Seven Brothers

2. A Glare Or A Smoulder?

"He was at your house!" Silver squealed before I shoved my hand over her mouth to shut her up.
"Shh! He could be anywhere!" I exclaimed "He's sneaky" I added, scanning the hallway to make sure the person of interest was not in sight.

She just continued to stare at me with worried eyes, and then I realised I was still covering her mouth. "Oops, sorry" I chuckled as I removed my hand. She took in a large breath of air, drama queen.

"That means he's getting close to your brothers" she deduced, walking slowly down the hallway. The girl thought she was the female Sherlock Holmes. "New plan! Maybe if your brothers like Elijah they won't beat him up? See, my plan still works!" she concluded victoriously.

"Your plan does not work. You're forgetting one major detail. Elijah is the spawn of Satan. Worse than that. I despise him. I hate him" I narrowed my eyes, feeling anger coursing through my veins just at the memory of the night before. He had called my dance an atrocity and I would never forgive him for that. He would pay, possibly with his life.

"You're saying that you don't find him attractive? Peyton, you must be the only girl at Lexington High who does not want to jump his bones" Silver rolled her eyes.

"Trust me, his arrogance is more than enough to put me off. Anyway, so what if his features are like, chiselled to perfection and his jaw is sharp enough to cut diamonds on? You know, that doesn't really matter if you can't be nice to people" I huffed as we made our way to class, unaware of how obvious I had made my attraction.

Okay, the guy was incredibly good looking, I couldn't deny that. He was like a model, those dark and broody types who stare into the camera and seem to be staring into your soul.

But, his eyes were what was most intriguing about him; a brilliant blue that was captivating enough in itself, but his left eye was also partially brown. As if Elijah needed anything else to make him stand out to the crowd, his eyes were two different colours.

Needless to say, the girls threw themselves at him, desperate to be special to the outsider, to be the one girl he lets in. But not me, no sir! I would never stoop that low, there was no way I could look past his douchebag-ways.

"So, you do think he's hot then?" Silver grinned at me, knowing she had won the argument.
"Fine. Yes, he's hot, but that doesn't change the fact that I can't stand him, and he can't stand me." By this time we had taken our seats at the front of our English class but the teacher had yet to arrive.

"Is that so, huh?" she narrowed her eyes at me "Then how come he is staring at you?". I spun around instantly to see that sure enough, his gaze was fixed on me and he wasn't even trying to hide it.

"He's glaring at me" I corrected her "A classic symptom of hatred".
"That is a smoulder" she tried to convince me, but I did not believe her.
"It's a glare!" I hissed at her. The argument was ended with the entrance of our teacher, but I knew I was right.

~~~

We sat at lunch that day, shallowly rating the males in our school.
"Tristan Hartman" Silver challenged.
"9.5" I decided after a little deliberation.

"You give the football star a 9.5? Who does it take to get a 10?" She was shocked by my scores, but then her face contorted into a wicked smile "Elijah Antonelli, by any chance?"

"Vincent Chambers" I challenged for her to rate, ignoring her taunt. She had been teasing me relentlessly all morning.
I could see that Vincent was making his way over to us, which is why I chose to put him forward.

"8" she said after thinking hard, I nearly spat out my apple juice. Just as I was making sounds like a seal to keep my juice down, Vincent sat down in the seat adjacent to mine.