Chapter 9 : Awkward

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♡Jessica Woods♡

"Why are you so silent today?" dad questioned sipping his water.

"I'm always silent." I stated flatly and forked a piece of bacon into my mouth, avoiding the unusual curious gazes of my mom and my brother who were sitting across me.

"You okay honey?" dad asked concernedly, turning his full attention to me.

I'm not, dad.

I sighed and placed the fork down before looking at my dad who was sitting beside me.

"I'm fine dad." I forced out a smile at him and he searched something on my face for a few seconds before smiling back at me.

"So young man.." dad shifted his attention back to Alex and I resumed eating, tuning out as they were talking about the latest football match.

Is there anyone who'd hug me and tell me 'you're not okay, tell me what happened' when I say 'I'm okay'?
----

"What did Jace tell?" Louise asked me turning down the volume of radio as soon as I got into the car.

I let out a sigh and leaned back on the seat as I didn't know from where to begin. "Well.. he said it's better not to talk with me."

Driving the car at a slow speed, Louise gave me a quizzical look. "Why is that?"

"Because he doesn't want to break our pinky promise. Remember? that pinky pro-" she cut me off.

"Yeah, yeah. you've told me." Louise stated quietly, focusing ahead. We both didn't utter any word as she didn't know how to console me while I didn't want to recall yesterday's incident.

"I thought he'd fight for you." she broke the silence and I snorted, looking at her.

"Why would he? I mean, who am I to him? sister? friend? girlfriend?" I asked and she shrugged.

"Who knows, maybe the last one." she wriggled her eyebrows suggestively and I shook my head in disbelief.

"I'm a stranger to him while Oliver is his best buddy. So without any doubt, he would stand for Oliver." I explained and she rolled her eyes.

"Forgive me but I'm always team Jace." she pouted and I frowned playfully.

"Traitor."

She giggled and I giggled back and sometimes I've wondered what would I do if Louise didn't come into my life after my break up with Sarah.

Louise parked the car in our school parking lot and I grabbed my bag from the backseat before stepping down.

"Jessie. I wanna return the library books so you go ahead. I'll meet you in our second period." she chirped and I gave her the thumbs-up sign as we both walked in the opposite direction.

I ignored all the irritating gazes as I made my way towards the locker room. As I expected, Natasha's locker was surrounded with her friends group and all of their gazes were fixed on me except Jace's who averted the gaze to the locker when he noticed me.

Today I wasn't in the mood either to sad because of Jace ignorance or to be happy because of Samuel's intent stare so I pretended to ignore them as I walked past her locker.

"Hey." Samuel's voice made me stop and I heard Jace cursing although I turned around and Samuel nodded me to come closer and I did so.

Natasha and Samuel were leaning on the locker while Jace and Ryan were standing in front of them bu when I approached them Jace said something to them hastily and turned around which made our eyes lock with each other for a split second as he rushed past me and Natasha too muttered something to Ryan and Samuel before following Jace, calling out his name.

"What?" I asked Samuel but he was glancing behind where they both were gone.

"No no nothing. I gotta go." he replied, shoving past me which made me stumble but before I could fall, Ryan steadied me.

News flash: Embarrassment is my husband and I'm his wife, Clumsy.

"You okay?" Ryan asked, letting me go and I nodded awkwardly and he nodded back.

We both stood there without speaking anything for a minute or two.

"Jace is a good guy." Ryan said suddenly, glancing at the direction they all went. "But sometimes he's an idiot too."

I nodded absentmindedly and he chuckled. "So where's your girlfriend?"

"She's my bestie." I corrected.

"Oh I see."

"Ryan!" I frowned playfully and he chuckled again.

"I'm kidding. So where's she?"

"She went to the library." I replied and he nodded and glanced at his watch.

"Uh, I too gotta go.." he said hesitantly and I nodded, giving him a 'go ahead' gesture with my hand. He smiled and waved at me and I waved back at him.

Can't every popular guys be like Ryan?
----

"I. Hate. Ryan." Louise stated, emphasizing each and every word and placed down her tray on the table furiously before sitting across me.

"What did he do now?" I asked wearily, slurping my strawberry milkshake.

"He mocked me saying could I get even more uglier?" she frowned and I chuckled.

"He didn't mean it."

"How do you know?" she asked me, taking a big bite of her hamburger.

"Because.. you're the definition of an attractive person." I grinned.

"And you're my idol." she beamed.

"This is why I love your lies."

"Sometimes the truth could be sweet." she winked at me.

While we were both praising each other, suddenly Louise stiffened and gestured at me to look behind through her eyes but before I could, someone approached our table and pulled the chair beside me.

I turned to my left side and my eyes widened when I saw Oliver who was turning the chair to face me properly before sitting down.

"Hey." he blinked his eyes once and I forced out a smile before looking down at my plate.

Here we go again.

"Umm, shall I-" before Louise could finish her sentence Oliver glanced at her and told her that she could stay if she wants and she nodded as she didn't want me to handle this situation alone.

Despite he was looking a bit calm than yesterday, his presence was still making me nervous. Now my mind couldn't get some good comebacks too, though his words were running in my mind which gave me a little strength.

Then tell him you deserve everything. Don't cry and let their words affect you. Don't go away from him because if he does today then he would do some other day too.

"I guess I owe you an apology." he admitted and Louise choked on her food which made Oliver to turn towards her.

She smiled sheepishly at us between her coughs before gulping down the water. She didn't expect this was coming. Neither did I.

"Aren't you gonna say anything?" Oliver asked me and his voice was surprisingly calm now.

"Yes." I spoke. "I mean, you owe me an apology but.. I'm not good at forgiving."

"Oh c'mon. I'm your deputy head prefect."

"Stop saying that." I grumbled.

"Ok. Chill. Look, I don't care whether you forgive me or not, I just wanna ask you sorry." he told, standing up but I couldn't see any sincerity in his voice.

"No thankyou." I faked smile at him and he gritted his teeth before stomping off.

I sighed, stirring up my milkshake with the straw as I saw him leaving out of the canteen.

Did he really come here just to ask me sorry? Maybe I should've forgiven him.

"What have you done to my Jessie?" Louise shrieked at me and I looked at her weirdly for seeking the whole attention of the students towards us.

"Louise. what're you talking about?" I hissed and she pointed at me.

"The Jessica Woods I know, always says that she doesn't have backbone, but now.. Oh My God! She just snapped at the Oliver Smith." she gasped dramatically and I rolled my eyes.

"Drama queen."

"But this is how Jace reacted too." she informed, leaning forward.

"Huh?"

"Yeah. For the whole time he was sneaking glances at us." she told and I looked to my right and left side through the corner of my eyes but when I found him nowhere I leaned forward too.

"Where is he?" I whispered.

"At his usual place." she said, pointing over my shoulder and I slowly looked behind, tucking the strand of my hair behind my ear as I pretended to look everywhere before shifting my gaze to his table.

Ryan and Samuel were arguing like little kids while Jace was explaining something to Natasha and he was sitting straight infront of my direction but he didn't even glance at me for once so I turned back, pursing my lips together.

"You are lyi-"

"See, he looked at you." Louise uttered and I looked behind quickly before I could realize what I was doing and it made my eyes lock with Jace's. He rubbed his temples as he averted his gaze in a nanosecond.
-----

I didn't know what was going to happen in the Computer Science period but I was hundred percent sure that the period was going to be awkward.

Jace entered in with Mrs.White and she was talking with Jace like he was her long-lost friend. Jace nodded at her before approaching my direction without even looking at me.

I too pretended like he was nowhere around me. We welcomed the teacher and he pulled the desk a little so there would be a space between us. I rolled my eyes at his childish action before sitting down.

The teacher wrote something on the whiteboard while I was sneakily taking my phone out of my bag. I turned it on and scrolled down the newsfeed of Instagram just to show Jace I was ignoring him too.

I kept the phone on my lap and I could see he was glancing at me but I knew he wouldn't complain to the teacher because ignoring me means not sticking his nose in my business too right?

Out of nowhere, a link opened and before I could guess what it was, a video clip played and a slutty girl voice moaned like 'go baby go.'

Holy heavens! It was a freaking spam porn link.

"What the f-" Jace gasped and covered his mouth with his hand, turning his head the other side. I tried to exit the link but I couldn't as my fingers were trembling so I just switched it off and slipped it into my bag and looked at the whiteboard like a good kid.

The teacher was still writing on the board and I thanked God because Jace was the only one who caught me watching it as the volume was too low. My face was flushed in embarrassment and I didn't want to see his reaction.

"So class." the teacher faced us placing down the marker. "This year too y'all going to have an assignment and don't forget that it was a part of your exam." She explained and everyone nodded except me and Jace as I peeked a glance at him while he was looking down at his book, suppressing his laughter.

Sweet Jesus! He's smiling. I've seen him smirking and chuckling. But smiling? And when I was being ignored by him.. It's too much.

"I already explained it to Jace." At the mention of his name we both looked at the teacher and Jace nodded, biting his lower lip as if it could stifle his laugh. "I'm reminding you again, This is your important assignment Jace. If you fail at this there's no way you're going to pass on this subject."

He nodded again but now his face was holding no emotions.

"Right. Now we'll be picking up the partners and as we all know Ms.Woods is great in this subject so we're pairing her with Jace." she stated and I was surprised as she had never ever complimented me. "Are you okay with it Ms.Woods?"

"Yes ma'am." I nodded.

"Great! Jace and Ms.Woods, Mr.Anderson and Ms.Carter and Mr.King would be doing the assignment alone as he wished, right Mr.King?" the teacher asked Micheal and he nodded.

"Alright. Now everyone start to discuss about your topics. These are the topics you've assigned to do." she pointed to the whiteboard where she has written three topics.

"First one is for A group, second one is for B group and the third one is for Mr.King." she announced and we all nodded.

"Okay. Go ahead." she smiled, removing her glasses.

I opened the book and turned to the chapter where we could get more information about our topic and looked at Jace but he was already writing something on the last page of his notepad.

"Jace, what are you writing?" I questioned but he didn't stop writing.

"Jace.." I called his name quietly and he let out exasperated sigh before turning at me and raising his eyebrow.

"Hmm?"

"We are partners." I stated hesitantly.

"So?"

I bit my inner cheek as I realized still we weren't on good terms. "You can't do this assignment alone."

"I can't do this assignment with you, either." he stated nonchalantly and I glared at him.

"Why?"

"Don't you know the reason?" he asked, tilting his head and I sighed.

"Then why didn't you inform it to the teacher?"

"I did. But she said I should do with you as you're some kind of computer science nerd who fell from the heaven and blah blah blah. So I didn't have any choice." he said bitterly. "But I hope you'd help me out in this situation."

"Fine. Do it in your own then." I told and he gave me a tight-lipped smile.

"Thankyou so much." he said sarcastically and turned his attention back to his notepad. I cursed at him underneath my breath as I should've guessed that if any guy has a sweet side then he must has an evil side too.

Maybe Micheal could've behaved sweetly with me if I had paired with him. Why on earth was everything screwing up only in my life?

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