"This is why you've missed the past four practices?" I hear Eli ask, obviously not pleased. I probably mirror her unhappy expression. She, along with me, has probably been hoping for the supervisor to be easily breakable. We're both smart enough to figure out that if the adult supervisor quits, we will be able to forget about this crazy idea and go back to our normal lives. Coach Holfman, however, happens to be the one person in this entire school whom both of us respect. He being over six foot five and the only person who can beat Eli in a kickboxing match doesn't help with our situation either. This will make it impossible for us to make the adult supervisor's life a living hell. Plus, I had been looking forward to working with Eli after all of these years. Why couldn't it be Mr. Hooper, my biology teacher, or something? That man would back out as soon as he saw my face.
I blink myself out of my thoughts and turn my attention to Principal Richardson. Her already smug face is somehow looking smugger by the minute. It's evident that she had this all planned out from the start.
"I hope you find your supervisor satisfactory," she says, smirking. "You better close your mouth before a fly gets in, dears."
Shaking her head, Eli closes her mouth and trains her face to go blank. I still keep my shocked face, but I do close mouth. The forgotten girl does nothing but look around with startled brown eyes. I make a mental note to introduce myself to her after all of this is over
The principal opens her mouth to continue, "I believe that is all for our meeting today. Do not, and I repeat, do not miss the meeting with the Elite or else I will personally skin you three alive and make new boots for myself." She pauses to collect herself once more, "Are there any questions?" Narrowing her eyes, she looks at us daring each of us, including coach, to ask one. We gulp simultaneously and shake our heads no. As soon as we answer no, her face brightens up and she pastes on a fake smile. "Very well then, I knew you were bright kids, you are now dismissed."
Feeling kind of numb and lost, I get up to leave. I see the others doing the same as well. We walk out the door in a straight line; however, before Eli can get out, her mother grabs her by the wrist and asks her to stay. The principal signals for someone to close the door and Eli looks at us with the wild look of a trapped animal in her eyes. Before I can help her, brown eyed girl reaches past me and closes it.
"Hey! What was that for?" I ask, annoyed, "You saw how scary her mom was!" she just rolls her eyes to answer me. This happens to annoy me even more. "Aren't you going to say anything?" I snap at her.
In response, she glares and opens her mouth; I'm surprised to hear a slight accent in her voice. I can't quite pinpoint where it's from, "It's her mom. Deep down she must love her, no matter how selfish she seems on the outside," I guess her response kind of makes sense. "Plus, we can always keep an eye on her from the outside and intervene if it gets dangerous."
"Are you saying we eavesdrop?" She looks at me and grins mischievously. "Hey! Shouldn't we ask coach first? He is, like, responsible for us." At that, she directs my attention to Coach Holfman, who was crouched down in front of the door, listening to their conversation. He catches me looking and shrugs his shoulders.
"I have to make sure Eli stays safe." That was enough of an excuse for me. I walk over to them and crouch down next to them. I'm thoroughly surprised by how much I can hear; the walls are like paper.
"You will stay in the group for as long as you can." I hear Eli's mother whisper-snarl. "You will take any means you can to become an Elite. I have done so much to get this family into the highest social class an Undeclared can achieve. Now my daughter has a chance to bring me even higher. You will not disappoint me understood?" She pitches her voice super low so her last question sounds chilling.
I'm surprised on how calm and monotone Eli's response sounds, "Yes mother." I'm sure if I had been there my voice would have cracked at least a dozen times. I guess that growing up with that witch would have forced her to become accustomed to scary situations.
The three of us quickly detach our ears as the door knob turns. An angry looking Eli stomps out. She quickly closes the door behind her and, ignoring us, she storms out of the office. With a quick glance at each other we follow her.
Being a very in shape athlete, Eli moves fast and swiftly. Coach, being the one who trained her, has no trouble keeping up and I'm vaguely in shape from all of the torturous soccer practices, however, from the corner of my eye, I can see brown eyed girl struggling to keep the pace. I guess that she'll just have to hang in there, because Eli seems to have no thoughts on stopping.
Contrary to my predictions, Eli abruptly stops in front of a noticeably empty classroom. She throws the door open and barges in. I follow her in. The others do the same. Coach approaches her slowly. With his hands up and in as gentle of a voice as he can muster, he says, "How are you Elliot?" Eli doesn't answer, but she does scream a little and kick a chair. Poor chair, it didn't have a chance. She continues to use her wide knowledge of kicks on the single chair until it is in its original IKEA stage of life. Finished dismantling one chair, she quickly moves on to another victim, and then another. As she kicks, I can vaguely hear her muttering something under her breath. From what I can make out, it sounds like she is cursing something, probably her mother, but I can't be completely sure. I lean over to the girl next to me with a startled expression in her wide eyes and whisper, "Can you hear what she is saying?"
She leans towards me and whispers back, never taking her eyes off of Eli as if she might be her next target, "No." In that exact moment, Eli finishes her little stunt with a loud, ear-piercing scream, and a punch directed towards the wall. I think that everybody's eyes widened, even a little, in a mixture of surprise, fear, and impression, as her hand went through the wall. This school has got to get a renovation.
Noticeably calmer, Eli extends her non-dominant hand towards the other girl. She smiles her brightest smile and cheerfully says, "Hi! I don't think we've met. I'm Elliot, what's your name?"
With a slightly unsure look on her face, brown eyes takes her out stretched hand and cautiously says, "I'm Armina."
"I'm Kai!" I jump in, feeling left out. They continue to ignore me and coach sends me a pitying look.
"That's such a pretty name," Eli says, as if nothing happened before hand, "I noticed you accent, did you just move here?"
Armina nods and responds, "I just moved from France."
"That's so rad!" I internally roll my eye at her choice of words, "How are you liking it here?"
"It is constantly exciting and the people here are so... lively."
Eli smiles sheepishly, "I'm so sorry about that. My mother just gets under my skin. I hope we can be friends? You should teach me French!"
Eli looks super excited at the idea of making a new friend and Armina's starting to look like she's about to faint from fear. Feeling slightly sorry for the new girl, I step in, "So we still have the problem of our fourth member?"
"Wait? That crazy thing was for real?" asks Armina, "I thought it was a welcoming party or something."
Eli rolls her eyes, "Yeah, No. My mother doesn't joke."
"Well, you can't back out now," says Coach reaching out to put a reassuring arm around Armina's slender shoulders, "Principal Richardson would pop a vain. Plus, I know the perfect guy for this team."
