Her Safe Haven

Chapter 2 - What A Drag...

Previously on Her Safe Haven: It was a Spring morning in the McHalen household. Winter and Gray were getting ready for their new sophomore year at Lakeside High.

The sky outside was dark as he walked towards the hall. He could hear the soft rumblings of thunders, and soon enough the faint sound of drizzle as he walked next to the soccer field.

What a drag... he sighed. He observed black clouds forming above his head and sighed again before continuing down his path.

The sight of an excited arm waving at him from the distance finally made him smile.

'Seth! Hurry up, we're almost late!' she gestured, motioning for him to come quickly.

He quickened his pace and shook his head as he caught up to her. "Can you be patient? Tch, women," he muttered, but the smirk on his face gave away his true feelings.

She grinned as she playfully punched the side of his arm.

She was well-acquainted with her best friend's laziness and pessimism, along with his well-known superiority complex over women. But still, he was her best friend for a reason.

The first time he had heard that she was mute, he quickly learned the sign language, and, with the IQ of over one-hundred-and-eighty, had mastered it in a little less than two weeks.

Of course, under normal circumstances, he would never put himself in so much trouble as to learning a new language just to communicate with a girl. But this certain girl couldn't be put under the category of 'normal', as far as he was concerned.

When he first saw her, ten years ago, she was being helplessly teased by some of his classmates to the point of crying. Usually, he wouldn't really care for bullying and would just sit back, relax, and ignore the show. However, after seeing the small McHalen crest on the back of her school uniform, he quickly stood up and warned the other kids that they were messing with the wrong girl.

They left, of course, after being warned by the school's first in level. And after they did, she smiled at him with the brightest smile he had ever seen, and he was stunned.

Seth Connor was not one to be made speechless by a girl; hence it was quite easy to say that he had fallen for this girl.

And he had fallen hard.

Until now, Seth didn't know whether it was just a mere crush, or that she was his first love. Whatever that feeling was, it had gotten him into trouble the first time she had learned about it during their third grade primary school year.

Seth never confessed to her nor asked her out, obviously, yet it was some foolish loud idiot who told her about Seth's... dilemma. She had avoided him for weeks after that, and it took him quite some time to be able to assure her that it wouldn't change anything between them. Then, after a week's worth of argument, she agreed to stop ignoring him.

Of course, their friendship didn't turn up quite the same after that. The awkwardness was obvious, but as the years went by and he had finally learned to let go of the feelings he knew will never be requited, they became best friends again.

And over the years, she had grown to regard him as one of her most precious people, and her most favourite person to hang out with at school — partially because he could actually speak her language fluently; while others, she found, required a bit of a piece of paper and a pen for them to truly understood what she had meant with her gestures.

"Have you heard the news?" he asked, putting both his hands in his pockets.

She turned to look at him and raised her eyebrows. 'What news?'

"The Sponsorship Exchange Programme. Rose sent us a notice about it last night."

She furrowed her eyebrows and flipped open her cell phone. Sure enough, her vice-president of Lakeside Private High Student Council had been inundating her inboxes and notifications with news about it since last night.

'I slept very early yesterday...' she could only chuckle sheepishly at her best friend.

"I figured as much," he sighed. "We're receiving three important guests from Dews High Student Council this morning, so we're going to have a meeting to decide on escorts after assembly. Make sure you don't turn up late at the council room later," he knocked her head lightly and smirked.

She pouted.

She was about to come up with a remark on her own when a familiar loud shout prevented her from doing so.

"Winter! Seth! Over here!"

They turned towards the sound and found Gray walking towards them — along with a familiar loud blond who was waving hyperactively.

Looking at each other, they silently agreed that this was going to be a long morning.

"Jonah. I see the holidays didn't take away your vocal cord," Seth said, giving Jonah a brief 'bro-hug'.

Someone scoffed loudly as he walked up from behind Jonah. "Ha! You wish. This guy has over a hundred vocal cords on his own," he said before turning his attention to Winter. His lips quickly turned into a smirk, "and how are you, milady McHalen?"

Kai Ren, being the most mischievous in their class, never failed to make use of his knowledge of two of his friends' supposed crush on the 'lady McHalen'. With his messy brown hair and charming brown eyes (or at least that's what he thought of them), he never ceased to flirt with Winter whenever those two were around.

One of them seemed to have taken the bait. "Back off, Kai! Keep your dirty mind to yourself!" Jonah quickly shouted, moving in front of Winter to supposedly protect her from the dangerous Kai.

"Hey, I wasn't even thinking about anything!"

"Tch. Idiot," Gray scoffed at Jonah, earning a glare from the blond.

Winter rolled her eyes and quickly took out a piece of notepad paper. 'I'm fine, Ren. Thank you for asking.' she wrote and showed it to Kai, who was roaring with laughter.

Next to them, Seth sighed for the nth time that morning. "Troublesome..." he muttered before turning his attention to Gray and Jonah. "So, how was football season?"

They walked towards Lakeside High's Hall, the boys having their own conversation. Winter trailed behind them and silently smiled — just like last year.

While her brother's close group of friends was not exactly the brightest nor the most peaceful (with Jonah and Kai yelling at each other every about two minutes) at Lakeside High, she decided that Gray had definitely picked the warmest people.

As they lined up and Lakeside High School's anthem began to play in the hall, Winter began to look forward to the many wonderful things that could happen in this new sophomore year.

AUTHOR'S NOTE: Lol cheesy chapter, I know, but otherwise I have no idea how to introduce them /: Hahahah anyway other than that I'm back to 1-3 chapters per week guys <3 Tell me what you think :D

P.S. -> two consecutive chapters to make up for the lost time ;)