The next morning I woke up like a zombie with a bird nest instead of my hair and bags under my eyes. I got up from the warm cacoon of my bed sheets and head towards the bathroom. I cleaned myself up and got ready for school looking pretty presentable not like the zombie a few minutes ago.

I went downstairs to find my brother eating his breakfast. "Hey" he said.

I didn't make any eye contact with him. I was still pissed at him. "Hey" I replied coolly. He didn't notice my change in behaviour and continued eating like an ape.

After our quiet breakfast we head to Ashton's car and made our way to school.

"wats up Jessie? You seem awfully quiet today." He said.

"Nothing, just deep in thought." I say still not looking at him.

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When we reach school, as usual he pecks my forehead and says goodbye. He then makes his way deeper into the school,not going towards our friends. I catch Jace's eye who is near one of the lockers and gesture towards my brother.

Jace nods when he gets what I was trying to say then follows me where Ashton has gone.

We see Ashton entering an empty classroom and hide ourselves near the door of that classroom. We wait for about 10 minutes, completely quiet until Ashton comes outside. He is not alone.

With him is the same red headed girl I saw in the park. They are laughing at something and holding hands.

Up close the red headed girl is much prettier with orangish red hair and grey eyes. She is shorter than Ashton by some inches and has freckles on her nose. Her smile is the best part on her face that lights up her face and makes her look a little chubby from the cheeks.

When they saw me and Jace there,their smile melts away. We both are standing near the door with our arms cross over our chest and narrowed eyes. Ashton and that girl immediately leave their hands and look at us with guilty expressions.

"Hey" Ashton stutters.

"Hey?Seriously!?" I say in disbelief.

"What's going on?" Jace asks.

"What?! Nothing!" Ashton says trying to maintain his cool.

"Stop trying to bluff Ashton and tell us the truth." I say sternly nodding towards the girl.

He signed. "Well as you know now....... This is my girlfriend Veronica."

"Girlfriend!!! You are kidding me!" I say. "When did this happen?"

"Ummm...Just a week ago." He says scratching the back of his neck.

"A week and you didn't even thought of telling us?" Jace asks with a raised eyebrow.

"I was gonna tell you but-" Ashton starts to say something but Veronica stops him and starts saying instead of him.

"But I asked him not too." Veronica completed the sentence. Her voice was not shrill,it was a little deep and mature. I immediately had a liking towards her. She sounded mature and good natured and was perfect for my immature brother.

"Not too?Why?" Jace starts to ask.

"No worries. We will deal with it later on. First Ashton tell me how did you meet her and how did you start to date?" I ask directing my question to my idiot brother.

"Me and Ver" he looked fondly at her before continuing and I knew from that moment that my brother was a gone case. "Met in the library. I was looking up something for my project and she was there too.We talked once and  coincidentally met the other day too. From then we became friends and started meeting regularly and then.....You know." He shrugged.

As he said something about the library,me and Jace looked towards each other and then I looked away, blushing.  Curse my stupid crush!

"Oh my god! You both are so cute,I am so happy for both of you." I say hugging both of them.

"Veronica,I am Jessica. It's soo nice to meet you and I am so happy that Ash found someone like you. I am sure that you will be there for him and help him when the thing in his head is  out of order." I say to Veronica, earning a glare from my brother,  then add quietly "I can see that he likes you very much." As I say that Veronica blushes a deep shade of red.

I laugh at her reaction and pull at my brother's hand. "Come on."

"Where?" He asks.

"To our friends. You are gonna tell them." I say but then stop when he freezes at his spot and look at Veronica.

A silent agreement goes between them and atlast Veronica nods. He lets me pull him towards our friends.

When our friends get to know about Ashton's new girlfriend they all give different reactions. Sydney threatens him and say that if he'll hide something as important as this it will not end well for him,Hannah just smiles and give both of them a friendly hug,Zach bro hugs Ashton and shakes hand with Veronica and atlast Brad punches Ashton lightly at the head and says "where were you hiding this beauty before" earning a glare from Ashton.

Everybody welcomed Veronica to our group warmly. She really was a great person who had a great sense of humour and got along well with all of us mainly with Hannah. Hannah and Veronica later discovered that they had the same taste in almost everything thing from TV shows to boy bands and immediately started talking about it but were disturbed by the bell. We all parted to go to our respective classes.

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The days passed by, more and more, nearing my birthday. The 4rth of  June,my 18th birthday. It was only a few days away. God,I was so excited,atlast I was turning into an official adult. But one thing that bothered me was that my friends, my group of idiots were getting distant from me. Whenever I neared them they used to trail off the thing they were talking about and started on another topic. I got the feeling that they were hiding something from me,even Jace and Ashton. I tried to ask them and tried to get a hint but it was all in vain. After a while of trying I gave up thinking they'll tell me eventually.

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