Chapter 24- Edward's POV

"So, we could incorporate art with literature, and then plan out how we're going to present them to the students and..." John trailed off and stared at the sheet of paper he was holding and then looked up at me. "You're supposed to be helping," he complained.

I smirked and took a sip from my cappuccino. "I am," I said, amused. "I'm letting you stay in my classroom and listening to you rambling about this stupid activity."

 I had to tease the guy, it was so boring here.

John rambled on. "Well it's not my fault that I'm an English teacher and the administration decided that I have to organise this when they only informed me about it a week before."  

"Yeah that's true. They've only just informed the students, so I'm hoping that there will be response." I set the plastic cup back on my desk. 

"Nah, they will attend. I'm more concerned about the fact that we're under short notice." He shrugged. I stood up and started pacing the room.

"I'm bored," I muttered. We'd been planning out this whole thing since around nine in the morning. It was five minutes to twelve now, and l was drained out, even though John had done most (all) of the work. Luckily, I had a lesson after break finished at 12.30pm, so I'd be able to shoo him away, or at least, get him to stop talking about the live-in. 

John ignored me. "Should we put in classic books or is that too, I don't know, unmodern?" he asked. I rolled my eyes and turned to look at him.  

"Whatever, man. I'm more concerned with the fact that we only have a week, meaning only three lessons with my students to prepare for this."  

Teaching is stressful. 

"Technically a week and a half now..."  

The school's administration had done the most stupid thing the previous day, when they had organised a meeting, telling us that there was going to be a live in at school, not this weekend, but the next. It was going to be filled with activities, some of which the administration had come up with, and others which they left to the teachers to take care of. And since the live in was about literature (boring to most students, I know), the language teachers had to come up with the activities, and preferably art teachers, too, to lighten up the mood. Yeah, right.   

Since John was an English teacher, and happened to be the only nice person around here, I agreed to work with him on this. He was coming up with all the ideas, and I was just there, angry because they were going to waste this week and next week's lessons. I'd have to work with my students on these topics, which meant stopping from what we were doing right now.  

"Okay." John closed the file in front of him and looked at me. "You and your students work on the designs in order to make the school nicer, and I'll take care of the activities meanwhile. Art students always have the best ideas."   

"Not my students," I muttered. "They're lazy."  I sat back down.

Right then, I heard a knock on the door and I looked up to see Ella. I smiled automatically. Life's always better when she's around. "Hey, come in love," I murmured. She smiled and entered the room, dragged a chair from the other side and sat next to me. I immediately noticed John shifting in his seat. He looked uncomfortable.   

"Hey..." Ella said. "Did you guys come up with anything yet?" Her gaze flickered towards John, who lowered his gaze to his file immediately. I couldn't really understand what was up, but I didn't comment about it.   

I answered Ella's question. "Not really. This live in thing is stupid. Are you sure this is how you want to spend your birthday?" I grinned at her. We had already talked about this.   

"As long as I'm with you, yeah," she said, and I smiled, leaning in for a kiss.   

John cleared his throat. "Um, could you guys like, be a bit more careful? The door's wide open and anyone who looks in could see."   

I turned to look at him, arm still around Ella. I decided to tease him a bit since I was in a good mood. "What's wrong John, are you jealous because you can't have your own underage gal?"   

If he thought that I'd forgotten all about the girl he'd been seeing, he was wrong. I wasn't going to let it go, not until he told me who she was. And I honestly had no idea whom she might be.  

John glared at me. "Shut up, Edward." He focused back on his work.   

Ella looked at me. "What's this about?" she asked. John's head shot back up immediately and I could see him wanting to say, Don't tell, don't tell or I''ll kill you. I raised an eyebrow and turned to Ella.   

This was mean, so so mean. But I just had to share it with her.

"John really, really liked this girl, basically, and for a while it seemed that she liked him too, but then suddenly she started going out with someone else and left him without any explanation. And he's been down in the dumps ever since."

What a great friend I am.

Ella's eyes turned to John's and he looked at her for a few seconds before tearing his eyes away. Ella turned to me. "And what does the underage thing have to do with all of this?" she asked.  

I shrugged. "The girl was underage. That's why Nathan was pestering him about it."  

Ella squinted her eyes. "Nathan?"  

"Yeah, the photo Nathan sent," I said matter-of-factly.  

I saw Ella looking at John once again, and he met her eyes once again. They looked at each other for a few seconds, until John looked away again.   

I guess I should have sensed that something was wrong right then, but I didn't. I was so stupid for that.   

Honestly, I wonder now why I never questioned how Ella and John knew each other.

A couple of minutes passed without anyone saying anything. The bell rang and John stood up abruptly. "I have to go, I have a lesson," he said, shoving his pencil into his file. Before leaving, he added, "I got another idea for the activity we're taking care of. Don't just let art students take part, let everyone. We'll read extracts from books and everyone can draw what they get inspired. Everybody could draw on a single sheet, which would be huge."   

With that, he turned and walked out of the room without saying anything else. I clicked my pen. "Okay," I said.   

The next week and a half went by in a blur. It was a busy week in which I was stressed, with the project regarding the Literacy thing and everything else in between. I barely had time to think about what to buy Ella for her birthday, but in the end I came up with the most obvious and natural gift in the world. 

 John’s POV

The day of the start of the live-in finally arrived, after so many days of preparation and hard work. It was annoying that I had been the one to do most of the work, even though I totally hadn’t been in the mood for the past week or so. 

Most of the activities which I had to take care of were assigned with Edward, so with that I did have a familiar face- my closest friend- with whom I was able to work. Unfortunately for me though, I wasn’t really in the mood to talk to him, and I had not been since the previous week. 

I just couldn’t believe that he’d told Ella about the girl… the girl who was her. I just wanted the ground to swallow me whole when realisation crossed her face and she looked at me for answers. She knew. She knows it’s her I like. And she clearly hadn’t told Edward about us two, because he was clueless. Quite dim of him, if I may say so. Ella’s face on the photo may have been blurred out, but that’s no excuse not to recognize your own girlfriend from her figure, or at least the situation, in which I look effortlessly guilty. 

Anyway, he's dumb.

Edward dropped a box next to my feet and looked at me. We were in the middle of a literary session in which the students were asked to draw whatever they felt like. It was an easy session, because everyone, artist or not, enjoyed drawing without anyone imposing anything on them. Coincidentally, Ella and her friends were in this session with us. Of course they had to be. Like making awkward eye contact with her for the past week hadn’t been enough. 

“What’s up?” I asked Edward, avoiding Ella’s glance at me. I picked up the box which Edward had dropped. 

 “Can you help me out with something?” he whispered.

I rolled my eyes. “What now?”

“It’s her birthday tomorrow and I’m dying to get some time with her. On my own, of course. Would you be able to help me out?”

Trust Edward to ask you to do the most impossible thingsin the world- and what you don’t want to do most. I shrugged. “I honestly don’t know if I can. Obviously people would notice you two are missing,” I said in a hushed tone.

Like I said, he’s dim.

Edward’s blue eyes narrowed as he leaned against the teacher’s desk. “Damn, you’re right,” he mumbled. I saw his eyes flicker towards his girlfriend’s and their eyes met. He smiled at her. I looked away jealously.

“Surely we could try?” Edward turned to me hopefully. “I mean, what’s the worst that could happen?”

I chuckled and sat down on the desk, looking at the students. “Hmm, let me see. The principal could find out by seeing you two, or he could also find out by your stalker ratting you out. That’s nice, isn’t it?” 

Edward glared at me. “I so hate you for being right. But it’s for her birthday, man. It’s still worth a shot. I’ll make something up if we get caught. I want to spend time with her on her birthday.”

Maybe I too want to spend time with her on her birthday…

But I can’t.

I made awkward eye contact with Nathan and then averted my gaze. “Alright, I’ll help,” I gave in.

Edward grinned. “Thank you.”

I shrugged once again. “No problem.

The next day was Saturday, Ella's birthday. The day passed by fairly quickly, and I can safely say that I barely managed to see Ella. She spent most of the day with Edward, of course. Since I was busy, I didn't mind that much. But at around 9pm, when all of the students were sitting together watching a film, I got bored and annoyed with Edward, for making fun of me in front of Ella the other day, and for being so lucky in his life, having the most amazing girlfriend. Where was he right now, anyway? Probably with her once again. I didn't even bother looking around to see if they were there, I just stood up and walked away, towards the English department, where I'm mostly comfortable. 

Whilst walking up the stairs, I noticed a figure walking towards me. I squinted my eyes since it was so dark, and I could just make out who the figure was. Of course. Ella.

Coincidences...

"Aren't you supposed to be with Edward?" I blurted out. I walked up the rest of the stairs to get next to her. She looked flushed.

"Oh, hey John," she said. She looked surprised to see me. "What about Edward? He's downstairs with the students. I was there too. Didn't you see me?" 

I shook my head. I guess I was too angry at Edward to notice him or his girlfriend at all. Then again, I'd made it quite a point not to look around for either of them. Yet here she was.

"No, I didn't," I admitted. 

Ella took a step closer to me. "What's up with you?" she asked. She looked concerned. 

I shrugged and forced a smile. "Nothing. Happy birthday, Ella." 

She smiled. "Thank you." She paused. "You look like you want to say something else though." She didn't wait for me to say anything else though. "Is this about what Edward said the other day?" 

I looked away, not wanting to show her how angry I felt. "What about that?" I asked.

Ella leaned against the wall. "I never really knew that you felt that way about me." 

My heart skipped a beat. I guess I should really keep away from this girl. She was driving me crazy and it was like nothing I'd ever felt like before. Seeing her made me die on the spot everytime. 

I chuckled. "I thought I made myself quite clear the first time." 

"Yeah I..." Ella shook her head. "Look, I'm really sorry for Edward talking about that the other day. He still has no idea." 

I grinned. "It's our little secret," I said. 

"And that's how far it will go."

My ears pricked up. "What?" 

Ella met my eyes. "I have a boyfriend." 

I suddenly felt very courageous. "But I like you," I said. 

Ella didn't even blink. "I know..." she said. 

"Honestly," I replied, edging so close to her that she was just a few centimetres away. This was, after all, a good opportunity. I cupped her face in my hands. She didn't move. "I'd do anything to be with you." 

An abrupt grunt came from behind me, catching me off-guard. Someone was here, and had seen our short exchange. I gulped and turned. My heart leapt out of my chest as I saw that familiar male face...

Hi guys! I'm finally updating :) Sorry that this part is awful, and probably one of the worst I've ever written, but I'm trying to keep up with a lot of stuff right now and I'm going all crazy about it. 

Basically, I started school around two weeks ago, and apart from the stress and all the work we have to do this year, school brings with it an important thing, right? Teachers. Yeah, they're basically why I have not been updating. I had a reason for writing this story, and it's because of this one teacher, whom I now have to see everyday once again... and I can't really cope with that. He's literally a much better version of Edward (without all of that crazy past, of course).

So I hope you guys understand. Thank you for your patience, and your votes and comments, I really do appreciate them. I can't promise a date when I'll update, but I hope it will be soon. Meanwhile, I've been trying to avoid (and probably will continue doing so) my teacher, even though he seems to be literally everywhere I am. And I have two lessons a week with him (yay). I just don't want to see him- it gets all worse every time I do.

Anyway, after that long note explaining one of the problems in my life (lol), I have to say, I hope you guys did enjoy this chapter. If you did, please vote and comment, I appreciate all the feedback I can get. 

And even if you didn't like it, please do tell me. I appreciate all criticism :)

Dedicated to my best friend, because she's the only one who goes through all of this stuff with me and who understands. And she's the best :)