Chapter 5

Kat leads Lizzie to a plain wooden unmarked door at the end of the hallway, their chemistry classroom for the semester.

She'd explained that last year's seniors had changed the room numbers to confuse the new juniors to the school. In the time passed, no one had bothered to renumber them. Luckily, Lizzie discovered that Kat was already in most of her classes, making her Lizzie's unofficial tour guide.

Kat pushed open the door waltzing through with Lizzie following shyly behind. Everyone stared as she entered but instead of standing awkwardly at the front of the room like she'd dreaded, Kat grabbed her hand pulling her to a seat at the back.

The room didn't resemble a chemistry classroom, it was painted a basic white with plastic desks planted symmetrically across from each other. There were no workspaces or sinks to conduct experiments however there were long wooden cupboards leaning against the back wall that held their chemistry equipment.

Gaining her attention Kat poked Lizzie's arm, gesturing to the boy beside her, "This is my friend, Donovan"

Lizzie's eyes go wide as she studies him. Donovan looked like he had just stepped out of one of those famous Hollywood films. Wavy blond hair that fell just short of his face, with matching surf blue eyes. He wore a white t-shirt that barely hid his toned body, along with his high cheekbones and flawless smile, he resembled the perfect boy to bring home to her parents.

"Hey" Donovan grins, revealing two rows of perfectly straight white teeth.

"Hi" Lizzie mumbles meekly. She was at an immediate loss for words, expecting him to give off a brusque or uninterested comment due to his perfect looks. She was surprised at his easy-going and relaxed attitude.

Kat leans over whispering in her ear, "Your staring"

Heat rises to Lizzie's cheeks as she swiftly averts her eyes. She bends over to look in her bag to hide her face. As her face begins to cool, she arranges her stationary utensil on her desk.

"I know he's gorgeous" Kat continues in her soft tone. "But sadly, he's already taken"

Lizzie doesn't let the revelation crush her despite her heart still racing fiercely against her chest. She liked being single she reassured herself. Life was uncomplicated.

Kat grabs her essentials for class, lowering her voice she turns to Lizzie.

"Now, I know I'm biased but if you like the look of him you should check out my brother"

"Your brother?" This piqued Lizzie's interest. How many gorgeous people did Kat know?

"Apparently he's the hottest guy in the school at the moment"

"Second hottest" Donovan juts in, leaning over Kat's desk. Lizzie hadn't realised Kat was speaking loud enough for him to hear. "But I would stay away from him Lizzie. You seem like a sweet girl and even though he is my best friend, he has zero respect for the female race"

"He's right" Kat adds disappointedly. "You don't want to be on his radar Lizzie. He's nice to look at but not touch. She laughs to herself cynically,

"He's currently in this off and on relationship with this girl but she'll be gone by the end of the week replaced with some new girl who thinks she'll be the one". Kat sighs, "It frustrates me to death"

"God, he's not that bad" Donovan turns directly to her, his features filled with shock. "You make his sound heartless"

Kat ignores the accusations. "I basically just repeated what you said" She shrugs, "You're not the only person who is allowed to bad mouth my brother" She arches her eyebrows daring him to argue.

Donovan raises his hands in surrender, shuffling his chair an inch back. "I'm not going to argue with you, we both know who would win," He says bitterly.

"Anyway, Kat you shouldn't worry" Donovan continues, his tone turning sympathetic. "This behaviour will stop once he's found his mate"

Kat draws in a sharp breath as Donovan freezes, his eyes going wide in trepidation.

Lizzie looks between the two of them, confused by their sudden change in actions.

"What do you mean by mate?"

"Ummm. What he means..."

The door slams open, cutting Kat off. In walks their teacher.

A middle-aged man who from stress or bad genetics had managed to go completely grey. He knew the school couldn't fire him without a valid reason, so he spent his classes handing out online quizzes he found on the internet.

"Everyone quiet, the next person who speaks will be receiving detention" He shouts, shuffling to his desk.

Out of fear the class falls quiet, placing his steaming mug of coffee on the table he grabs the crumbled quizzes from his bag.

"If anyone has any questions, please see me after class". He grunts, assigning one of the students at the front to hand out the quizzes

Lizzie receives the paper, just from a brief glance she knew these questions were beyond their year skill set.

Lizzie turns to Kat, still expecting an answer for what "mate" meant, but she just nods her head to the teacher at the front of the classroom, indicating that she couldn't talk.

Slightly frustrated, she tucks it into the back of her mind, she'll ask Kat later.

Suppressing an audible groan, she picks up a pen and starts the impossible chemistry equations.

Her next subject was maths. Kat introduced Lizzie to Cassandra. Similar to Lizzie's personality she was also shy around new people, but Kat sat between the two of them allowing the conversation to flow easily.

Kat also informed her that Cassandra was Donovan's girlfriend. Lizzie immediately understand how they were suited for each other, not only was she beautiful with her long blond hair, clear face, free of makeup and model-worthy outfit, she was surprisingly easy-going similar to Donovan's disposition.

The bell rings signalling the end of the class. Lizzie packs up her maths, quickly jotting down her unfinished questions at the corner of the page. She would need to finish those this afternoon.

Getting to her locker was like traffic on the highway at 5:01 pm. Everyone shoving their way through the crowd to grab food. Kat left quickly, travelling to her locker located at the opposite end of the school.

With only twenty minutes for break, Lizzie abandons her apologies as she forced her way through the school halls.

The cafeteria was of a similar design to Everdale. Students cramped around crappy tables shoving food down before the bell rang. Lizzie scrunched her nose in disgust, smelling the cheaply made food wafting around the cafeteria. There was hardly any ventilation with all of the windows closed to keep the frigid air out. Hopefully, by the summer, they would be able to eat outside.

Scanning the area, she quickly found Kat and her friends sitting to the left on a table by the window.

People stare at her as she walks by, she keeps her head low, avoiding eye contact. Lizzie wonders how long was she going to remain the 'new girl'.

"So you've met Donovan and Cassandra," Kat says as she takes a seat next to her.

She glances over at them, they were sitting together like two little love birds. Lizzie was glad that she liked Cassandra, it made watching them cuddle more tolerable.

"The guy in front of you is.."

"Jack" He states abruptly, barely looking up.

Lizzie's immediately taken aback by his attitude.

"It's not you" Kat mouths, nodding her head towards Jack. With his coal black hair that shadowed his face. Lizzie thought it would be best to avoid him. He was obviously unhappy that Kat had brought the outsider to their group.

"So Lizzie" he drawls. She can already feel her stomach bubbling nervously as she lifts her face. His steely eyes are raised catching hers. "We've never had a hu-"

Kat cuts him off almost immediately, narrowing her eyes in warning. "An outsider sit with us, we've never had someone from another town sit with us"

Lizzie frowns at their interactions but ignores it. She was new to this group, she wouldn't be able to understand every strange interaction they did.

"So, where are you from," Donovan asks as Cassandra snuggles closer to him.

"My old home was in Everdale"

"In Everdale?" Donovan questions his voice strained as his features darken slightly. He shares a look with Jack whose face remains impassive. "Did you know someone named Henry Castill?"

Though he was calm, Lizzie heard the tension underlying his sentence. She was surprised that they knew the name of her best-friend.

"Yeah, I know of Henry. We didn't really talk a lot, but he was much liked by everyone"

"Of course, he was" Jack mutters, his revulsion evident.

Lizzie tries to comprehend what just happened. Why had the atmosphere at the table dropped so suddenly?

Why did her hometown stir so much angst amongst her new group of friends?

"Is there some feud between the towns that I don't know about?"

"You have no idea" Jack grunts, rolling his eyes at Lizzie's obvious ignorance.

"I've lived in Everdale my whole life, and never once heard of it"

"It's kind of ancient history," Kat says taking a bite out of her banana. She plasters an easy smile on her face. "I wouldn't worry about it. It's mainly between the founding families"

The table seems to calm slightly, but both Donovan and Jack still looked edgy, like they could jump into attack to defend their city's honour at a moment's notice.

This would be a good idea to change the subject Lizzie thinks. "Do you know who the Blacks are, I was warned to stay away from them"

Kat chokes on her banana.

From their reaction, she's expecting them to say the name belongs to a group of thugs that live on the outskirts of town.

"My name is Katherine Black"

She tries not to let the surprise show, "Your last name is Black?" This couldn't be right, maybe Henry had gotten the name wrong. Kat's surname couldn't be Black, she looked harmless. She hadn't envisioned their friendship ending after only two classes.

"Lizzie, what are you thinking," Kat asks

"I don't know. I think my friend got the name wrong" From across the table Donovan communicates something inaudible to Jack.

"I think your friend was warning you against my brother" She laughs buts it's strained. "I can't believe Aiden's notorious reputation has travelled all the way to Everdale"

Embarrassment stirred within Lizzie, she couldn't believe how quickly she'd made a mess of things. She goes to grab her recess, they probably didn't want her to sit with them.

Kat clutches Lizzie's hand. "Don't leave" she says. "Just because you're from Everdale doesn't mean you can't be our friend. She surveys the table, daring someone to speak up. "We're not that prejudiced"

No one says anything, not even Jack who Lizzie thought would grumble.

Lizzie sends Kat a thankful smile, as she picks up her recess finishing it before the bell rung in a few seconds.

The table quickly returned to normalcy as Kat starts a conversation about her recent assignment.

Lizzie holds in her sigh as she glances around the table, wondering how long they were going to remain her friends.

...

Kat and Cassandra also shared the next two classes with Lizzie, History and French.

History passed quickly, according to Kat, Aiden was supposed to be in this class. Despite his so-called notorious reputation with women and Henry's warning to stay away from the Blacks, she couldn't get his name out of her head.

She hadn't even met the guy and yet he was all that had consumed her thoughts for the last hour. Something was seriously wrong with her she thinks as she leaves the class hiding her unanswered history questions in her workbook, she would quickly complete them tonight along with her pile of unfinished work.

Her next class was French, but their teacher was homesick. Their substitute handed them a sheet of paper with questions asking them to translate French to English. The three of them sat at the back spending the lesson talking like everyone else.

"Why wasn't Aiden in history," Lizzie asks, the question leaking out of her before she can stop herself.

"My brother?" She rolls her eyes, shaking her head displeased. "He's skipping class as usual with another girl. I wouldn't worry about him honestly, just stick with me and he won't make a move.

"Oh, okay" Lizzie wasn't sure why she felt disappointed. She should feel grateful that he wouldn't harass her.

"Also, I forgot to tell you earlier, I'm throwing a party this Friday night at my house. You should come along"

"I'd love to," Lizzie says trying to hide the shock. After what happened during break, she didn't really think that Kat would want to stay friends.

"You'll get to meet all of our other friends as well"

Other friends, Lizzie thought how many people did she know? In Everdale Henry was her only true friend, now in the space of just five minutes she had made three new friends.

"Where do you live?" Lizzie asks, hoping that she lived within walking distance.

"You moved into the house at the end of the cold-de-sac?"

"Yeah"

"That's perfect, I'm to the south of you probably a twenty-minute walk.

This brought a smile to her lips, Lizzie liked to run so she knew it would probably only take her 15 minutes to get to her house.

"That's so convenient," Lizzie says, not fully believing how close her new friend was.

"Do you guys get the view of the forest as well, I was hoping to explore it this weekend"

"NO," Kat and Cassandra say in unison, alarming Lizzie.

Their surprise outburst shocks her, reminding her of a moment in Everdale when she went exploring the forest without Henry. It was one early morning and she couldn't be bothered ringing him, so she went alone.

When she arrived home, she found him in her front garden pacing. He was furious with her, despite the fact that she'd returned safe.

"Sorry" Kat apologises, "We didn't mean to scare you but..."

"Let me guess, the woods are a perilous place for me to go venturing by myself"

Cassandra looks at her strangely, a frown creasing her forehead. "Are you telepathic?"

"No" Lizzie laughs. "My best-friend had similar rules" She smiles sadly, her thoughts consumed with being back home.

"Do you miss it, Everdale?"

"I miss my best friend more than anything we were really close, so close that we could've been soul mates"

Lizzie doesn't miss the shock that slips onto the girl's faces, going just as quickly as appears. She doesn't have time to think about it as the overhead bell rings, signalling the start of lunch.

The three girls begin to pack up their things eager to head to lunch. As Lizzie departs heading to her separate locker, she hopes that lunch will be uneventful. All she wanted was one normal school day.