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Thalia Lively

I think she got whip lash from turning her head so fast. I'm surprised it didn't snap or twist.

"Woah, are you okay? Do you not like them?" I ask, knowing full well that wasn't the case.

"W-what? No, they're okay I guess, I mean I don't really know them, I just see them around school and hear things about them but we've never interacted—" She pauses, noticing she's rambling and let's out a awkward laugh. "I just, I don't know."

Sneaking a peak back the boys that sat at the back table by the window, I hear her sigh in defeat. She's next in line and orders a bunch of food, turning around to me hungrily. "You have to try the food here, it's another blessing from the gods." She orders for both of us and we sit down at the front.

I think she purposefully chose this table because it's the farthest from the boys and everyone else.

She sat with her back towards them and I sat in front of her, having a perfect view at the boys as I imagined Emmett coming over here and talking to Riley which will end up with her fainting. At least that's what I assume would happen.

"Besides the schools cafeteria, where we only go when it's pouring or snowing outside, but everyone usually comes here to eat. I work across the street from here on night shifts and on weekends, are you looking for a job?" She points to a restaurant across the street, it didn't seem too fancy, but it looked busy anyway.

I nodded eagerly, hoping to get enough money to help Nonna out even though she has more than enough money, I wanna help and repay her.

"Okay, I'll put in a good word for you and talk to my boss about it, she's super chill. We need new employees anyway, it's getting busier by the day." She smiled widely.

We heard a ruckus coming from the back of the café and we both turn our attention to the people we assumed caused the disturbance.

Ethan stood there with a drink spilled all over his shirt and covering the floor, meanwhile Rebecca and her friends standing there smiling.

"Oh, I'm sorry." She stalked off to another table and sat down, happily going through her phone as if she didn't just do what she did. Ethan stood there staring at his shirt, while Emmett stared at Rebecca disgusted.

Carter spoke up first. "Well you probably shouldn't have told her she looks like a sloth."

Ethan gave him an incredulous expression. "Sloths aren't that bad—" Emmett slapped his hand over his mouth, preventing him from getting anymore drinks or food thrown on him as Rebecca turned around waiting for him to finish his sentence.

Ethan yanked Emmett's hand off and glared at Rebecca but quickly regained himself.

"Fight me." He said pretending to pounce and Emmett tried containing his laughter.

Ethan got over it quickly and laughed also, Rebecca glaring at the two.

Ethan was mid-way taking off his wet shirt when Carter stopped him. He pointed at all the girls staring at Ethan in anticipation, which caused him to smirk and lifted it higher. He quickly pulled it down and laughed.

"Ha-ha tricked you guys, you dirty freaks." He said.

Riley laughed in front of me, unable to hold it in. Carter looked over, hearing her loud burst of laughter and she quickly stops and bends down so she's out of his view.

But now he's looking directly at me.

The boy's looked over too and I grabbed a menu, covering my face from their eye-interrogation. Riley looks up at me mouthing 'holy shit' and I look at her out of the bottom of the menu as her face was pressed onto the table.

I check and they're talking again, their attention off of us and I mention to Riley that it's safe.

"As you can tell, Carter is the serious one but he isn't the scariest, that's a hundred percent Nathan. Austin is another Ethan basically and Emmett is the only normal one. They're all intimidating when they want to be though, one time at Austin's basketball game, our rival school I guess you could call them, started a fight with Austin and the boys all pounced, it was a bloody mess." She whispered hurriedly hoping no one was listening.

"Oh and there was the football game incident, and the soccer game incident, then the party incident—" I cut her off abruptly.

"What were they fighting for?"

"They never fought over the game or anything, they have personal issues with the guys from Region High, they go way back I've heard. But again, I've only heard these things so I don't really have an opinion on them or what they do. I'm sure they have their reasons because they aren't too keen on having the attention on them either which is shocking since they're always the centre of attention." She finishes and looks back at I'm assuming Emmett but I look at the girl come over with our food. The food looking freshly made.

She smells the fresh food and whips back, awning at the amount of food she ordered.

"I'll be back, she didn't give us tissues." I get up and go through the line of people, the waitress sees me and asks if there's a problem, to which I just simply pointed to the tissues since she probably wouldn't be able to hear me with most of the school in here now and talking loudly.

She hands me some and I turn around attempting to get back to my table. As I'm going through the tables, I tripped on one of the chair legs and stubbled but hit someone's shoulder by accident.

"Oh, I'm sorry—" I look up to see deep brown eyes and a cheesy smile.

"It's okay, love." I stood there awkwardly nodding at the handsome boy in front of me. "I'm Austin, and you are?" Oh, the fourth gang member.

"Thalia." I sent him a small smile and tried to go past him back to our table where Riley sat gawking at Austin, well I think she was looking at Austin.

"Get off of me, Ethan." I heard a deep, raspy voice behind Austin and as I passed him, I saw some guys back and another guy hugging him.

"I missed you so much, Nate."

"Ethan, you saw him this morning." Carter came into view and tried ripping him off of the random dude.

"That was the longest two hours without seeing him." Ethan got off and slapped Carters hand off of him but got a head slap in return.

"Austin did you orde—"

I locked eyes with forest green eyes and the breath got knocked out of me. I suddenly remembered I was standing there like an idiot for no reason and quickly turned, rushing back to the table.

"She's so cute!" I heard what sounded like Ethan's voice come from behind me and I looked down blushing even though no one would see it anyway.

"Y-you t-t-talked to Austin an-d-d the rest w-were there-e." Riley stuttered still looking at the group.

"Oh my god! You talked to them, you were right in front of them, they freaking looked at you! Oh my fucking god." She began rambling looking back and forth from me to the boys who were on their way back to their table. I could barely hear them but I did heard Austin asking why Ethan's shirt is soaked and Ethan replying with "Your girl paid me a visit, it wasn't just my shirt that got wet." and I choked on my drink.

"Nathan looked at you and didn't wanna kill you, that's a sign." She snapped her fingers in my face and I shook my head.

"Let's eat, lunch is gonna end in like thirty minutes and I have to go back to get my ID picture taken." She nodded and we ate the burgers, potato wedges, chicken wraps, fries and drank our milkshakes easily as time passed.

"I'm so full." I patted my stomach and groaned, I don't regret eating the food a single bit though, she was right it's amazing.

"Okay let's go, we don't have a lot of time left!" Riley grabbed her bag and I went to throw our trash out.

The waitress saw me. "Oh it's okay, we'll clean the table don't worry!"

"We are capable of throwing our trash out like normal humans, why make your job harder when we could do a little something to help. It's common courtesy." I smiled and went back to my table, grabbed my bag and again I was being dragged around by Riley like a little girl would drag her doll around.

We made it out without a hassle and I took a calm breath in, the fall wind flowing around me. It was getting colder so I took my hoodie out of my bag and put it on, Riley waiting for me shivering.

The crunched up leafs being pushed around the ground caught my attention and I admired them with a smile. God, did I love the feeling fall gave, it truly felt like a fresh start.

"I still can't believe you talked to them." Riley said turning to look back at café longingly.

"I'm not here for boys."

Her head snapped back to me, curiously. "How could you look at them and still think that? I bet you didn't get a good look at them, that's probably why." She tried convincing herself and I let out a huff.

"No, I seen them and like I said, I'm not here for boys."

"Then what are you really here for?"

That question struck me in a way I didn't think it would, what am I here for? I mean, it's not like I had a choice coming here.

"I don't know really. I guess to finish school and help my grandma out?" She changed the topic noticing my discomfort and told me stories about people from school.

Endless stories about fights, drama, teacher drama, anything that ever happened, she told me on the way back to the school.

I didn't mind listening, she was quite the character. She's one of those people that speak with their hands, where they act out what their saying with their hands. It was funny.

As we were walking through the parking lot to get to the main doors, a car drove by dangerously close to Riley and I grabbed her back to keep her safe.

"Who the fuck is that?" I glared at the car, waiting to see who came out and surprise, surprise. Rebecca.

"Is there a problem?" I called out to her and she turned around shocked that I didn't let that slip past.

"You are?" She said cockily, looking at her friends with a smirk.

"You'll know who the fuck I am when I break your nos—" Riley grabbed me and stopped me from walking closer to her.

"Now is there a damn problem? You could've hurt her." I looked at Riley who silently begged me to drop it and I did. For now.

Before she could say anything, I looked at her straight in the eyes.

"I dare you to try some shit like that again." With that I walked off, pulling Riley with me. My eyes scanned the parking lot, no one was here except Rebecca and her rats, and five guys watching from a far silently.

"Why did you do that?" Riley whispered to me, her eyes widened.

I looked at her with a serious expression. "Are you kidding me? She could've killed you if she got any closer, or ripped off your arm by how fast she going. You really think I'm going to take that lightly?" She let out a deep breath and hugged me suddenly.

"Thank you." I wrapped my arms around her for a second then looked at the time.

"I made us late to our next class again."

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{ probably not edited properly }

Did you like it? It's sort of too short to me so I'll make sure to make the next chapters longer but that seemed like a good place to end the chapter off.

I sincerely hope it was good though! Please give me feedback so I can improve.

Thank you for reading!

she's so pretty i'm gonna go cry now