Highmore Manor

I stared at Jesse and then to the door in shock.

"Jesse?" Jesse's dad asked again.

"Uh yeah, just wait Dad, I'm getting dressed," Jesse called out. The thought made me blush slightly as he said it. Jesse turned back to me and then suddenly pointed at the wardrobe, he went over to it and opened the doors.

"Get in here," he whispered, beckoning to me. I ran over lightly and climbed into the huge wardrobe. "Don't make a sound," he hissed before closing the doors.

The doors were the kind that had angled slits in them so I could see through it as he walked over to his bed. To my surprise he stripped off his jacket and slowly began unbuttoning his shirt revealing his nicely toned chest, probably to fit in with story that he'd only just got dressed but it made me blush again and get this weird feeling in my stomach. He glanced over at the wardrobe door, or me, and then opened his bedroom door slowly. Principal Reed walked in.

"Ah Jesse, I was just coming in to check that you still had the invitation for tonight," Mr Reed said immediately walking over to Jesse's bedside table to search for it.

"Uhh yeah, I have it," Jesse replied going over to a bookcase at the end of his bed, picked up a piece of paper and handed it to his father.

"Good, good, I was starting to think you'd lost it," Mr Reed said with a pathetic laugh.

"That's not really why you came in here is it Dad?" Jesse asked slowly re-buttoning his shirt. Mr Reed glanced down at his feet and then back up at his son. I realized just then how alike the two were. They both had blonde-brown hair - although Mr Reed's was shorter and darker - and they both had fine, handsomely chiseled faces with strong jawbones, both had deep, velvety English accents and they were both built in the same way, broad shoulders and obvious muscles under their clothes. Even though Mr Reed had to be in about his mid-forties he was still just as hot as Jesse, even for an old guy.

"Well no, you're right, Jesse," Mr Reed replied. "Mrs Lourdes has informed me that Camilla has requested a seat next to you at the dinner. Apparently Camilla in vying to win your heart," Mr Reed said with a joking wiggle of his eyebrows.

"Dad," Jesse groaned glancing at the wardrobe again.

"What? She fancies you Jesse, and she's rich," Mr Reed said with a shrug.

"Is that all that matters, Dad? Because apart from fancying me and being rich there's nothing much else that would attract me to her," Jesse said; my heart fluttered as he said it.

"Well I thought she was pretty enough," Mr Reed shrugged again.

"You're being incredibly vain," Jesse pointed out. "She's horrible to all the first years and scholarship students," he said glancing at my wardrobe as he said scholarship students.
"She only thinks of herself and how amazing she is at singing, I would never go for anyone like that." Mr Reed sighed.

"Well there's no way of getting out of sitting beside her, I already accepted Catherina's offer," he said. Jesse nodded slowly.

"I'll just have to put up with her for one night then," Jesse said. Mr Reed nodded and headed towards his door.

"I'll see you in half an hour, son. Don't be late," Mr Reed said walking out of the room. Jesse relaxed his shoulders and then glanced up at the wardrobe. He came over and opened the doors.

"You are more trouble then it's worth," he groaned leaning against the door frame again. My heart was officially broken at that sentence.

"Oww, thanks for offending me?" I said pushing past him. Jesse carried on staring at his clothes. "I think I'll be off now. It was, again, fun while it lasted. Even being stuck in a wardrobe," I said heading over to the door.

"Mmmm," was all Jesse said. I glared at his back and then went out his door, tempted to slam it after to me but decided against it. I was halfway down the corridor when I realized I had no idea on how to get back to the main part of the school. I sighed and ran back to Jesse's door and knocked. Jesse opened the door and stared at me.

"What?" he asked a little bit rudely.

"I'm lost," I said with a small, innocent smile, Jesse just rolled his eyes.

♥♥♥♥♥♥

We walked down the corridors in silence. I looked purposefully away from Jesse and out the windows at the view of the courtyard instead. Jesse had very kindly offered to take me back to the lobby before going off to the party he was attending. I wanted to ask him what the party was and why Camilla was also invited but after he'd 'offended' me back in his room I decided I didn't really want to talk to him.

But I did anyway.

"So, Camilla Lourdes, huh?" I asked in an almost boring voice.

"You heard all that?" Jesse asked in the same voice.

"Well yeah, I was right in the room with you," I said in a condescending voice.

"I was hoping you would have temporarily blocked your ears for that part."

"Well you're out of luck," I said. "I always knew Camilla had a thing for you."

"Yeah, well I don't fancy her, so she's wasting her time. She's too snobby and up herself. No one can know that she fancies me though, Hayley, it will upset the school. My dad says the only way it won't is if I go out with her, but I won't do that. Don't tell anyone what you heard. Or about me being the Principles son, no one else knows apart from Ryan and Alex," Jesse replied turning to look down at me.

"I won't say a word, wait they know?" I asked, Jesse nodded and decided he didn't care enough to elaborate.

"Would you like to explain to me why you were in the Principals Suites anyway?" Jesse asked still looking down at me.

"Uh well I was taking a walk and found myself there and got lost," I said pathetically.

"Ok, just don't do it again. You could get in a lot of trouble, others have been expelled for it," Jesse said almost helpfully.

"What do you care," I muttered, still a little hurt that he thought I was trouble. I mean I know I was looking around in an area of the school that I wasn't supposed to be in, but what was the worst I could find there? Jesse?

"Hayley, I didn't mean what I said back in my room, I didn't realize I would offend you so much," he said, I stared down at my feet. I didn't know why it was affecting me so much.

"It's ok," I managed to say back.

"And, Hayley," Jesse said grabbing my arm and stopping me dead in my tracks. I turned to look at him.

"Yeah?" I asked looking up at him.

"I'm…" he started.

"Hayley!" a voice exclaimed. I looked away from Jesse, a little angrily, he had sounded like he was about to say something important. We had arrived in the foyer without my knowing and Callie was standing up the top of the stairs staring down at us. Jesse groaned. I turned back to him.

"She ruins everything," he muttered to me, so quiet even I could hardly hear it. I stared at him, wondering what he meant.

"Tell me later," I said quietly back.

"Yeah whatever, I'm late," he said angrily, he turned quickly and stalked away from me. I watched him walk away then turned to look up at Callie. I walked up the stairs towards her and stopped beside her.

"Did you have to do that?" I growled.

"Oops," she said coolly.

"He was opening up to me a bit, Callie. Just because your relationship isn't going well doesn't mean you should spoil other people's chances at one," I snapped and weirdly regretted it immediately. She narrowed her eyes at me angrily then stormed away from me down the stairs leaving me standing at the banister staring at the glossy wood.

♥♥♥♥♥♥

I woke up on Saturday morning with a headache.

I lay in bed for ages just staring at the ceiling, immensely glad that it was the weekend and I didn't have to get to out of bed.

Callie had changed from my best friend in the world, apart from Payton, to some stuck-up mean girl who was almost falling in to league with Camilla, Brittany and Phoebe. I was beginning to question how loyal I had been to her at the start and wondered if she was only nice to people who were nice to her.

I groaned and held my head in my hands, swinging my legs out of my warm bed and glanced at the clock. 7:45am, still rather early for a weekend. But I sighed and climbed out of bed I went over to the bathroom, brushed my hair and dismissed the feeling of Déjà vu.

I stared at myself in the mirror; I had become a lot paler in the time I had been in England. My once dark tan was still there but slowly disappearing. My green eyes were a lot brighter, perhaps reflecting the brightness of the flora around me. My hair wasn't as unruly as it had been back home; it now fell around my shoulder in wavy, light strands instead of knotted curls. The sea breeze had made it like that somehow. And best of all my skin had completely cleared; it would make me happy if that was all that had changed.

I smiled at myself, and then headed out of the bathroom and into the corridor.

As soon as my feet hit the carpet-less ground I gasped. It was freezing. It was weird having it be cold in the middle of October, I was used to it getting warmer by now because in New Zealand we have Christmas in summer.

I mean Ryan and I had gone down to the beach in the spring and only the water had been freezing cold. But now as I stood s staring at the ice-cold floor I realized how freezing it really was. I stood in the hallway looking like a freak for a few minutes before running back into my room and slipping on socks.

I walked down the hallway with my now warm feet saying 'hi' to random people I walked past. I walked to the cafeteria and sat down at one of the seats. After a few minutes I started shivering, regretting the fact I hadn't put on a jacket as well as my socks.

"You should have brought a coat," a deep, English voice said. I looked up at Jesse; he was standing beside me holding out his jacket.

"I was just thinking that myself," I said with a small smile. "But I'm fine."

"Just put it on," Jesse growled lightly chucking it into my lap then sitting down beside me on the bench. "So you couldn't sleep again?" he asked.

"It's 7:45, I'm allowed to be up at this time," I said as i put his jacket on.

"But you and Callie normally sleep in until 11:30 on a weekend," Jesse pointed out.

"True," I nodded slightly. I watched him stare down at his hands. After a few minutes he started talking again.

"You know, you're the first girl who has kept on being nice to me after I've said I don't want to talk to them," he said quietly.

"Is this a lead on from yesterday, before Callie interrupted us?" I asked.

"Just listen, don't talk," he said, I muttered 'whatever' under my breath and then stayed quiet. "The only reason I don't like Callie is because she got really angry at me when I first told her I didn't want to talk to her and tried to get Ryan and Alex to stop hanging out with me," Jesse said quickly.

"I get that. She's being really horrible to me at the moment," I said.

"You're fighting?" he looked up at me in surprise and I nodded. "What about?"

"Umm, clothes," I lied; he stared at me for a few minutes and then nodded slowly.

"I always thought you two were really close," he commented.

"I thought we were too, but she's almost turned into a Camilla replica with this charade," I replied.

"Why don't you apologize?"

"I want to, but every time I think of it she'll say something rude or look at me like she's really angry at me. I'm starting to doubt whether she's really as goody-good as she seemed at the start," I confessed looking down at my hands myself.

"She's a goody-good, just a goody-good with a temper. You get on the wrong side of her and it's the end, she just blows up," Jesse said. We sat in silence for a few seconds.

"Why are you suddenly being nice to me?" I asked looking sideways at him.

"I have no idea," Jesse shrugged with a slight smile. I smiled slightly too and we fell into silence again.

"Why don't you want to talk to people?" I asked gently.

"I just don't," he said simply.

"So, you want everyone to just accept the fact that you don't want to talk to people?" I asked turning to look at him again.

"It would be easier," he replied.

"Well you can't just tell people you don't want them to talk to them and then just go on with life like you hadn't just completely rejected them," I said.

"You don't understand," he said stiffly looking away from me.

"Then explain, what is there to understand Jesse? What, that you just hate everyone apart from Ryan and Alex, and you can suffer through brief confrontations with me? Because you haven't exactly made it clear what it is that everyone is supposed to understand. You just ignore people and be anti-social and think that people aren't going to wonder what your problem is," I said softly, careful to not let my anger get the best of me.

"I don't have to explain myself," Jesse said.

"It would be easier," I quoted him looking at him pointedly.

"We aren't having this conversation," Jesse said standing up suddenly.

"Jesse don't do this," I said standing up too. "I keep trying to talking to you and we always fight."

"That's because you also happen to be the most stubborn, persistent and annoying girl that has carried on talking to me after I told them not to, to carry on from our previous conversation," Jesse said not angrily but in that voice that made it sound like he was. I stared at him a little shocked.

"You know who you remind me of? You remind me of Darcy, you're all full of some sort of pride and prejudice just like him. You are just as insufferable as him too. I can't help but get angry at you basically every time I talk to you," I said.

"Then don't bother talking to me," Jesse said, his face just inches from mine. We just stared at each other for a few seconds.

"Fine," I hissed and then turned and walked away from him, ignoring the people staring at me as I went.