E V E R E T T

HALFWAY THROUGH MATHS TODAY, I was really starting to question my life choices. What was I thinking when I chose to continue with advanced math in my senior year when I could barely focus on school after Emma died?

I glanced at Lana seated next to me but instead of having her nose buried in her notebook like she did most of the time during maths and physics, she was today seated crossed-legged in her seat, fully engrossed in the Nintendo in her lap. She again wore a flannel way to large for her, baggy ripped jeans, and her usual ratty uggs. Her black hair fell loose and her pale skin was in contrast.

When I looked her up on Facebook and sent her a friend request, I saw an old picture of her, which was her only post. It was a girl in a red summer dress with long shiny black hair. Her was face round and a big smile reached her eyes, making them nowhere near as dull and empty as they seemed now.

The Lana next to me looked almost like a different person. It made me wonder what happened.

Another week had passed since my first day here and after sitting next to Lana in physics and advanced math on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, I had figured out that she was not the talkative type at all. In fact, she only spoke when she had to. Otherwise, she was either too engrossed in her textbooks or in her Nintendo.

In addition to being very quiet, she was also a genius. When the teacher wrote a problem on the whiteboard, Ali, Lily, and my brain barely started taking in the numbers while she was already halfway through solving the whole thing in her notebook.

"Lana." I poked her arm with my pencil and she raised her chin and turned her head, dull, coal-black eyes meeting mine.

I offered her a small smile. "Did you solve it?"

"Yeah."

"I don't understand the last part."
Could you help me out?"

With a blank face, she dropped her gaze to the halfway unsolved problem scribbled in my notebook before meeting my eyes again. I expected her to mumble an emotionless "Baka" and look away but she actually sighed briefly and nodded.

She put down her Nintendo in her lap and I shoved my notebook closer to her. She put her a finger by the x and started explaining, "So to find the x..."

Despite it only lasting for a few minutes, it was the longest time I had heard her talk and I was really surprised. Her voice was different than I expected. It was raspy like she hadn't talked in days.

Despite looking like she just wanted to return back to her game, she didn't seem to mind repeating the explanation when she noticed I hadn't quite gotten the hang of it.

When we were done solving the problem, I raised my surprised gaze to hers. "Wow. Lana, you are a genius."

The sleeves of her flannel were too long, grazing her fingertips. She pushed them up when she returned my pencil to me, and I caught sight of the five bold letters tattooed on her knuckles on each finger of her right hand.

S I R E N

Subconsciously, she adjusted the black sweatbands around her wrists before picking up her game again and averting her attention back to it.

"What are you playing?" I asked, curiously narrowing my eyes down to her lap where she was hiding her blue Nintendo behind her desk.

"Mario Kart."

I grinned. "Mario kart is awesome."

Once again, she lifted her gaze from her lap and turned her head, but instead of holding a flat face, a hint of astonishment tainted her face and she blinked. "You play?"

"Yeah, but Pokémon and Zelda too. I mostly play on the Nintendo switch though."

A hint of surprise touched her face and she said, "me too."

"You have the 3DS and the Nintendo switch too? Nice."

She nodded. "Nice."

Ever since Emma died, I had gotten more immersed into my Nintendo games. It was the only way to escape reality and I thought it was kinda nice knowing someone seemed to feel the same way. Thus, I smiled and it surprised me how naturally it came. "You're actually kinda cool, Lana."

After math class was over, I was shoving my books inside my backpack because I was screwed if I didn't repeat today's lesson when I got home today. When heading out of the classroom, I noticed Lana had already left. Ali caught up beside me and we headed down the crowded hallway together.

"Dude, listen. Just a heads up, you should be a bit careful around Lana," he said, as we darted past the crowds cramming the hallway, barely escaping all the possibilities to get mugged.

Brows furrowing, I glanced sideways to Ali. "Why? She's cool."

"It's not that. There are rules you need to follow if you wanna talk to her."

When we approached my locker, I laughed. "Seriously? Rules? What rules?"

Sighing, Ali leaned against the row of lockers while keeping his unamused gaze on me. "Rule number one, no touching. Especially no skin-contact with her and rule number two, at least one-meter space between you and her."

Bewildered and astonished, my brows shot up. "What the heck? Why?"

He shrugged. "Don't ask me. It's been like this for three years. Just follow the rules unless you seriously want to get your ass kicked by The Sirens. You're already on their bad side. Don't make it worse. You don't even wanna imagine what's gonna happen to you if you break those rules."

Before he walked off down the hallway, Ali's next words left me standing even more dumbfounded by my locker. "And one more thing. The rules only apply to boys."

~

"We need someone who can take responsibility for our cheques, can set up our budget and manage our Facebook page. Someone who's good with numbers, accounting and managing," I explained to the council members. After school, we were gathered in our meeting room, seated around the large table, and trying to contribute with suggestions on who could be the finance and media manager.

After thinking it through for a few minutes, I finally suggested a name. "What about Lana?"

The shock which was followed by laughter ripped through the thick silence in the room.

Seated across me, Kevin was still breathless as if my suggestion was the joke of the year. "You want a gang member to join the council? Isn't that what we're trying to prevent here?

I blinked. "What? No, and just because she's in a gang that doesn't mean she's not worthy enough to be on the student council."

Kevin shook his head. "I mean, the previous student council only consisted of gang members. What's the point of creating a new council when it's going to turn out just like the last one?"

"It won't and we can't just assume all gang members are the same. I'm sure Lana can keep the student council and her gang business apart," I argued, firmly.

"Yeah but-"

"Guys, why are we having this decision? There's no way she is going to want to join the student council anyway!" Ali interrupted.

I glanced at Ali. "How do you know that?"

"Because...because she's Lana. She has no interest in anything except her gang. Besides, if you stare at her for more than ten seconds, she'll legit kill you. Not to mention the rules."

I knew Kevin and Ali were only worried about me and the outcome of the council but I couldn't generalize the people here. Just because most gang members didn't give a damn, that didn't mean all of the gang members did. 

But I wasn't going to give up so easily. "I'm still going to ask her. We have to treat everyone as equals here. Everyone deserves a chance to change. What they do outside of school shouldn't take that chance away from them. Plus, I want to be on everyone's side. I don't want to make this school a better place only for the few people who aren't gang members. I want the majority who are gang members to be included too."

"I think Everett's right. Just think about it. If we have at least one gang member among us in the council itself, it's even better. The gang members have someone from their side on the council. It'll make them feel apart of the school community," Lily explained, passing me a meek smile.

As the meeting ended, the others ended up agreeing to my suggestion. It was late when I was heading out of the school and my mind was going back and forth on how I was going to ask Lana to join the council, imagining a hundred different scenarios of how it would go down. Mostly because her gang would probably be with her. Jada's death glare was already giving me the chills. That girl hated my guts more than anything.

Suddenly, I felt Ali's hand on my shoulder. I looked at him and let my gaze trail off to what he jerked his chin towards. At the entrance to the school parking lot, five very familiar girls were gathered. It was now I noticed a strand of their hair on the left side of their head was red. It made me wondered if they had the same tattoo as Lana too? 

Speaking of Lana, if The Sirens were here, that definitely meant...the one my eyes immediately searched for was seated on her rusty red bike, hands loosely curled around the handlebars.

"Ali and Mr. President. What's up?" Isha's eyes were on us now, curiosity flashing across them.

Ali looked at me expectantly, which caused the rest of the girls to move their eyes to me as well. In the end, they were all staring at me.

Isha seemed amused.

Carmen seemed bored. 

Lana looked sleepy.

Jada looked at me like she was analyzing me from every possible angle.

I felt my cheeks warm up when I failed to keep it cool and ended up offering them a stupidly awkward smile. "Hey. I just needed to talk to Lana for a moment."

Lana looked up from the ground and her onyx eyes met mine.

Jada folded her arms across her chest and shot me a glare that I had a feeling I should start getting used to. "Whatever you have to say, you can say it in front of all of us."

I sighed and glanced at Lana again. "I was wondering if you wanted to join the student council? You can-"

"-Baka." She immediately looked away.

The other girls started laughing.

"Wait. You can't just decide without letting me finish. I was saying that you can be the finance manager since you're really good at math and with numbers. We could really use your skills on the council."

She didn't answer let alone raise her head.

"But why not? I really need you, Lana."

As soon as the words left my mouth, I realized what I just said and I felt my whole face heat up.

Fuck.

My mouth was never going to learn how to stop blurting out
embarrassing shit. Lana's face jerked up, round Bambi eyes briefly wide open. I stared at her. She stared at me. Nobody made a sound. It couldn't get any more awkward than this.

Apparently, my total embarrassment broke the boredom across Carmen's face and she almost burst out laughing while Isha started giggling.

"He's so cute," Isha whispered.

Unfortunately, I still got the same answer from Lana. "Baka."

"You'll get paid!" I argued, quickly.

With that, her eyes instantly found mine and her voice was faint but curious. "Paid?"

"Yes. I talked to the principal and she agreed that if we pay the gang members to work as student council members, they won't need to sell drugs and stuff. So it's kinda like a better option."

"We don't sell drugs," Jada butted in, watching me like a hawk.

I shrugged. "You'll still get paid."

Carmen met Ali's gaze and smirked. "Well, Ali. My bro, you just got exposed. Doing it for the cash, are we?"

Ali shrugged. "Both I guess. Change and money."

Jada snorted. "Sounds promising."

He grinned at Jada. "Don't be a grumpy ass, J. Doesn't suit you."

Jada rolled her eyes and looked at Lana, waiting for an answer from her.

For a moment that seemed so endless, Lana stared past me, disappearing into her own thoughts. I was surprised when she murmured, "I'll think about it."

I grinned. "Awesome. If you decide to join, we're having another meeting tomorrow after school in the student council meeting room."

Jada sighed. "Why the fuck are you even doing this? You're wasting your time on this student council crap."

I folded my arms across my chest and looked Jada in the eye. "Why? I mean people always complain about how undeveloped and bad their country, town, or family is, but instead of staying to make changes, they run away. And yet, they still complain. You want to change, you have to stay and make those changes. Not run away. You have to be the change."

Carmen and Isha raised their brows while Jada just rolled her eyes, mumbling, "We'll see about that."

"What are you even going to do? People hate you here. What will you pull off that'll make them listen to you?" Isha wondered.

"They'll listen to me and I'll listen to them," I replied, firmly.

Ali and I were about to leave but without warming Carmen was in front of me, gripping the collar of my hoodie in her fist. Suddenly, all the boredom in her eyes had vanished. "Listen up, Weston. The Sirens are a family. If you hurt one of us, or in this case, Lana, if she decides to join this little sunshine club of yours and you even wrongly lay a hand on her-"

"-I promise I'm not going to hurt your friend. I'll follow the rules," I said, my voice sharp.

"Good. Then we agree." She smiled and shoved me away but bumped her fist against Ali's before following the girls out of the parking lot.

My jaw dropped. "What the fuck?"

Ali shrugged as a grin played on his lips. "They hate you, man. Don't worry. I think you can actually get on their good side. If I did, then you can too."

***

Author's note: Hi, friends! Here is a brand new chapter! Hope you guys enjoy it. Do you guys think Lana should join the council?

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