𝙿𝚊𝚛𝚊𝚍𝚒𝚜𝚎 || 𝐅𝟒 𝐓𝐇𝐀𝐈𝐋𝐀𝐍𝐃 (editing)

nine

chapter nine:

"I would run away with you"
———

"Is it because I called you pretty?"

Shopping bags filled with random trinkets she found at the tourist shop adorned Lia's arms. The girls signature shades sat comfortably over her curled hair. Her eyebrows were raised in surprise after hearing Mira's scream.

Mira shook her head. She was completely engrossed in Lia's appearance. How could the person she was dying to meet be standing five feet away? At every charity event that Mira went to in Europe she would always keep an eye out in case Liliana was to make an appearance. Unfortunately, Lia wasn't the biggest fan of showing up to those events and preferred to discretely donate money as to not cause a fuss.

After Mira calmed down a bit the F4 boys introduced her to Liliana. Mira stuck her hand out for a handshake but Liliana threw her bags over at a startled Ren and engulfed Mira with a large hug. For the rest of their time at the airport both girls hard their arms hooked together whilst they giggled to one another. Thus, the boys were completely ignored and left out of their conversations.

Once again, the music was uncomfortably loud. Unlike the typically high school parties shown in movies with the sweaty dancing and vodka drunk teens, Mira's party was a bit different. All of the attendees were too conscious of their status to be drunk and making grave mistakes. Instead they all drank red wine and pretended to fill up on finger foods even though you could practically hear their stomachs grumbling. They weren't wearing the tiniest crop tops or trashiest outfits they could find. Everyone wore designer dresses or business casual attire — as long as it was worth enough to feed a starving village it was acceptable attire. Mira's parties weren't just a way for the students to have fun they were much more than that. Her parties also served to check the status of everyone at school and they were a place to flaunt around the wealth of their families.

When Gorya and Kaning entered the party they stood out. Not that it was necessarily a good thing. It wasn't their faults though, no one had told them the dress code for the party — not that they would be able to afford anything in the price range — but still, they looked nice. After encountering the same group of girls who invited her to the event her shirt became stained after one of them "accidentally" caused her to spill a plate of food on herself

Thyme and Liliana were watching the event unfold from behind a window in one of the rooms in Mira's house. Before that they were chatting to one another whilst sipping away on bitter wine. He watched as Ren came to the rescue and as Mira sprayed the girls down with champagne, ultimately causing them to fall into the pool. Lia cheered when she saw, "fuck yeah Mira!," she yelled with her glass raised in the air. Thyme smiled at the girl next to him and admired her. She truly was a stunning girl. Her neck was decorated with a simple fresh water pearl necklace from Vivienne Westwood, her white heels had the classic red bottoms, and her dress was a beautiful dark green velvet that nicely complimented her skin tone. But still, he felt uneasy about the scene he had just witnessed with Ren and Gorya.

After a while, Lia and Thyme left to go find the rest of their friends in the lobby near the stairs. Lia spotted a focused Ren who was sketching away just like he usually did. She leaned over to peak into his sketches and saw the outline of Mira's face. "So is this like an unrequited crush you have?," she asked him. He was flustered by her sudden question and closed the book, "No it's— it's complicated. I'm not sure how to feel about her anymore". In response the girl raised her eyebrows and took a sip out of her glass of champagne. It was then that Lia learned who Kaning was and introduced herself since they were both Gorya's friends. The two girls chatted away in their own little world completely blocking out the rest of the party. It was a grand surprise when they saw Gorya descending from the stairs in a beautiful dress that Mira had given her.

Everyone else kept their eyes fixated on the two girls as they reached the bottom of the staircase. Ren approached them and said something to Gorya that was inaudible to the rest of the party. Their moment was ruined by Thyme when he pushed Ren out of the way.

"Ren, what the hell are you doing? I gave this girl a red card. Why are you helping her?

His gaze searched from an answer on Ren's face. Mira interjected and ended up being pushed by Thyme which caused Ren to push him back harder. The two began to argue as punches flew at one another. "God I hate teenage boys with a passion," Lia mumbled as she set gave her glass to some stranger that was standing nearby. She was completely prepared to interject and end the dispute. It was starting to annoy her. Thankfully Gorya came to her rescue and pushed Thyme out of the way.

What Lia and the rest of the party weren't expecting was for Gorya to land on top of Thyme. Not only was she just on top of him but her lifts were also on top of his. Both of them stood shocked by the scene along with a confused Ren hovering over the two.

"Shit!" yelled MJ, Kavin, and Lia in unison.

Eventually Gorya and Thyme separated from one another. "You!," exclaimed Thyme before feeling his lips and looking at her in utter disbelief, "you just kissed me,".

His first kiss — the one he was saving for the right moment with the right person — was just robbed. The whole party stood in shock after watching the scene. Thyme did the only thing he could think of: run away. Apparently, Thyme had sticky hands because he happened to see Lia and took her with him on his way out. The girl yelled in surprised as she was dragged away by her wrist.

"Why do I feel Like you do this often, Thyme?"

Thyme and Lia were laying down on the grass hill after running a couple minutes away from Mira's house. He wanted to continue running but stopped after hearing Lia complain about her feet hurting for the hundredth time. Lia's heels were scattered across some strangers lawn as the freshly misted grass was staining her entire outfit with every second she laid there. But she didn't mind, her feet hurt too much to move to the concrete sidewalk.

"Aren't the stars beautiful?" she said rhetorically between breaths. He looked up at the sky. When was the last time he payed any attention to the stars? He couldn't remember. "Yeah," he agreed. "When I was little, I used to ask my dad about the stars and we made it a hobby to watch them every night to see if the changed." Thyme gave her a warm laugh. It was funny to imagine a small Liliana watching the stars attentively.

"Hey Thyme?" she turned to look at him, "I've recently heard... some things about your family. Are you doing okay?". In that moment Thyme wanted to cry. He was never able to talk about his family situation with anyone other than the three other members of F4 because no one would believe him. Why would they believe that his mom, on of the most well-respected women in Thailand, wasn't the warm hearted family woman that she wanted the public to believe? He was grateful that Lia had asked him in that moment. So he told her everything. He told her how his mom was incredibly strict with his life and how he could never do anything right in her eyes. He told her how his sister had essentially sacrificed herself to be subjugated to their mothers endless torture. He told her about how he created the red card game slightly hoping that his moms career would greatly fall and he wouldn't have to worry about his status anymore. He told her about the endless pressure he received from everyone: his family, the press, random stranger on the internet and so much more. He told her about how awful he felt for forcing his best friends to do things for him and how bad he felt for breaking Ren's toy. He told Lia everything.

By the time he finished his eyes were misty. She nodded along and followed everything he said closely. He looked at her with hopeful eyes, he hoped he hadn't said anything that would scare the girl away. All his concerns went away the second she gave him a sincere smile. They both say up at she reached over to pat his hair.

"Well pretty boy, if you ever want run away from home I would run away with you and we could live out our lives as average, broke, and happy college students".

——— a/n
NOT EDITED

HELLO!!! For those of you who actually read the notes at the bottom — I GOT THE SCHOLARSHIP:D Your girl Soul is officially university ready. I also missed writing this book yesterday but i'm glad i took the time off! Also thank you for 2k reads and over 200 votes! Definitely a massive surprise to come back to after my one day break!