Chapter 5

Valentinas pov

I stand in front of the mirror picking through the fabric of my cheerleading skirt. It was pretty short on me, but not enough to show my ass which is good. 

I told my mom about me being a cheerleader and she told me she was happy that I got into cheerleading, since she was a cheerleader in high school as well. 

Maybe that's where I got my skills from...

Here I am feeling insecure about the way I look through the mirror. I always feel insecure about my body and the way I look because I see other girls, and automatically want to have their body.

"Estas bien?" (You okay?) I hear my moms voice stopping me from my thinking about my insecurities, as I turn around and look at her. 

"All good." I fake smile. I don't want to tell her I'm feeling insecure about myself because she'll give me a whole speech on how I shouldn't feel like that because I'm, 'perfect', but I don't feel that way at all. In fact, I hate the way I look. My face, my body, the way I care for people when they did me dirty, and just everything about me in general. 

"Are you ready for school? You have 10 minutes to get there." My mom asks, jiggling her car keys around her hand. 

"Yup. Vamos." (Let's go) I say, getting my backpack slinging one of the strips over my shoulder. 

I get into her car without saying a word. It's just awkward sometimes I don't know what to say. Plus, it's too early to be dealing with conversations, I'll rather just keep my mouth shut. 

"Uriel is coming down next week." My mom says, turning her car on and reversing out the driveway. 

My brother is coming next week?! What happened to a month?!? I mean, my dad just got murdered for fuck sakes. Don't get me wrong, I'm happy he's coming down because I can finally get to see him, but what if someone from Mexico follows him and find us? They want my dads money and they won't stop till they find us. Partially, that's the reason why we had to move. After my fathers murder, we were in danger, which we still are but we're safer here. 

"What? I thought he was coming next month?" I ask confused, wanting to know the reason as to why he's coming over so early. 

"I thought so too, but apparently he wants to come over here already." Mom says, as I feel the car move up and down because of the road bump.

"Oh I forgot to tell you that my boss invited me to her house for a party, she wants me to bring you because she also has a daughter your age." She continues, already pulling up to hell. I see students looking towards me direction, then quickly looking away. 

"No quiero ir." (I don't want to go) I state, but her eyebrows raise giving me a signal to not argue with her. I sigh in defeat and kiss my mother in the cheek. 

"Fine I'll go, but just for a little bit. You know how much my anxiety gets to me." I say and she nods at me understanding. 

I've suffered through anxiety since I was eight and ever since then, it's been my worst enemy. It wasn't as bad right now, but when I was younger it was horrible. Luckily, it hasn't been affecting me, so let's just pray it doesn't ruin my life again. 

"Bye mami." I say, opening the door as she waves goodbye at me. 

I walk to the front doors, gently pushing the doors to get inside. When I opened the door, everyones eyes were on me. Why is everyone staring at me?! Please make this stop. 

I walk quickly to my locker, when I see Gina leaning against her locker which was in front of mine, on her phone scrolling through I*******m.

"Hey." I sigh, using my hand to pick through my brown locks.

"What's wrong?" She asks, worriedly immediately turning off her phone. 

"I'm fine, everyone is just staring at me as if I came naked to school or something." I laugh lightly, examining at Ginas cheerleading outfit. It fits her so well I'm literally jealous because it looks good on her, and on me it looks like shit. 

"Girl that's because you look so good! I mean, who told you to look this pretty?" Gina smiles, moving her hands to fix the bottom of my skirt. 

"I don't look good. In fact, everyone in this outfit looks great. I on the other hand, look like a dumpster truck." I say, walking over to my locker and picking through the combination. 

"Shut up. You're the prettiest girl in this school, stop being insecure about yourself. Trust me when I tell you that you look so pretty." Gina says. I look at her trying to see if there's any lies buried into her eyes, but there wasn't. It's pure honesty. 

"Thank you. I'm very insecure, so I'm sorry." I frown, getting my books out of my locker and squishing it into my backpack.

"No need to apologize, I understand. Let's get to class before the teacher has a heart attack." Gina laughs, extending her arm around so I can wrap mine into hers.

As we were walking to English which is my favorite class, Heaven bumps into Gina on "accident" causing Gina to groan in pain and hold her shoulder with her hand. 

"What the fuck Heaven?" Gina winces. Heaven looks at me and analyzes me. She keeps staring at me not realizing that I can see her. 

"Hellooo?" Gina snaps her fingers, pulling Heaven out of her trance. 

"My bad I didn't see you, maybe next time look at your surroundings." Heaven smirks, walking into into class and taking a seat in her usual desk. 

I grab Ginas arm and pull her to her desk, and sit behind her. I massage her shoulder lightly, not wanting to hurt her and I stare at Heaven and smirk. Two can play this game. 

She rolls her eyes and the teacher came in starting on the lesson and talking about Macbeth, a book we had to read and answer questions about.

✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦

I walk into the gym where I have cheer practice. This is my first cheerleading practice for the football game. God I hate football. I'll rather watch girls play it than boys. 

"Girls start running 2 laps, Gina and Valentina come over here for a second." Coach Sanders says, motioning us to go to her with her finger.

"I want to pick a co-captain for the team, but in order to do so, I need both of you to show me who can be a leader to this team." Coach Sanders explains, writing something in her clipboard. 

"Isn't it too early to determine that?" Gina asks. 

"No, now I need both of you to show me who can be co-captain I feel like-" 

"I say Valentina should be co-captain, I mean she's the best out of everyone here. She's very committed to this team, and she feels that she would be a great leader." Gina says, confidently, cutting Coach Sanders off. 

"Great then it's settled." Coach grins, blowing her whistle really loud almost blowing my eardrums.

"Girls, come here for a second." Coach Sanders calls out, as the girls come jogging towards us. 

I hear the gym doors open revealing Heaven walking to us. We make eye contact and she stares at me, before quickly restraining her eyes away from me. 

"Heaven, perfect timing. I'm about to announce something important. I wanted to find a co-captain for the team, considering Heaven isn't always here and when I'm not here, so I've come to a perfect girl for that." Coach Sanders smiles. There was an immediate pause, until she speaks again. 

"Valentina is the new co-captain. I'm sure all of you girls can agree that she'll be a great asset to this squad." Coach continues. All the girls nod and smile at me supportively, while Heaven looks furious. 

What a surprise. I know she's dying inside, but I don't care. 

"What?" Heaven finally replies furiously, shaking her head. 

"I have to WORK with her now?" She continues, emphasizing on the 'work'. 

"Yes, stop acting like a child throwing a tantrum. I chose you to be captain of this team, so support Valentina instead of being a brat." Sanders argues. Heaven stays quiet and nods her head in defeat. 

"Okay well I have to go to a doctors appointment, so Heaven and Valentina are in charge. Listen to them please." She pleads, turning on her heel and walking out of the gym. 

After she left, it was pure silence. I didn't know what to say or do, since I've never been in this type of situation before. I feel like everything is moving too fast with me being co-captain. Like I literally just got in. 

"Okay girls, we have someone that wants to join the squad, we're going to watch them, so let's move these tables." Heaven says, motioning to the table that's in the middle of the gym. Quickly the girls and I helping them, move the table to the back of the gym to give the person room for there audition. 

"I hope we get someone good for this squad, we really need it." Gina says, grabbing a chair for her and I. 

"I hope so too." I sigh, sitting down in the middle of the table, where Gina was in my left and Heaven is on my right.

A girl came walking into the gym with black shorts and a white tank top. She had blue eyes that would make your gaze into her, and her hair was mid length, curled black. She was pretty attractive I would say.

"What's your name?" I ask, coming out as flirtatious. 

Gina glares at me and smirks, knowing that I find her attractive. 

"My name is Violet." She smiles at me, showing me her pearly white teeth.

"Can you get to your audition now? We don't have all day." Heaven scoffs. I look at her with a, 'bitch what the fuck' face, and she just shrugs.

What a bitch. 

"Right, sorry." Violet mutters, turning over to a girl that has her phone plugged in into the aux. The girl nods and plays the music. 

(A/N: skipping this part because I'm too lazy to write the whole thing, but to sum it up, her routine was good.) 

To think of how good Violets routine is an understatement. I have to say that she's really good, hopefully we can all agree to that. 

"Wow that was so good. Do you have experience in cheerleading?" I ask, putting my hand under my chin to hold it. 

"Not really, it took me about a week to practice this routine." Violet giggles, hearing that cute laugh of hers. 

I nod, "I can agree that you were good, but that doesn't mean you're in the team. We have to discuss it, so give us a minute." Heaven says, causing me to roll my eyes in annoyance. 

Heaven turns to Gina and I giving us a cold glare. 

"I feel like she should be on the team." I say, crossing my arms. Gina from beside me nods in agreement. 

Heaven grabs my hand and pulls me out of the chair harshly, dragging me to god knows where.