is a song I've been into that I thought fit the vibe of this chapter xoxo

News about the Green family scandal has quietened down and Holden and Logan are still handling it.

The rumour about Daisy's mum being the reason Courtney's parents are getting a divorce has circulated. Daisy's locker was vandalized, and she was attacked after school.

Daisy got into an argument with her mum but wasn't able to reveal the actual reason she was so angry: the affair. The chapter ended with Daisy falling asleep with Parker still on the phone.

--

Damn it. My eyes were puffy, and my eyelid creases had decided to go on vacation. I'd stayed in bed as late as possible until I knew for sure my mum had left the house. I couldn't handle a confrontation, or worse, talking about our feelings this early in the morning.

"Good thing I bought these this morning," Parker said when I got into the car, patting the paper bag sitting on the centre console.

"Accidentally underestimated how long I slept in," I lied. I could see him do a double take when he looked at me, probably noticing how awful I looked that morning, but he said nothing and continued pulling out of the driveway as usual. It was days like these where it was obvious how much I'd been taking these lifts for granted. Had I needed to take a bus, I would've definitely been late.

"Have some breakfast," he said, unrolling the top of the paper bag with one hand while he continued steering with the other. My stomach rumbled, so there was no point in denying I was hungry. There were two breakfast burritos inside and two coffees in the cup holders.

"Thanks," I said. "I love breakfast burritos," I grinned.

"Morning you two," Holden said when he spotted me and Parker coming down the hallway. He gave a chirpy wave when I noticed there were red flecks caked underneath his nails. Noticing my stare, he cleared his throat and tucked both hands into his pockets. Although, that just drew attention to the weird soap suds on the corner of his blazer. "Catch you at the senior class meeting for World Health Day." Holden zipped off before I had a chance to ask any more questions.

When I got to the locker I realised the spray paint from the day before had been removed. There were still some red streaks here and there, but most of it was gone. It wasn't much, but it did make me feel a little better even though the entire school probably knew it was my locker even without the sign. I glanced up at Parker just in time to catch a smile on his lips.

"So, what's World Health Day?" I asked him.

It turned out that it was quite an event at Pemberton. The senior class organised and ran stalls each year with different promotional and fun activities for the junior years. Every senior had to volunteer for a role. Too bad I'd missed the fun times and arrived at Pemberton just in time to join the workforce for it.

"I'll see you at the meeting," Parker said before leaving for his locker.

I got to the meeting a little early but thankfully Logan was even earlier and was sitting at the back by himself. He was picking at his fingers and I spotted similar red flecks in them. "Is that paint?" I asked him.

"Maybe," he replied.

"You and Holden are the ones who cleaned my locker aren't you?" He smiled.

"We're not going to be brothers, but we did both want to do this."

It'd taken a while, but I realised I hadn't seen him with many people in the last few days. I remembered in the first few months I'd been at Pemberton, he'd always been surrounded by people. "What happened to your friends?"

"When the article was released, it seems several families at Pemberton didn't think the Greens were appropriate to associate with."

"But the Top Four," I said mindlessly before I had a chance to hold my tongue. Weren't those four families practically bulletproof?

He laughed. "They still call us that? I'm sure the truth is much less glamorous than what you've heard."

Holden and Parker came through the doors not long after, and it surprised me when they opted to come and sit by Logan and me. That being said, Holden was sitting next to me, not Logan. Stephanie spotted us when she arrived and sat down as well. I hadn't seen her in ages. "Hey," she said. We all exchanged greetings before she said she'd been busy cramming and her parents had been training her up to work in their firm during the holidays; she'd had to fight to come back for her last World Health Day at Pemberton.

I caught a glimpse of Clarissa coming in. She shot me an apologetic look before hurrying past and sitting next to Courtney who was still shooting laser beams through her eyes at me. After stepping in for me the day before, I wasn't sure what to think about Clarissa.

Miss Delgardo, my literature class teacher, was overseeing the meeting which was being organised by a couple of senior students. A list of the roles was projected onto the board. They all seemed to involve interacting with people. Running game stalls, selling snacks, giving talks about exercise and nutrition.

"The first role we need filled is someone to help give directions and guide students towards the stalls they're looking for." Surely every kid at Pemberton knew their way around. This was likely to be the role with limited speaking. I stuck my hand up. That was before I had a chance to see Stephanie, Logan, Holden and Parker all shaking their heads at me. But it was too late because my name was already entered into the single space on the spreadsheet.

When all the roles were finally assigned, we dispersed to go to our first classes. "Why did you choose that?" Stephanie asked.

"It seemed like the role with the least active role," I replied. "Why?"

She considered what I said for a moment. "Well, I guess...but you have to wear the costume."

"What costume?"

When they took me to the storeroom to show me the costume, it was obvious why that had been a bad idea. It was a huge carrot costume. The bottom half had two leg holes that opened into black stockings. The top half had room for arms to be inserted into black long sleeves. The worst part was probably the helmet-like bit. There was a huge green sprout coming out of the top, two huge googly eyes stitched on the front, and a creepy grin with netting I assumed was for vision while inside the costume.

"You could've given me a heads up," I said.

"We did. We were all violently shaking our heads," Parker responded, crossing his arms.

I had to take the costume home to be cleaned. Thankfully, there was plenty room in the back of Parker's car. It was the morning of World Health Day when this became a problem. I was sitting with my backpack on and both hands holding separate parts of the costume.

I was once again reminded of how accustomed I'd become to getting driven to and from school – it was indeed a luxury. Parker had something to do early that morning so he said he'd meet me at school.

--

Parker

"Young master, you're leaving rather early this morning," his butler commented.

"Um...yes. I'll see you later," Parker replied, shutting the front door. In all honestly, he felt kind of stupid driving twenty-five minutes to a costume store in the middle of nowhere, but that wasn't stopping him.

"Are you sure you don't need a shrink?" Holden had asked him yesterday when they visited the costume store. "You look ridiculous." He had to pick it up the morning of because the costume hadn't been hired or cleaned in eons. Which was fair enough, because it was a heinous orange thing.

After paying, the store clerk handed Parker the costume which he then shoved into the backseat of his car.

He couldn't help but laugh to himself when he spotted the gigantic carrot waddling around near the gate. It was the worst job to volunteer for in the entire list of possibilities and somehow, she'd managed to choose just that.

As he approached, the carrot turned around and took off the helmet. "Parker!" She exclaimed. "What is that?" She asked, eyeing the orange costume in his hands.

"I'm your relief," he grinned, holding the two pieces up. It was only nine in the morning so she couldn't have been in the costume for long, but she was already sweating. She brought her forearm up to her head to wipe the beading sweat from her forehead. In actuality, Parker had assigned himself with Holden to running the basketball competition.

"Yes – only because you're in so deep," Holden smirked after agreeing to cover for Parker and run it on his own.

--

Daisy

"I thought you said this was the worst role possible," I grinned.

"Apparently we have too many seniors this year, so we get to take turns being the main carrot," he said with a lopsided smile.

"Why the hell does the school have two of these heinous things?" Last I remembered there was only one of them.

"It's probably super old," he said.

We spent most of the day messing around because as I'd expected, no one needed directions around the school they'd spent their entire year at.

By the end of the afternoon, we were both dripping with sweat inside the carrot costumes. We both peeled off the huge carrot top half of the costume and walked back to their club room. "That was definitely a lot worse than I imagined," Parker commented, opening the door to let me in.

"I warned you."

"Couldn't let you suffer out there alone, could I?"

"Even now, I'm not sure if you're doing this because you're being nice or if you're just a masochist."

"Because I'm being nice?" He chuckled, leaning against the table. "I'm dressed as a carrot, Pizza," he grinned. "You've called me dense before, but you're at least ten times worse."

"Sorry I'm not as smart as you," I retorted. "So...you're a masochist then?" I teased.

"See? Dense," he laughed. "Think about it. I don't dress up like a carrot for fun, and I don't usually get involved in anyone else's business." He tapped his right temple with his finger and grinned. "Now let's get you home."

I was once again the passenger seat of his Range Rover, twiddling my thumbs while he drove. What he'd said in the club room was turning over repeatedly in my brain. Usually I was relatively comfortable around him, but now my stomach was doing backflips. Forget butterflies, there was an entire zoo running rampage inside.

We got to my house and he parked in the driveway and got out to help carry my carrot costume in. I slung my backpack over my shoulders and held the door open for him to put the costume in my living room. "Thanks," I said.

"Okay, see you tomorrow."

He turned to leave, and he was halfway back to the car when I dropped my bag and jogged out towards him. "You okay Pizza?" He asked, probably because I was puffing from a tiny jog.

"Thank you for everything Parker," I puffed. He looked at me weirdly. Then I threw my arms around his shoulders and hugged him. My heart was thrashing against my ribcage and my limbs were heavy, frozen. I leaned up onto my tip toes to kiss him on the cheek, when he suddenly turned, and my lips ended up landing on his lower lip. My brain short circuited.

I finally managed to pull away. "Ok bye." Then I ran back to my house and shut the door with my back against it.

--

SO, THOUGHTS!?!?!?

As anticipated, the # of chapters till completion has been extended. I've had to split this chapter into two because it seemed to run on for too long!

Thanks for your support this long into the story!! Pls continue to vote if you enjoyed the chapter xo