Ash’s POV

“So, Ash, are you going to come as well?” Jack asked me with while stuffing a slice of sloppy pizza from the school canteen, in his mouth.

“Huh?” I looked up from my phone, surprised to have heard my name. For the entire lunch break, I had been texting Luke. We took every chance we had to text each other, so basically in between classes and in breaks. It hadn’t gone far enough for me to start texting him in class, but the urge to answer when I heard my phone buzz in the bag, kept getting stronger and stronger as time passed.

“The Sum 41 concert…?” Jack told while everybody else was just staring at me as if I had committed a terrible crime.

My phone buzzed again, notifying me that Luke had answered, but I couldn’t be rude and ignore my friends, “concert? When?”

“We were literally just talking about the whole thing!” Rian groaned with big gestures, making me feel very guilty for not paying attention.

“I’m sorry,” I mumbled and put my phone on the table, causing the buzzing of messages to be amplified, “I wasn’t really listening…”

“Yeah, we realised,” Alex scoffed in a hushed tone, but I still heard him. He had been getting a bit better, joining some more conversations than a couple of days before, but he still wasn’t the happy hyper Alex I remembered. I hadn’t been able to figure out what it was all about, but I thought it would just be better to leave him be, and be there if he actually wanted to talk to me. But now he also started making bitchy comments, like the one he just said. Normally he used to use them as a joke, but they actually seemed to be honest now. Something was just setting him off that caused him to be like this, but I couldn’t figure it out.

“I’m sorry,” I whispered again, feeling honestly ashamed of myself. I was never the girl to always be texting or always be on her phone in general, but in just a week, I had turned into one of them. Never did I mean to annoy my friends because of it…

My phone kept buzzing, the messages first coming at a 10 second interval, before the intervals kept getting shorter and shorter, to the point where it was just one message after the other. I would have picked it up and answered, if it weren’t for the fact that I literally had just put it away, trying to prove something to myself and to the others. But everybody was just staring at the phone that was making so much noise.

“Don’t you want to answer that?” Rian pointed at the device.

“Ummm…” I picked up my phone and quickly looked through the messages. It was basically Luke freaking out and being worried because I wasn’t answering. We had been texting back and forth and then I just suddenly stopped in the middle of the conversation, of course he was going to be worried. So, I quickly texted him telling him that I was sorry, but that I had just realised people were asking me questions, so that I had to go for the time being.

“So, do you want to join us or not?” Jack raised his eyebrow at me and looked at my untouched plate of food. Speaking of which, I probably wanted to eat that before the bell went in 5 minutes.

“When is it?” I asked, hoping it wouldn’t clash with any plans I had with Luke, because, seriously, Luke and I really tried to meet up pretty often. In the two weeks we had been together, we already went out seven times… which was, like, every other day. But I wouldn’t have it any other way. He really was great, even though he barely talked to the others when he saw them. I understood that, though, I also wasn’t very comfortable around his friends, so why would he be comfortable around mine?

“In a couple of weeks,” Rian told me before stating the specific date, “I already got the tickets… so…”

“Ok, yeah, sure, I’ll come and I’ll pay you for the ticket as soon as I get my hands on some cash,” I told him with a smile. Even if I wouldn’t be able to make it last minute, I would have at least payed Rian back

“Oh, and Lianne and I were thinking of getting ice cream after school, do you want to come?” Harper added, drinking some water from her water bottle. She still didn’t feel comfortable being around Alex alone, but she didn’t mind being in his presence.

As much as I would have loved to, I couldn’t. Sure, I wasn’t spending as much time with my friends as I had been able to do before, but they understood, right? It would be exactly the same for them. So, I had to decline, “I’m sorry, I’m going out with Luke again today, maybe next time?”

“But you said that last time!” Lianne pouted, making me feel pretty guilty. It was true, I had bailed on them so often before. I had been spending most of my time doing something with Luke, whether it be texting or actually hanging out with him.

I frowned and decided to just give up on eating any food, “I guess I could cancel my plans with him…”

“No, it’s ok,” Harper told me before anybody could agree with it, making me actually cancel my date with Luke, which I had been looking forward to, “just come next time.”

“Will do,” I smiled as the bell went. Everybody collected their stuff and rushed to their own individual classes, Alex and I awkwardly walking next to each other to the same one. I didn’t know what it was that made it awkward, but it still really was. There was silence while we sometimes accidentally bumped into each other, or Alex was clearing his throat weirdly. Why this happened really did not make any sense.

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Alex’s POV

After school Ash still walked out with us, but she parted ways as soon as we got outside. Her ‘boyfriend’ was already waiting for her, sitting on the hood of his car, acting all cool with his stupid sunglasses and his stupid muscles. It wasn’t that cool. I mean, a black shiny car that was pretty nice and was all his, wasn’t that special. So what I didn’t actually have my own car that was awesome? So what I didn’t have a chiseled face and basically consisted of only muscles? So what that guy was basically what every girl wanted and I wasn’t? He wasn’t that much better.

Ugh, fuck it, he really fucking was. Everything about that dude was perfect. It just wasn’t fair. Of course Ash would choose him over me! Sure, Ash didn’t exactly know I had feelings for her, but she could have waited just a bit longer, right? I just hated that stupid boyfriend of hers. It was not normal for some college guy to live in his own house, have his own cool car, look all fucking hot and shit, and also be a good person. There was no way that was possible! And did I voice my opinion about it? Hell yes I did!

“Dude, calm down,” Jack sighed, just waiting to be able to play a couple of songs already, “you’re just pissed and jealous because he isn’t you.”

“So not true!” I gasped over dramatically. Who cared if there was some truth to it? I still had to look like I didn’t really care that much. Of course this whole thing was a big fucking deal to me, but I didn’t want the others to know it was that bad.

“Alex, stop lying to yourself,” Zack mumbled and shook his head at me.

I wasn’t lying to myself, I was only lying to them, but that didn’t stop me from defending myself, “I’m just saying I don’t like that guy.”

“I actually don’t think he’s that bad,” Rian shrugged while twirling his drumsticks around, “he seems to make Ash happy, and he seems like a cool guy.”

“There’s just something I don’t like about him,” I urged, hoping they would just understand me. It wasn’t just that I didn’t like him because I was jealous, there was something else as well, but I couldn’t quite figure out what it was. He was just too perfect to be real; no human being was that perfect.

“Can we just play this new song you were talking about?” Jack groaned out of frustration, obviously having enough of my complaining, just like the others, “I get that you don’t like him, but there’s nothing we can do about it.”

“Fine,” I grumbled and plugged my own guitar into the amplifier. If they didn’t want to understand and agree, sure they could do that. I just didn’t like that guy. No, wait, scrap that. I fucking hated that guy. The way he smirked at Ash just got my blood boiling and the look he gave her when she wasn’t looking was like he was undressing her with his eyes. That guy was acting like he liked Ash a lot, but it just didn’t seem right.

He was just simply a dick.

Notes

I feel like the next couple of chapters are going to be rushed... I don't know why, but I don't feel like spending too much time on this part of the story. You guys probably want me to get to the interesting part... right?

I feel like I'm betraying you guys right now because these chapters seem to shitty!