A/N: Hi there. I've had a lot of stuff going on in the past few months, which resulted in me being less motivated to write every other day. I'm in a better state of mind now, and will hopefully follow the previous routine of weekly updates.

4.

"Why are we going wherever we are going?" Elena asked grumpily from her place in the backseat.

She was frustrated beyond words. It was Saturday and she wanted to get done with her assignments, especially the Chemistry one which Lucy so wonderfully interrupted the other day. Public schools or private schools, they all become bitches while piling up homework for the weekend.

Riley turned back after stopping at the red light. "You girls are extremely boring, going about destroying your weekend over homework. Don't you have parties to attend, friends to hang out with?"

"Dude, just 'coz you're in college, doesn't mean we all have the same luxury of being our own person." Julia, who was sitting in the passenger seat and shaping her nails with some obscenely red coloured nail file, said absent-mindedly.

"Just come to college and you'll know how luxurious it is…"

Elena tuned out of the argument, mentally sighing. She knew she should be going out more often, mingling with people, new city and everything. But she couldn't afford to lose a perfect GPA if she needed to keep her aunt convinced that she didn't come here to escape her life in Germany. Which she so did, but that's not the point.

She was about to pull out her phone because looking out of the window can only be interesting until all you see is the same design of houses and trees when she noticed a change in the vicinity. This neighbourhood looked different; bigger houses, more space between them and huge ass trees right in front so one couldn't get more than a fleeting glimpse of the houses.

Rich people and their pretentiousness. She knew all about it. She had lived through it.

"Are we going to rob the rich?" Elena interrupted Julia and Riley, who seemed to be in a very thoughtful discussion whether Evermore was just an album of songs that didn't make it into Folklore or it's a genuine sister album like Taylor Swift said it was. According to Elena, it's a pointless discussion when Fearless (Taylor's version) was already out.

"Why?" Riley asked slowly like she was contemplating Elena's words.

Elena shrugged, "Thought role-playing Robin Hood was a weekend thing. You Americans are weird anyway." No hate to Americans, but they be doing some sketchy stuff.

"I'm just gonna meet my boyfriend." Riley pouted. It would've been cute if Julia and Elena didn't shriek out right after.

"Say what now?!"

Elena had an itch under her skin. A weird metaphorical itch that increased every second she spent on the couch.

"Hey boo, you wanna go upstairs?" Troy whispered (not that much of a whisper when she could hear everything clearly) in Riley's ear, and the couple soon disappeared from the living room.

Yeah, her itch wasn't just the weird thing there.

One.

Two.

Three.

"Troy is Kai's brother?"

Elena looked at the occupants in the room; both busy on their phones. Julia shrugged, "Guess so."

"Troy is my half-brother. From my mother and her ex-husband, John Thompson." Elena nodded in understanding as Kai explained to her. She could've lived on without knowing his family history, but Troy and she lived under the same roof. That must be reasoning enough for her curiosity.

"Okay, I don't think we've got anything important to do now. So how about we finish the chemistry assignment?"

Julia groaned, "One day! I wish for one day when you'll be as eager for doing actual fun stuff instead of studies."

Elena ignored her and raised an eyebrow expectantly at Kai, who got up and stretched his arms. Elena was so not mentally drooling at the sight of his biceps, those defined biceps she would love to put her hands on, squeeze them, feel them, lick them… yeah definitely not thinking about them.

"Sure, follow me."

Julia groaned again. One might think she was in severe pain, she was dramatic like that. "What about me? I'll be so bored!"

Kai chuckled and ruffled her hair, messing up her orange bangs, "We've got a pool, and spare sets of bikinis in the changing room."

"Aw, I love you." Julia cooed. She pushed both Kai and Elena out of the room, "Go on lovebirds, work on your chemistry."

"That was such a bad pun," Elena commented.

Elena slumped on the bed, laying down with her arms and legs spread out, covering almost all of the huge bed. "My hand is ready to die any moment now. And I thought the German history essay was lengthy."

Kai turned around on his chair, "You're lucky enough for not having World History."

Elena groaned. There was nothing she hated more than social science. "I had endured it enough till 8th grade. Then I failed it on purpose in the final exams, so my aunt had to remove it from my subject selection in high school."

"Your aunt?" Kai cocked up an eyebrow.

"Yeah, she handles my stuff. Family thing. I know you'd rather be in the pool right now." The truth was she would rather be anywhere but in Kai Hiwatari's room, explaining the drama around her parentage and hereditary. It was complicated and messed up, so much so that even she tried not to think too much into it.

Thankfully, Kai didn't push into the matter (Elena knew he wasn't the type to do so) and went down to the pool.

It was huge, the pool, and was surrounded by half a dozen lounge chairs. Julia was lying on one, sipping on a mojito coolly. Too coolly, if one noticed. Like she was trying to be cool while hiding something.

Elena was about to interrogate her when she was interrupted-

"Hey, guys!" Tala popped out of the water like literally popped up. And like any normal person with reflexes, Elena shrieked.

"WHAT THE FUCK?!" Her eyes bulged as she tried to calm down her heart. "Where did you come from?"

Tala just shrugged and waded around the perimeter of the pool. He was red-faced. Must be the sun, he's quite pale anyway, Elena thought.

"Hey Red," Kai greeted Tala casually and sat on a lounge chair. He pulled off his t-shirt, put on black aviators and laid down. Elena kept staring at him, more specifically his abs. She didn't want to be that girl in a rom-com movie and try to put sunscreen on a hot guy, but she so wanted to be that girl and get to put sunscreen on this hot guy. She would've stood and drooled for hours if not for Julia beckoning Elena towards her.

"Okay, first of all, I want to thank you for becoming so chummy chummy with Kai. Without you, I would never have experienced all this." Julia indicated to the whole place with the hand that held her mojito.

"Where did you get this mojito from?" Elena asked. The whole situation- from Riley's boyfriend being Kai's brother to her best friend nonchalantly relaxing with a freaking mojito, with Tala, suddenly being there and Kai Hiwatari stripping off and being his cool under the sun- confused the German out of her.

"You wouldn't believe it, but the Hiwataris have a bar specifically for the pool! So like I was coming out of the changing rooms when I saw this hottie, who's the pool boy. He offered me this."

"Julia!" Elena admonished, "Just because you're in a safe vicinity, don't take alcohol just from anyone."

"It's a virgin mojito." Julia rolled her eyes. "Matt, the pool guy, told he had specific orders from 'Mr Hiwatari' to not give alcohols to Kai's friends." She said, air quoting on Mr Hiwatari.

Elena laughed at her best friend's pout. "So tell me, how come you've never seen all this if you and Kai have been classmates since 1st grade?"

"Well, we were friends since 1st grade, including Tala, Natalie and Summer. And when we became old enough to hang out without our parents around, we would go to each other's places but never Kai's. Then his parents used to be around quite a lot.

"Then high school came along. Natalie and Summer changed schools. I joined the cheerleading group, made friends with Ming Ming and others, but they were friendlier with the football guys than the soccer ones. I still used to hang around Kai and Tala at parties and school events. Then I got bored of cheerleading. I met Hilary one day at Tala's party. She introduced me to drama club. So I once again I had enough time to hang out with Kai and Tala occasionally and I was still friends with Ming Ming and group since I needed some girl time too."

Elena gaped at Julia and blinked twice. "I just asked why you've never been to this house." She asked slowly.

"Oh, that's because Kai never got around to invite us over." Julia shrugged and pulled out her phone, "Let's click some poolside selfies."

Elena never understood the creature her best friend was. God had a lot of spare time when Julia was made.

There were certain moments in life where Elena questioned why she did whatever Julia persuaded her to do.

This was one of those moments. Except for this time, it was Tala. After spending most of the afternoon in the pool, he got "bored out of his water addled mind". Which made no sense to Elena, yet she was in the mall after an hour, window shopping.

If this is what Riley meant by high school fun, Elena wasn't liking it much. She was tired and hungry and hated window shopping. Or mall shopping.

What? She's filthy rich, it takes few taps on her laptop for her to get anything. Or sometimes she bothered to visit some of her father's friends' boutiques where she would get refreshments and a couch to rest while browsing through clothes.

"Let's watch a movie!" Julia exclaimed suddenly. Elena mentally face-palmed. She couldn't wait for the day to be over. Her bed was calling her. And she bet Troy mentioned he was making mac and cheese for dinner, from scratch!

Elena was busy drooling and daydreaming that she missed her friends making the entire plan, until-

"ELENA!"

"WHAT?!" She yelped. Three confused faces were looking at her.

Kai shook his head. Tala sighed. Julia smiled at her sympathetically.

Julia said softly, "We've decided on the movie. You wanna get some snacks, while the boys get the tickets?"

"Yeah, sure," Elena muttered distractedly. She tried to keep her embarrassment at bay as they walked towards the concession stand. There was a decent line, so they relaxed and chatted the time away.

They were talking about their upcoming semester exam before winter break when they heard a loud shriek.

It was Lucy and her friends. It looked as if some guys were following her. "Get away from me, you freak!" Lucy shouted at them.

"C'mon baby, it's just one kiss." One of the guys, with dirty blonde hair, said. He was staring at her lewdly.

"We're gonna file a complaint if you don't go away right away!" Kate said angrily. The other two boys hesitated a bit, but the blondie didn't seem to feel threatened at all.

He stepped towards Lucy, and picked up a lock of her hair, "You think you can do anything?"

"Hey!" Elena may have had a spat with Lucy in school, but she couldn't stand like a spectator when anyone was being harassed. Elena moved towards them and pushed at blondie's shoulder. "She said back off."

Blondie didn't seem to be affected much and pushed up his shirt sleeves, "Oh, you wanna do this now?" He packed a punch, but Elena quickly blocked his arm and punched his nose. He staggered backwards, clutching his bleeding nose. Elena didn't let him gather his senses and kicked under his shin.

He fell on his head. Elena jumped on him, straddling his chest and picked him by his collar. "Learn to take a no." For a final measure, she threw a punch at his jaw.

She stood up to see Kate and April standing over the other two cowering boys, both seemed to be the victims of the girls' kicks.

"Oh my god! That was epic." Julia rushed to her side. Kate and April were also grinning at her. Lucy, though, still looked quite shaken.

Julia took it up to herself to check any damages on Elena. "You need to get your hand bandaged. C'mon, I've got a first aid kit in my purse."

Julia had finished bandaging her hand, and both of them were checking their hair, ready to get back to the movie. That's when they heard the toilet door open, and before she could register anything, Elena got hugged by a sobbing Lucy.

"Lucy…" Elena didn't say any further and hugged her back. Lucy's arms were filled with goosebumps.

"I- thank you so much for what you did back there." She hiccupped, her voice muffled on Elena's shoulder.

Elena pushed her away a little by holding her shoulders and wiped her tears. "Do you wanna tell me what happened there? Did you know those guys?"

Lucy took a deep breath, gathering her bearings. "I was in the changing room," she started, her voice scratchy and wet from crying. "Wh-when those boys barged in. Fortunately, Kate and April were outside, so they came to my aid. We thought that was it, and just left the store. But they didn't seem to take the hint and kept following me, saying that they've taken the picture of me in my undergarments."

That's when Lucy completely broke down. Her knees wobbled, ready to give out, so Elena pulled her back into her arms again. They stood there for a while, Julia rubbing a comforting hand on Lucy's back.

A/N: Thanks for all of the reviews, follows and favourites.

I hated how in the previous version, I made it the cliché of a popular girl hating the new girl for a guy. So here it is, a better version. 'Coz we ladies gotta stick together!

Stay safe,

Keep reading,

Rome :)