You'd never think that a girl who had it all could ever feel so lonely. A girl who had a perfect family, perfect friends; perfect life. A girl who was both loved and feared by all. a popular girl, in school; invited to all the parties, the primary crush of most boys in the school, a girl who got everything.

A girl with long, wavy red hair, piercing blue eyes and a perfect smile. A girl who seemed to look like she could've been the happiest person in the world.

That girl? That's me. My name is Cassandra, otherwise known as Cassie or Cass. I'm 18, just started my second year at college studying Sociology, Psychology, Sport and Fashion Design. And in the words of others, I'm probably the most popular girl in college. I'm the girl everyone talks about on a daily basis, the girl people stopped to look at in the cafeteria, the girl other girls were jealous of.

But the truth was I was suffering inside.

I told myself every morning I'd be okay and I'd smiled and I did. But no-one ever knew what I was really feeling. It was so easy for me to hide my feelings because I'd been doing it all my life. I'd been pretending to my family that all of the things they'd got me were enough. I didn't want to come across as ungrateful but you see, people thought I was a complete bitch anyway. I'd heard by overhearing conversations in the cafeteria and getting information from other people. They were too scared to say it to my face though. I was one of those people who wouldn't take shit from anyone and if it ended up in a punch-up, I'd be up for it.

But this one person saved my life in a way. He first joined school hating me. well, I lot of the people told him to hate me because of my personality and my social status. He never knew what I was really like.

Me and my two friends Brittany and Taylor were sat in the common room in college on a Monday morning. All three of us had made a bad decision to get drunk on the Sunday before and we'd been suffering from a killer hangover for hours. It was lunch, and I'd lost my appetite so I decided to take some of the aspirin I'd found in my bag. A post-it note was attached to it and I opened the flap and read it:

I thought you'd need these as you came in yesterday night barely able to walk in a straight line. Have a good day. Dad xx

My dad was like my saviour. People would usually think I would be closest to my mum but it was my dad. He always looked after me after I did something stupid. He'd be against it and give me a scolding but he would still help me through it.

I went to the sink in the corner of the common room and filled up a glass of water and downed two of the tablets. When I came back to the sofas where we were sat, Brittany was beaming with delight.

'Hey, Cass! We've been invited to Sam Night's party tonight! He's like, the fittest guy in college; we cannot turn this down.' She squealed, jumping up and waving the invite in front of my face. Taylor just stayed sat down and laughed at her.

I sighed. It wasn't really a surprise that we'd been invited to the one of the coolest parties of the summer. Really, I'd heard Michael Smith talking about it in Sociology and I was kind of expecting an invite from him. Sam was okay I guess. We didn't talk much and he was in the year below but his social status was about as high as mine.

Brittany squealed again and finally sat back down, still smiling at the invite partially because it had her name written on it and because she'd well... been invited to his party.

'Brit, do you even know where he lives?' I asked, leaning over and staring at the address on the sheet.

'No, but I think I'll be able to find it.' she replied.

Brittany had this weird obsession with Sam since she'd bumped into him in the corridor a couple of months ago. She'd known him before when we were still at school but never really noticed him until his voice had suddenly broken and he'd grown his hair. She never wanted to admit it, scared that she'd be bullied by people. It was basically a taboo to like a guy in the year below.

I went back to my position opposite the two girls and put the aspirin back in my Louis Vuitton bag and leaned back on the seat. I looked at my timetable which was exposed in my bag and saw what I had the next 4 hours. Double Fashion Design and double Sociology.

I glanced over to a few girls who were sat in the corner eating their lunch and laughing. I sighed again and wondered why my life couldn't be like that for once. They didn't need to keep their social status up every day and they didn't need to worry about people talking about them. They were normal people. I wasn't. When I said that to the girls they just said to me I sounded like I was trying to hint at them I was a vampire or something.

I looked away before I could do myself any more emotional damage and turned my attention back to the conversation that Brittany and Taylor were having. As a surprise, it was about what they were going to wear to Sam's party.

'...Yeah, but all my clothes are out of fashion. I don't even know why I've still got them. We should go shopping.' Brittany said to Taylor.

Taylor nodded and turned to me, 'wanna go shopping after college today, Cass?'

I thought about it for a moment but shook my head. 'Nah, I've got homework to catch up with.'

Both Brittany and Taylor's jaws dropped.

'Are you actually being serious? Since when did you give a monkey's about homework? What's really going on, Cass?' Brittany asked, looking at me like I had something to hide.

'What? That's what I'm gonna do. I need to spend some time outside and I've got photography homework to do.' I argued.

Brittany raised an eyebrow and grabbed her bag. 'Right okay. You don't need to tell us but okay. C'mon, we've gotta go. I've got Music to go to and I don't actually want to be late.'

We made our way to class, splitting off in different directions.

We finally finished class after what seemed like an eternity and we walked home, laughing at first years. I headed straight for the clearing near my house where it was nearly always quiet and pulled out my sketchbook and a pencil. I spent about 10 minutes drawing and when I looked up a boy was sat on the other side of the river, like a mirror image; sketch pad and everything.