The Rebel League

Chapter 16- Sparks

This was beyond frustrating. This was actually humiliating. Every muscle in my body tensed with concentration and beads of sweat formed across my forehead. I pushed harder, making the veins in my arms pulse. I had to win. This time, I wasn't going down without a fight.

Just as I thought I had it, my arm was slammed against the table with an incredible amount of force. Kira had won. For the seventh time that morning.

"Good lord, girl." I gasped, rubbing the newly formed bruise on my wrist. "No thirteen year-old should be able to arm-wrestle that well."

Kira flashed a knowing smile. "Damn straight."

She stood up and fetched a water bottle from the fridge. Despite the ease of thrashing me repeatedly, her pink singlet top was dampened with sweat. As she sipped, I took my black one off and started doing push-ups. A little extra toning never killed nobody, right? Besides, I was now convinced that I was heavily off my game.

"Good morning, Estella." Kira called from over the kitchen bench.

I looked up through my way-too-long bangs and saw her yawning outside her door. After a slight blush, she had decided last night to crash in Kira's room. It seemed like the most appropriate choice... I suppose.

I stood up and tried to look presentable, tucking the loose strands of hair behind my ears. "Morning."

Kira chuckled behind me for some reason. "Smooth."

Estella rubbed her eyes. "Good morning. How did you guys-"

She froze mid sentence when she saw me. "What?" I asked. "Do I look- oh."

I realised I still didn't have a shirt on. Quickly pulling the singlet back over my head, I wondered exactly why I cared that Estella saw me shirtless. She'd probably already seen me without a shirt from our time in the treehouse at some point. I could've just made a joke about it like old times. Why did I suddenly feel embarrassed?

Estella recovered herself with a small shake of the head. "How did you sleep?"

"Like a rock." Kira said. "What about you, Harley? I heard your snoring at four o'clock in the morning so I'm assuming you had a nice dream." She turned to Estella. "You made a good choice for your bunkmate."

After a brief awkward silence, Ruby and Thea joined us in the main room. Thea's short hair was spiky from pillow head and Ruby's eyes had dark rings around them.

Partially my fault. I thought, remembering last night's escapade. Including the conversation afterwards.

The only strange part of it was, Ruby came from Joel's room.

I wasn't fully aware of it until a few moments later but when I was, I looked over at Estella to see if she'd noticed. Luckily, she either didn't see it or just hadn't said anything.

Yet.

I'd ask Joel about it later. For now, I still wasn't fully convinced that Ruby and Callum had dated. Sure, he might've been nice to her, but surely he would've realised what a mistake he had made. And Ruby, how could she not see how dark he was?

Harley. I mentally slapped myself. This is her love life, not yours.

I thanked mental Harley for the pep talk and smiled at the two latecomers. "Morning you two. Sleep well?"