The Doyen

Chapter Eight

     VICTORIA HESITANTLY pushed the door to the YWLA's apartment room open. She was surprised to hear that they were able to rent out an entire apartment for the non-profit organization, but at the same time she knew that quite a few members like Anika and Nile were very wealthy.

     As she walked inside of the meeting room, all of the members paused their activities, and stared at the foreign individual who had just entered their room.

       The first person to move was Nile. He stood up with a closed-lipped smile, and walked towards her. "Today we welcome Victoria to the YWLA."

     Reina hummed before she pulled her pink hair over her left shoulder,  and glanced at Julie with confusion. "Uhmm," she narrowed her eyes, "there are literally no jobs left for her."

"Yeah, is she doing clean-up?"

     Michael–who was currently laying on the couch and drinking a can of soda sat up at Julie's statement. "Isn't that your job Julie?"

      Michael and Julie stared at each other with intensity. The two members had never gotten along, and Michael took every opportunity to embarrass Julie when he could. Finally, when Julie had enough of the glaring contest, she rolled her eyes and looked away, leaving Michael to smirk and take another sip of his soda.

    Jayson smoothed out his shirt before standing up and facing Victoria. "Nice to see you here Victoria," he said to her as he gently shook her hand,  "I'm Jayson Zhang."

     Nile stared at the handshake between Jayson and Victoria before he straightened up and faced Reina, Julie, and Anika. "She's going to be our temporary editor since you've been busy with your sister Julie."

   Julie glared at him, and Nile sighed. "Relax. You still have your main tasks."

     Julie slouched back in her chair, obviously not happy to have some of her activities taken from her, but she relaxed knowing that Victoria's position was temporary. She knew that Anika would never let Victoria become a permanent member.

"I'm glad to be here! Thanks for having me."

     "And we're very glad to have you." Jayson added, and Micheal nodded in agreement.

      Victoria noticed that Jayson had been staring at her, so she held Jayson's gaze. He gave her his full attention, and this attention made Victoria want to squirm. Victoria had never imagined that someone like Jayson would be so friendly and attentive to her.

     Nile coughed, bringing everyone's attention back to him.  "Why don't we introduce ourselves and our roles to help Vic become more familiar with who does what?"

    Victoria rose her eyebrow at the nickname, yet continued to smile politely.

     "I'll start." Anika finally spoke, "I'm Anika Kaur, which I know you probably already know. I'm the Vice-President, but whenever Nile is busy, I'm practically the President."

"Which is not often."

      Silence filled the room once more, before her cousin Michael decided to speak up.

     "I deal with the talking and stuff." He looked at the ceiling, his eyebrows pulling together as he tried to remember. "I think I'm the secretary?"

Nile sighed. "Collaborative Affairs."

     Michael stalked towards the fridge to open a bottle of water–which he always drank right after a soda. "Right! I do that!"

     Julie crossed her arms, and glared at Victoria from across the table. Victoria noticed that Julie seemed to love glaring at other people.  "I'm Julie Gemma, and I do advertisements, graphics, and most recently taken away from me, editing." She hissed.