Miss Fake

Chapter 7: Planning and Scheming

“Sky?” Nina asks from the other side of the door. I internally thank her for looking out for me and rush to the door. I unlock it and opens the door to a worried Nina.

She looks at me and then Ethan, who didn’t move from the middle of the room, looking annoyed. She was about to say something, but a guy grabs her from behind.

“Sorry,” Jake says with a smile and starts to walk away with Nina in his arms. She starts to wiggle to break free and looks at me concerned. I smirk at her and wink. I’ll be fine, I mouth to her and she smiles, relieved. She stops trying to break free and starts to giggle. She turns to Jake and gives him her seductive smile. The guy isn’t indifferent to her charm, and he put her down, staring at her with a smile. She starts to push him inside a room, and the door closes behind them.

I chuckle, leaning on the door, my arm crossed on my chest.

I feel someone getting closer behind me. I involuntary stiffen when I feel Ethan’s hands on my waist.

“You’ve got yourself one protective friend,” he says with a chuckle. I look up at his face and give him a bright smile.

“Nina is the best!”

He doesn’t answer, just smile at me.

After a few seconds, I feel awkward to stay in that position, even though he doesn’t seem to notice it. “We should go back to the party, Bryan can show me another time Matt’s autograph,” I say, starting to walk, getting away from him. I walk fast, and go down the stairs, not looking back to see if he follows or not. Once I’m down, I feel his hand going around my shoulder, and he leads the way to the sofa where Bryan is chatting with some friends. When they notice us, Bryan looks at Ethan, as he was waiting for an answer. From the corner of my eye, I see Ethan shakes his head. I ignore what just happened and move from Ethan’s arm to the place next to Bryan. I’m done doing detour, I should try Nina’s way and be more straight forward. If it doesn’t work, I can just blame it on the alcohol tomorrow.

“I don’t know if you guys know, but we are making a party by the waterfall next week,” I say, looking like if I invite everyone, but only staring at Bryan. “It’s getting warm, and we don’t have any exams, so we wanted to chill there with everyone.” We actually didn’t plan anything, and just mentioned it with Nina that it would be a good idea. And I don’t plan on everyone being invited, it will be just me and some girls I choose, and Bryan and his friends.

“I don’t know, we’ll tell you later if we can make it,” Bryan answers politely, looking uncomfortable. I cringe internally, I should be the one uncomfortable. I know I am far from being ugly, being one of the prettiest girls of the school, and I keep going to him, so why does he always reject me? I should be his perfect girl!

Ethan sits next to me, stretching his arms on the backrest, one of them next to me, meaning that if I lay back down, my head will rest on it. I turn to him, and smile, hoping he doesn’t notice it is fake and how pissed I am for him behaving that way in front of Bryan. The mischievous smirk he gives me back makes me understand that he wasn’t a fool. He slides his arm from the backrest towards my shoulder, but I move away quickly, making him miss his target.

I turn back to Bryan with a bright innocent smile, looking ignorant of what was going on. “Bryan, where should we go on Monday?” I purposely avoid to refer it as our study session, wanting it to look like a date in the eyes of the rest of the group.

Bryan looks first to Ethan, before moving slightly away from me. I pretend to not notice but boil inside. And why does he always look first to Ethan? Does he need the approval of his friend for every move he does? At school, he always looks like the leader of their group of friends, but why does he act differently around Ethan?

“We can go to the school library, I had a look at the assignment, it shouldn’t take too much time.”

“I can’t concentrate at the school library,” I say innocently, putting a lock of hair behind my ear. “We could go to this new coffee shop, I went there with the girls, and it’s pretty nice.”

“Wouldn’t it be too noisy?” Bryan asks.

“Or you could come to my house if you prefer a quieter place,” I say with a small smile, tilting slightly my head on the side and looking at him from under. I know that this move always works on guys.

Bryan’s body stiffens, looking behind me, most probably again at Ethan. Tired of this exchange of gaze that they make, I turn to Ethan, looking confused. Surprisingly, he smiles, and I don’t know why I thought he would have a different reaction.

“Wouldn’t it be easier here, since you have something to do after, Bryan?” Ethan proposes, and I frown. It’s the first time he is not cockblocking, and actually helps me. Did he finally understand that someone who isn’t Bryan isn’t going to have a chance with me?

“True,” Bryan answers, and I try to not show how happy I am. “It’s a chemistry assignment, you can help us with it since you are good at that.” My eyes widen in realization, and my smile slowly fades. No! There is NO way he is getting in my way. That assignment was my ticket for a date with Bryan, and he isn’t coming along!

“I would actually prefer my house,” I tell Bryan, trying to quickly come up with an explanation. “My parents won’t be home, and I need to look after my little sister. I can’t leave her alone.”

How am I going to explain to my parent that they need to leave Monday evening? Why is it so hard to get that guy and me alone?

“Oh, okay,” Bryan answers. “Well, that isn’t a problem, right Ethan?”

“Right,” Ethan answers with a smirk. I want to roll my eyes and sigh, understanding that it won’t work, as long as this guy is around…

It’s just until he leaves, I repeat to myself. He isn’t going to stay here long, he is just visiting his friend, and then he will go away.

“Good,” I reply with a smile. I stand up, not wanting to be around him any longer. I tell them I am going to look for my friend and leave them.

I find rather easily Addison, jumping and dancing on the dancefloor. I didn’t dance since I came here, since Bryan isn’t the type of guy to dance. I join her, and she looks super excited. She must have one or two other drinks, and I dance with her. Her energy is infectious, and I soon join her in her crazy dance, who is mostly jumping around, her hands in the air.

After some time, Nina joins us, a big smile on her face. I scream hysterically when I see her, the loud music on the dancefloor covering me anyway. I lean closer to her, still dancing. “How was Jake?”

She bites her lips, still smiling. “Am-a-zing,” she answers separating every syllable.

“How did it go with Bryan?” She asks then and I roll my eyes.

“Ethan keeps on getting in my way,” I whine, pouting like a baby.

“You didn’t have a single alone time with him tonight?” Nina asks me, are eyes widening in surprise. She puts her phone out, looking at the time. “Baby, it’s three a.m. already, you better make a move.”

I wince, exaggeratedly depressed. “I can’t with him cockblocking me every single time,” I answer looking in Ethan’s direction. I am not even surprised to see his eyes on me. I smile at him, too used to fake my smile at the people looking at me. Nina turns around to see the group of guys chatting, looking at the dancefloor, and stealing glances at us.

“You know how to get rid of a cockblock?” She asks me with a devilish smile.

I shake my head, but smile, knowing she has a plan. She looks around us until she spots the person she is looking for. She tells us not to move, and we keep dancing, following her with our eyes. She goes to Jake, who was with Nathan. She comes back toward us, hand in hand with Jake, who looks confused.

“It’s about Ethan,” she starts once she arrives in front of us. Jake smiles looking at me.

“What about Ethan,” he asks, still looking at me even though it was Nina who talked to him. I refrain from a wave of anger, knowing I’m already the one associated with him. What did that guy say to them?

“I’m interested, hook me up with him,” Nina says, turning Jake’s head toward her.

He looks at her with disbelief. “He isn’t interested,” Jake says with annoyance.

“I don’t care, I am interested,” Nina insists before leaning to his ears, a devilish smirk on her lips. “You better be my wingman or I’ll tell everyone how you gave me an STD. And, trust me, I’ll make sure that there will be NO girl in Ravendale who would want to sleep with you.”

Jake looks at her, frightened, and Nina answers with one of her smirks. Jake seems to be internally debating, still with that horror expression on his face. Finally, he sighs, nodding, knowing that if Nina doesn’t get what she wants, she will go until the end of her threats. “Nina, you are freaking scary,” he tells her before walking to the guys. I hear her giggle.

They stop talking when we arrive, and Jake bring Nina next to Ethan. “Ethan, have you met Nina? She is an amazing girl.” Urgh… I would have hated it if I was interested in a guy and my friend tries to help in that obvious and lame way. It's a good thing that Nina isn’t really interested and she is only helping me. And knowing her, she probably wouldn't even care.

“Hey, handsome,” she starts leaning on his chest, her hands playing with the collar of his shirt. Yep, she definitely doesn’t care. “We didn’t have the opportunity to talk, and I would love to get to know you better…” she trails off, suggestively.

Ethan looks at her, confused and a bit disgust. I want to punch him right now, NO ONE is allowed to look at Nina, and being disgust. That girl is gorgeous and amazing!

His gaze turns then to Jake, still confuse.

“Dude, please. She is blackmailing me,” Jake says honestly, giving him puppy eyes. “And she is pretty cool,” Jake adds before glaring at Nina, “except when she threatens you,” making Nina giggle.

“How weak are you if you get threaten by this girl,” Ethan answers in a laugh. Nina smiles at him, seductively, and takes both his hands in hers. She starts walking backward, dragging him along with her. Jake joins his hand in front of him, begging his friend to do as she says. Ethan rolls his eyes, but go along with it. She leads him outside and seeing this makes me feel like it isn’t right. It is a weird feeling, like I shouldn’t let them go. I shake my head, looking back at Bryan and Jake.

Addison gets the hint, and takes Jake by the hand, saying she isn’t done dancing, and she needs a partner. I smile shyly at Bryan, who looks uncomfortable. I tell him that I’m a bit tired after dancing and that the music starts to hurt my head, and fresh air would be nice. Bryan nods, and we start to go outside. I know I am completely taking advantage of the fact that he is a gentleman, and he won’t leave me alone after I said that. I know that Nina and Ethan went through the front door, so I make sure we go to the garden. We sit by the pool and start chatting. Soon, the mood changes, going back to the comfortable one we used to have when we talked. He only started changing behavior toward me when his friend came, but now, it feels like before. It feels good.

I don’t know how much time we spent chatting, and laughing. Bryan is a really funny guy, and I really enjoy spending time with him.

At some point, the conversation comes to Ethan. I don’t know how I let it happened, but Bryan asks me what do I think about him.

“I don’t know, I just met him…” I answer vaguely.

“He likes you a lot, you should spend more time with him, you will like him too,” Bryan says, staring at the stars in the sky.

I sigh, and lean on the floor, facing the stars as well. “How could he like me; he doesn’t know me…”

“He doesn’t need to, to know he likes you,” Bryan answers, shrugging his shoulders, before leaning on the floor next to me, our legs still in the pool.

“I like someone else,” I answer truthfully, tired of the fakeness, all of a sudden.

“I think you should give it a try; I know you both and I am confident in saying that no one will ever suit you better than him,” Bryan insists. I can’t refrain from a bitter chuckle. I changed everything in me to be the one that suits Bryan the best, to be the one and only for him. I’ve always hidden my true nature around him, being the cute and innocent girl, he likes. He doesn’t know who best suits me.

“And you? What do you think of me?” I ask him, turning my head to him, looking at him with hope.

He looks back at me, looking sorry, and he doesn’t need to speak up to know what he is about to say. “I think you are an amazing girl, Skyler. You are smart, gentle, really beautiful, and have many talents; but we just aren’t meant to be together.”

I turn back to the stars, not wanting him to notice the tears that are forming in my eyes.

“Ethan is a great guy; you should really give him a chance. He will make you happy,” Bryan adds, noticing my tears.

“Why won’t you give us a chance? I’ll make you happy,” I say, turning back to him, not caring that my tears are falling on my cheeks.

“That wouldn’t be fair, you are meant to be with him,” he says lowly, removing with his thumb the tears that were on my cheek.

“You aren’t fair,” I answer in a whisper. Bryan doesn’t answer, and removes his hand from me, looking to something behind me. I turn to see Ethan standing afar, looking at us.

“You will realize it one day,” Bryan murmured, referring to Ethan and me. I don’t know what makes him so sure about that, but it feels like I won’t be able to change his mind.

I sit back suddenly, and dry my tears, for the second time of the night. “I don’t know why you are saying that to me, but I won’t give up,” I add, smiling at Bryan. I stand up and leave him there. I walk past Ethan, not wanting to look at him, even though I feel his glare burning me, and following me until he can’t see me anymore, lost in the middle of the teenagers.