Crystalline

02

"Maya, Mino will you come down for breakfast? You don't want to be late on your first day!"

"Coming..."

My father's words echoed around the house and reached to my bedroom. He thought that his continuous chanting would wake me up, but he had mistaken there because I was already fully awake even before he started calling, half an hour ago. I didn't oversleep today like I did most of the days. The reason why I was late again was because I tried to somehow magically remove the dark circles under my eyes. Hopelessly, of course.

We just moved back in our house and although I've lived here before, the place was still foreign to me. I couldn't sleep well even after the third night being here. Maybe the reason why I couldn't fall asleep last night was because today was my first day in Dark Mist High School, or maybe it was because this town was still giving me the creeps. Either way, I had only slept for three hours tops and now I had to deal with dark circles.

I wasn't a huge fan of products. Luckily my skin didn't need foundation on daily basis, so I only used it on special occasions, like today for example. The product helped to cover at least fifty percent of the damage, but exhaustion was still written in my eyes.

Giving up on covering the dark circles, I checked myself one last time in front of the mirror, only then to see that something was missing - my necklace. I always wore it, and without it my neck seemed somehow opened and empty. My necklace was a vintage design, contained a tear-shaped crystal colored with a mixture of aqua green-blue and it unusually resembled the color of my eyes. It was not the prettiest, but it was the only thing I had from my life before my father had found me. Maybe that was why I always had it around my neck, to remind me that there was a girl inside me that existed before The Maya that I'm today. Either way, I didn't seem to go anywhere without it.

Breaking out of my daydream, I heard Mino's alarm clock ringing for the fifth time in the last half an hour. Through the wall separating our bedrooms, I could hear when he slammed it quite hard. That poor thing, had to deal with his Monday moods.

Mino hates Mondays. Well I mean, who doesn't.

• • •

On lunch break, the cafeteria was the perfect place where I got to meet almost everyone. Don't get me wrong, because those were not my words. I was not the social butterfly in my previous school and definitely not the attention-lover type of a girl. The words were from the black-haired girl that was currently sitting in front of me, Reina Haruto.

I've met Reina during my second period and after one hour sitting together in class; I thought that I've known her for years. She was the type of girl who never stopped talking, but was really smart and very polite. As we passed through the hallways, a lot of the students greeted her and she flashed every single one with a genuine smile.

There were few boys who held their gaze on her as she passed them, dreamily looking as her long hair waved behind her. I don't know if she was trying to act like she wasn't affected by the way they looked at her or she was really clueless about it, but she continued as if nothing had happened.

Maybe those boys didn't have an effect on her, but these ones had and not only on her but particularly on every girl who was sitting in the room. Just when the canteen double doors had opened, everyone just stopped talking. All the eyes weren't turned on me, the new girl anymore - they were now on the three boys who just entered.

"And who are they?"

After the people inside the canteen returned on their normal behavior and unstoppable rumblings, I asked cautiously pointing at the students who just entered the canteen. The three poker-faced boys sat on what it seemed to be their table, not even sparing a glance at the squirreling girls who were practically drooling when they walked past them. The aura around these boys was strange, somehow cold.

"Oh they, Our Valentine Boys..."

"Don't tell me you drool on them, like that blondie over there."

Reina just laughed at my comment for the blond girl who was looking at the boys as if she was under a spell. Her sandwich had fallen from her hand and landed on her lap spilling the sauce on her pants. But she didn't seem to be bothered by it, and was still gaping at the boys. Reina had spoken again, getting my attention back from the poor girl.

"The caramel-haired one, his name is Joaquin. He is a Senior; great artistic skills and also a bit weird."

"Define weird?"

Reina stopped as if she was choosing the right words of how to describe Joaquin. I didn't get what she meant by weirdness, because all I was seeing was a fine man. Okay, maybe more than just fine - he was naturally handsome.

"I don't know, he just always looks like he is lost in his own world. Although the three of them don't associate much with the other students, he doesn't even speak. I don't know if I've ever heard his voice."

"Huh, strange. What about the others?"

"Next to him, the blond one is Elijah and he is Joaquin's twin brother. Totally smart, in fact he is one of the best students in our school and totally gorgeous."

Moving my eyes from Joaquin to Elijah, I could see what she was saying. In front of my eyes was a well muscularly built man with a smirk that could give a thousand heartbreaks.

And I didn't miss the way she dreamily spoke about Elijah. If the fact that her face was as red as a tomato wasn't enough proof that she was totally smitten by him, then I don't know what was. The way she described him as a gorgeous man, even though all of them looked like they just came out of a magazine, made me grin at her statement.

"Well, looks like someone has a crush." I smirked, pointing at the blond-haired dude.

"No, I don't have."

She threw her apple at me, trying to get me to stop laughing and teasing her, which only made me laugh even more. A few other students turned in our direction; even they low-key looked at us. And for a bare moment, my eyes met with one of theirs, the one I'm yet to know the name of. He stared wide-eyed at me for a brief second, before returning his gaze to his friends.

Reina must have seen our exchanged glances because she answered my question before I even thought of asking.

"And that is Jaime, the youngest one among them - the same year as us. There are only two words needed to describe him: mysterious and cold."

She may have described him like that, but I wanted to add the term gorgeous myself. Even though every single one of them was astonishingly beautiful, there was something about him that made me notice his presence. I liked how his unruly dark hair disobeyed his fingers and was curling on every side, but at the same time, it made him look undeniably sexy. His face was decorated with a perfectly scalped jaw, round high cheekbones, and lips that looked like they were designed only for him.

I would lie if I say that my breath wasn't caught in my throat when I looked at him. Even if it was only for a few seconds when our eyes met, I felt it - a weird connection, an unbreakable pull connecting me with him. There was something intriguing in his eyes that drowned me in.

I didn't know what it was and I wasn't sure if I wanted to find out.

• • •

N O T E :

Chapter two is here! Did you like it?

Let me spill you a little secret about the characters of this book. Jaime was originally played by BTS's Jungkook. The twins, Elijah and Joaquin were Jimin and Taehyung. You can still imagine the characters like them if you want, but you have to admit that Young K, Hunter and Dominic are eyes-candies too.

I must say that I like how this book is developing and I really look forward to the next chapters. And I'll need your full support on that too.

Stay healthy!

THIA