"What does a girl like?" Alexander thought out loud.
He was sitting with his friends during lunch hour, which luckily coincided for the three again. At his sudden question, Travis slowed his sandwich-munching and Taylor scrunched up his face in confusion.
"Who cares?" Taylor said matter-of-factly, the other nodding along.
He should've asked another girl instead of those braindeads, but he lacked female friends for some mysterious reason.
"That's why you both are still virgins" Alexander muttered hatefully.
The f*ck did this fat loser say? Both his friends felt pretty much insulted, as if their manhood were questioned.
"Excuse-excuse me? Maybe HE is, but not me" Travis defended himself, offending Taylor even more "I-I've had some experiences, you know? But I won't go presuming it around, out of consideration for you two".
"HAHAHAHA" Taylor laughed at his friend's blatant lie.
The trio's bickering lasted for another ten minutes before Alexander realized their own stupidity and brought back the original topic.
"My birthday's getting closer and I'll invite a girl-friend. I want her to feel comfortable"
Like last year, Alexander planned to celebrate his upcoming 15th birthday. Obviously he couldn't return to the U.S right now, so he'll 'borrow' a classroom with Principal Lowe's permission. He'll allow it as always and even would help coordinate with the birthday child's parents and School Administrates to arrange the place, including a birthday cake, drinks and music system after normal school hours. The birthday child and its guests could also party past curfew time or go sightseeing some of the nearest towns, accompanied by an authorized guardian of course.
He had remembered to invite Bianca this time, feeling very guilty about forgetting last year and eagerly wanting to compensate her. Like how could he had forgotten? Maybe it was because they stopped all contact when he moved away, or because he got new friends after that, or because her gloomy, lackluster look when they met again made her fade into the background…
Anyway! She went through a lot losing her parents so tragically, so of course Bianca wouldn't be all smiles and giggles like other girls. And being on her own among those nasty witches which clearly bully her whenever they can doesn't give her any more reason to, Alexander finally realizing it with those ridiculous rumors spread about her and how no one defended her.
D*mn, her life s*cked balls. As in super-big ones, like elephant's b*lls.
As the man he was, it was Alexander's responsibility to fix his mistakes and protect the girl like his father wanted to from the beginning. She was practically a member of the Hamington household after all. Besides, poor Bianca wouldn't be able to survive without his and his family's intervention for too long.
She was condemned to be weak until death.
Her fate was to serve and submit to a powerful family of magic users in exchange of protection, a tradition that's being going on for ages. Strong warlocks would pair-up with equally-strong or stronger witches or, in worse cases, with remarkable humans and increase their family influence either in the financial, military, politic or scientific spheres. For example, Alexander knew his father was initially interested in his deceased (God bless her kind soul) mother for her money, only later on falling for her for real.
Alexander didn't have any hard feelings for it towards his father, that's just how it worked. Besides, his father never stopped pampering and treating her like the goddess she is even after her death. She probably was his only soft spot.
Just like her mother, Bianca was truly sweet and sensible, but unfortunately Alexander came to find out much later. The damage was done but he'd do anything to get his friend back. However, he wasn't stupid enough to not notice Bianca's reluctance to get close to him, let alone to talk, so he couldn't approach her so carelessly.
During those days of birthday party-planning, rumors of Bianca's purulent infection still circulated strongly. That gave Alexander even more reasons to invite her, so she would cheer up and realize she wasn't alone in this school and its horrifyingly-boring country: she still had him to rely on. That also meant he couldn't invite any of his classmates, except for Taylor and Travis, for fear of them misjudging Bianca and making her feel bad but so what? Alexander didn't care about any of those d*ckheads anyway.
Oops, wrong!
There was someone else among his classmates who also was on civil terms with Bianca: Peyton Sammuels, his annoying classmate. He had seen them together many times already, especially during their club activities. Bianca always stuck close to her like a lost puppy, irritating him for no reason.
What was so good about that brute, masculine b*tch? Her tomboyish ways were going to stick to Bianca sooner or later, how disgusting! Girls are supposed to be delicate and caring, it's in their nature. Peyton was an abomination, but unfortunately his friend seemed to weirdly like her so he'll have to seriously consider inviting her to his birthday party too.
Just when Ms. Anna had gone out of the classroom to look for some teaching materials, Alexander turned around and leaned towards Peyton, who was previously checking something from her notebook.
"Hey, Peyton" He called her, but was ignored in return.
Conceited b*tch, he thought.
After a couple of tries, the girl finally surrendered and payed attention to him, visibly annoyed.
"Come to my birthday party"
"Huh?"
"It's the day after tomorrow, my birthday party. Come"
"Eh? No?" She scoffed.
"C'mon! There'll be free food? Past curfew time?"
Before Peyton could reply, the boy sandwiched between them exclaimed:
"I want to go too! Me too! Alex, I'm also invited, right?"
"I don't know, eh… no, you aren't, sorry"
"Why not?"
"Eh… limited seats, sorry dude" Alexander lied, shrugging.
"How come Peyton's invited and not me?"
"I want her there for a reason, dude, haven't you caught on?"
Peyton raised her eyebrows in amusement while the other boy was already making far-from-reality speculations about Alexander's and Peyton's relationship, smirking mischievously. Smells like another interesting drama! Unfortunately, Ms. Anna came in at that moment, so their conversation had to be disrupted.
Only during the next class shift, Alexander revealed to Peyton (quite privately and to the curiosity of other gossipy classmates) he wanted her on his birthday to convince Bianca further on going herself. Peyton's amusement increased, making her smirk at the boy.
"You'll have to invite another guy too" She said "If he goes, Bianca surely will go too"
Alexander frowned. Bianca wasn't close to anyone except for himself (kind-of).
"His name's Dereck"
Peyton's 'cooperation' wasn't out of kindness but, instead, she was more interested in seeing the assh*le getting intimidated by Dereck if he went overboard with poor, little chicken (Bianca). It's not that Peyton herself wasn't confident about her fighting skills, but she didn't want to dirty her hands for someone like Bianca, for whom she wasn't even sure if she liked her or not.
But Peyton had to at least try to be civil with her, for Dereck's sake. Her warlock friend clearly cared for her, a lot.