Four of Clubs

11

I looked out the window of the school bus, admiring the vibrant oranges and yellows of the trees that decorated my route home. It had been a week since the wildest night of my life.

The police had the gym sectioned off by crime scene tape for a while, but it was gone by the end of school that day. If they did find anything, they were keeping it quiet. They'd questioned a lot of students, not just about the vandalized court, but about the new illegal acts that started occurring. Although we were all competing against each other, it was like the whole student body banded together against the police. No one wanted The Seven to be caught, especially not before the five grand was given away. 

Things were starting to pick up, and with pranks being pulled every day, more and more groups were being added to the scoreboard. We were tied for first with two other groups, one being The Six Debonair's, who painted a whole classroom bright red and signed their team name across the whiteboard. I had a hunch the other team, The Green Five, had been the ones to change the locks on the cafeteria doors. When they locked them at lunchtime, students and staff, myself included, had been trapped in until a locksmith could make it down to the school.

It wasn't the most comforting thing being tied, but I was just glad that we were still in the game-- the stories of groups who got eliminated after not completing their first tasks within the allotted time had spread through the school like wildfire.

My eyes drifted downwards as a familiar rusty car drove past. Roy was in the front seat, his head nodding rhythmically, probably to the beat of whatever was on the radio.

There was also that problem-- as much as I tried, I couldn't deny my attraction to Roy. I had to hold back a smile as I watched him tap his fingers on the tattered steering wheel. Without fail, I got the same stupid, giddy feeling every time I saw him-- it wasn't like this before, when I would just see him around school, but now that I knew him, things had changed. Could I even say that I knew Roy at this point? Either way, I was in way over my head.

He made a right turn, driving out of my sight. Even if he wasn't out of my league, the whole thing was a distraction. I kept telling myself I should be focused on the competition-- although it was difficult when there weren't any new developments. The five of us-- yes, even Daniel-- had been waiting all week for any sign of a new challenge. We started sitting together at lunch, developing theories on what was to come, who The Seven could be, and who might be in the teams we were tied with.

Maybe it wasn't friendship, exactly-- we'd come together for a mutual interest. It was almost like working together on a school project. Our conversation didn't usually stray from things involving the competition, and when it did, it was small talk. Movies, music, things you could talk about with anyone. Still, I was having fun-- the most fun I'd had in a long time. I couldn't help it-- I was crossing my fingers that it would be a long competition.

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