A Closet Romantic

Chapter 1
"Childish Antics"
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"You're late." I told Nathaniel Ryne, the other president of the Student Council flatly. He was somehow the most popular guy in school because of his looks –personally he looks like an alien-, his charms –at being a gentleman apparently- and because of his brains. Unfortunately I can't object to that, he is pretty smart. Not that I'll ever let him know I think that. His ego doesn't need to be inflated anymore because at the rate I see it inflating it'll blow up soon enough...

"No... You're just early. We arranged to meet at 11:00am and it's still only 10:58am." Nathaniel answered calmly. I was determined to finish picking out things for our Snow Palace Ball so I wasn't going to let him annoy me a bit. It's not working so far.

I started walking off, "Fine! Now come on." We walked the whole way to Blue Bird Cafe in silence. Blue Bird was the cafe situated near our school; it was where everyone mostly went because there aren't many other choices near Harps College, a high school that's pretty elite located in England.

I now have to spend my Saturdays with Nathaniel because we have to decided themes and things like that for the Ball we were holding and unfortunately that idiot lost the only copy of all the information the first day we finished deciding everything. And to think I said he had brains! So that was why I was sitting there on a table outside the coffee shop waiting for him to get the drinks and start working on the Ball.

So I just noticed something odd. I've been sitting here for about 10 minutes. So I stood up and pushed open the doors and guess what I see?

Nathaniel Ryne was talking to a very pretty blonde and so I came to the conclusion that he was definitely flirting after all this jerk can't have a civilised conversation. I saw my perfect chance. You see I have a brother and that already makes it hard to get a boyfriend but Ryne being an idiot sees me talking to a guy, and a cute one at that, comes up and asks me about my body odour problem... Needless to say the poor guy was freaked and little Ryne took a beating but I don't think that was enough. But after this we would be even!

Slyly I walked up to them.

"Hey sweetie, what are you doing? You do remember our baby needs a check up?" I rubbed my hand on my tummy and put the other so that it was supporting my back, luckily I was wearing about 3 layers, just enough to make me look a bit plump...

The blonde opened her eyes wide. Well a bonus, I'm shocking two people.

I am such a good actress! Now that idiot is going to get it. This is supposed to be bad for him... so why is there a smirk on his face?

Oh no... That's bad what is he going to do?

That annoying smirk only grew larger, "Oh, Honey! Of course I didn't forget! Nice talking to you. Come on." He wrapped his arm around my shoulders; that was about the exact moment I shuddered.

"You bastard." I muttered. And damn that smile of his.

"Oh I'm not finished... Wait I have to introduce you to someone, dear!" Nathaniel spun me around again. You know the blonde had exactly the same colour hair and eyes as Nathaniel...

"Rose meet Annie Bett, she comes to Harps as well." His smile was way too big, very big; in fact it nearly lit up the whole room. Now the blonde was looking amused as well.

Why do I feel like I've done something really stupid...?

"Aah, nice to meet you." She put out her hand, that smile was very familiar.

"Uh... yes?" Oh Lord, that sounded stupid. Yes that laughing sound was definitely Nathaniel's laugh, the same evil cackle a mental person has.

"Well Nate over here never told me about you." Rose said. I could also tell that Rose was having trouble keeping her laughter contained... Suspicious...

Score, now was the time to make this Rose scared of Nathaniel. "Oh really? I'm surprised because we're getting married in two weeks time! Plus we've already got a pretty baby boy at home!" Now after all that left my mouth I was expecting a different reaction from Nathaniel. A very different one. He was smiling, looking as if he might burst.

"Nate! How could you not have told me that I was getting a sister-in-law and that I already have a nephew?" Shit...

Cue the annoying laughter...

Nathaniel burst out laughing; I guess I may be psychic! "You know I only found out today myself!"

"Uhm... it was only a prank," My face was definitely heating up or the temperature in the room must have rose..., "Wait! You can't be his sister? I've been over there heaps of times; I've never seen you there!"

Rose smiled, "I have my own place, I rarely go back there anymore. That would explain why you haven't seen me. Now I know that your family is pretty close to ours... any chance you two are ... I don't know? An 'item'?"

That was enough to stop that annoying Nathaniel's laughter, heck he nearly choked on his own saliva. I was shaking my head furiously.

"That's a shame..." Rose shook her head.

Definitely not a shame... I opened my mouth to say that but he beat me to it.

"A shame? Definitely not a shame! Her... I mean I wouldn't stoop that low!" Nathaniel looked at me shaking his head.

Stuff that not getting annoyed by him!

I put a hand up to my waist, "Excuse me! I don't think I would stoop so low! I know heaps of guys better than you!"

"Oh yeah... Sure they might be better than me but would they want a shortie like you?"

Shortie... He's dead! Just because I was always short for my age...

"Well you're an idiot!" That wasn't the best comeback I could have come up with.

Nathaniel ridiculed me, "Please don't tell me that was the best you could come up with?"

Fabulous now he was saying out everything I thought!

"Jerk..." I murmured.

But of course he had to hear that... "Pip squeak!"

"Sorry but I'm way too mature to argue with you!"

"Oh really? Last time I remember correctly you were so mature you tried to pull out your tooth so you'd lose it before me! Real mature."

I blushed at that...

I'm just going to give you a little warning, don't try to pull out a tooth that isn't even a tiny bit wobbly. You'll just end up hurting your finger and most probably get your gums infected because you stuck your hand in your mouth. Or that might just be me?

"Nice meeting you Rose but I don't think I can stay here any longer with him!" I jabbed my finger really hard on Nathaniel's chest, unfortunately his chest was harder than my finger... In other words, pain!

She laughed, "And you say there's nothing going on between you two... See you later." Rose walked out of Blue Bird holding her cup of coffee and laughed to herself about our so-called "chemistry" because "chemistry" to me means chemicals mixing together and blowing up. A bit like a volcanic explosion!

"We have nothing going on! And there is definitely no, none whatsoever, chemistry!" We had to yell it out at the same time.

"Explain that then!" Rose told us. "It was a coincidence" We again said at the same time.

I turned to Nathaniel, "Will you not copy what I say!"

"Why am I the one copying you? I think you're the one copying me!"

Rose continued laughing, "Bye." The door closed behind her the small golden bell attached to the top of the door rang daintily.

Great! Now we wasted about 20 minutes, which only leaves us with about an hour left. That may seem like a lot of time, not if you're trying to start planning the Ball again from scratch.

I crossed my arms and furrowed my eyebrows.

I heard a laughing like sound and guessed it came from Nathaniel. "What?" I basically spat.

"Y-y-you're angry!" He was stuttering on his words because he was too preoccupied with laughing.

"No shit Sherlock!" It was hard to stop from laughing; Nathaniel did look like he was constipated, "You look like you're c-constipated!!"

He flicked my forehead, "You don't look too better either."

Now cue my annoying heart that's beating at a quickened pace... I'm going to refuse to believe that that was love taking its course like some idiotic friends of mine had said before, it's simply ... hormones!

"Well I have to go now; I have a ... date you see." Nathaniel winked.

"Have fun sticking your tongue down her throat!" I rolled my eyes.

Nathaniel pretended to look shocked, "What would make you think I would do that?"

"Do you really want me to read my list?"

"Rather you didn't... But I wasn't going to stick my tongue down her throat! I wouldn't want to make you jealous..."

Jealous... as if! "Well you could try... And you're absolutely right! You weren't going to stick your tongue down her throat, just her mouth!"

He put his hands up to his heart, "You know me so well!" And with that he walked out of the shop, the bell ringing behind him. Nathaniel was one to know how to make a grand entrance and exit; he had most of the girls' attention as he exited! Those kinds of girls make the rest of us look bad, too bad that more than half of my school was filled with the exact same kind, shallow and fake girls.

I turned to walk out as well when I remembered... we were supposed to hand in all the information to the headmaster on Monday, when we got back to school and he had just got out of doing it!

That bastard...

Before I could get caught up with that matter I heard some loud chattering from the corner of the shop.

"Oh Annie? Over here!" Jasmine O'Conner waved; she said my name in a sing song voice. Not good.

I turned around slowly. It felt like I was about to walk into my awaiting death trap. Sat down in the corner of the shop was Jasmine, Jay O'Conner a good friend of mine that I've had since Primary as well, Katie Lee a great friend of mine and Darren Gray, Katie's boyfriend. They were smiling megawatt smiles, it hurt my eyes!

One thing I've learned when your friends smile like they've won the million dollar jackpot it's usually a bad sign since they're too young to even participate in the lottery! But right now I'm not trying to tell everyone about minors and what they can't do...

I laughed, laughter was the best medicine after all..., "Hey there..."

"Sit down... sit down," Jasmine patted on the empty space next to her so I sat down, reluctantly, "You were just talking to Nathaniel Ryne over there weren't you?"

I nodded.

"...About kissing?" Jay was grinning.

Yes these four were also devil's offspring; they were obsessed with the idea of me and Ryne as a couple. I couldn't see that happening in a million years but they saw it within the end of this year. Unfortunately to disappoint them... Not gonna happen! They also found it there job to tell me every little detail about Ryne, for example his favourite things, and also every little interaction that happened between us needed to be reported to them... I'm the only sane one left...

I shuddered, "Yes we were, and I was telling him to have fun kissing some other bimbo."

Katie shook her head at me, "How can the president of our school, head of the elite," I gave her a look. She was definitely trying to use as many words to describe the position I was on the Student Council, "One more! Queen to the people be using such distasteful words." I forgot to mention Katie also had brains and also enjoyed using loads of different words with the same meaning to describe something. That was her latest craze; you should have seen her trying to work a little bit of Shakespearean language into every sentence that came out of her mouth. Once can only hear a certain amount of 'thy', 'art', 'thou' and 'shan't' before cracking or maybe we were just all way to sensitive...?

I gave her another look; one may call it an incredulous look, "Queen of the people...?"

Katie glared at me, "I like that one; it's imaginative and shows authority!"

"Agreed." Darren wrapped an arm around Katie and gave her a peck on the cheek. They were so sweet! Those two lovebirds have been together for over 2 years, they were the ideal couple! It reminded me of a book I recently read, "Chocolate Kisses" by Renee Well, one of the best romantic comedy authors there are! But of course no one really knows that I read those kinds of stories, I had always detested them, up until reading Chocolate Kisses, and told everyone that I hated them and thought they were disgusting... And I'm too embarrassed to admit that I do love and are obsessed with them now! Call me stubborn ... I do.

"Guys, please don't go all lovey-dovey and start flirting," I gestured to all the customers seated in Blue Bird, "People are watching!"

I felt someone kick me underneath the table ... definitely Katie.

Katie laughed, "But you and Ryne do it all the time!"

I think that Katie apart from being super smart and pretty she was also now an assassin and someone definitely hired her to kill me because I pretty much just choked on my mocha...

So where was I? Oh yes, my choking experience.

So after about 10 seconds of spluttering out all the mocha I recovered, "No way! Unless you count countless insults as flirting!"

"You say that now..." Jay added.

Right now that adds one more person to glare at.

"You are so going to end up with him!" Jasmine concluded. Cue countless shudders...

Hah! I'll prove them wrong because there was no way I, Annie Jem Bet, was ever going to fall for that obnoxious, narcissistic, annoying jerk, Nathaniel James Ryne... hopefully.

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A/N: Yay finished the first chapter! I have heaps of ideas for later on but I'm having trouble deciding what to put in before it...

School resumes on Wednesday... T_T 8th grade is hell...

I'm not that used to writing in first person so any tips?

Thank you for reading!

Pand-A Eyes