When I got to class, Elena was alone in her seat as usual. I sat down at my own without paying her mind. I was going to study my notes for Lycan Study Group with my homepack.
Last week we were told there was going to be a quiz. I clean forgotten about it with everything that's going on. But the moment I took out my notebook, the three cool girls strutted in.
They are early today. They strutted past their desks (why did they walk like that?) and stopped in front of mine (why were they walking here?), "You're early." I say.
"Homework." Krystal demanded as she turned Liam's chair around and sat down. Zara sat next to me in Jasmine's chair. And Leia walked around to sit down at Troy's.
I put away my Lycan notes and slapped the homework on top of my desk, "You girls can take it to your own desks to copy." There was too much perfume going on.
"Oh!" Zara remembered as she unzipped her backpack, she pulled out some clothes, "Here Krystal, thanks for lending them to me."
Krystal took them, "No problem. Tomorrow night, let's go again. Remember to borrow your cousin's ID."
"Where are you going? (That required those skimpy clothes and a borrowed ID) " I asked.
"Clubbing." Zara told me.
"Don't tell her." Krystal scolded. "She's way too young to go."
"Aren't we all too young?" I protested, at the back of my mind, I'm thinking that I must have misunderstood.
"It's fine." Krystal defended, "She can use her cousin's ID and I have my sister's."
She opened her wallet and flashed it at me. I frowned, "Those places are dangerous."
"It's alright," Zara reassured me, "We went on Wednesday and everyone was friendly."
Vampires can be very friendly at clubs, I'm told.
At this point, Henry and Marcus entered. Henry fuming and Marcus sauntering behind him with a wry smile so I knew he wasn't the reason for the Alpha's bad mood.
Henry clomped down loudly at his desk with a short grunt-growl. This was enough to make Zara startle. She whipped her head around to Henry and then turn wide-eyed to the rest of us for help.
Leia ignored her, Krystal rolled her eyes.
"I still think clubbing is a bad idea." I told her. Deciding to give Henry space to calm down by totally ignoring him. (It works for him, trust me.)
She nodded a bit, "Maybe I won't go."
I see Krystal huffed annoyed, "It's fine! I go with my sister all the time."
Liam and Jasmine came in, with some sweaty rumpled looking boys trailing in behind them. The boys looked like they had fun, the ball Troy was tossing up and down confirmed they had an early morning match, "You should have joined us Liam, we would have been undefeatable!"
Once in the classroom, the gang of boys parted to their own desks.
Liam and Jasmin took pause at the sight of the cool girls in their seats. The human boys had noticed too, and were now just hovering at their places, watching to see what would happen.
Then Liam sauntered over, Jasmine just behind him. Krystal stood up and smiled, "Opps! Sorry Liam."
I heard chairs scrapping as Zara and Leia stood up too. Liam looked at me, then he pasted on his usual lopsided smile, flipped his hair at Krystal and shrugged, "Is okay."
Krystal beamed hugely at that, then the cool girls retreated to their desks with my homework.
Jasmine sat down, "You're lending them your homework?"
Liam turned and leaned over, his hair looked lighter in the light today. I stared at it. Fluffier? I don't know how to describe it.
Troy turned and said too loudly to Liam, "Man! That Krystal is hot!"
Troy said everything too loudly. Liam looked amused and chuckled lowly, "Ask her out then."
"That's it!" Jasmine decided, she grabbed me by my sleeve, "You're eating lunch with me today!"
There was a silence. Jasmine let go of my sleeve.
"Yeah ok." I said.
"You're sitting with us?" Marcus asked from behind me.
"No." Jasmine turned and leaned over my chair to tell him, "We are eating with the other girls."
And then to me she said, "You will like them more than the cool girls."
Zara was sent over to return my homework, she looked hesitant as she approached us, "Thanks Zammi."
I heard Henry cough a short laugh behind me at my new nickname.
"My name is Sam." I told Zara. Zara looked at me as if she wanted to convince me otherwise, but the guys chortling behind me made her turn red.
"Sorry." She mumbled and left.
The guys were laughing at me. But how would she have known that? I turned around and slammed Marcus' desk hard. Marcus grabbed it to stop it from rattling, his amusement not quite leaving his face. What the hell.
Henry was still chuckling, soft and growly, but I'm sure he only continued laughing because he knew he was the Alpha and could get away with it. It wasn't even that funny.
I glared at him, but only very quickly. I wanted him to know I was annoyed, but not start a power struggle.
I turned back to face front. Liam was still hanging around. Jasmine was flipping through the homework Zara had returned, "Oh no! Math!"
She pulled out her own paper and started to copy. I passed the rest of my homework back at Marcus, he can hand it in for me for the rest of the day.
"What's this?" Marcus asked.
"Your punishment." I answered.
Henry was laughing again. Marcus gave a deep long suffering sigh, but accepted it. I heard him shuffling the papers under his desk, so I turned and once seeing that he was sorting them in piles along with Henry and his own work I nodded in satisfaction and turned back front.
Liam was still there. I don't think he had moved. Jasmine was still frantically copying the homework. I looked back at Liam wondering why he was still facing us. I'm noticing he looked different again. It was his hair. I'm sure of it now, just a little more coppery. Did he dye his hair?
But could dying your hair change you so much? Make your shoulders look broader? I looked hard, trying to pinpoint what it was exactly. I studied him carefully. What was it? The bell rang and he turned to face front again. And then I realised, "Liam! You've shifted!"
Troy answered back over the sound of the bell, "You want him sit there and stare at you all day?"
I was not someone who would roll my eyes, but Troy, a mere human, had single handedly helped me understand why some people did it.
Jasmine covered her mouth and gasped, "Oh my goddess, I didn't tell you?"
I looked and saw she had one more question to go, "Finish up and tell me later."
Jasmine nodded and went back to copying with new determination, I noticed her writing was really neat, and she had purposely gotten some of it wrong.
Mrs Henderson entered just as Jasmin finished. "Good morning class! I know there isn't math today, but please hand in your homework to the front now while I set up for homeroom."
Today was different again. Since when did a teacher have to set up for homeroom? Everyone passed their homework up to the front, and Liam picked it up from the front rows and put it on Mrs Henderson's table.
Mrs Henderson was busy trying to plug in her laptop into the projector. It took quite a while, but she managed. "Today, we will watch a video about stress and how to cope with it. I want all of you to pay close attention so you can discuss the questions at the end of it."
The class groaned. One of the larger boys shouted from the seat next to me, "But that's so stressful!!!"
The class laughed and I guess this would be as good as it gets.
After the video, Mrs Henderson gave us printouts about stress and asked us to discuss the questions on it with our desk partner. Jasmine wanted to fill me in about Liam's first shift, but I happened to see the line at the bottom of the printout read, "Now share with the rest of your classmates your thoughts." So I told her to hang on a minute while I wrote in generically acceptable answers.
But let's skip that because what Jasmine had to say was more interesting:
Liam shifted last night. She was on the phone with him when he suddenly hung up on her. At first she thought he had gotten annoyed by her calling him every night, but he picked her up from her pack this morning to apologize and told her he hung up because he had felt a bad pain and didn't want to worry her.
And that he had shifted.
How did he shift? Did he know at once that the bad pain was a shifting pain? Did he get a chance to get outdoors before the shift happen? Or did it happen so fast, he ended up shifting in his room? Was his family there? Did he run with his wolf?
I wanted to know, but either Liam had not shared the details or Jasmin had more important things to say, like how angry she was when she found out.
"Can you imagine?" She huffed, "What if he was all alone? He could've at least let me know he was hurting! I could've helped or called for help! Why didn't he just tell me something hurt?"
"What? And cry on the phone in front of a girl?" I teased.
"But still!" She protested hotly.
"I would have done the same thing." I told her finally.
Jasmine huffed, "You know, Sam, sometimes I feel like I'm talking to a guy."
Mrs Henderson called for our attention and told us we would now share our answers with the class, "Jasmine, what are some situations that makes you feel stressed?"
I pushed our printout to her, my finger on the first question.
"Oh," she said when she saw it, "Exams and tests." She read out, sounding rather relieved.
Mrs Henderson nodded and said something to show how she understood that would be a stressful time for us. Then she went on, calling another kid. We were in the safe.
There were some who didn't have any answers, and one or two very personal answers... On what we do to unwind when we are stressed, Zara had answered, "I sing to my hamsters."
All the humans laughed at that. Maybe it was a human thing. Zara turned red and looked down at her printout. What's wrong with singing to her hamsters? Not that I ever had hamsters before.
I looked at my own answer, "listen to music". It was something the video had suggested. But if I had been honest, the answer would have been: I hide in my bed, or take a long shower, and more recently, I punch and slam things in school and end up in fights with stupid goons at home.
Because as much as I believed this homeroom session was a waste of time, it did help me identify what was making me so easy to tick off since school started.
I wasn't angry, or frustrated. I was stressed.
But I will never admit it, because stress is for weaklings. I can take this. I can take a lot of things. I am the Alpha. And I'd sooner shut myself alone than let anyone see me cry. But you didn't just read this. If you are, stop imagining the words.
This is what you should read: I am the alpha. It'll take a lot more than this to make me stressed.