The soccer boys were currently out for soccer matches in another state, that's precisely why Ethan hadn't wavered about his affection for her, she'd soon have to be surrounded by her 'bros' as he called them and, boy, will Ethan feel the heat!!
Leah wasn't one to ever talk in vain, so when they'd exchanged a little small talk, Leah pitched her ideas to E, she began, "Let's revive our newspaper, and magazine, let's not let literature die just yet, we shouldn't be so modern as to wipe out our culture, before Terminator happens in real life, let's make the best of what we can. Let's throw an essay, writing, debating, cultural, social, political, poetry, painting competition, we can have all kinds of events, a place for everyone." "Wow, head girl, you might wanna slow down a little, take a breath and sure, we'll organise these competitions, but first we have to go play Inter-school matches today, we're going with the basketball team, our bus is No. 13." E looked at Leah with admiration, she never forgot about her responsibility, not even for one second. "Oops! I totally forgot about that, that's today." She wondered what was wrong with her, was it because she always busy or because she'd forget everything when she was with Ethan; everyone thought that Leah and Ethan would change the entire school system, and so everyone was looking forward to this change. During morning assembly, Head Boy and Head Girl, looked smug as they announced all that they'd planned just for this month. The school would have a busy month, and then another; it was tiring to just think about it, she wondered what would happen when they put their plans into action. Leah had changed clothes when she got out of the sports room, and saw Ethan and Mindy arguing, they were talking to each other with such animation that Leah wondered what it could be, suddenly some girls came out giggling, and they pushed Leah accidentally, she was exposed and as they say, Eavesdroppers never do hear good of themselves, Leah felt awful when Mindy cut their conversation short and scurried away, while Ethan had a guilty look on his face, she didn't know what it was but suddenly, Leah felt insecure, as if she was about to lose her favourite toy, something that was irreplaceable in her heart, jealousy, anxiety, and envy, all flooded her and she became mad at Ethan. Just like that she walked away from him, and this irritated Ethan, Leah could be moody as hell, she'd change her mood within seconds, they'd become good friends, then what was this attitude? Ethan wanted very much to sit next to her on the bus, but when Leah sat down, she placed her bag on the seat next to her and pretended to sleep. Ethan stood there for a while, but she didn't budge, in the end, disappointed he turned to find another seat, of course, the only seat available was next to Mindy, who'd joined the team recently, because apparently, the girl was suddenly a die-hard fan of Regla Torres, like what?? Leah was really annoyed when Mindy proposed the idea of her joining the team, first, she didn't like Mindy, Mindy tried to stir up gossip about Leah, and second, she felt like Mindy was perfect with no problems, no weight issues, no binging-purging problems, through-the-roof-confidence, she was the kind of a girl who didn't look at you unless you had a Tipphany's bracelet hanging around your wrist and your waist wasn't so small that your butt looked enormously big against it, she was hypocritical, driving girls in her group to the edge, they'd follow whatever diet she allowed them and secretly stole off to eat up without them. Leah had seen her eat chocolates during class, junk food outside class, yet she looked so unbelievably perfect that it seemed like she was dieting. She was one of those people who could eat everything they wanted and they didn't gain any weight. On top of that, she looked thin effortless, without having to work for it. This irritated Leah, and she hated Mindy, Mindy didn't hold back on the hostility either but Leah truly didn't understand why she couldn't just erase Mindy, Leah would later come to understand why she felt this way.
The whole way, Leah cursed at herself for letting Ethan sit with the witch, it was absolutely her fault, she'd not let him sit next to her, this made her grow more irritated and so she was sulky all the way to the grounds where they'd have their competition, the matches started and even though Leah was in a sulky mood, she didn't make any mistakes. She'd told Mindy to just observe the game in the first round and sure enough, she had to invite her in during the second round. Leah was centre likes always, and Mindy was the smasher. Leah loved all her smashers but this was gonna be hard. She tried to hide her feelings and cooperate but Mindy was being a pain in the ass, they'd lost the second round, and the third round, which by the way, thought Leah, wasn't supposed to happen at all, she was annoyed because she'd promised the basketball team that she'd cheer for them. Right now, nothing else mattered though, they needed to win, so she sucked up her hate, and threw it into a vortex, inside her mind, not to escape for a while, she eyed Mindy and told her, "Don't worry, you can do it!" she said, reassuring Mindy, who looked unfazed but was trembling on the inside, if they lost this game, the blame would go on them, that's just how it worked and though she didn't care about Leah, she didn't want to fail at anything, being perfect was all she had too. Just like that, they shared common beliefs, though Leah's had changed recently, even if only a little bit, Mindy was just like her, another victim of our so called natural beliefs, the urge to be perfect lied in everyone. And everyone hated that belittling voice that told them a task was too hard for them, or enunciated the fact that they'd down worse than someone, no matter what it was, that feeling of, "I wish I could've gotten that!", the urge to take something that belongs to someone else, the tendency to feel jealous or worthless when compared to others, Leah didn't like this way of living, so she'd changed her thinking, she'd made a rule, whenever she wanted to compare herself to someone, she'd mutter, "I'm better than I was yesterday." three times to herself. She'd recently read a book about how our subconscious minds are slaves to our conscious minds, if we tell our mind that we're worthless, we're going to make sure that we remain that way, unless we make a true commitment and seal it up by saying, "I'm going to be better!" with confidence, your brain is going to take this as an order. And so by applying this principle, you're going to consciously and subconsciously try harder to be better, because well you just ordered yourself to do better.
The look that Leah's eyes beheld when she assured Mindy that she could do it... moved her, she'd never thought her enemy, or rival, Leah Sanders would ever try to make her feel confident. She felt a surge of emotions as she thought about the team that relied on her right now, she hadn't practiced enough to play properly, and stepping down was a big decision, she was a cheerleader after all, the cool girl, stepping down would mean accepting that she couldn't do something, before the entire school, because whatever happened here would reach every one's ears, through stories, with mixed images and opinions as processed by everyone, but even as important this moment was, she didn't step down, how could she, her image mattered more than the team, Leah wanted to order her to leave but the substitute player was off somewhere, Leah couldn't care about anything else, her heart thumbed loudly, each echo, each beat, louder than the last, she needed to take charge, even thought the strategy of playing volleyball singlehandedly was like playing basketball 2 against 5, no matter how strong, numbers have strength, and the chances that the team with two players would win would be astronomical, just like that trying to cover the centre and the smasher positions would be extremely difficult, she could end up sinking the whole game, could she take a risk?