three years but it feels like forever.
** This fictional book features MATURE THEMES such as violence, sexual content, strong language, etc. Please read at your own discretion. **
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CHAPTER - TWENTY TWO
flashback chapter ALMOST 10 YEARS AGO | 6TH GRADE 𝙰𝚝𝚕𝚊𝚗𝚝𝚊, 𝙶𝙰
Moni walked out of the school building, clutching her backpack in one hand and her water bottle in the other. She marched over to the parent pick up line and sat on one of the benches, not caring that the school day didn't end for another two hours. She just needed to be out of that classroom.
She knew she was gonna hear it from her mom when she got home about skipping class, but she couldn't stand another second of the teacher's lecture about the importance of Father's Day when her father was in jail.
Regardless of how much Sage tried to sugarcoat stuff to her daughters, they were old enough to understand that he wasn't getting out any time soon. Just the thought of never seeing her daddy again constantly made Moni burst into tears, while her older sister was able to suppress her sadness better and saved her tears for her pillow every night.
Moni halted her steps when she found someone occupying her signature seat on the bench. A tall brownskin boy with curly hair sat hunched over on the bench, staring at nothing in particular. Usually she'd go back inside to avoid any conversation with someone she didn't know, but she was too upset to make her way back inside the school building and risk getting stopped and forced back to class by a staff member.
With a sigh, she plopped down on the other end of the bench, a comfortable distance away from the boy, and wrung her hands together in her lap. The boy picked his head up and looked at her with a look of pure irritation at the fact that she chose to sit on the bench he was sitting on.
"What?" The word left Moni's mouth before she could stop herself. As soon as the world escaped her lips she regretted it. She sounded like her sister, and there was nothing wrong with that, but Mercy was 10x more confrontational than her.
She watched the boy narrow his chocolate brown eyes at her before facing forward again and saying, "Nothing."
Moni hummed in response. She kept fighting the urge to look over at the boy, but he was just so handsome. Sighing, Moni dropped her backpack and lunch box on the floor in front of her, unzipping the biggest compartment of her backpack to pull out a book.
Katriel couldn't help but watch her out of the corner of his eye. He knew exactly who the girl sitting next to him was, he was just never this close to her. This was Kimoni, Mercedes younger sister. Mercedes, or Mercy as everyone called her, was in his grade and in a handful of his classes.
They didn't speak much at the beginning of the year besides a few short convos in detention. But ever since his best friend, Makai or Kai, had developed a crush on her, they'd all hung around each other more often. That also meant running into Kimoni on more than one occasion. If the talk he'd heard was true, Moni was supposed to still be in elementary school, 5th grade to be exact. But she'd excelled all her state exams and got bumped up to 6th grade with her older sister.
