Chapter 8 – Setting up

(Juliet POV)

"Ok, a little higher on the right," I instructed Daniel, who was standing on a ladder, threading white fairy lights through the archway at the entrance of 'The Garage', the hot new night club we had chosen to host the party.

"Perfect," I called out to him as he adjusted the arrangement. Completing the task, I picked up the box of white roses at my feet and began slipping them in between the fairy lights and the archway, my thoughts still occupied on the fiasco at the gym. It didn't help that it was all anyone could talk about, since a lot of people had been waiting for that game and it just been cancelled until further notice. The victory party had been transformed into just a party , and since the game had been abandoned, we had had a few extra hours to set up before the party started. I was too pre-occupied thinking and hoping that nobody had seen my act of pulling the fire alarm. I knew for a fact the surveillance camera's hadn't been installed in the newly built building containing the new gym and changing rooms. Last year some kids hoping to pull a prank pulled the alarm during assembly and had been suspended for a week, suspensions didn't look good on college applications, and as far as my parents knew I had just applied to what they considered suitable schools and they weren't the type of schools to accept anyone who had a suspension on their record.

"There you are!" Nala startled me as she shouted up the stairs at me while she stood at the bottom. She was dressed in a hot pink juicy couture tracksuit , which she had in her car and had changed into after getting soaked when the sprinklers had gone off. She already had her hair and make-up done for tonight. All of her hair had been clipped back, with a single curl escaping either side of her face, and she had obviously spent a long time perfecting her make-up , strangely neither of which looked out of place with her 'exercise outfit.'

"I have been looking for you everywhere! I need you to explain the whole wrist band situation to the people at the door."

"Sure," I said as I passed the box of roses onto one of the junior members of the committee who had been assisting me.

"Thanks! Oh and then go and get dressed, Let everyone else finish up, people should start arriving soon!" She began to walk away but then stopped as an afterthought.

"Jules?" She said quietly.

"Yeah?" I asked.

"Sorry about earlier. I get kinda crazy when I've been fed too much cheerleading in one day " she said as she smiled.

I smiled back in forgiveness, "I know, it's ok."

She looked relieved as she walked away. This was the way it was with us. We would have little disagreements but we would always be ok a couple of hours later.

I made my way over to the people assigned to working at the door. They had already arrived dressed up in the outfits for tonight. A couple of them greeted me as I approached them, and I smiled back.

"Ok so here's how it works. The boys get the blue wristbands; the girls get the purple ones. Make sure you don't let on about the numbers on the back, because then they'll all get picky with which wristband they get."

"What are the numbers for?" A girl I vaguely recognised as being in my history class last year asked.

"Each girl has an individual number on the back that matches one of the boys' wristbands. At midnight, the DJ will announce to everyone to find their partner, and then they dance the last dance with them."

The group began to talk about the idea and how cool it was. I could gladly say that I could take the credit for that. I thought we should do something different and had come up with the idea.

I looked at the time on my phone and seeing that the party officially started in fifteen minutes decided Nala was right and I should probably start getting ready. On my way to the room behind the stage which was normally used for the featuring artists but tonight was our dressing room, I was stopped by Jared, who worked for the school radio station and was working as our DJ as tonight. He also usually handled the music side of things whenever we had house parties or get-together's

"Juliet I have a slight problem. The disc I was supposed to use for the final dance isn't reading! And there isn't really time to re-burn it."

"Ok, firstly don't panic," I said to calm him down. I pulled my iPod out of my pocket and began scrolling through the playlist until I came to the song that I was looking for. "Here, play this." I handed him my iPod.

"You're a life saver!" He said in thanks as he took it and walked back to his booth.

Romeo POV – A couple of hours before.

"I feel bad for you dude," Ben said to me as we hung out in my house with the guys playing various gaming technology. Me and Ben were playing on the play station, while Ted and Mark were playing on the Xbox and Luke and Adam were on the race car driving stimulator. We were all facing the various flat screens in my game room.

"For what?" I asked.

"You didn't get to fight Capulet."

"Timmy?" I asked, I was glad I didn't have to fight him, "I wasn't looking for a fight Ben."

"What?" Ben asked shocked. He paused the game and looked at me, "I thought I saw reluctance when Timmy was about to punch you, but I hoped I was imagining it!"

"You've gone soft man," Luke said. I hadn't gone soft. I had grown up. Why would I want to aimlessly cause friction with Timmy? A part of me knew what had happened was my fault and even though I have changed I still felt bad.

"You're not who you used to be. When you walked into a room everyone used to be wary of you, man." Ted said.

"Yeah I'm not proud of being an arrogant jerk guys." I said truthfully.

"Well the way I saw it, you were popular, everyone respected you, and I don't see the downside to that. The Romeo we knew fought for his friends, and who he was." Fought for my friends. I hadn't done much of that before I had left.

"You know maybe we were wrong," Adam said, "You used to be a different person." He switched off the game he was playing and put on his jacket, getting ready to leave. This was ridiculous.

"I'm still the same person guys." I said, "I just have done some things I wasn't too proud of."

"I can't believe you're still bothered by that! Get over that! Just because of one little thing, you don't need to change your life."

Maybe he was right. After what had happened I had felt the need to change, and moving had helped with recreating me. A part of me though was still how I used to be even though I tried hard to repress that side.

"Like I said, I'm still the same."

"Well I'll believe that when I see it." Luke said. I didn't like being challenged. Like they said I was usually the alpha amongst these guys and being doubted felt strange. I felt like I needed to prove myself to them.

"Let's get out of here," Mark said, changing the subject. He was never one for conflict with one's own side.

"Well now that you mention it I have a great idea." Ben said. We all looked at him waiting for him to finish his 'great idea'

"We need to find some costumes."

"Halloween isn't for a couple of months." Ted said.

"I know!" Ben said throwing a pillow at his head, "We're going to masquerade party boys." He finished with a smirk.

A/N: Don't forget to review!