Kisses after midnight (WICKED #0) | ✓

1

GABRIELA RUÍZ HAD HATED mornings since forever, but Mateo Martinez just didn't care. Every single day he woke her up the same way, leaning over her with a wide grin while he gently shook her shoulders, and every single morning she felt the urge to murder him. As her neighbour their rooms were barely seperated from each other by a small pathway, a large tree in the middle connecting them. So every morning he climbed across it, before opening her window and coming in for the usual routine.

Though she complained, she did always keep her window ajar for him. She had gotten so used to him there was a huge chance her alarm wouldn't even wake her at this point, so here they were. That, and the fact that he always just sat on a branch in front of her window, slamming his hands against it, if she closed it.

"Good morning sunshine!" Mateo smirked at her as he pulled the curtains open," isn't it just a beautiful day?"

"I will push you out of the window," Gabriela groaned.

He looked over his shoulder, a wolfish grin on his face as he shook his head.

"If it's you," he said," I wouldn't even mind."

And then he jumped out of the window, vanishing for a second before his dark mop of hair reappeared again as he pulled himself up on a branch.

"See you in thirty, Nena," he said.

"Stop calling me Nena," she murmured in her pillow, more a force of habit than anything at this point.

When she heard the soft thump of him landing in his room, she reluctantly opened her eyes and forced herself to get ready. She walked towards the curtains, yawning as she made eye contact with Mateo.

He was shirtless, sunkissed skin dusted with silver scars like lightning, grey jogging pants lowslung as he threw his shirt somewhere in his room. When he spotted her, a smirk tugged at his lips and he leaned his arms on the windowsill.

"Distracted, Nena?" he said.

"Oh yeah, Mateo," she said sarcastically as she grabbed the curtains," by your unbelievably muscular arms. Every day you bless me with the chance to look at you."

"As long as you know it," he drawled.

She rolled her eyes and closed the curtains, before turning around to change in her plaid skirt and black sweater. The chains on her belt jangled as she walked back to let the sunlight pour in her room again, Mateo only noticing her after he had shrugged his leather jacket on.

"I'll grab my motorcycle," he said," meet you out front."

She nodded, sitting down to make her eyeliner as sharp as possible while he left his room. Knowing Mateo it would take another twenty minutes for him to be even out of the house, so she could take it slow for now. And indeed, thirty minutes later she was on the back of his motorcycle, their helmets fastened as Mateo went way above the speed limit. Even after she had gotten her license he still insisted on bringing her, but she adored the wind dancing on her skin anyway, so it wasn't like she minded.

And then they arrived, a sigh leaving her lips as she pulled her helmet off and her hair fell down.

St Joseph's Institute for Troubled Children was one of the largest schools in the whole country, the huge, grey buildings reminding her more of a prison than anything else. The one in the middle was the biggest, four floors high and stretching on left and right as far as it could. Behind it two dormitories were being built, though there still hadn't been much progress in the last few years she had been attending. It wasn't that surprising that it looked like a prison though - after all, troubled children was only a pretty way of saying the worst of the worst got sent here.

The whole place was filled with delinquents, each one crazier than the last. Whoever had built it had probably hoped it to be an efficient way to discipline them, but over the years it had just become a place where everyone ran rampant. Graffiti was sprayed across the walls, windows broken almost daily and bones shattered with the minute.

And Mateo ran this place.

It was hard to believe this was the fourth year already. She remembered the day she was sent here like it was yesterday though. Mateo had been fighting on the streets ever since he could punch, his reputation becoming worse with the second. And then one day a group of guys had come to confront him at their catholic middle school, their smiles as sharp as the knives in their pockets.

She had told herself to stay out of it, but when she saw one of them pull out the knife, well -

It hadn't been their first offense and with them having taken down at least twenty guys together, the principal of their last school ensured it was their last there.

So here they were at the start of their senior year, though with all the incidents which happened every time her temper got the best of her she suspected she would be here forever.

People immediately stepped aside as they walked through the crowd, Mateo flashing a lazy smirk left and right like a king walking through his subjects. Everyone always had adored him, with his easy charm and confident attitude. Her, however -

"Your glare scares them all, Nena," he chuckled as he put his hand casually on her waist.

She raised her eyebrow at him and he pulled it back, giving her a cheeky smile in response.

"Let them be scared," she shrugged.

"Mateo!"

Chase slapped him amicably on his shoulder in passing, grinning as he turned around to him.

"Excited for the new kids?" he said.

Each year St Joseph had a new batch of delinquents who got sent there and each year they were eager to fight without caring about the hierarchy. Everyone who came always thought they were the worst, the most wicked out there, and each year Mateo proved them wrong and made his position as king abundantly clear.

She didn't want to have anything to do with it, even though he always told her she was the only one he wanted by his side. No, all she hoped for was to quietly wait out her years before she could start university, ready to be on the path for her future. Soon hopefully she would be a lawyer, so for now all she had to do was survive this high school bullshit.

Mateo cracked his knuckles then, stretching out lazily like a lion before he chased his prey.

"Oh, believe me," he said," I am."

He turned to Gabriela then and in the morning light he seemed so untouchable, his brown eyes soft thunder and windswept hair dark like the night sky. He has always reminded her in every way of a storm: wild and quiet at the same time, beauty at the edge of destruction.

"You know what to do if you're in trouble," he said.

"I know how to give a right hook," she said.

"I was going to say call out my name," he said," but okay, that works too."

"Whatever," she said as she rolled her eyes," go and have fun intimidating the new kids, Mateo."

"I will, Nena," he smiled.

He walked away then, Chase by his side and reverent gazes at his back as he headed to his throne. Gabriela  looked at him for a second, before shaking her head.

It was time to head for first period.