5

Auriana

I was standing at the school entrance with the rest of my friends (except Scarlet, Nikki and Jake) at 7:30. The idea was to approach the headmistress in front of the school and present her with the plan we had come up with last night.

"Where is Nikki?" Renee asked. She looked impatiently at her phone.

"Always late," Brooke laughed. We watched a car pull into the parking lot. Nikki had told us yesterday that the headmistress always shows up an hour early and that, that would be the best time and opportunity to present the plan.

"Does everyone know what to do?" I asked. The others nodded. Headmistress Nickolas walked over to us.

"Wow, you guys are excited for school," she said as soon as she saw us standing in front of the double doors. Although it was clearly a joke, we didn't laugh.

"Actually…we're here this early…for you," I replied. The headmistress looked at us in surprise. She clearly hadn't expected that.

"Oh?" As we had agreed, Brooke spoke up.

"It's like this…our friend Scarlet is moving in two months and we wanted to do a few different things for her." The headmistress' interest was piqued. We could tell from the look on her face that she was curious about the rest of our story. Of course she knew about Scarlet's upcoming transfer that she had to arrange.

"And what are those…wait, come with me to my office. It's still pretty chilly in here this early." We walked past the reception, through a double door, down a long hallway and through a pine door into Headmistress Nickolas' office.

"Okay, tell me. What did you have in mind?" I pulled a file folder out of my bag and handed it to the headmistress. We had thought out the whole plan yesterday and worked it out carefully down to the smallest detail. The headmistress read it over and looked at us with a serious look.

"You've come up with a great plan. Now I am prepared to invest a little in Scarlet's farewell, after all, she is one of our best athletes. She has already won many trophies for this school, several of which are first place. What if I take care of the financial costs? The music equipment. We have headsets and microphones here at school. Instead of a small farewell party, we will make it a school party, that way she will not suspect anything and we will also have a theme for the school party that was planned to take place but still had to be organized. Then it is up to you to decorate the gym if...' The headmistress waited to build up the tension.

'If what?' Jeremy asked. Waiting has never really been his strong suit and he is not very good at it. The headmistress looked at us one by one and could not suppress a smile. She thought it was a beautiful idea that we wanted to do so much to our friend and was more than happy to help us with that. That way she could also give something back to one of the best athletes at school.

"If everything goes according to plan and I get a piece of cake too," the headmistress laughed.

"Deal!" I stuck out my hand. The headmistress closed her hand around mine and shook it.

"Do you also spend this much time on your homework?" the headmistress asked, laughing. My friends laughed and nodded innocently. A little white lie never hurt anyone.

"Okay kiddos, I'll take care of a lot, but the biggest work is up to you." We gave each other a high five.

"If you come to me after school with a date and an estimate of what you expect to spend, I'll give you the money for the supplies. Just make sure you bring the receipts from your purchases." We stood up and grabbed our bags from the floor.

"Deal!" all seven of us said in unison.

"Okay, Nikki will decide the date," Emma said. We'd immediately walked to our lockers on the first floor after leaving the headmistress's office. We saw Nikki running up the stairs. When she reached us, she was stared at by seven pairs of angry faces.

"My alarm went off too late," Nikki defended herself.

"Uh-huh," all seven of us made the noise. She rolled her eyes, knowing we wouldn't believe her anyway, and decided to change the subject.

"How did it go?" Nikki asked curiously. We all couldn't hold back our smiles any longer and quickly told her how the conversation had gone. Brooke put the books she didn't need in her locker and closed it so Nikki could reach hers while she talked.

"Cool!" Nikki said. She opened her locker and dug through her bag for the books they wouldn't need until the afternoon.

"She did have a few conditions though," Renee said.

Headmistress Nickolas

I was so touched by the idea of ​​that group of friends that I couldn't think of anything else for the past few hours. I had looked up their schedules and decided to go get them out of class just this once because I couldn't wait to start this surprise with them. I took a moment to take a deep breath, knocked on the door and walked into the classroom. Their science teacher seemed taken aback for a moment but gestured for me to speak. I cleared my throat before I began.

"Hello, can I borrow: Emma Johnson, Jimmy Bender, Skylar Jackson, Auriana Williams, Renee Dawson, Nikki Simon, Jeremy Walker…" The friends stood up when they heard their names. Jake couldn't help laughing when he heard Auriana's name.

"…and Jake Matthews please?" Jake stopped laughing abruptly, thinking he was in trouble like the other eight. The nine students followed me to my office.

"Sorry to pull you out of class but I think it's such a nice gesture of you and I couldn't think of anything else all morning." The students looked at each other questioningly. They didn't seem to have a clue what I was talking about.

"I know I gave you until the end of the day, but I'd like to go shopping for Scarlet's surprise with you. Two months go by faster than you think." Everyone except Jake seemed to understand what I meant now. Jake still looked just as clueless.

"What surprise?" Jake asked. The friends remained silent and it was obvious that none of them had asked if Jake was interested in joining them. I got the feeling that they hadn't even thought about it.

"A surprise that you probably think is stupid anyway," Auriana shot back at him.

"Watch out, shrimp!"

"Shut up, idiot!" she responded fiercely. As I tried to ignore the bickering between the two, I tried to continue with my planning.

"You're all on your bicycles, I assume? I'm going to split you up into pairs to do the shopping: Brooke and Jeremy, Emma and Renee, Skylar and Jimmy, Auriana and Jake, and Nikki will walk with me," she thought out loud.

"Why the shrimp?" Jake asked. He crossed his arms stubbornly over his chest.

"Shut up!" she said again fiercely. I looked at them with a patient look.

"Because you need to learn to get along." Jake sighed. I grabbed sticky notes from my desk and started making lists of what needed to be picked up and who was going to get what.

Brooke & Jeremy:

Party decorations.

Scrapbook decorations.

Emma & Renee:

Cake batter and cake decorations.

Fabric.

Skylar & Jimmy:

Scrapbook.

Photo paper.

Blank CDs.

Auriana & Jake:

Basket.

Banner.

Friendship bracelets.

Nikki & Headmistress:

Basket decorations.

Camera.