𝚂𝚊𝚛𝚌𝚊𝚜𝚖 𝚒𝚜 𝙼𝚢 𝙱𝚎𝚜𝚝 𝙵𝚛𝚒𝚎𝚗𝚍 (Complete)

𝙰 𝙲𝚛𝚊𝚣𝚢 𝙶𝚒𝚛𝚕 𝚊𝚗𝚍 𝙷𝚎𝚛 𝙲𝚛𝚊𝚣𝚢 𝚀𝚞𝚒𝚗𝚌𝚎𝚊ñ𝚎𝚛𝚊

"Not really what you expected, is it?" I question as Lucas literally leaps away from the grandma he was forced to dance with.

"The girl still hasn't come out yet," Lucas replies, turning to face me as he brushes himself off. "All the focus will be on her and it will be like I'm not even here until I have to perform."

"Keep telling yourself that. But just know that I didn't come here just for some boring Quinceañera." I grin. "I really thought you had given up after the eight-year-olds tried to use you as a piñata. No, actually, I thought you would give up with that bear hug Mr. Princess's daddy gave you when you first arrived. In fact, I was trying to decide how awkward it would be if I stayed while you were rushed to the hospital. You know, for the food of course." I grab an hors d'oeuvre from a passing tray and stuff it into my mouth. The bite-sized slices of heaven are all that was between me and going home.

But no way am I going to leave them behind.

He grins at me and grabs several bites of heaven from another server with a platter walking by.

Finally, music begins, and we see a girl appear at the top of the grand staircase—princess style—and carefully descend, her hands clinging to her skirts. If she's nervous, she doesn't show it as she joins her father on the dance floor.

With everyone's attention focused on the graceful brunette, I seize the opportunity to grab some more hors d'oeuvres and stuff them in my mouth.

A few minutes later, I begin swaying to the sweet music as I hum quietly to myself, words forming on my lips but not tumbling forth.

A song is what it reminds me of.

A song I haven't heard in a while.

One I never wanted to hear again.

But I can't move, my feet are concreted to the ground as I continue swaying to the soft beat.

Step.

Step.

Step.

The final step landed on a large platform, and I tumbled forward, desperately trying to ignore the noise behind me.

My body swayed as I continued forward unsteadily, just able to reach my destination and grab onto the smooth black pole rising from the center.

The beat began again, deep and steady.

Or maybe it was just my heart.

Step.

Step.

Step.

Until it was like I was falling.

Because I was.

Failure.

Failure.

Failure.

A scream pierces through my ear and it takes me a minute to notice that it's not from the memory, but rather from the stampede of girls charging towards Lucas, arms flying as they rush to meet him.

A laugh escapes my lips as they reach up for his hair. He screams like a girl when one of them is successful in getting a strand.

"Oh my gosh, Lucas, marry me!" the birthday girl exclaims suddenly, jumping up and down while pushing the other girls away.

"Uh, no thanks..." Lucas replies, trying to carefully pull the girls off his arms. "It's time for me to perform anyways."

I roll my eyes when the birthday girl giggles and says, "You're so funny, Lucas," staring at Lucas with complete adoration.

I giggle mockingly. "You're so funny, Lucas," I imitate her in a high-pitched voice.

The girl turns to glare at me before turning back to Lucas. "You have a pretty jealous girlfriend," she says while still clinging to his arm. "Why is she here anyway? I didn't invite her."

I fold my arms as Lucas explains, "I invited her, Genevieve. I wanted her to come."

"All she's doing is getting fat on our hors d'oeuvres."

Thankfully, her father takes that moment to step onto the large raised platform and announce, "Now it is time for our very own Lucas Bryant to perform his latest song, 'Your Eyes Put the Stars To Shame'!", drowning out my reply.

"Wouldn't you know," Lucas says, grinning, "It's time for me to perform!" Jogging forward, he jumps up the stairs to the platform and waves to the crowd. "Before we get started, I just wanted to give a big happy birthday to the beautiful birthday girl, Genevieve Avara!"

"Did you hear that, girls?" Genevieve squeals to her friends. "Lucas Bryant thinks I'm beautiful."

Ｂｅａｕｔｉｆｕｌ

𝐇𝐚𝐯𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐪𝐮𝐚𝐥𝐢𝐭𝐢𝐞𝐬 𝐰𝐡𝐢𝐜𝐡 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐬𝐭𝐢𝐭𝐮𝐭𝐞 𝐛𝐞𝐚𝐮𝐭𝐲; 𝐩𝐥𝐞𝐚𝐬𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐭𝐨 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐬𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭 𝐨𝐫 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐦𝐢𝐧𝐝.

Ｂｅａｕｔｉｆｕｌ

𝐀 𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐮𝐬𝐞𝐝 𝐤𝐢𝐧𝐝𝐥𝐲 𝐭𝐨 𝐝𝐞𝐬𝐜𝐫𝐢𝐛𝐞 𝐚𝐧 𝐚𝐧𝐧𝐨𝐲𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐛𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐭𝐲 𝐝𝐚𝐝𝐝𝐲'𝐬 𝐝𝐚𝐮𝐠𝐡𝐭𝐞𝐫

𝐀 𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐲 𝐠𝐞𝐧𝐞𝐫𝐨𝐮𝐬 𝐝𝐞𝐬𝐜𝐫𝐢𝐩𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧

I cover my mouth to contain my laughter, but Genevieve thinks I'm covering it in shock. "I bet he's never called you beautiful before." She smirks cockily, hand set on her hip as she looks me over.

"You should come with a warning label," I say, looking away from her to where Lucas is cueing the band Mr. Avara hired to begin.

"A warning because I'm so cute?" the girl asks, flipping her hair.

"I was thinking more of annoying." Then I smile mockingly and walk to the other side of the crowd to watch Lucas' performance away from Genevieve and her friends.

———————

"Genevieve is going to be so disappointed by your sudden departure," I say, looking over at disheveled Lucas as we walk down the street towards our houses. The girl lives surprisingly close to our side of town. "At least until she makes a clone of you."

Lucas pauses his hair and clothes fixing to snap his head towards me. "A clone?!"

"Sure, her daddy's rich enough," I reply, failing to hide my grin from his panicking face. But he's too freaked out to notice.

"She wouldn't do that, would she?"

"We're talking about the girl who was ready to marry you."

"I need to get that hair back," Lucas murmurs before yelping and running back the way we came, leaving me in a fit of uncontrollable laughter.

Even though cloning is possible, Mr. Avara is too ethical to agree to something like that.

I continue laughing as I rush after him yelling, "Lucas, I'm kidding!" I grab my sore stomach and snort as giggles continue coming forward. "I'm 99 percent sure she wouldn't do that!"

"99 percent sure!?" Lucas screams back. "What about that 1 percent?"

"With crazy fan girls like that, you can never be sure!"

"I'll be back, Paris! Wait for me!"

And with that, he turns the corner, and I explode with laughter.