Awa'atlu College.

Chapter 3

The sun had completely set as the two duos were settling down. Lo'ak had set up a makeshift bed on the floor, but upon seeing how comfortable it looked, Gio insisted that he slept on the floor. In the mean time, they both laid on the bed.

Lo'ak was scrolling through TikTok with one Airpod in, when all of a sudden he was reminded of the Nike store campaign. He turned onto his side and pulled out his Airpod.

"Gio, did you see that big poster in the Nike shop? In the soccer section?" He asked, and Gio nodded.

"Yeah, and it's football, you damn American," he laughed, earning an eye roll from Lo'ak, "Shut up, you Italian."

"Anyways, what about that poster?" Gio asked.

"The girl on it, she was kinda.. pretty," Lo'ak mumbled, and there was silence for a minute before Gio cackled.

"What?" Lo'ak snapped, and Gio shook his head, "Just never thought I'd live to see the day you actually call a girl pretty."

"You're so fucking unfunny," the Brazilian boy replied, swatting at his friend who laughed at his annoyance.

Downstairs, the atmosphere wasn't so playful between Jake and Neytiri. They were sitting at the dining table, talking about something with hushed voices.

"So you went to the interview yesterday? What did they say?" Neytiri asked him, and Jake sighed before responding.

"There's a position open in the department of internal affairs. That's all I know, I don't have any other details and I won't get any until the next interview which is on Saturday," he explained.

Neytiri's eyebrows were furrowed as she looked at him, which indicated that she was anxious about the situation. Upon noticing this, Jake reached a hand out and held hers, his thumb brushing along the top of her hand.

"It'll work out, I promise. Just wait until Saturday, okay?" He said, and she didn't respond.

"It'll be good for us, Ney. We need a change, we can't stay in the same position our whole lives. Our kids need new opportunities, they need to get out of their comfort zones, and we do too," Jake continued, his voice soft, "The most we'll be doing is moving across state, which isn't bad."

"Okay," Neytiri said simply. Jake was stunned, and a bit suspicious, which only grew as she spoke again. "It wouldn't be that bad to move across California."

Her voice wasn't very certain. She sounded reluctant to warm up to the idea, but she pushed it aside because she knew that Jake wanted the job, she could tell by his tone of voice when speaking about it.

Jake smiled slightly and planted a small kiss on her cheek as he stood up. "We've still got time, and nothing's for sure. Just wait until Saturday."

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WEDNESDAY, 6 PM
GREENWICH HIGH SCHOOL FIELD

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The Greenwich football team were busy training for their upcoming game. Their official team name was the Serpents, as was all the other sports teams in Greenwich High to honour their mascot, which was also a serpent.

Neteyam and the rest of the team were warming up by doing shuttle sprints. As they ran to the first cone, Neteyam spoke to Brooke.

"I saw Taryn today," he told his friend, who just nodded. "How is she?" Brooke asked.

"I don't know. I didn't speak to her," Neteyam responded, and Brooke's eyes widened. "What? Did something happen?"