022

  Jenna Brooks's POV

  How was it possible? How could Conrad be the prince? No, no, no, no, no! He's not even the type to be interested in stuffs like this. Conrad being the prince was going to ruin my whole plan. With him as my prince, I would never want to ditch drama club after finding Pstar7. This is bad, real bad.

My palms suddenly grew clammy and I took a deep breath, "I…I'm not even sure I'll take the role." 

He cocked his eyebrows, "Why? I think you'll make a great princess." he said, softer than I had expected.

Why does he have to say it like that?!

"I'll think about it, Conrad."

"Alright, shortstuff."

**********

  At dinner, Jeanette was the first one to talk about the play to Auntie Laurel. Conrad wasn't at the table to stop her, he had left minutes ago for a run but only he and I knew he does a lot more than running. 

How did Jeanette even find out about the play in such a short period of time? Auntie Laurel was excited to hear about it and now that she knew, it would be hard to ditch the role and settle for something else.

"You're going to look amazing in your Cinderella gown, Jenna." she said, staring lovingly into my eyes. Her gaze spoke volumes, of expectations and the thought of disappointing her couldn't dare to cross my mind.

It's been decided, Jenna. You're taking the Cinderella role head on. All the best.

"How about we go shopping? I want Jenna to look her best on opening night," Auntie Laurel said as her gaze landed on Jeanette because she was the fashion prodigy of the family. But Jeanette wasn't listening, her grip was tightened on her spoon and she was glaring at Jamie. They were at it again.

"Jeanette?" I called and she shuddered before turning to me.

"Sorry, I was too busy glaring at Jamie," she admitted.

Jamie raised an eyebrow, "Me? What did I do?"

Jeanette rolled her eyes at him, then turned to me, "Well, earlier at school today, we had a 'friendly' maths quiz but Jamie went all out and I lost."

Jamie scoffed, "It was a competition, Jean."

"No, it wasn't. You were just being too competitive."

"No I wasn't. I'm just way better at maths than you are," Jamie snapped.

Jeanette let out a long dramatic gasp, and we all knew something was coming. Then she turned to Auntie Laurel, a serious look on her face. 

"Who's better at maths? Me or…Jamie?" she asked.

"Parents never answer those kind of questions." Jamie said.

"Jamie is better at maths." Auntie Laurel replied.

"What? Mom, how could you?" Jeanette exclaimed in a dramatic tone.

Auntie Laurel forced a smile,  "Jamie is an honors student and he gets all A's while you get…the other letters."

"I can be smart if I wanted to, I just don't wanna." Jeanette said.

"Or you just can't." Jamie taunted.

"Is that a challenge?" Jeanette asked.

"Maybe."

********

  The next day at school, I texted Pstar7 about joining drama club because of him and he replied that he was seeing everything. Creepy, right? But I wasn't creeped out. As a matter of fact, I thought it was fun.

As the closing bell rang, Liam came up to me, a smile on his face as usual.

"It's time for rehearsal," he said as he held my wrist and pulled me up. 

Arrghhh. As if being in the play wasn't stressful enough, I was now being forced to spend my after school hours doing rehearsals?

As Liam and I walked out of the class he told me he had decided to drop the mouse role and give it to someone else. I would have whole heartedly accepted the role but now that auntie Laurel knew I was Cinderella, there was no going back.

"So, you're not gonna be part of anything?" I asked in a sarcastic tone.

"Well, I'll be playing the piano for the background music," he replied, a little too overconfidently.

"Do you even know how to play the piano?" I asked, furrowing my eyebrows.

He let out a long laugh that seemed to dragged on longer than I had expected. I nudged his arm playfully and his laugh came to a stop.

"No, Jenna. Nobody knows how to play the piano. I mean, look at all those buttons. There's like a million of them. Luckily my phone has only one button."

I knew what he was driving at. He was going to pretend like he was playing the piano while he played the piano soundtrack from his phone. I once saw it in a movie where the character played the piano soundtrack from his phone and pretended to press the keys while the phone did the rest. But it has never really worked in real life so I doubt he would be able to pull it off.

I scoffed, "Please, you'll never be able to pull it off."

He smirked and ran his hand through his hair, "Is that a bet?"

"Sure. It's a bet."

"And what's in it for me?" he asked, 

What do you want?"

"Well…" he took a step closer to me and I took a step back. My face suddenly heated up as my heart chaotically pounded in my chest. 

Control yourself, Jenna. Your heart can't beat for three guys at the same time.

For every step he took forward, I took one back until I finally hit the wall, feeling the coldness against my back.

"If I manage to pull it off, you'll have to go on a date with me this weekend. Deal?" he asked, a smile twitching on his lips.