chapter 6 • Dana and Leila.
1020 Words
Excuse me's and sorry's flew from Dana's mouth repeatedly as she manoeuvred her way through the clutter of people in Gregory High's hallways.
"Watch it!" A voice snarled at her.
"Sorry!" She called over her shoulder, heaving a sigh of relief once she was at her locker. She put in her lock combination and zipped open her Aztec bag.
"Royce! Don't hit the pretty girl!" Just as Dana heard the feminine voice, a body collided with her side. She staggered, nearly losing her footing.
"Oh my God... "
Dana's blood began to boil and she wanted more than anything to just scream. She hadn't even been in anyone's way!
Her lips were curled into a scowl as she turned to see the person who'd gone ahead to hit her—even despite his friend's warning.
The ginger-haired boy looked at her with furrowed eyebrows, his blue eyes conveying an apology.
Dana sighed, feeling her anger begin to melt away. "It's okay."
"I'm really sorry. It's my friend, she-"
"It's fine, honestly," she said, already turning away from him when the sight of the two Kane siblings rounding the corner caused her to stop.
The tightness in Avi's features made Dana's stomach drop.
No!
There was no way he was still bothered by her not taking his calls. It'd been three days since he'd last rang her and a whole week since they'd met at night. He'd stopped calling so he had to be over it. To her dismay, her body wouldn't cooperate with her brain and every time she saw him, she wanted to disappear.
Her palms were clammy when he and Leila passed by her. Him in his fitted black polo and jeans and Leila in a white blouse and cut off shorts, her lips, a dark rouge colour.
Dana, with her lips parted, couldn't keep her eyes off Leila as she walked down to her locker, as if the hallway were her runway and no one else was present. Her gait was lax yet confident, her face devoid of any expression.
Dana sighed. Leila was so mature.
Her attention appeared to be on getting her books into her locker, but she nodded her head as Avi spoke.
Suddenly Dana found her gaze being returned. She gripped her locker door, torn between looking away from Leila's stare and maintaining eye contact to seem bolder.
Once she felt Avi looking at her too, her decision was made. Who was she kidding? She wasn’t bold!
With a palpitating heart, she hurriedly hid her face behind her locker door, focusing on putting her books inside with sweaty hands.
She was done and ready to leave the hallways when a pair of ankle boots and tights she'd seen just minutes ago, came into her vision.
Her heart skipped a beat. What if Avi had sent her?
Her hands trembled as she looked up to meet Leila's black eyes.
"It's Diana, right?"
"No," Dana whispered. "Dana."
"Is there a reason you're leading my brother on?"
Dana's stomach plummeted, her entire face felt hot. "No! I'm not leading him on!"
Leila raised her eyebrows at her. "Why didn't you return his calls after Tuesday?"
Dana opened her mouth to speak but nothing came out. How was she supposed to tell Leila that her brother scared her? Besides, how was her ignoring his calls leading him on? That was a clear enough message.
"If you're not interested, tell him." Leila backed away and walked back to her own locker, her floral scent dissipating from Dana's environment.
Dana wanted Leila to notice her but not like this. Dread covered her, preventing her from looking in Avi's direction.
If she had known how serious things would get between them or how much Leila cared about him, she'd have stayed the hell away. All she'd managed to do was create a bad image for herself.
•••••
"I'll be placing all of you in pairs," Ms. Farrah said at the start of Dana's Economics class. "It's only for this week so swallow your complaints."
Dana's eyebrows pulled together. She usually liked Ms. Farrah's class—Economics was her favourite subject—and Ms. Farrah herself; with her perfectly done hair buns connoting her seriousness when needed and the dark purple lipstick that covered her lips everyday showing her edgy, cool side.
Groans resonated throughout the entire class nevertheless. Ms. Farrah simply rolled her eyes. "I noticed that in the last three pop quizzes I've given, the performance wasn't so great."
"Maybe because you sprung them on us." A boy muttered from the back of the class and what Dana guessed was his crew snorted.
"Shut your mouth, Brady. Damn jocks," she scowled.
"Anyway, I'm pairing those who scored the highest with those who failed. Let's see if this will help make things better. Those who show improvement in the next quiz get out of the one after it and the originally good ones get an extra ten percent on the exams at the end of the term."
Dana grinned. Economics was the only subject she excelled at. If she could get the boost, she was looking at having at least a ninety on the exam.
Dana bit back her squeal. Her mother would be so glad.
She crossed her fingers, silently praying. Please let my partner be cooperative.
Ms. Farrah pulled a sheet of paper from her mahogany table and walked to the middle of the class. "Brady and Sierra."
Dana nibbled on her fingernails as she waited to hear her name.
"Kareem and Nadia, Dana and Leila, Courtney and... "
Dana froze. Why hadn't this come before she'd met Avi. It just had to be now when her image had been tainted rather than when she’d been a faceless stranger. To Leila, she was just the girl who'd led her brother on. Great.
Perhaps, it could her chance to show Leila that she wasn't actually so bad; that she was only a girl with good intentions. Besides, partnerships always gave way to something good in her novels. There was no reason it couldn't be the same in her life.
- Writer
