I stared down at the ornate bracelet that was tightened around my wrist, I took in its beauty, it was so delicate and stupefying. It just reels you in and causes you to study it.

The most prominent thing on the bracelet was a gold snake engraved on its navy blue leather background. The actual bracelet was fairly thin and two strings tied in a knot kept it on my wrist.

"Come on, we need to get to school," my brother announced at my bedroom doorway with a bored tone.

I turned around to face him, taking in his rugged style appearance. Brown shaggy hair that matched mine, plain black tee, dark jeans and sneakers then taking in Naomi's appearance. Long bleach blonde hair cascading down her back, black leggings, green jumper and Liam's brown Torvux bracelet on her wrist with the same gold snake.

"Shut up Pissy," I snarled at my brother and shoved past him and smiled in triumph. Hah, 'Pissy', I should use that more often.

"Pissy, don't be so mean to your brother," Naomi spoke in that incredibly high pitched voice of hers.

"But Nao-"

"So you want to argue now?" Naomi interjected and cocked her eyebrow.

If there's one thing Liam can't do, that would be arguing with Naomi, she can win any argument, any day and Liam knows better than to even attempt to start an argument.

I headed out to Liam's car and made myself comfortable in the backseat, meaning stretching my legs across the black leather seats.

"Hey hey hey! what are you doing, get your dirty shoes off my seats or walk. It's only a forty-five minute walk afterall." Liam yelled and this time, he was the one to smile in triumph.

Naomi jumped into the passenger seat and Liam in the driver's seat, throwing his backpack into the backseat, as a result hitting me in the face.

"What the frick Liam that hur-" I got cut off when Liam went at about 60mph on a small road that was crowded with other cars, coming close enough to them to scare me shitless.

I gritted my teeth and crossed my arms, soon enough, we arrived in to the student car park and got our of the car. Liam and Naomi quickly disappeared as if I was the plague and found their own friends.

I walked through the tiny corridors and met with my own friends who were all huddled around a table in the canteen.

I was already dreading the day and it hasn't even begun yet.

"Flynn, Ryan." I greeted my friends and fist bumped them.

"Yo," Ryan had a problem, he was unable to speak basic English, he always spoke as if he was from the streets and it annoyed me so I chose to not talk to him often.

"There's a Torvux meeting after school," Flynn informed me, fist bumping me again flashing me his mustard yellow coloured snake bracelet.

Flynn, like me was a Torvux and he hasn't given his bracelet away yet.

We started walking towards class, I had Mr Shultz's class while Flynn and Ryan both had Miss Green.

"I dread this class, so so much. It's full of nerds." I groaned.

I walked the rest of the way to class and walked in, sitting at my usual space in the middle rows.

I ducked my head down into my textbook, ignoring all the people surrounding me and trying to get my attention. It wasn't odd for random people to just come up to me and act as if we'd been friends since we were much younger. I really only kept a very small group of good friends.

Sometimes I wish I could just burn my bracelet and my popularity along with it.

"Toby, would you please read the first paragraph?" Mr Shultz asked the boy sitting next to me.

It was silent for an awkward minute or two before he started speaking about The Battle of Gettysburg but he kept stuttering, unable to read the paragraph properly.

The class snickered to themselves and then the teacher looked at me.

"Can you carry on, Zach? From where we left off please?"

I read the next three paragraphs with ease and then looked at Toby, who glared at me.

I mouthed a 'what' then shivered from his heated glare.

Man, the boy sure could glare.

We covered the next two pages of the textbook before the bell rang and everyone rushed out of the room and that's how it continued the whole day. It was now nearing to the end of the day and I had one more lesson before the meeting.

I made my way to maths, the lesson I dreaded even more than History. I just didn't like History because none of my friends are in the class but I hated maths because of its actual content.

I sat down in my usual seat, in the corner of the room where nobody else sat. Toby was in the class and he glared at me as he walked in to the room, sitting at the front.

I closed my eyes, it was only meant to be for a couple seconds but instead, I slept through the whole lesson and soon, the teacher was shooing us outside, everybody happily ran out the classroom, leaving just me and Toby standing outside and sorting our bags out.

I was still sleepy so I grudgingly zipped up my bag and put it on my shoulder but Toby was all set to leave but instead of leaving to the heavenly place called home he stared at me.

He walked towards me, like a cat slowly walking towards a mouse, ready to pounce then-

"Ow, what was that for?" I yelled when Toby shoved me into the lockers. Right, this was totally uncalled for...

"You think you're better than me? I'll show you." He held his fist up, ready to swing and I closed my eyes, readying myself for the blow but it never came.

I cracked open my eye, seeing a tall figure with a hood over their head - his shiny, exclusive bracelet glistened in the light.

The shiny bracelet? Yeah, not for me but instead for the seniors.

My Torvux friend shoved Toby with such great force that he fell to the floor and let out a string of apologies before he could be hurt again, but the senior readied his foot for a blow to the stomach.

"Don't kill him for crying out loud!" I yelled.

The man stopped and pulled his hood down to show a grinning Calvin.

"Come on we have a meeting and you're late."

We walked past tons of corridors and into the basement of the school where we had a kind of Torvux shrine set up and a podium for the seniors. It was dark and the only light were a few candles here and around. We were technically classed as an after school study club, which made it all legitimate and fine with the teachers, but they absolutely did not care what really went on. Nobody really did in this school.

The whole affair was just excruciatingly... pathetic.

We have cloaks but they're strictly for the seniors as they're the most respected, however, because they're literally just black hoodies and not actual cloaks, we all liked to wear our hoods up outside these meetings because for some reason, everyone liked to look intimidating in a way. Two members already had theirs on and Calvin was yet to put his on. One day, I'll be a senior and I'll be wearing a 'cloak' too. It's something that's passed down.

I sat down with the rest of the brothers, in a small huddle opposite the seniors.

It was already the recruitment ceremony, we'd only been back in school for about a week. I took in all the chairs put in a line and the people sat down on them blindfolds over their eyes. I was once sitting right there, and so was Liam, and Flynn, and everybody else here.

"Guys," Calvin greeted, "we have finally made a decision on our new recruits. It was tough and these four people are very lucky."

"You can reveal yourselves." He ordered the two other seniors with hoodies on to remove all the blindfolds.

One by one, the new recruits were shown. I was really bored and I almost fell asleep. I would've if it weren't for Liam slapping me every minute. He knew I hated these things.

An hour later, I was heading home with Liam.

"Why do you hate ceremonies? Zach, you don't know how lucky you are to be in Torvux. You're taking your position fore granted."

"How?"

"You use it so you can get girls to fawn over you," he smirked.

"I'm not. I hate all the attention." I said matter-of-factly.

"Right sure," he said while pulling into the driveway.

I walked in to the house, grabbing a chocolate bar and kissing my mum on the cheek.

"Zach, I'm going gym in a bit, do you want to come?" Liam said ten minutes later in a pair of joggers and loose fitting t-shirt.

"Do I look like I want to go to gym?" I said with a mouth full of whipped cream.

"Gross man. Suit yourself." He waved me off and went to find his gym bag.

I smiled and turned around, "would you like help with dinner mum?"

"No I'm fine, go do your homework."

"You complain that nobody helps you in the house. I see why." I smirked.

"Can you just set the table then, please?"

I smiled in triumph and strolled to the cupboard to get the plates and cutlery, trying to balance four plates and four glasses as well as forks and knives.

I don't make two trips.

- - - - - - - -

"So Liam, why was Naomi at our house this morning?" I smirked and put a carrot in my mouth. It was clear she's been here since last night, with Liam.

His face flushed and he said something along the lines of an upcoming project deadline. The thing was, Liam was a terrible liar and be spoke way to quickly for anybody to comprehend.

"Are you using protection?" Mom asked, knowing just as well as I do that he's lying.

"Mum! Can we not do this here? Come on, At the dinner table?!" Liam yelled.

"Son, answer your mother's question. I'm quite curious too." Dad said.

"That's it. This conversation is over." Liam announced as he got up from the table and washed his plate.

And that's how dinner went. Just me, mum and dad discussing the use of protection and why it's important. They didn't mind Naomi staying over that much, it was only as long as her parents consented too, so they kept in touch. Theres an extra set of bedding in Liam's room, but it hadn't been been used since they were in the early days of their relationship. We all knew what went on, and mum and dad were in the mindset of 'it'll happen anyway, so it's best its not in secret'.

I haven't had sex for a couple months, just relationships and it's because of my damn womaniser status so nobody wants to be with me until they're sure that I won't just dump them afterwards. It's not like I sleep around or anything, no, I've only had sex with one person.

- - - - - - - - -

The next day came a bunch of surprises.

My physics teacher informed me that I'm failing the class and that if I don't improve then I would be kicked off the basketball team.

He also set me a tutor, somebody called Jace Chapman. A name I've never heard of before but it does have a nice ring to it.

It was weird for me not to know his name. Being a Torvux, it was vital to learn everybody's name.

I was meant to meet my new tutor now in room thirty-five, which was on the other side of the school from where my usual classes were.

It had been fifteen minutes and he still wasn't here. Obviously punctuality isn't key for this Jace person, but it only fuelled my curiosity. Maybe he had short legs, that why it was taking so long? Or perhaps he has a lot of things going on at once, so time management isn't his strong point?

Sighing, I stood up from my chair. Walking to the front of the room, thinking about all the time I had wasted, I was just about to leave when the door was pushed open. The door opened inwards so it hit me and sent me sliding over a table top and falling on the floor. My brain stirred as it all happened so abruptly, and I cried out in pain.

"Oof," I huffed as I fell and winced at the sudden pain in my legs and arms.

"Oh my gosh! I'm terribly sorry, that wasn't meant to happen!" An unfamiliar voice spoke and got louder as textbooks and papers fell to the floor and feet rushed towards me.

I stared up at the most gorgeous blue eyes I had ever seen. Never have I seen such stunning eyes, they reminded of an ocean. They looked rather small from behind his square framed glasses, but but before I could look further, his long strands of dark hair suddenly moved in front.

"I'm sorry! Ha what a a great first impression r-right?" He helped me stand up straight and held his hand out for me to shake.

"Jace,"

"Zach," I smiled and shook his hand. It felt warm.

"How can I make it up to you! I really am sorry. How about coffee, the one across the road? I'll pay." He grinned.

"Huh.. well, I don't know, Jace." I smirked, finding it difficult to hold back my mischievous intentions of fooling him. "My legs are in pain, I did just in fact slide over the table."

"I know, I know!" he exasperated, shielding his eyes.

Was he... upset?

"If I can get extra whipped cream, and a slice of cake, I'll forgive you."

"Sure, whatever you want. Just don't be mad."

- - - - - - - - -

"Do you mind?" I turned to a grinning Jace who kept poking me because I was apparently taking so long to drink my frappacino.

"No, I don't."

"Shut up."

"I don't know if I can."

"You're such a bastard."

"I know you are but what am I?"

I turned to him again, mouth wide open. He's playing that card? That was so five years ago.

"Keep your mouth open any longer and you'll catch flies. Oh and also you'll take longer to finish your drink. Hurry." He pushed.. and poked. I'm definitely going to have a bruise there.

"We wouldn't be here if you came on time. I did." I snarled. "I missed out on valuable gaming time, now I have to go home and do my homework straight away."

"I told you, the printer got jammed when I was printing out those worksheets we did. It took three other people to figure out how to fix it."

I rolled my eyes and went back to drinking my beverage. We had our first lesson before coming here. Jace was a miracle tutor, I understood everything he said because he explained everything with such enthusiasm I didn't know existed when teaching Physics, unlike in lesson, where I fall asleep to the sound of the teachers very monotone voice.

I finished off the drink, slurping and slurping until all the froth and cream was gone.

"You know, slurping is bad manners." Jace announced, tapping his fingers rhythmically on the glass tabletop.

"Your mum."

And just like that, I knew Jace and I would be fast friends. Like I said, I kept a only a small group of people close to me, but nobody could ever be so snarky and joke about with me like this.

And I'll also get my required grade in physics of course.