovers?" Says Nathan. The Rovers is an international football team that only consists of the best players in the state, aged 16-18.
"I didn't know that," I say to him. I wonder why he never told me. Even if he hasn't been talking to me lately, for reasons I don't know why considering I though the whole Nathan-being-popular-so-he-isn't-quarter-back-any-more thing has blown over, he still could have told me the news for us to celebrate.
"Yeah, he got accepted last night. Courtney set it up for him as her uncle's the manager."
I scoff at the mention of her name. Well at least I now know why those two have been spending so much time together.
But if he is now on a better football team, shouldn't he let me off the hook for getting Nathan the position of quarter back? Why is he still not talking to me?
"Courtney posted a pic," Nathan tells me.
I go onto social media and type in her user name. I see the image Nathan had been referring to, but another image catches my attention first. Uploading the picture to full size, I go to speculate the image more clearly.
Is this what I think it is?
"What is it Paige?" Nathan asks worriedly, noticing my change of expression as I gasp. My body stiffens as my hands paralyse. "Tell me, are you ok?" He rushes to my side, just as a tear seeps from my eyes.
"I can't believe he cheated on me," I choke up.