Happy new year! Here is another update! I want to finish this book by the end of the year, or summer.

As soon as Maitreyi and her friends had all gone home after comforting her about Diamanté, as well as helping her choose an outfit for tomorrow, her mum and her sister wanted to talk to her.

Diamanté from school had asked her to be his personal tutor at school today, and she was going to go over to his house tomorrow since it was Saturday.

Maitreyi had suspected that her mum and her sister wanted to talk to her about this, and she was right. But before making assumptions, she wanted to double check.

"So what did you want to talk to me about?"

Like she didn't already know the answer.

"It's about this Diamanté kid," Khadijah had said to her daughter, sitting down next to Maitreyi on the bed, along with her sister at the same time. "So I had a talk with the headteacher about him and thankfully he has good grades."

Even though Diamanté had good grades, he had known very well that he could have gotten better grades, which was when Maitreyi tutoring him had come in.

"You did what?"

"She was concerned that she had wrongfully said yes to you going to help Diamanté out tomorrow," Avantika had chirped in, not saying anything else. "She just wants you to enjoy yourself, but aside from that you seriously need to be careful out there as well."

This was the first time that Maitreyi was given permission to go to a boy's house.

Perhaps if Diamanté wasn't a good student and/or he had gotten worse grades then Khadijah would have said no for sure when Maitreyi had asked her to go to his house.

"Yeah, you know what some boys are like. Some are good, however you should still be careful out there. I just don't want you to risk anything."

"I appreciate you, mum. And you too, Avantika. I promise I'll be fine. Nothing will happen. Plus, I'm pretty sure that Diamanté's mum will be at home all day anyway. So we won't do anything we're not supposed to. Don't worry."

They had hugged her, with Maitreyi thanking them. Minus her having to deal with Natalia, her life was pretty great.

She had a lot of people that had cared about her, whether it was her friends or her family. Now all she had to do was wait for tomorrow.

---

Tomorrow had soon come, with Maitreyi having to use Google Maps to go to Diamanté's house because she didn't know where it was.

Diamanté had texted her the address, and since his house was pretty easy to find, she didn't need much help looking for it.

His house was a lot bigger than what Maitreyi had thought it was going to be:

Becoming more nervous the closer she was to it.

As Eucharia and Saniyah were busy at the moment and Candi Rose wasn't, Maitreyi had talked to her on FaceTime throughout the journey.

"How do I look, Candi Rose?"

Maitreyi was wearing a light blue leather jacket, a black and white long sleeve stripy top saying you are beyoutiful on it, dark slightly ripped jeans and white Adidas converses too.

She was wearing a bit of make up, but not too much as she didn't exactly like it. Candi Rose had given her some make up tips on the way here - which Maitreyi wasn't really listening to yet she was still grateful.

"Girl, you look fine." Candi Rose had admitted truthfully. "Looks don't matter. You don't need to stress about anything. Just be cool. You're not in school."

Was that supposed to be advice or something?

If so... what exactly did it mean?

It wasn't good advice, although it wasn't bad advice either. It was mediocre.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"I feel like in school, you can't really be yourself because everyone kind of wants you to be someone else. Or, you just unconsciously become someone else because you're trying to fit in. Which is something you shouldn't really do. But outside of school, you can be whoever you want to be, as long as it's good!"

She was right - even if her theory had only applied mainly to people that had cared what other people had thought.

Maitreyi was slowly starting to care less about what other people had thought of her.

Unfortunately Maitreyi had still thought that Natalia was her friend, not knowing that she really wanted her life to be ruined, and she was going to do anything to make that happen.

"I'm so scared."

"Diamanté doesn't bite! And neither do his brothers. Trust me babe, you'll be alright!"

Maitreyi had completely forgotten he had brothers. What if Stevonté and Kyriacos were there too?

She wouldn't really have known unless she had found out, so rather reluctantly she had pressed the doorbell, waiting for a response.

"I just pressed the doorbell."

"All right, sis. Good luck! I hope all goes well."

Why did this seem as though it was a date? It was just a study session, right?

Stop it. You're overthinking this. It's too early for this. It's only 1PM.

Rather loud but censored old school music had played inside when Diamanté had gone to open the door.

Don't be young and foolish
You don't know what you're doing
You don't know what you've lost until she's gone (gone)
And her pretty face, drove you wild
But you ain't have that Snoop Doggy Dogg Style

Signs by Snoop Dogg. Maitreyi had realised after she had heard the song. Classic. They have good taste in music.

"Yo, Maitreyi!" Diamanté had greeted her, which had turned into a hug. "You're kinda early, but it's okay."

She was early? She didn't even realise.

"How early am I?"

"Ten minutes, but it's not that deep," Diamanté had beamed at her. "Come inside. You look fantastic."

He had seemed genuine about that, and he was. Diamanté hadn't looked so bad either - he was wearing a lilac coloured tracksuit, matching slippers and his hair was in cornrows.

He had told Stevonté to turn down the music, with him and Kyriacos also greeting Maitreyi when she had arrived.

So far, so good, Maitreyi had thought to herself, although she actually had nothing to worry about because Diamanté and his brothers were raised well.

Maitreyi was kind of concerned that Diamanté's brothers were staying here, but it was revealed they weren't.

Both of them had basketball practise to go to at the moment, greeting them goodbye before eventually heading off.

After they had gone, Diamanté had led Maitreyi to his living room, asking her if she wanted anything, more specifically drinks.

"What type of drinks do you have?"

"Apple juice, pineapple juice and then some," he had replied. "Mainly juice. Don't worry though, I know I look like I'm the kinda person that drinks alcohol but I'm not. I'm not allowed to, and even if I'm not - why would I? I don't want an early death."

That had made Maitreyi faintly smile for some reason, as she had kind of wrongfully been judging him, then she stopped judging him.

In the end, she had settled for apple juice, with Diamanté telling her kindly to wait patiently as he had come back with some.

As she was waiting, and as she had gotten ready for the study session, her phone had pinged.

It was Eucharia, wanting to know how things were going.

I hope he ain't doing anything he's not supposed to, sis!

Don't worry, girl. It's perfectly fine. 😅❤️ he's so sweet and respectable. There's nothing for you, and me too for that matter, to worry about.

Eucharia had typed something, which Maitreyi couldn't wait long enough to find out as Diamanté had come back earlier than Maitreyi had thought he would.

He had given her the apple juice like she had requested - yes Khadijah had told her to never really accept food from someone's else's house unless Maitreyi was very familiar with them - but she couldn't resist.

Just as Diamanté and Maitreyi were about to get started on said study session, his mother had come inside, having a go at Diamanté, regardless of the fact that Maitreyi was there.

"Diamanté, I thought I told you to clean your room this morning!"

"Mum, I have a visitor right now. Can I do this later?"

"No, I told you to do it now!" His mum had yelled at him, ignoring Maitreyi staring at her blankly but not on purpose. "So go do it! Your brothers have, so why can't you do it too?!"

Rolling his eyes, Diamanté had gone upstairs, with his mother apologising to Maitreyi, asking her how she was at the same time.

They had engaged in small talk, and as Maitreyi was waiting for Diamanté yet again, she had managed to read Eucharia's text message from earlier on.

If things go well with Diamanté, then maybe I can have Stevonté 😍😍

She had liked him for some time, and hopefully the feelings were reciprocated.

Girl, seriously? 🤣 Diamanté just got in trouble anyway. I hope he's okay.

Trouble for what? And kinda sounds like a red flag to me.

Red flag? Eucharia, everyone gets in trouble. And he didn't clean up his room.

Eucharia had unintentionally left her on read because she had to do something, which Maitreyi was unaware of.

Diamanté had come back ten minutes later as Maitreyi was texting Eucharia, taking a deep breath and sitting down.

"I'm sorry you had to witness that."

"You okay?"

He had nodded, but Maitreyi could tell that he didn't really mean it, so she had hugged him, and vice versa.

"If it makes you feel better, I get in trouble quite a lot of times too. Compared to my sister, anyway. She rarely does."

"Thanks," Diamanté had smiled faintly, then frowned solemnly at his own expense as well as what he had to put Maitreyi through. "But don't worry - I don't normally get told off like that, especially in front of someone. This was just a one off."

They had gotten started for real this time, and Diamanté as well as Maitreyi had put their phones away.

It had turned out that they had a lot in common. Diamanté was a bit unserious at first as Maitreyi was testing him, however things had gotten better eventually.

The study session was supposed to be five hours in total. Thirty minutes had gone until something had just dawned on Diamanté.

"Oh yeah, that reminds me. Something kinda strange had happened yesterday at school, slightly after I had asked you to tutor me."

Not saying anything, Maitreyi had looked at him blankly, wanting to know what it was.

She hadn't known that Natalia was on her case before, but she was just about to find out.

And it wasn't pretty - at all.