Song recommended while reading this chapter - anything - by anyone

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KENDALL
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I stared at the unappealing red apple on my lunch tray, fiddling with the stem poking out from the center of the apple I peered up to face Rose who was deciding what to choose on display. Finally, Rose settled on getting a ham and cheese sandwich for lunch.

We slid our trays along the counter making our ways to the beverages, there we were greeted - Okay, not really - by the lunch lady Jonah, she looked just as cheerful as ever, and by that I mean she was as cheerful as Squidward from Spongebob Squarepants. She stared at the both of us blankly.

"What? are you going to decide? Or am I going to have to decide for you?" She snapped, speaking in her heavy foreign accent, shaking my head I caste a small smile as she rolled her eyes in reply. Note to self : do not, whatever you do, stare at lunch lady Jonah. Check.

"No, no thank you." I answered muttering.

So maybe I never really had a choice in the first place because Jonah had not even bothered to look at what she was doing and slammed the first packaged drink her hand had got a hold of and slammed it onto my tray, giving me a iced-coffee. Great, when I had ordered an orange juice, maybe I could just not look at the packaging while drinking it and pretend it was orange juice and force myself to believe it was.

Just as I was about to protest she sent a murderous glare my way, I inhaled, gulping the lump down in my throat, my mouth slowly became dry and sticky. I hung my head low and moved on muttering "Ice-coffee is fine." I don't even drink coffee, I thought to myself. I hate it. It's bitter. It's gross. It's coffee.

I grumbled scuffing on my feet to continue walking down the lane. Rose too intrigued in her food hadn't taken any notice of lunch lady Jonah.

I grabbed a small cup of pudding and placed it onto my tray before a certain someone had nudged me by my side.

"Want mine?" Mac stood there, in line, next to me - and I never even realized until now.. - He peered at my ice-coffee frowning. As he held out his Orange juice. "It's like a lucky dip with her." Mac joked nudging me with his elbow.

"A lucky dip, more dip, less lucky."I scoffed as he smiled charmingly at one of the lunch ladies passing him a cup of fruit salad.

"You can have mine, I didn't even ask for a drink but she practically threw one at me anyways, square in the face." I stared at him skeptically as he smiled. Although I couldn't help a small laugh escape my lips, he grinned. I'm only drinking water now since the basketball season's started, got to keep in shape." Mentally I wanted to just say 'keep in shape? says the guy with the six pack but of course, I didn't.

"If you insist. I don't worry about that kind of stuff." I grinned toothily taking his juice from his hands. Our hands ever so slightly brushed against one another, a delicate touch - is it weird that Ed Sheeran's lyrics 'Maybe just the touch of a hand' just came into my head? - yet sent warmth into my hands. He seemed unfazed by this, I cleared my throat, settling the juice down.

"Thanks." I managed a smile as he peered down at me. Staring for a moment, his eyes settled on mine before he simply nodded casting a polite smile back.

"So, the lions first basketball game is this Saturday-" Mac begun before David came running around the corner pulling people out of the line by their shoulders and yelling. 'YOU'RE NOT MAC' and moving onto the next person as he slowly made his way down the line ignoring the death glares coming from the students as well as some of the lunch ladies - Jonah - he had finally reached us and pulled Mac around by his arm to face him before exhaling.

"Mac, dude. I was looking for you everywhere." he sighed, catching his breath before continuing. "Look, Messi is going to whoop our ass's if we're late, we've got a meeting, you know how he hates tardiness. So move it." He finished.

Mac turned back to face me "Talk soon?" he asked as I nodded all while in the background you could hear David singing... more like shouting 'I like to move it, move it, I like to... move it!' referencing a movie I couldn't exactly remember the name of... to top it all off he spun his two hands around in circles one overlapping the over as he'd stop every so often and point to the ceiling before switching hands.

"Lets get a move on Flurry." David grumbled leaning over the counter, just behind Mac, taping his watch, or should I say imaginary watch.

"Sure." I replied but mentally knowing we probably weren't going to.

"I'm getting old." Gasped David bending his back down like an old crumpled man on a walking stick, he squinted his eyes as if looking into the sun, in doing so he literally shoved a guy behind him back with his butt, with that, the guy walked out of the line with his tray looking revolted.

"Haha, real funny." Snorted Mac before placing down his tray as a lunch lady took his tray of food away. As Mac was walking off David slid into his place staring at me, he prompted himself up with his elbow as he rested against the counter top.

"Hey," He sent me one of those boyish nods. "David." He spoke as if we hadn't met, I had to stop myself from rolling my eyes. He outstretched his free hand for me to shake, but I simply stared at it not really sure what to do, He then slowly retrieved his hand back into his pocket.

"Touche." He winked.

"Move it Legends, you have the rest of your life to worry about girls." Mac grunted, pulling him along by the arm making their way out of the cafeteria.

"You're just jealous." David shouted out so the whole student body could hear, Just as they had made it to the double doors that opened to the hallway full of lockers David turned his head to a side to face me while making a phone sign with his hand and putting it up to his ears. While mouthing a 'call me' maybe.

David Legends, my stupid neighbor, the notorious womanizer, the party animal (or as I like to call it as a person who wakes up on someone's front lawn), the best party host of all time, the list goes on, he's trouble and he's Mac's best friend, they're the total opposites of each other, that's what I don't understand.

"ARE YOU GOING TO MOVE?!" Snapped Jonah, who was not one but two lunch lady's down from the one I was currently at, I jumped a little but so did everyone else from her sudden outburst. I moved out of the line noticing I was blocking the way and everyone was waiting for me to move while I was helplessly just standing there staring off into space.

I peered over to my side where I found Rose at our usual table accompanied by several others of our friends, Leanne, Bree and Anna. I somewhat jogged over to her as she peered up from her phone smiling.

I slid my tray next to hers skidding into the seat beside her, in between Leanne and her.

"Mac and you would be cute. I can see it now." Leanne exaggerated waving her hands around like the instructor of an orchestra.

"And that's what I always say." Rose sighed agreeing with Leanne.

"Who? Me? Him?" I pointed to myself before where Mac had just excited and shook my head. "No." I laughed taking a bite from my apple in hopes I'd have to speak less about this topic, I'm so awkward its embarrassing.

"Whatever you say." Rose laughed pulling off small pieces of her sandwich into her mouth, one by one."You know it too." She added wiggling her dark eyebrows as I rolled my eyes.

"No." I muttered placing down my apple, which may I add was still green (on the inside).

"Okay." Leanne chirped in a sing-song manner.

❅

After lunch like I had suspected there was no more encounters with Mac, nor David, nor anyone of that matter, besides my teachers and my classmates, they were all nice but after staying in chairs that gave you pins and needles for almost two hours straight while listening to teachers who oh so love their jobs - not -, you get over it.

School went by in the blink of an eye, after coming from Summer break, there were a lot of upgrades throughout the school such as their art rooms, they had hung inspirational quotes in each and every room, all of which framed. In the music room their stock of guitars had grown, from a few acoustic guitars to now too many to even count, even a collection of electric guitars too.

Other than that nothing sparked my interest after lunch.

❅

"You all can't slack off! this is the first game of the season!" Coach barked.

"Bite me." Rose snorted rolling her eyes as the coach demanded us to do another ten laps around the court while dribbling two basketballs with both hands all at the same time. "Extra five laps from Winters." The coach didn't even bother to give Rose another glance, I didn't dare to talk, I needed to focus on my breathing and keep running, I found if I talked while running I would go out of breath, discovering that after a month of track at school, I'm glad I joined the team when I was younger, it paid off.

"You've got to be kidding me." Rose murmured. "Make it six." The coach exclaimed, Rose now remained quiet and ran alongside me in silence.

"It's obviously that time of the month for somebody." Anna huffed running at the same pace as Rose and I, on my right side.

"Yeah or her boyfriend dumped her, again." Rose shivered at the thought, she started to slow down huffing, inhaling than exhaling. Anna giggled at Rose's remark nodding.

"Yeah, I don't think anyone could forget about that day..." she commented. The corner's of my lips tugged down into frown as I thought about that day.

She literally showed up in her pajamas's, slippers, fuzzy socks and a Adidas jumper thrown over it all, her whistle was no longer visible that day, she probably forgot it, surprisingly she hadn't come late that day. Her eyes were so red that it looked like she rubbed shampoo in them.

I quickly looked over my shoulder as I heard coach screaming like someone had just cut off her pinky toe.

Leanne's basketball had smashed into the back wall of the stadium, she held her other ball in her hands, hanging her head down low not daring to look coach in the face, even though coach only stood at five foot in height her temper made her seem like she was six foot and over. Leanne curled her shoulders looking at her shoes.

"Everyone, stop." Coach demanded, huffs were heard all throughout the hall, echoing. She stomped her foot down. Here we go again, she'll crack it at the smallest things, like if someone misses a lay-up every once in a while she'll blow a fuse, it's like she expects us to be at NBA player's standard. "That is enough, you girls are never serious, maybe you should all just quit." She snapped, Jesus, I know its like I'm depicting her as a witch but I mean... she kind of in the nicest way possible was like a witch. I stared at her disgusted, I wasn't going to stand for this, never in hell.

"Okay, so we're not good as the lions, or whatever, but when you signed up to help the Haven High Tigers maybe you should have read the terms and conditions section,"

"Who even reads the terms and con-" Bree begun to comment before Rose sent her a look to remain quiet and sit the hell down to let me continue, she gaped her mouth before quickly closing it nodding, Rose smiled mouthing a 'Love you'.

"My point is, when you agreed to coach for this team you signed up for training us, if we were perfect we wouldn't need a coach." I ended staring her dead in the eyes, everyone that was between coach and I parted away as if I was Moses splitting the seas.

Coach stared at me blankly, expressionlessly, maybe she was drilling lasers into my skull or envisioning her snapping my neck like a twig, but I had to do what I had to do. We as a team weren't going to put up with this anymore.

She begun clapping and I stiffened, color came running back into her cheeks. She laughed, walking away to the benches-tripping over in the process- before swinging her bag over her shoulders.

"Well done, I'd like to see you coach this team." As she spoke it started off calm until her voice started to grow louder, I stared back at her shrugging. "Fine." With that she smiled, not a genuine one though, it looked as if she was amused by this.

She looked around the whole gym before walking off, pushing the doors open. No one dared to move a muscle, it was all registering for us what had really just happened.

When I thought we were going to stay in that position until the next morning and school kicked in a bang against the polished wooden floorboards was heard.

I looked over, Rose was dribbling the ball ready to make a lay-up, as she shot, she scored, the ball running around the rim before dropping into the net.

"T- what?" Rose called, cupping her hands around her mouth, she repeated "T-what?" She wanted us all to finish off our team chant, the chant we made back in sophomore year. The team remained silent, itching their arms and looking around, anywhere but Rose.

"Ti-gers!" I yelled, as Rose grinned. "T-what?" she placed her hand to her ear as if she couldn't hear. "Ti-gers!" I laughed.

"Come on, I can't hear you!"

"Ai, Ai captain!" Bree burst out laughing referencing Spongebob Square-pants. "Who lives in a pinapple under the sea?" Bree sang as I chirpped in.

"SpongeBob Squarepants!" And in a matter of time the whole team joined along, shouting, the excitement built as I sent a thumbs up to Rose she grinned showing off her pearly whites.

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H E Y  G U I S E !

Naw, I love the tigers team, they're so cute. Oo, big game soon, the Lions and Tigers will be playing, go Haven High! no? anyone?

Oh! and I was thinking should I do a Q&A? I'll be posting it on my trailer channel, but if you guys think I should do it comment questions! x it could be about anything, the book, upcoming books or questions about me xD

Thinking of SpongeBob just brings me back to my childhood guys ;') Like haha, I used to love it so much I made up a dance to go with the theme song, it was like a tradition, like I had to do the theme song after every episode... yeah, I'm weird, like my parent's friends would be over and I'd be doing some really weird as dance and they'd be so worried like "Brendan, Linh, is Kylie alright?" like I literally looked possesed... haha... ha.

anyways, love you all, hope you liked the chapter and that short story time with Kylie, haha.

- Kylieee

xoxo