Remember when I said that maybe it'll get better? I highly doubt that as long as Axel is around and free. Each and every single time Aiden and I associate with each other or come close to it, Axel is there to drag me away with some inane excuse that either Professor Snape or Alejandro would confirm. Aiden was always left looking confused as ever and I would be looking annoyed as ever. Axel on the other hand had the most smug look on his obnoxious face as his excuses would be, well, excused!
I went to lengths to try and hang out with Aiden, I even tried meeting him in secret, nothing works at all. Axel was there, right at the meeting place, with the most obnoxious, atrocious, smug, look on his face with Snape right at his side. The worst part is that Snape is in on the whole keep Danielle away from Aiden at all cost plan.
We had managed to speak to each other a few times when Axel wasn't free or if we had a class together but it was still incredibly annoying that I wasn't allowed to talk to Aiden in public.
Oh and the lunch with Snape was postponed since Vera had something incredibly important and urgent to tell him. I was supposed to go for lunch with him either today or tomorrow.
Back to the point, Snape and Axel and not to forget Alejandro! They are all annoying as hell.
"Danielle? Danielle!" Aiden shakes my shoulder and I snap out of the haze I was in and look at him.
"Yeah? Yeah? What's up?"
"Miss asked you a question," He mutters to me before sliding a piece of paper into my hand.
"Oh, I'm sorry miss. Can you repeat the question, please?"
"Danielle, you need to focus in class. I asked you what you were going to do for your project, the group project I was just discussing." I frown at this and Aiden nudges me with his elbow so the teacher won't see and nods down at my hand. I open up the paper and see the words 'the origins of mythical creatures' written on it and I look at him in confusion before realising what it's for.
"Egyptian history, miss. That's what we'll be doing,"
"We? So Aiden will be your partner?"
"Um, yes miss. Unless you're assigning partners that is," I realise what I said after I said it and I wince as the rest of the class groans. They all turn and glare at me before the teacher tells everyone to quiet down and look back to the front.
"That's enough, I wasn't planning on assigning partners but maybe I should now that you all made such a big deal about this."
I try raising my hand to stop her but she already got on her laptop, the projector showing us what she was doing, and she presses some buttons before everyones names get paired together. My name was along at the bottom of the list and I slowly lower my hand before using my incisors to nibble on the side of my lip. Lip biting, a nasty habit I developed without knowing it. Everyone says it's cute but trust me, it's far from it. Everyone starts re-arranging to their partners, some looking at me annoyed as they do so, and when everyone is settled the teacher notices my name.
"Who's willing to take Danielle into their group?" Everyone immediately looks down and then at Aiden, I do so too but I see his partner holding his arm down and I shake my head at him.
"Miss, I can work alone. I'm not bad at this topic," I really wasn't plus this was a history class, how hard could it be?
She goes quiet for a little while and then sighs, "I was only kidding, everyone. Go back to your places and pick your partners." She looks at me and sits down at her seat again.
Aiden comes back and immediately apologies to which I just shrug before waving it off.
"It really isn't that big of a deal, it's okay."
"Are you okay?"
I give him a confused look and ask, "What do you mean?"
"Well no one picked you, not to be rude, but doesn't it affect you in the slightest?"
"I never thought about it before… I started getting used to it after a while."
I wasn't even lying. I hardly even noticed it this time, I just prepared to do the project myself. Jeez, Axel really must have been happy when I told him Cole is my friend.
I look at the time and see that there's only 10 minutes left for class to finish and I groan. Aiden was busy finishing some notes his dumbass forgot to copy when he bunked a class and I do not talk to literally anyone else in this class, scratch that, this school.
What made having to wait 10 minutes worse is the fact that both Axel and Alejandro were now standing outside the class, and unless they started stalking another student in school, they were here for me. Can someone please, please, please, shoot me in the foot? Maybe then I'll get some privacy or will they follow me into the operation room as well?
They keep shooting looks at me and Aiden, or in Axels case, glares and I roll my eyes. They should get paid for this or maybe even take up a job as bodyguards, I'm sure there's a girl in need of two annoying bodyguards.
Soon enough the bell rang and Aiden told me he was going to stay in class for a while to finish off the last bit of the note and I nod at him before we say our goodbyes and I head to the door. The teacher stops me before I can walk out and walks over to me.
"You need to socialise more, Danielle. I'm worried for you, there was absolutely no one willing to take you in."
"I have done nothing to anyone, miss. I'm not worried about it anyway, I've gotten used to working on the projects alone and I have tried to socialise as well. Please don't say anything to anyone, miss. I'm completely fine," I smile at her while she just sighs and I excuse myself.
My polite smile instantly fades at the sight of the two buffoons outside the class who I forgot were there.
"Do y'all need something? If so, I hope it does not involve me."
"Let's go," Axel starts walking away after that and Alejandro just shrugs at me before following.
"I'm not a puppy, you know that right?!" I walk the other way and the two are instantly by my side. "I may not be a puppy but you two sure act like y'all are."
Axel scowls at me before shoving my head away and I groan. "Don't touch my hair!"
"Stop whining, you can fix it," He walks faster and I start smoothing my hair down again.
Alejandro still hadn't said anything but I payed no attention to that because I was annoyed at the both of them. We walked down the stairs and I realised we were heading to Snape's office so I passed my bodyguards and was about to open the door but I settled on knocking first instead.
"Come in, Axel," I open the door and Snape looks surprised to see me standing there.
"Oh, Danielle, you knocked?" He utters the word in shock and I shrug awkwardly.
"Yeah, it was about time."
"Uh, yes, well, we are going for lunch today. Meet me at the gate after school," He says after he composes himself. I nod, an action I seem to be doing a lot, and turn around to walk away but the dum dums are blocking my way.
"Let's hang out. Follow," Axel walks away again and I sigh.
"I don't want to, go hang out with someone else. I have people I need to meet up with."
"Aiden? Cole? Any boyfriends I forgot to name?"
"Stop being such an ass, Axel! Jeez, you're such a pain."
"You're one to talk, your existence is a pain."
"Ooh, good burn, someone pass the aloe vera," I remark sarcastically and that's when Alejandro steps in.
"That's enough, you two are being children. Axel, Danielle can meet up with whoever she likes, stop trying to control her. Danielle just go, I need to talk to this idiot. Don't make it worse."
I walk away, albeit reluctantly, and search for Aiden. I find him talking to Cole and I look at the two surprised.
"Wow, who knew? Are y'all friends behind my back?" I ask while gasping dramatically.
They roll their eyes at me and Cole walks off so he can go to his next class but not before making plans to meet up on the weekend.
"So what did they need to talk to you about?"
"Snape needed to talk to me, not anyone else. It was just to tell me we're having lunch today."
"Are you and Axel okay? I hope this isn't on account of me," He mutter while looking at me with a guilty look on his face.
"Don't stress. You did nothing, just some stuff that happened a while ago," I walk faster and he speeds up as well. He doesn't question it and I'm grateful for that.
We get to class and take our seats but I notice something weird. Rocky is walking outside in the corridors and he stops outside the classroom directly opposite ours. Cole walks out and he looks extremely mad and they both start arguing. I see Rocky look around and I duck down in my seat so he doesn't notice me and I slowly peak at them over the top of the table. They argued till the teacher came and I see Cole flip Rocky off before storming back in the classroom. That was certainly peculiar. I didn't even know they knew each other.
"Wasn't that Cole?" Aiden asked me while looking at the now closed classroom door.
I nod at him and then wonder out loud, "What do you think that was about?"
"Don't know but it seemed pretty heated,"
We didn't get to continue our discussion because the teacher walked in and started the class. I didn't really care much for classes to be honest, I would not be going into an exact field of work unless I chose to anyway. Elementals had a saved inheritance, the five of us didn't know from where it was from and when Axel and I questioned him, him being Snape, we got nada. We stopped trying to find out after a while.
"Danielle," the teacher singled me out before she started the lesson. "Pay. Attention."
"Yes, miss." I mutter a bit annoyed and embarrassed as some kids start snickering.
This lesson peeved me more than the others even though I had maths earlier on in the day. The teacher was relentless towards me today, she asked me practically all the questions and she would constantly make me come up to the board and draw diagrams and write down examples.
Miss Sherrine, the chemistry teacher, the same teacher who was teaching Alejandro when I pranked him, it almost seemed like she was extracting revenge for disrupting her lesson a few days prior. If that was the case the satisfaction she must have been getting from this was immense. I fucking hate chemistry right now.
The class ended after what felt like hours even though Aiden and I got here late and the teacher did as well. I was not in the mood to be called on by my teacher after class so I tried to leave discreetly using Aiden as a barrier to block me from view but it was in vain {no avail}. Miss Sherrine called on me the moment my foot was out the door and I turn around with a strained smile.
"Yes, miss?"
"I need to speak to you," What could she possibly want?! I'm pretty sure she asked me every question available in the world during the class.
"Yes, miss. What can I help you with?"
"The teachers have been speaking to each other, Danielle. There are so many complaints about your socialisation skills and your attention span during classes. I need you to pay more attention, not just to your surroundings, but to your classmates as well. School is not just about learning, that's a big part of it of course, but it's also about teaching you how to socialise. You can't be ignoring the others, Danielle."
"Miss-"
"No, Danielle. I don't want your excuses. If this continues I'll have to go to Professor Snape about this."
"Yes, miss. I understand."
I walk out after she nods at me and I sigh in frustration.
"You okay?"
"I'm fine," I answer roughly and Aiden nods.
"I'm free now. You should go to your class, I might not see you after since I have to go to lunch but I'll try say bye. Just in case, bye."
I walk off and I hear Aiden shout bye from behind me and it only makes me even more frustrated. It would be so much easier to be an ass to him if he wasn't being so nice.
I pass Axel on my way down and he grabs my hand but let go after I look at him in anger.
"What do you want?" I ask him annoyed.
"What happened?"
"What the hell do you want, Axel?"
"Uh… Nothing. You can leave."
"I can leave whenever I damn well want," I grumble while pushing past him and walking to the basketball court.
I sit there for about 10 minutes before going to Snape so I can ask for special permission to get my phone early. He said no at first but then came out later and handed me my phone and reminded me not to leave. I spent the rest of my time scrolling through instagram and then I looked at my tagged photos after seeing a notification concerning them. There were three, one from a few hours before and the other two more recently. About an hour ago? I look at the notifications and find out one is from Aiden and the other two are from Axel and Alejandro.
The picture of Aiden and I was from a few days prior when we were hanging out in school. Axels and Alejandros had a few more than Aiden but all of them included me.
The first was of Axel, Ale, and me standing in front of the backdrop at one of Axels birthday parties and we had our arms around each other with the biggest smiles on our face. The second was Axel and I being photobombed by Alejandro. He jumped into the picture at the last minute and you can see Axels face morphing into his infamous scowl, in my case my face was kind of blurry since I started laughing.
I didn't really pay much attention to the rest when I saw what the last one was. It was all of the elementals gathered for a picture, this was taken when we were young and I was surprised to see Aiden and Ale in it as well. We were all so little back then… Wow. Something about the picture kind of made me feel uneasy but I just ignored it. I'm being paranoid over nothing.
The bell rings a while after I took screenshots of the pictures and posted them on my page. Snape made his way out and Axel followed.
"Ready to go?" Snape asks me and Axel stands behind him staring at me.
"Yeah, let me just say bye to Aiden."
Lucky for me Snape let me go say bye and when I came back he was talking to Axel.
"We won't be going far since I need to drop Axel off as well so we'll just have a quick lunch and come back," Axel nods before muttering a quick bye and leaves.
Snape and I walk out and to this noodles place near school, and after a long awkward silence while looking at the menus, we place our orders.
"So let's talk."