Chapter Three

As soon as I entered the science lab, my nose was immediately hit with the smell of Bunsen burners and chemicals, unfamiliar to my nostrils. Flora was sat in our usual seats at the back of the class. Her blonde hair was easily spotted from where I was standing.

However, when I walked over to the seat, I was not met with her usual warm welcome since her eyes were glued to her phone screen, scrolling through a Facebook page. "Since when do you use Facebook?" I asked, knowing that I had only seen the app being opened on my mom's phone.

I used it only to speak to family members, and to be notified when it was someone's birthday, which I could never seem to remember.

"It was my last resort to find Caleb," before I could respond, she spoke again, "did you know that he doesn't have Instagram, Twitter, or Snapchat?" she emphasised like it was the end of the world.

I stared at her for a while before I could conjure up a response, "Who is Caleb?" I asked, the name being the only thing on my mind after her rant.

As a reply, she thrust her phone into my face to show me a profile picture of a face I already didn't want to be familiar with. Even though he had a straight face in the photo as he stood with some other people, I could sense his smirk already.

"From this, I have learnt that he is a Capricorn, he has a mom, a step-dad, an older brother and a younger sister." She said without letting out a breath. Before I could even be impressed with how much she had found out, she carried on.

"His older brother lives in Europe somewhere and his little sister lives with him." She finally said, keeping her eyes firmly locked on his Facebook page like a possessed stalker. In the photo, the boy stood beside the young girl I assumed to be his sister, but I didn't see any sign of an older brother.

I furrowed my eyebrows at her, "how do you know he has an older brother?"

"Oh, I learnt that from everyone else." She seemed pretty proud with her findings as she locked her phone and threw it in her back pocket after seeing Mr Davies walk into the room.

Despite the fact that it was Chemistry, one of the most boring classes on my timetable, Mr Davies was the only teacher to make a tedious subject sound almost, fun.

However, the room suddenly fell silent, like it did in the halls. The boy, now known to me as Caleb, followed it. He was circling his wrists with his hands, rubbing the area that appeared red underneath his fingers.

"Oh my god," I heard Flora whisper slowly from beside me, but I wasn't listening to her. Instead, I was looking at the boy again. His eyes caught mine for the second time before a stupidly familiar smirk plastered onto his face again.

"Caleb Andrews is it?" The boy nodded hesitantly at Mr Davies, ignoring the worshipping eyes of everyone sitting around the class. "Welcome, take a seat," Mr Davies said to him, scanning the room before finally pinpointing the seat next to me.

Mr Davies' smile lifted as he looked straight over to me, "Gabriella Hart has a spare seat, you can sit there for now," the teacher said before going back to write on the board.

I threw my head into my arms as I felt the glares of jealous girls looking my way. If they wanted to sit here, I would gratefully give up the seat to anyone.

He slowly walked over, keeping his eyes locked with mine. I struggled to tear my eyes away from his glare. Annoyingly, he scraped the chair out; making a noise that would cause anyone to shudder.

Much to my discomfort, he slumped down in the seat next to me after throwing his bag to the floor. "Isn't Gabriella a name for someone in high school musical?" I bit my tongue at his first remark towards me; I could already tell we weren't going to get along.

Instead of replying, which I so desperately wanted to do, I kept my words trapped and stared ahead.

For the remainder of class, he had attempted to get to me in some way shape or form, without even knowing me. At one point, I was tempted to grab something from a shelf and throw it into his face, whatever it may be.

After many attempts at ignoring him, the heavenly sound bell eventually rang and I dashed out of the room, forgetting about Flora. I waited outside for about five minutes after everyone had exited the room.

Where the hell was she?

After a lack of patience, I looked in to see an excited Flora talking to him. My eyes rolled automatically as I looked over at their interactions.

From what I could gather, he looked a little bored, but was able to mask the expression with a smile. It angered me that it had hardly been one day and Flora was already throwing herself at him.

Its not like I didn't want it for her, but I already had a bad feeling about him, despite him only sitting next to me once. Instead of waiting for her, I made my way to my next class. I had a late card now because of her.

And him.

All of the classes up until lunch went by fast, thankfully. Soon enough, my ears were graced with the sweet sound of the lunch bell. It was hardly a great sound, but the meaning behind it was enough to make me jump out of my seat and run to the cafeteria.

As I walked in, James and Flora were sitting on our usual table in the corner of the room, looking like they were playfully arguing about something. I smiled happily at seeing them before I walked over and sat down.

I pulled out a pot of pasta that I had made the night before. Every day I would thank myself for making something from home, since all the cafeteria food seemed to give off an abhorrent smell, almost making me gag.

"How were your first classes?" James asked the both of us as he threw an arm around my shoulders, giving Flora her title of third wheel. I don't think she ever minded though.

"They were-"

"Caleb was in all of mine so they were great," Flora interrupted, smiling happily. I fake smiled back, knowing that the boy she was so passionate about was definitely trouble.

As if on cue, he waltzed into the room, only holding onto a water bottle and striding straight towards where we were sitting. Many people still stared up at him. Obviously the hype of the 'new boy' had yet to die down.

Why was he walking towards our table?

As he reached us, he smirked ever so slightly and leaned down to whisper something into her ear. After he finished, he stood up from a tomato red Flora and walked back out of the cafeteria, still relishing in the attention he was getting.

What a jerk.

• • •

"Wow, it smells nice, what are you cooking?" my mom hardly ever cooked, so this was all new to me. "I'm cooking for seven actually." I nodded in a confused manner as she looked up at me.

She gave a small laugh before continuing to cook, "I bumped into an old friend today," she told me whilst whisking a bowl and stirring a different pot at the same time.

"So, how does one person make four?" I asked, hoping that she got her numbers wrong and she had only invited the friend and not the whole family.

"She's coming with her husband, son and daughter." I nodded slowly and backed out of the kitchen. After a long day, the last thing I wanted to do was to socialise with people I didn't know.

"They will be here at seven so get dressed," she called as I began to walk up the stairs to my room, "the son is your age, and the daughter is Kylie's, so you'll have someone to talk to," she cooed as I threw my head down to the floor.

Great.

I changed into some plain black jeans and a white off the shoulder top. It wasn't fancy, but it probably wasn't something I would wear everyday. Comfort came above everything when it came to picking my clothes.

As soon as it reached seven, the doorbell rang loudly through the house. I scrunched my eyes together before plucking up the courage to walk downstairs and greet whoever was at the door.

Kylie walked ahead of me, smirking innocently but with a hint of smugness. Where she had a girl to talk to, I was left to converse with a boy that probably went to my school. Therefore, we would probably have to get past the awkward notions about which classes we were in.

When I walked downstairs, the door was already open, revealing a tall woman and her husband. They both wore comforting smiles and had food already held in their arms. The girl next to them was pretty.

She had beautifully long blonde hair that fell just above her elbows and was already smiling when the door was opened.

However, when my eyes moved upwards towards the next person, bile threatened to creep up my throat, and I suddenly wasn't hungry anymore.

"Shit," I wasn't able to stop myself from cursing as I stared up at the piercing eyes, and the knowing smirk of Caleb Andrews.