"Mr. Patterson, with all due respect, this doesn't make sense."
The words leave my mouth before I can stop them. Every council member's head swivels in my direction, and I feel the weight of their stares.
Mr. Patterson blinks at me from behind his wire-rimmed glasses. "I'm sorry?"
I keep my voice steady, professional, even as my pulse hammers against my throat. "Tate Mercer and I have a… complicated story. Pairing us together is counterproductive. There are other council members who could oversee his hours."
The silence that follows is deafening. Mr. Patterson's expression shifts into something that looks almost like pity.
"Miss Valdez, I understand your concerns, but this decision came from the administration. You have the highest responsibility rating on the council, and frankly, the kind of firm hand that Mr. Mercer clearly needs. Consider it a testament to your capabilities."
A testament, an honor. As if.
"But…"
"The matter is settled." His tone hardens, signaling the end of discussion. "I expect weekly progress reports. Mr. Mercer, you'll report to Miss Valdez starting tomorrow after the last period. Any questions?"
Tate stretches in his chair like a cat in a sunbeam, utterly unbothered. "Crystal clear, sir."
Mr. Patterson nods and gathers his papers. "Excellent. I'll leave you all to it, then."
The door clicks shut behind him, and the room immediately erupts into whispered conversation. I pretend to organize papers while the gossip swirls around me, but I'm barely processing any of it.
A chair scrapes beside me.
Grant Daniels, the current student council president, leans in close. He's one of the few people at Wentworth who's ever shown me genuine kindness.
"You okay?" he asks quietly, his brown eyes scanning my face. "That was... a lot."
"I'm fine," I lie. "Just processing."
Grant glances toward Tate, who's now surrounded by curious council members peppering him with questions he's clearly enjoying deflecting. "You know what happened, right? With the pool party?"
"Just rumors."
"It was at the school natatorium, after hours. Somehow he got keys—nobody knows how."
Grant keeps his voice low.
"Forty people, maybe more. Kegs, hard liquor, the whole thing. They broke three windows and completely destroyed that statue in the east courtyard. The one the Montgomery family donated back in the fifties."
I watch Tate laugh at something one of the other members says, the easy charm radiating off him. "And he's getting corrective hours for that? Anyone else would be expelled."
"That's the thing. When the administration started investigating, Brooks and Reid, his best friends since middle school, didn't hesitate.”
Grant's expression tightens.
“They pointed fingers so fast they probably got whiplash—Tate's idea, Tate's keys, Tate's party. They claimed they were just guests who left early."
I should feel satisfied. Karma, finally, catching up with the boy who's made my life hell. But looking at Tate now, that practiced smile, those cold eyes, I just feel tired.
"Thanks for telling me," I say.
Grant nods, then hesitates. "For what it's worth, I voted against pairing you two. Patterson overruled me."
"I appreciate that."
The room finally begins to empty, council members gathering their things and drifting toward the door.
Tate hasn't moved from his sprawled position, watching me with those unreadable blue eyes. I can't resist.
"Must sting," I say coolly, slinging my bag over my shoulder, "when your loyal friends leave you to take the heat by yourself."
His jaw tightens, a muscle ticks beneath his skin, but he says nothing. Just watches me with an expression I can't decode—something between anger and something else, something that almost looks like exhaustion.
I don't wait for a response and walk out with my head high, refusing to give him the satisfaction of a backward glance.
***
The bus is late, because of course it is.
I stand at the stop for fifteen minutes, watching luxury cars glide past, ferrying my classmates to their mansions and penthouses. By the time the bus finally wheezes to a halt in front of me, the afternoon light has started to fade.
I find a seat near the back and press my forehead against the grimy window, watching Wentworth's manicured lawns give way to strip malls, then pawn shops, then the familiar decay of Southside.
The contrast hits me every single day, but today it feels sharper. More brutal.
The elevator in my building has been "under repair" for three months. The sign taped to the doors has yellowed at the edges, the maintenance company's number long since disconnected.
I climb six flights of stairs, my legs burning, the faint smell of mildew following me up the stairwell.
Finally home. I hear the shouting before I even get my key in the lock.
"—completely out of line, Diego! You can't just show up with your boys and intimidate paying customers!"
"He disrespected us! You heard what he said about Dad."
"I don't care what he said! We're trying to run a legitimate business!"
I push open the door to find Mateo and Diego squared off in the middle of our cramped living room, faces inches apart.
Mateo's reading glasses are pushed up on his forehead, his paperwork scattered across the kitchen. Diego's fists are clenched at his sides, his jaw tight with barely contained rage.
Rafael leans against the kitchen counter, watching the confrontation with that unreadable expression he always wears.
Aro sits frozen on the couch, his worn sketchbook forgotten in his lap, looking like he wishes he could disappear into the cushions.
"What happened?" I ask, dropping my bag by the door.
Both Mateo and Diego turn toward me. Diego speaks first.
"Some rich asshole came into the shop today. Needed a transmission repair, drove all the way from the west side. The second he saw Aro and a couple of his friends hanging around outside, he turned white as a ghost."
His voice drips with bitterness.
"He asked Mateo if this was a 'gang operation.' Mateo said no, because we're trying to be legitimate, and the guy still walked out. Said he'd rather pay double somewhere else than let 'people like us' touch his car."
"So Diego decided the appropriate response was to have his friends follow the guy to his car and scare him half to death," Mateo cuts in, his voice sharp. "Which is exactly the kind of thing that makes people think we're criminals in the first place!"
"We are criminals, Mateo! Or did you forget that while you were playing businessman?"
"I'm trying to build something real! Something that doesn't end with all of us in prison like Dad!"
The word hangs in the air like a gunshot. Everyone goes still.
"Don't," Diego says quietly, dangerously. "Don't you dare use Dad against me."
"Can you both just stop?" My voice is rising despite myself.
They turn to look at me.
"I just spent eight hours at a school where people call me 'Southside trash' to my face, and I come home to this? You two screaming at each other over some rich asshole who was going to judge us no matter what Diego did or didn't do?"
Diego's expression hardens. "So what, we're just supposed to take it? Let them disrespect us and smile?"
"I take it every single day!" I snap. "Every day I walk into that school and let them look down on me because the alternative is proving every stereotype they already believe. So yeah, Diego, sometimes you take it. Sometimes that's the only way to survive."
"That's the difference between you and me, little sister." Diego's voice is cold now. "I don't believe in surviving. I believe in fighting back."
"And look where that's gotten us," I say. "Dad's in prison, the shop is struggling, and I'm the one trying to be the first Valdez to actually make it out."
The words land harder than I intended. I see the flash of hurt in Diego's eyes before anger swallows it.
"Make it out?" he repeats. "That's what you think you're doing? Getting out? You think if you get some fancy degree, you stop being one of us? You stop being a Valdez?"
"That's not what I…"
"Save it." He grabs his jacket from the back of a chair. "I'm done listening to the scholarship princess lecture me about survival."
He's out the door before anyone can stop him, the slam echoing through the thin walls.
I stand there, breathing hard, my hands trembling at my sides. Mateo looks exhausted. Rafael is still watching with that calculating expression. Aro has curled in on himself, making himself as small as possible.
"Harley," Mateo says quietly.
"I'm going to my room," I say, and my voice sounds hollow even to my own ears.
Later, in the darkness, I stare at the ceiling and try to empty my mind—It doesn't work.
Tate Mercer's face keeps swimming into focus.
I hate that he's taking up space in my head. I hate that even now, after everything, some stupid part of me remembers how it felt before—freshman year, those first two weeks when I was naive enough to believe his smile meant something.
Before the cruelty calcified. Before I understood exactly what kind of enemy he would become.
Everything went wrong from that very first day.