Niall sends me his e-mail, having three pictures attached. I smile and download the pictures to my external hard drive. We edited some pictures and already found titles for the pictures. The one of me is called "processing", the one with Mere is called "la carcajada", which means "laugh" in Spanish. I decided we should bring that in since Mere is part Hispanic, her father originally coming from Mexico. She's actually a native Spanish speaker. I love it when I'm at her house and she speaks Spanish with her parents. Niall found some pictures of his little sister playing on a playground. It kind of makes me happy to see that he has such pictures. Niall also has one he took of Wesley where Wesley is hugging Lilian. It's shot in the middle of the street with the sun going down. It seems so staged but it's not. That was after the first party of the year, as far as Niall explained. Lilian was just saying goodbye to my brother and he captured the picture because he thought it would be an amazing memory since it's their Senior year and they all are going in different directions after school.
"So, do you have like a folder with the edited pictures and a separated one for the unedited ones?", Niall asks me, as he sees me disconnecting my laptop and hard drive from each other.
"Yes, I do. It's the best way to stay organized", I answer.
"Smart", he smiles, as I put everything on my desk, "Do you want to fetch some coffee down at the Brew and come over to my place? My sister is home with my Mom but she's leaving soon for a business trip, following my Dad to Dubai."
I look down at my hands, playing with my fingers. Well, going over to his place means explaining myself to the girls and Wesley and I'm certainly not in the mood to deal with that. I don't even like Niall. It's not like we're best friends or something and we never will be. He's friends with my brother and he hurt Meredith. That's enough for me to stay distant. I mean, yeah, he saved me and he's doing the project with me. But it's not like we have to be best friends now. Of course, I like making new friends but it's Niall.
"No, thanks, Niall. I appreciate your offer but I can't. I still have a lot to do for school", I tell him.
"Okay, but you owe me a coffee date", he smirks.
"No, I don't. What makes you think that?", I chuckle.
"Well, I won our bet yesterday. So, you owe me a favor", he explains.
Well, I actually do owe him a favor. This is going to follow me all of the time until I do the favor for him. I roll my eyes, remembering what we did yesterday. I should've never agreed to get that drunk. I was basically an open target for anyone. I was so stupid and I still am.
"I guess so", I mumble.
"You do", Niall smirks again.
I roll my eyes but smile this time.
"How about Monday after Photography?", I suggest, trying to get this done soon, so I don't have to explain myself to my friends and Wesley.
It's not that I don't want to hang out with Niall, it's just Mere and the others always assuming things that aren't even real or close to being real. I still can't believe I hid the thing between Tobias and I without anyone noticing.
"Yeah, Monday is great", Niall smiles.
"Good, so should I bring you down or will you go to Wesley?", I ask.
"Nah, I'm good. I can find my own way out. It's not like I've been here a couple of hundred times already", he answers with a slight chuckle.
I nod and walk over to my desk to get my Math text book out to do some homework. Niall says his goodbyes to me before closing the door behind himself. I smack my head on the desk top, sighing. What am I even doing? I told myself that I wouldn't behave like I actually like his existence and now I've ruined everything I worked my ass off for. I don't like Niall and now he's involved with me more than I wanted. This is so confusing. It's not like I want to do more stuff with him, it's that I'm forced to do stuff with him. This stupid project is his fault, Wesley is kinda fault, Mere is kind of fault. If Wesley never became friends with Niall, I'd probably not have this problem right now. And to be honest, Niall is quite a friendly guy. I mean, he went looking for me at the party after I ran off from him. My brother trusted him enough to make him look after me while drunk. Wesley doesn't trust people easily but with Niall it seems that he trusts him more than he trusts me. It's nice to see that Wesley has a person he genually trusts but why does it have to be Niall Horan? He's got a reputation that I don't even understand. He's the heart breaker and girlfriend-stealer, sex god and most likely the cockiest person but then he was all sweet and cuddled me when I felt like shit this night. He made me feel comfortable. He cared about my well being and stayed up the whole night, not sleeping at all but rather making sure I was okay. I mean, who in the world does that as a heartless fuckboy? I don't understand Niall's intentions. Does he just want to sleep with me? Or does he genually care about my feelings? I'm confused. And to top that, Wesley told his guy friends to stay away from me but Niall seems to be closer to me than Wesley wants, making Wesley a little mad probably. Is he trying to mess around with Wesley? Or is he just messing with me to make Wesley's protective-brother-monster release? I don't know what is going on at the moment. We've been in school for one week and so much already happened, it's crazy. I take my phone from my bedside table and unlock it quickly before receiving about a hundred notifications since I didn't have my WiFi turned on on my phone. Mere, Riley and Mia continued the conversation but nothing interesting happened. Wes send me some memes and I also have some Snapchat notifications, seeing Mere and Lilian snapchatted me. It's nothing all too interesting, so I put my phone away again and take my laptop to watch Netflix. I decide to watch Pretty Little Liars. I'm on season five and it's crazy. I kind of lost track over who's done what and what is actually happening but it's still fun to watch.
*****
Mr Melroy walks around our tables, looking down at our laptop screens. He's eyeing mine specifically since I'm currently editing a picture of my Mom where she's passed out sleeping on the couch with her glasses and her nurse attire still on. I liked the photo option, so I took it. She already agreed on me using it.
"That's quite an interesting picture, Violet. When did you take that?", Mr Melroy asks me.
I turn my head around to look at him, not looking at him would be unfriendly.
"Yesterday afternoon. My mother's a nurse, so she works in shifts and she had a night shift and passed out on the couch after she came home. I just love how it shows her hard working personality and I want to honor my Mom. She's done a lot for my brother and I", I explain.
Mr Melroy nods.
"Interesting. Niall, what are you working on?", he asks.
Niall turns his laptop to him more, showing a picture he took of his sister while she was playing in the garden. The picture shows a very sunny garden with bright green grass and colorful but blurred out flowers in the background, so his sister is in focus. I like it a lot and it seems as if he put thought behind the picture.
"It's my little sister, Zoe", Niall says, smiling a bit, as he shows the picture.
Mr Melroy nods, looking like he's thinking of something. His eyes scan Niall's and my computer screens. Soon enough he opens his mouth to speak.
"I have an idea for your project. How about you make this project about your family, your friends and yourselves? Other groups do random people they don't know but you two could make a certain theme through your pictures. It could make a huge difference to have pictures sorted by a category and not just random pictures", Mr Melroy suggests.
I nod and I also see Niall nod from of the corner of my eye. Mr Melroy leaves us, moving on to the next group. His idea is quite good and I like how he wants us to have a theme. It's not easy to capture random moments and a theme. Sometimes the photo opportunities just come to you, other times you just spend useless time trying not to get pissed off by not having anything.
"I like it", Niall announces.
"Same."
I go back to editing. Niall suddenly interrupts me by poking my shoulder lightly. He has a smile on his face as he speaks.
"So, on Friday I'm having a sleepover or movie night with Wes, Luke, Lilian and Jake. How about you come, too, and invite your girl friends over? We could take some awesome pictures aswell", he suggests.
"I'll think about it."
"And my family is then having this grill party on Saturday since my parents are coming back from the business trip on Thursday. Maybe you can invite your Mom to come to the grill party. I mean, you guys'll already be there, so I'd like to have your Mom over. Lilian and Jake's Dad is coming, Luke's parents are coming, my parents will be there", Niall explains, "It could
be the perfect opportunity to get good pictures. Other than that, your Mom could make new friends and see that she's over-working herself."
I nod and take a few notes in my planer, whereas when the party and sleepover are going to be. I can't keep that in mind very long. Niall also just nods, seeing I noted down some things. Soon enough Mr Melroy dismisses us and reminds us of the due date in two weeks. Niall and I are two of the last people to leave the room. Now, it's time for that coffee date I owe him. I follow him down the hallway to my locker. Quickly, I exchange everything I need for homework with useless things and get my motorcycle helmet out along with my jacket. Niall and I decided on both coming with our motorcycles.
"The Brew down on 7th?", he asks before leaving me at my own locker to get things sorted.
"Yeah, see you there", I tell him.
I get in my jacket before closing my locker and leaving the school. I quickly get my keys from my jacket pocket and flip the ignition. The motor roars to life, making me smile a bit. I put my helmet on, seeing Niall exit the school aswell, already finished to leave. I back my motorcycle out of the parking and onto the road. I'm the first to leave with a small smile on my face. I love taking my motorcycle. It gives me a warm feeling on the inside. Soon enough I come to a red light. In the mirror, I can see Niall drive up next to me in the lane. Our eyes meet, as I look up at him. The light turns green, forcing us to move again. I'm the first one to drive off but Niall's beside me soon enough. He sits completely different on his motorcycle, probably being more comfortable than I sit. We come to The Brew soon enough, parking on some special motorcycle spots. I sort my hair out and put it in a quick messy ponytail before joining Niall.
"So, black coffee?", he asks.
"Yeah", I smile.
He holds the door open for me, being a real gentleman. The Brew isn't that crowded. There are only two employees and maybe two customers sitting around.
"You go find a seat, I'll go get the coffee", Niall explains, as he hands me his helmet and keys.
I decide to sit in a booth quite to the back but still by a window. I put his stuff on his side of the booth whereas my things lay on the bench next to me. I take off my jacket, realizing it's way too warm to be wearing a jacket but it gets cold on the motorcycle and I'd rather be too warm than way too cold. No one knows that we're here and I'm pretty happy about that. Niall comes back soon enough with two huge cups of coffee and a small chocolate pastry on a plate. He sits down, pushing the black coffee in my direction. I thank him before putting my hands around the mug.
"So, how are you doing?", he asks, nodding towards the bite mark on my neck.
Teachers and students looked at me weirdly the whole day. Grayson showed up to school with a black eye and limping with his leg. He seemed to be in big pain. Wesley must've shown him what happens when you touch me the wrong way. No one really asked me what happened, probably already have heard about it. Nothing stays secret at this school. You always have people that assume shit.
"The bruises are going back very slowly and the bite, as you can see, looks really bad. It's just the stares that people give. They irritate me a lot", I explain.
"People are always going to be nosy", he says.
"Yeah, but I think I'll cover the thing on my neck with a scarf tomorrow. I just can't stand the looks I get anymore. I just feel like an animal in a zoo", I groan.
Niall nods, taking a sip of his coffee. I look out of the window, seeing the sun shine brightly with very few clouds in the sky. It looks beautiful. There will probably be an amazing sunset. I could drive up on the nearby mountain. There's a place called "Couples Cove". People usually go there on dates and stuff to watch the sunset or sunrise. I on the other hand like to go there to take pictures. There's a huge billboard up there and it shows our city's car cinema. It's just for advertisement but I like to take pictures of that billboard in several different lightings. It's pretty interesting. And I also like to take pictures of the sunset itself.
"I'll drive to the "Couples Cove" later. I need to take some pictures and I feel like today will bring an amazing sky", I tell Niall, also taking a sip from my coffee.
"Sounds good", he answers, "I'll come with you. I can take some pictures of you for the project or your Instagram."
I chuckle a bit.
"Thanks, but you don't have to come. I can deal with this on my own and I don't need Instagram pictures and I don't think the pictures would fit our project", I explain.
"I'll come. When will you be up there? I'm serious and I will not pull a move on you. Wesley would kill me anyway", Niall smiles.
I nod, thinking of what I've gotten myself into. Why didn't I raise my hand as Mr Melroy asked for us to change partners? This class will be the death of me.