The Demon's Soul

When Lilly woke up the next day she felt tired. Eyelids heavy due to lack of sleep, she laid on the bed while not having the heart to wake up. She wanted to stay right here in the bed. Remembering what happened the previous night, she rolled around her bed to stuff her face in the pillow. She was an idiot to think she had a chance. She should have known Gavin being a demon would prefer a demon partner, a beautiful one. Not that she wasn’t when she applied makeup but still. Somewhere down she was glad she hadn’t given him the letter. Just thinking about it made her embarrassed. Pulling herself up from the bed, she began dressing.

On her way to school, Lilly explained the night’s ordeal of what had happened quickly.

"I’m sorry it didn’t work out," Gwen’s lips were set in a thin line.

"That’s alright. Maybe we just weren’t meant to be," Lilly waved her hand dramatically.

"That’s my girl," Gwen patted her back, making her stagger, "You know what they say."

"That there is plenty of fish in the sea. I don’t think fishes like me," she muttered under her breath.

"Nonsense. You have to meet the right fish until then keep fishing with a strong hook," she grinned making her laugh and shake her head.

Stopping near the lockers, then caught sight of their friends who had huddled in a corner, talking to each other.

"He could have informed us earlier. One day isn’t enough," Marc huffed crossing his arms.

"Whining is not going to help Marc, you heard Rick. It’s our first match and we need to be prepared if we are planning to head to the finals," Sam said, who had his back leaning against a locker.

"But-" Marc protested to only be interrupted by Rick.

"Good morning," he greeted both Gwen and Lilly, "You girls are rather early today."

"Well, excuse me. There are days when we feel we need to utilize all the time," Gwen rolled her eyes. Compared to the boys, Lilly and Gwen were always late for classes. Seeing them running into the building and to the classes was a common sight.

"Says the latecomer," Marc commented looking up at the ceiling when her best friend sent a quiet glare.

"You have practice again?" Lilly asked Sam while both Marc and Gwen began to bicker with each other, having Rick as their referee.

"Kinda. Coach called up Rick yesterday and told him that we have a practice match with another school on this Friday. I swear he wants us to practice until we drop dead. Frankly, our team isn’t ready," he replied, running his hand over his blonde hair with a sigh.

"Isn’t that more of a reason to have a practice match then? You will have to work harder if you want to be better," she raised her brows to finally see him nod in agreement.

Rick, Marc and Samuel or Sam as they called him were part of the soccer team. Rick being the captain always had a hard time handling Marc who behaved like a five-year-old in the field. Though it was comical to the others, Rick’s pain was real. Sam was the bystander who would do nothing about it unless said. There had been times when Gwen would tease her with Sam but it was purely for fun. All of them knew that Sam had a soft corner for Lilly.

Fortunately or unfortunately, both Gwen and she was too lazy to join the cheerleading squad to cheer their friends. Instead, they took time by doing their homework sitting in the stands while the boys had practice matches. The other times they would sit under the shade of the tree while doing nothing in particular.

Sitting in one of the classes with a sheet of question paper in her hand now, she stared at it as the teacher distributed it to her other classmates. Why was there no surprise test when she studied and one held when she hadn’t gone through a word through the chapter? Like a thief, she carefully turned to look at Gwen who was sitting next to her and she snickered. Glad that she wasn’t the only one with that expression. Very few of them had touched their answer sheet with the pen, the rest of them scratching their head and reading the question paper over again. Doing some guesswork and applying her own theory while wondering why she was writing the paper on something she wouldn’t be using in the future was a wonder to her.

Once they handed their sheets of answer papers back to the teacher, Lilly felt her phone vibrate in her pocket. Pulling it out, she noticed it was from Sam who had messaged to tell them they wouldn’t be able to eat lunch with them today due to soccer practice.

The school they studied in was an average place with average students with no high profile parents but that didn’t stop the stereotypical bullies to exist. There were few girls her friend Gwen avoided like plague because they would always threaten her when she was alone. Due to this in the past, Gwen and the queen bee of the group had ended up in the principal’s room after scratching and hitting each other. It happened because of the obvious liking of Gwen towards Rick who was oblivious about it.

"How was the birthday yesterday?" Sam asked, picking up his bag and placing the sling on his shoulder.

"It was good," she replied pulling out the water bottle she carried with her.

"Isn’t it weird to have birthdays celebrated in three digits?" Marc asked with his mouth full.

"It’s normal in the demon world, nothing new. The only thing is that few of them look younger than me but are actually older," she explained. Seeing Rick unconsciously take the juice Gwen had been sipping on to made her shake her head. Poor Gwen. Should she spell it out? thought Lilly to herself. She saw Gwen blush and look the other way but all of them noticed it, even Marc who was stuffing his face with the sandwich noticed it but not Rick who was on his phone.

"Yeah, that would be weird. Imagine people having four digits numbered birthdays," joked Marc taking the last bite of his sandwich before throwing the wrapped in the dustbin on their way home.

"Actually there are people with that," hearing this Marc choked and he hit his chest as his eyes turned red. Sam rubbed his back, "There are the king and the queen. Don’t forget their children. Dad told the king was around two thousand years old."

"That’s scary!" Marc exclaimed after swallowing the food completely, "And we get what eighty or ninety?"

"We are humans," Lilly shrugged her shoulders.