MesonHill’s Anem

Chapter 4: The beginning

Aria stormed over towards the group. She carried an angry look in her eye like she wanted to physically hurt someone. That wasn't necessarily a look that was uncommon for Aria but everyone feared it. Once she reached the table she sat down in a huff. 

"What's got your knickers in a twist?" Axel asked but probably not in the most appropriate way. 

Celeste's gaze flitted around between the others, looking for some sort of sign of whether Aria was about to blow her top or remain calm. With the look Aria gave Axel, after his comment, it was clear she was going to flip out.

"Would you just give over being your idiotic self for one moment? Can't you see I'm clearly annoyed?" Aria snapped at Axel, who continued to push her buttons by pulling his bottom lip down and pretending to cry. 

Aria launched herself out of her seat towards Axel, her hands outstretched and aiming for his neck. He was knocked backwards off of his chair, with his legs flailing in the air. Aria was straddled on top of him, throwing several punches at his already reddened face. Axel squirmed underneath her strong grip and uttered several slurs beneath his breath. 

"Aria! Cool it!" Shouted Fawn, running over to rip her off of him. Celeste followed her immediately, but Aria was in too much rage for them to be able to pull her away.

"Beck, give us a hand, would you?" Fawn yelled to him. He rushed over to help, and with the help of his strong build, Aria was torn away from Axel. 

Fawn and Beck carried her back to the table, whilst her legs were still kicking in the air, as she tried to pry her way out of their arms. But, Celeste stayed with Axel and attempted to help him to his feet. He stumbled a little, but other than a few red splotches on his cheeks, and a minor split in his lip, he looked well. 

"You alright?" Celeste asked. He replied with a thankful nod and smile. She didn't believe him, though. She knew that the marks hurt, but Axel always carried a very orotund manner, and would never admit that he was hurt. 

Celeste hurried over to what was being put out on the lunch buffet to fetch some ice from the lemonade jug and wrapped it in a napkin. She brought it back to the table, where things had settled down now, and passed it to Axel. He looked at her and rolled his eyes, clearly offended that she thought him to be so weak. He took the ice regardless and looked away with a weak smile in his expression and a pink tint to his cheeks. 

"Aria, now you're calm, what happened?" Fawn questioned in a soft tone. She placed her hand on Aria's knee to let her know that she was concerned about her.

"It was Mr Rhodes. I was literally just talking to Jaxon about the work. I know it doesn't sound believable, but I honestly was! And then, he calls me out, not Jaxon, and starts saying," Aria formed quotation marks with her fingers, as she exclaimed "and, I quote 'Balker, quit flirting with Jaxon, he's not interested. And, for talking in class, that's detention.' It was so embarrassing! You guys know I don't fancy him." 

Celeste was confused. She had actually assumed that the two were together, from what she had seen in the corridors. They would always wait for each other to go to class and would be hung from each others' shoulders half of the time. Celeste was sure she'd even heard people in the corridors talking about the two being together, but, apparently, all of that was something that friends did, too. They certainly looked like they were together, anyway, and it definitely wasn't just Celeste that had noticed. 

Celeste gave a questioning look to Axel, who once again rolled his eyes and raised his eyebrows, almost inaudibly saying 'I know, don't go there'. She smirked at him, then turned back to face Aria, whilst she pretended to look concerned about her so called traumatic experience in class.

When the situation had simmered down, Axel apologised to Aria for provoking her and she kindly thanked him. They were soon back to messing around playfully, again. Axel still needed to ask Aria about going to France, explaining why he'd actually bothered to apologise, but now wasn't the right time to tackle the question. 

However, Axel had other ideas. He had clearly decided it was better to do it sooner, rather than later. Right at that moment, he caught Aria's attention and blurted out the question. 

"Aria, do you wanna come to France with us to find the Zirkyan stone?" Fawn, Beck and Celeste shot each other shocked looks. 

Celeste thought that there was no way she would agree to it. Not in the state she was in. Not in any state, really. It was Aria Balker. She was one of the nastiest people that Celeste knew. 

"You know what, I wasn't even listening to what it was or how to get there but, yeah, whatever. Why the hell not?" She laughed exhaustingly.

"Wow, and we thought you'd be hard to convince!" Exclaimed Beck, who was taken aback at how easy it was to get Aria on board. 

"Well, I probably need to get away from Jaxon for a while, so people don't think anything of what Mr Rhodes said," Aria explained herself. Axel scoffed at her response. 

"I knew there'd be some sort of catch. You're not doing this for the group, you're doing this for yourself. Classic Aria move." He said, smirking slightly. 

"You know me." Aria grinned slyly, as she replied. 

"So that settles it then, we're going!" Celeste cheered. Beck sat up slightly, crossed his arms and rested them on the table. 

"Not quite, Cely. I said I wanted it all planned out first." Beck said. He was trying to be harsh, but that was hard for him to do because he was such a nice character. 

"When are everyone's next free periods?" Celeste asked. 

They each relayed when they would have an hour to spare, and it appeared that only Fawn, Axel and Celeste would have a free period together for the remainder of the week. 

"That's alright." Celeste directed her explanation at Beck. "Fawn, Axel and I will plan the whole thing tomorrow afternoon and get back to you." 

Beck thanked her politely and, for the remainder of the period, the five of them prattled on. The bell soon rang, and it was time for the group to head to their lessons for the rest of the day.

...

Wednesday afternoon came along swiftly. Celeste had been in lessons all morning. She had Chemistry first, Art second, and finally, Physics just before lunch. 

Aria had her detention during lunch that day because Mr Rhodes was supposedly busy Wednesday night. Whatever he could possibly be doing that would make him so busy on a school night, was a mystery to Celeste. Since when did school teachers have lives outside of school? Especially MesonHill teachers. They lived there! 

Aria's absence meant that there would be little discussion about the trip to France until Beck went to his lesson at 2 pm as the group tended to keep quiet about it around him. Instead, lunch was spent with the four of them chatting about how Aria clearly liked Jaxon. 

"It's so obvious! And, Cely, when you looked at me yesterday, when she was going on about how she doesn't fancy him, I was trying so hard not to laugh!" Axel was practically howling now, though, and not holding in any of that laughter that he had the day before. 

"Well, I thought they were together! It wasn't until she said that I realised that they weren't." Celeste laughed along. 

"I honestly don't see what she sees in him. He's such an i***t. Like, he's not even good looking, is he?" Beck said. He had spent a whole five minutes ranting about how much he disliked Jaxon. It actually appeared that's somebody disliked him more than Celeste. The others all joined in with added insults now and then, but Beck mostly took charge. 

"So, we're all in agreement then? He's a jerk, and only Aria can't see that?" Asked the giggling Celeste. 

"Yep! Seriously, if she ever entertained things with him, I don't know if I could be friends with her. Could you imagine having him sat at the table with us?" Fawn cringed at the idea of Jaxon being associated with them. 

She had a lot of respect for Aria, though Celeste couldn't understand why, but Jaxon really hit Fawn's nerves. Axel and Beck both agreed, and the conversation carried itself for the remainder of lunch. 

The 2 pm bell rang later,  signalling Beck to head for English class. They each said their goodbye's, and once he was gone, Fawn, Celeste and Axel got straight down to business.

"Right, the big question. When do we go?" Asked Celeste. "I'm assuming in one of the holidays? I'll just tell my parents that I'm staying at MesonHill, because of the exams coming up. What will everyone else say?" 

She waited for a response, as Axel and Fawn thought about their alibis. Fawn reached down under the table and picked up her bag. She fetched out a notepad and a pen, taking the lid of the pen between her teeth, and beginning to make notes. Then, she stopped and looked at Celeste. 

"My parents won't miss me. I usually stay here with Beck in the holidays, anyway, so that rules both of us out of being caught." Fawn said. 

Axel also seemed to have had an idea, as he leaned forward in his chair and snapped his fingers. 

"I can sort out transport and my alibi. My brother, as you know Fawn, is nineteen and has a license. He can drive us, and we can just tell my parents that he's taking me on holiday with him. They're quite chill about letting us do what we want, so they wouldn't have an issue with it." He exclaimed. 

Celeste hadn't even thought about how they would get there, considering they all weren't old enough to drive yet. She wasn't even aware that Axel had a brother, but she sure was glad that he did, now. 

"As for Aria, she usually stays at school in the holidays, too, but tends to hang around with Jaxon more than us," Fawn said. 

"Oh god, Jaxon!" Celeste sighed, "Aria will just have to tell him that she's randomly going home because a family member is ill. That doesn't sound suspicious, right?" Asked Celeste, hoping that her suggestion would work.

"Hmm, that could work. What about passports for travelling? Wouldn't we have to go home to get them?" Axel asked, rubbing his chin. 

"Kids that don't usually go home much," Fawn started, "like Beck, Aria and I, usually keep our important documents here ready for any school trips they decide to take us on. Cely, you could tell your parents that you can visit them for a night just to see them, and then come back the next day to 'study'." 

Fawn had made a brilliant point. There was always the chance the school would take them abroad on a trip, so they would need their passports. And, if they didn't go home much, then they would have to keep them at MesonHill. 

"Fawn, you're amazing! All we need now is someone to book ferry tickets, find us a place to stay, and then we just need to find money from somewhere. I don't mind booking it." Celeste realised that money could be an issue for some people, but she didn't want to bring the matter up straight away. 

"The money won't be an issue for me because my parents will know I'm going on holiday," Axel said. 

"I can ask my sister back at home to send my stash of money in my room here through the post, without Mum knowing. I can pay for Beck too.  I know his family don't have much money, so I don't mind doing that." Fawn exclaimed, continuing to surprise Celeste with how kind she was. 

"We'll split the money for Beck's place," Celeste said, wanting to help Fawn. 

"Thank you." She smiled, "Anyway, Aria makes money here at school all the time, buying sweets at the pound shop down the road, and selling it to the year seven's. It's crazy how much they will pay for a lollipop, honestly!" Fawn laughed at how sly and clever Aria was for getting away with selling sweets to students. 

"It's all sorted then. I can get my money when I go home for the night. Name me a date, and I'll book it all." Celeste was beaming with excitement.

"October 25th. The holiday starts on the 23rd, but that gives everyone enough time to get their stuff together." Axel said. 

That was the next upcoming holiday. It was only four weeks away. There was still a lot of preparation to do before then,and finding a hotel on such short notice was going to be hard. But, Celeste put her working mind aside for a moment and realised that this was actually happening. 

"Perfect!" Celeste said as Fawn wrote the last details down, in her notepad. 

It was finally sorted. Now, they just had to relay everything back to Beck and hope that he was on board.