THE PROMISES MADE TO BELLE LOVE #ONC2024

NOW. (Chapter 1)

"So? What was it like?" Sophia squealed.

Genevieve Knight turned subtly to her friend Jade – a true friend, unlike Sophia, the mere campus busybody who would stop showing interest in Genevieve once she'd extracted the information she so craved – and rolled her eyes. Jade snickered, hiking her books further up her chest as she walked. While Gen found it exasperating to be surrounded all day by wide-eyed, lovestruck girls wanting to know more about Gen's night with the boy they all swooned over, Jade just found it funny.

"It was good," Gen said, grimacing at her own bluntness.

Sophia batted at Gen's shoulder. It was a toying gesture and yet held a cautionary malice – like if Gen didn't start spitting out the details soon, Sophia would have to resort to other methods. "How can you disappear with the Dante Leon for a night and have nothing to say about it other than 'it was good'? Do you realise that my life depends on this information?"

"Okay, Sophia," Jade said, finally stopping in her tracks and giving Sophia a gentle shove away. It took a lot to make Jade break her silence, but Sophia – and the rest of their class – had been on Gen's back all day so far, and it was only lunch time. "That's enough now. Shoo." She flicked her hand, like Sophia were some detestable vermin. Sophia gaped at the action but, miraculously, stepped back.

"Fine," she said, her bunny rabbit nose scrunching. "Keep it to yourself for now. It'll come out eventually."

Gen nodded, conceding to Sophia's nonsense even though she didn't believe it. She kept nodding until Sophia was gone.

Gen was finally alone with Jade again. She turned back to her friend. Before she could help it, a laugh began to bubble out of her, and she started jumping up and down. Jade trilled and did the same.

"You're going to tell me though, right?" Jade hissed, grabbing Gen by the arm and pulling her down the corridor towards the dining hall.

"Of course!" Gen cried. "But where is Belle? I haven't seen her all day. She needs to hear this too."

If there was a flicker of hurt on Jade's face – it was always these subtle comments that reminded her that Belle was the best friend, not herself – then it was gone in a split second. "She must be in her room. If she had half as much to drink last night as you did, then she's not well enough to come to class." A pause. "How are you standing right now?"

The truth was that Gen hardly was. She'd slept on her desk in all four periods so far and had pleaded (honestly) a migraine to her maths teacher, who had only dismissed it with a raised eyebrow. "I think I vomited it all up before I went to sleep." She giggled again in that insane, giddy pitch. She couldn't help it.

Jade replicated the sound almost exactly. "Forget Belle. Get to the dining hall. You're telling me everything."

The girls raced each other to the hall and slid into their usual table, flinging their bags down onto the tiles. The dining hall was fashioned out of the old church, so that a giant stained-glass Jesus bore down over the girls while they were eating. It certainly reminded them to say grace.

Gen and Jade only had a few prized minutes to talk before others arrived at their table and then they would all be called up to collect their food, so Gen had to make it fast.

"He ran into me while the countdown was happening," Gen started, leaning across the table with her face in her hands. Jade leaned in with huge, adoring eyes. "He wanted to get into a good place to see the fireworks." Last night had been New Years Eve. As per tradition, the town of Hartly had put on a festival in the square, inviting all residents down to participate, including the students at the Palace Private School for Girls, and its neighbouring all-boys school, King's Academy. It was a rather notorious hookup occasion. The boys and girls saw each other often for interschool events, but never had the freedom to interact in anything other than a formal capacity.

"He had to push to get in next to me," Gen went on, shutting her eyes to reimagine the night. "But he felt bad. So he offered me some of his candy floss. I took it, obviously. Then the countdown finished and the fireworks went off. And–" She couldn't finish. She started squealing.

"What?" Jade demanded, hammering her fists on the table. "Tell me what happened!"

"He said, 'have you ever had a New Years kiss?' And I said no, of course." She slapped her hands over her mouth, so that the end of her sentence came out muffled. "And he kissed me!"

Jade leapt out of her seat and flung her upper half across the table, enfolding Gen in an enormous hug. They both couldn't stop laughing. "And then? You were gone all night!"

"Yes! Yes!" Gen smoothed her blonde hair back out of her face and regathered herself to finish the story. "After the fireworks, he grabbed my hand and led me away from the party. I was meant to find Belle at this point, but he seemed much more important in the moment. Don't tell her I said that." Jade laughingly agreed. "He told me to wait on the corner of the street, and then he disappeared to the shops for ten minutes. The time went forever. I almost thought he wasn't coming back. But then he did come back and his arms were full of bags. He'd bought us drinks. He's eighteen, Jade, so he can do that. I'm jealous of him! Anyway, he kept leading me further and further through town, and we were sharing beer, and we were just talking. About anything and everything. It was amazing. Eventually I looked back and realised that we'd left everybody behind, and we were completely on our own.

"He'd taken us to the park. We found a bench and sat down and kept drinking and kept talking and then we moved onto the grass. And then we did it right there."

Jade as good as screamed. "You fucked on the grass? In public?"

"There was nobody there!" Gen insisted, waving her hands around for Jade to lower her voice. "But fuck me, Jade, he was incredible. God! You should see him in the moonlight!" She could still picture him now. All dark waves of hair, deep brown eyes, wicked smile. "His hands are gigantic. And he knows what to do with them."

"Was that the only thing that was gigantic?" Jade teased.

Gen shook her head no, and then they were both screaming again.

"Girls!"

Both of their heads snapped around. Miss Len had been standing with her arms folded at the head of the table for god knows how long now. "If the pair of you are quite finished," she snipped, "then cool off and get up. It's your turn to collect your lunch."

Genevieve and Jade shared a final look of thrill and scandal, and then both scrambled to their feet to follow the teacher up to the kitchen.