The Other Side [boyxboy]

The Other Side {15}

               "Hey," Nadia greeted as I entered the student council room in the morning.

               "Hey," I said, dropping onto the couch.

               Kace was lounging against the wall, nursing a cup of coffee. It made me wish I'd grabbed some on my way to school.

               He caught me looking and held it out towards me. "Want some?"

               "No, thank you," I forced myself to say.

               He shrugged. "Suit yourself."

               The door opened and Leigh came bounding in. "Good morning!"

               "Morning," I said. "Let's just have a quick collection meeting, and then we'll talk during lunch. Okay?"

               "Sounds good," Nadia said, sitting next to me.

               Before I could say anything, though, there was a knock on the door. Kace went over and pulled it open, and we were all surprised as the assistant principal entered the room.

               "The principal wants to have a meeting with all of you," he said, looking around at us. "Head on down to his office, please."

               "Of course, sir," I said, standing up. The others looked to me and I shrugged helplessly. I had no clue what this was about.

               We left the room and I led my friends to the office. The secretary waved us through, and I knocked on the principal's door before opening it.

               We stepped in and I froze. Marshall and his council were already seated, and he watched me with nervous but determined eyes.

               Oh, god. I'd forgotten to speak to the principal about him.

               Suddenly anxious, I sat down with my friends. The principal, Mr. Shearer, waited for us to get settled before speaking.

               "Gabriel, I must say, I'm disappointed," he said.

               "Excuse me?" I said.

               "There were complaints about you earlier in the year, and now we have more," he said, shaking his head. "Marshall brought it to my attention. Some seniors submitted it to his student council electronically because they said they were afraid to speak out about you. It was mostly anonymous, but we did confirm they were from senior accounts at the school."

               "Sir," Nadia said before he could continue. "Gabriel was complained about earlier in the year because Taliesin Torres orchestrated that to get Gabriel in trouble. It's no secret Marshall has issues with Gabriel. How do we know this isn't a repeat?"

               Marshall stared at her indignantly. "You think I'd do that?"

               "Absolutely," Nadia said. "I won't take anonymous complaints that were conveniently submitted to you as proof that Gabriel is doing a bad job."

               "As I said, we confirmed the complaints were from senior accounts. Marshall would've had to hack all those accounts to make it happen," Mr. Shearer said. "I sincerely doubt he'd manage that. And the complaints are valid. Students have yet to hear anything about the senior ball. We need to plan for that months in advance. The senior advisor said she hasn't received the plans from you yet."

               "I have them," I said, taking my phone out. "They're on our drive. Here, I'll show you. We were just fixing everything up before we submitted it."