Won Over

B

Englewood, Chicago, Illinois. July 27, 2017

"Heads up, guys!" He pushed her forward. "This is our newest addition."

She was going to glare at him for pushing her roughly, but one look at the others who had fear in their eyes just at the sight of their boss made her decide otherwise.

She sighed inaudibly. Is everyone going to be pushing her around all her life? Does she have no control over her life at all?

Fingers snapped in front of her, jolting her out of her reverie. She glanced at the owner of the fingers who appeared annoyed.

"Instead of zoning out, why don't you introduce yourself?"

Whatever.

She lamely retorted in her mind. She was too much of a wuss to say it out - especially to the boss of the gang she wanted to join.

"Hi, my name is Peaches," Then she added just because she had watched My Name Is Khan, an Indian movie, "and I'm not a terrorist."

She laughed, expecting the others to catch on and join her in laughing.

None laughed. Not even the crack of a smile.

She coughed slightly as she regained her composure. "I guess y'all haven't watched the movie."

"We have. It's just not funny when you say it." A black haired girl piped up. Her hair was long and she had green highlights in them.

The girl didn't say it nastily, but she didn't exactly say it in a friendly manner. If anything, she seemed bored out of her mind.

Peaches herself had black hair, which was reaching her shoulders with a fringe in front. She had dyed the fringe a dark purple but left the rest black. She didn't know why, but she liked it that way.

The boss spoke again. "You already know my name and that I'm the leader of this gang. But I'll repeat it - my name is Race and I'm the leader of the Midnight gang."

"My name is Blue." A brown haired guy introduced himself.

"My name is Beauty." The black haired girl with green streaks who spoke earlier introduced herself.

"I'm Shirtless." Another guy with dreadlocks spoke up.

"Um, Shirtless?" She queried, completely baffled.

"Yeah." He smiled when he saw her shocked look. "You know those aren't our real names, right? Cos I'm sure Peaches ain't your real name."

True.

Before she met the rest of the gang, Race already told her she had to change her name. She couldn't go by her real name, she had to find something else that no one bears in reality but would sound cool as a gang member's name. She was at liberty to choose whatever name she wanted apart from those already borne by the other members of the Midnight gang. Race had mentioned their names but she didn't know those bearing them as she had never met them before.

A blond guy spoke up. "I'm Maho. Short for Mahogany."

Mahogany?! Well, he did look buff...

"My name is Snow." A girl with bright pink hair introduced herself, her curls bouncing as she moved her head while speaking.

"Nice to meet you all." Peaches said, smiling a little. She hoped to make at least one friend among the gang members.

"Is this everyone?" She asked.

"Nope." Maho spoke up. "There are three remaining peeps yet to be here. They went out on a quiet mission. I'm sure they'll be back soon because they've been gone since morning."

And it was now evening. What mission could they have been on that they were gone for the whole day?

As she was thinking about all this, she didn't notice three people enter until Maho tapped her shoulder.

Well, it was probably a tap to him. To her, it felt harder than that. Still, she straightened up and pretended like nothing happened, that she didn't feel any pain. She was used to doing that anyway, although her real reason was that she didn't want to look weak in front of the other Midnight gang members. She wanted them to have a good first impression of her, since this was the first time all of them - except Race - would be meeting her.

Shirtless shook her this time around. "Maybe we should change your name from Peaches to Dreamy. Since you're always zoning out, probably daydreaming about something. Or someone." he teased.

She just smiled. She didn't know how to reply to what he just said.

"So, as I was saying- " Maho continued before Shirtless interrupted to break Peaches out of her reverie, "the three other members of this gang just came in. That's Sugar," he pointed to a girl who had short hair. She had cut it into a bob and dyed it orange.

"That's Icy," He pointed to one of the guys that came in with Sugar. His hair was black and it was pulled back into a ponytail.

"...and this is the second in command of this gang." He pointed to the other guy.

She turned to look at him too as she had done with the remaining members of the gang when they were being introduced. His hair was brown, she observed as she looked at him. Although she was smiling slightly as she looked down from his hair to his face, the smile vanished rapidly as his face registered in her brain. "His name is Panda."

But she was long gone by the time Maho mentioned his name, floating ungracefully to the floor in a faint.

So much for a first impression.

*********************
Hi there!

And yes, I'm always this enthusiastic.

Thanks for reading. You have no idea how happy I am.

This chapter kept coming to mind, so I decided to upload. Thank goodness, no more writer's block.

I hope you loved it? Or probably you didn't? Lemme know how you feel by dropping your comments.