"Will I see you at the party tonight?" Asks me Jackson and I smile nicely. I don't know how to tell him that I will be there, but I won't be partying with the rest of the sophomores. It'd be too weird to say that I'm spending my night watching college parties and hunting monsters... dressed as Buffy Summers? Totally weird.
"Of course, pal! We'll both be there!" Will steps in just in time. My annoying guardian angel, at my disposal as usual. "Aline and I love your fraternity's Halloween parties. Last year we almost got suspended, let's make it happen this year!"
"You better bet on that, bro!" Comes Jackson's quick response, both of them hand-shaking before I pull Will toward the main entrance.
We walk to our motorcycles and I watch as Jackson leaves the university and joins a group of boys from his fraternity. They start doing their secret handshakes and shout their house's Greek name, watching at the other students like they are the masters of this school and we should curtsey in their presence. I hate the Greek system so much I would go back to London only to avoid them. All these sororities and fraternities are worse than the hunter clans I've encountered all my life. At least they had something real to be proud of, while these mindless monkeys and mean barbies only give me a headache with their boasting about the all-mighty greek system.
"Oh, isn't he a catch." Says Will with irony, looking at Jackson marching with the other boys.
"We should go," I tell Will when the Kappa-Pi-whatever fraternity leaves our sight.
"You know, if he wasn't so dim, I would see you dating." Keeps Will chattering about Jackson and I just roll my eyes in annoyance.
"You think I have such poor taste in men?" I ask him, mounting on my bike and putting my helmet on.
"I've met one of your old boyfriends, remember? The one we run into when we arrived at Yeti. Let's say he didn't impress me much..."
"Nev was in a coma then, Will. How could he make an impression on you?" I ask him and he just shrugs.
"I don't know, maybe because he fell into a coma after he was tricked by a goblin?"
"Well, they're Irish. And you know that Irish monsters are the best tricksters." I defend my ex-boyfriend's childish mistake. Goblins are a low-ranking monster, the kind we learn about during our first years of training. They're not evil like Leprechauns or Darachs, but they are pranksters. And for those that are easily distracted, like Nev, they are pretty dangerous.
"Fine, I'll give you that. I hate Irish monsters." Says him after pondering and I'm almost glad that I've won this argument. "But then tell me, who the fuck dates a guy named Neville? Where you in your Harry Potter phase at the time or what?"
Guilty. Sometimes I fell like Will knows me better than how someone whom I've met a year and a half ago should. I just love the way we got so close over the year we spent away from our homes, but sometimes is annoying how right he is about my past mistakes. He makes me feel very predictable, which I am not! How dares he make me question my spontaneity?
I stick my tongue out at him and drive off. I speed past the campus, heading for the city centre. I need to do some shopping before I head out to the halls. It's the first Halloween when I'll be hunting, but I don't have my expectations high. I'm sure it'll be far more boring than the ones in London. Boulder is full of young hunters from all around the world because of the Young&Troubled program, or Yeti Summer Camp as Will affectionately calls it. The high number of hunters patrolling the streets have driven the troublesome monsters out of entire Colorado because Boulder hunters have jurisdiction in the whole state. The ones that remained are mainly inoffensive or under a truce with the Coloradan hunters. Like the pack of werewolves outside Boulder, the den of vampires in the southern side of the city or the coven of witches who come here every year for Thanksgiving. Don't ask me why they do that, witches are just odd wired people who obey to long-forgotten traditions. But all of them are normal beings, like humans.
The wolves even have their program at the University, and although most of their time is spent away from the other students, you can find some of them in regular lectures. I had a werewolf girl in my engineering drawing course, who helped me pass my midterm. She stayed with me after the seminar, because she heard the professor telling me that I have zero chances of passing, and taught me the entire course that I've been skiving since I started college. I always hated drawing and I didn't know that my major included such courses, because I'd surely reconsider my choice if I'd have known. But Haven saved my lazy butt and helped me get a good grade at that midterm. When my professor realised that I'm not going to fail, she almost made me swore on the Bible that I didn't cheat on her exam. Haven was nice enough to explain to her how she helped me study, so practically that werewolf girl saved my butt two times. But I didn't see her since June and I can only assume that she dropped out in the meantime. Which is quite a shame because she was the most talented in our drafting class and I could've seen a bright future for her in this field.
I wonder what made her give up like this...
I park my bike and enter the first store I see. I walk around, searching for the items I've imagined that will help me create my costume, but I'm out of luck. I move on to the next one and I manage to find a pair of red, leather leggings and a tight, black, sleeveless halter top. I hop back into my black ankle boot and dress up with the leather jacket I didn't wear all day, because of the unusually high temperatures, but who I've carried all day in order to get a complete picture of my costume... of which I was not entirely proud of. I know I am missing some accessories, but I don't believe they are the missing puzzle piece. I decided to dress up as the Slayer because one of the perks of being a hunter, is that you don't have to splash out on a Halloween costume if you decide to cosplay as a fictional leading lady whose life resembles yours. I may not have a Scooby Gang, but I'm preventing my city, every day, from ending up like Sunnydale.
I pay for the clothes and I leave for the food court. I get some Chinese food for me and Will and I exit the mall. I walk to my bike, cursing the sun that was hurting my eyes and making me sweat. I prefer cold weather over this hellish sauna. Too bad that Octobers are usually warm and sunny around here, so I have to wait until the end of the term to have the weather I like. I put the bags in my trunk bag and fish a water bottle from one of them. I drink a little, but I scowl when I realise that it's already warm.
I had the fricking bottle for five damn minutes in the sun!
I throw it back in the bag and I prepare to leave. I hear a low growl and I immediately reach for the gun in my boot. I search the area for monsters, but even if there are any, I'd be impossible to find them in this crowded car park. I hide my gun away and I put my helmet on. Maybe if I leave, they'll follow me and I'll be able to attack them somewhere with fewer people. But if they don't, I will text the hunters patrolling the area to be alert and the monsters will be caught anyway.
I drive away from the centre, heading to the halls. I stop at every light, which I usually don't, and look for any monsters that may follow me. But there wasn't any so by the time I've parked in the alley in front of my room, I've convinced myself that I've imagined the incident at the mall. Maybe I wish so much for something interesting to happen this night that my mind started to make up threats for me. I don't think this is healthy behaviour, but as long as no one else knows about my degrading sense of reality, I won't be sent to an asylum anytime soon. Hopefully, I won't ever end up in such a place, but in my line of work is abnormal if you remain sane after decades of hunting. Take my mother, for example, she's a control freak and occasionally-murderous psychopath. She's especially gruesome when I'm in her proximity, which should really bother me but frankly doesn't. I guess I'm just used to her being like this because I don't remember a time when she was acting like a real, caring mother.
I run up the stairs to my room, passing by my colleagues and saluting some of them. I don't have friends here, but I've made some acquaintances over the freshman year. We give each other lecture notes and tell about the latest parties. Those I'm particularly nice with are the ones that know what parties are worth going to and how to get inside the most exclusive ones. They're nice people, but I can't get too close to them. If I become friends with them, I could be tempted to tell them my secret; because they surely observed my chaotic schedule and must be interested in why am I like this. I've only made this mistake once, with my third-grade best friend. I was expecting my first training and I was particularly excited. She asked me why and I couldn't keep my mouth shut. The next day I was the class clown, the girl who believes she's a superheroine and lives in fairytale land. Jez and Jonty talked me out of proving those idiots that I'm telling the truth and ever since then, I kept my distance around normal kids.
"Hi, Ally," greets me my roommate, Bee, "are you coming to the Kappa-Theta-Pi party tonight?"
"Sure, I'll be there," I say and I walk into our shared walk-in closet. I change into my Halloween costume and look for my make-up bag. I find it on my roommate's vanity table but I don't say anything. I sometimes borrow her things too. It's like we have an unvoiced agreement to share our things because we are living in the same room and it enlists us to this right. I sat on the chair and apply some foundation on my sun-kissed skin. I try to imitate some make-up I found on YouTube, but I end up looking like a racoon so I wash my face.
"Need my help, roomie?" Asks Bee in a giggle, watching me apply foundation for the second time.
"I am a mess when it comes to make-up," I say, dropping my brush on the table and letting Bee work her magic.
"Because you're an entitled little bitch with a babyface who likely never knew the struggles of hiding preteen acne until her senior year of high school."
"I've got good genes," I respond to Bee's accusation and she rolls her eyes.
"Maman has a saying for people born with luck like you, Ally, but I couldn't translate it even if I wanted to." Tells me Bee with the mascara wand right in front of my right eye. I just hope she won't decide to poke my eyes with that. "And it wouldn't be funny anyway."
She tops it with red lipstick and lets me admire her masterpiece. And it was worthy of being praised. I've never seen winged eyeliner so perfect in my life, and I should know. I had my fair share of meetings with many of my mother's beauticians whenever we were attending some fancy hunter gala. But my mother usually annoyed them so much with her many requests, that they were always hurrying to be paid and leave. But Bee didn't even need a lot of time to master these wings.
"You're a make-up fairy, Bee. Thank you."
"Just sparkled some fae dust here and there, no big deal." She jokingly says and we both laugh. But of course, I found more amusing what she think fairy dust is used for. Although it is created by fairies, they have little uses for it. Most of the times, they use it in the barters with hunters. The lesser fairies like pixies buy their freedom with this dust, which is rather tyrannic but it's the reality I've known my whole life. Sometimes I wonder if we are the actual bad guys and the monsters should be the ones to stop our despotic ways. "So when are you putting your costume on?"
"I'm wearing my costume," I say, pointing to my outfit.
"I know you're unconventional, Ally, but dressing up as yourself on Halloween is not as original as it may seem."
"I'm Buffy Summers, Bee."
"Aham, stay right there." She says as she disappears into the closet. She comes back with a cross necklace and a pair of earrings resembling two wooden stakes. After I put the accessories on, she gives me another glance and orders me to sit back on the chair of the vanity. She tossed my hair aside, as she started explaining the origins story of the character I was going out as. Turns out, Bee is a great fan of the Vampire Slayer and has dressed up as her for many Halloweens. So she perfected the art of becoming Buffy, down to the weird, vampire-bite marks on the neck and the wooden stakes.
"You're almost perfect," she informs me, before turning to her outfit, laying on the bed and rising the blonde wig from the bed.
"It's not necessary, Bee. I'm sure you need the wig to complete your costume."
"I was dressing as 21st-century Jane Bennet, but now I can be Elizabeth so it's a win-win."
It was vainly to even try to convince my colleague to let me go without the wig, so I just let her arrange it on my head. I had to admit, I was looking good in that costume and I thanked Bee for helping me, before grabbing my jacket and the hunting bag and hurrying out of the room. The halls were quieter now because people are either napping or last-minute shopping for a costume. But the silence doesn't bother me at all. I jog to my motorcycle and I secure the hunting bag on my bike. I drive to Will's dorm, which is on the other side of campus. Thanks to my reckless driving, I arrive there in less than ten minutes and I park my bike next to his. I get the takeaway food from the truck and I shove my hunting bag over my shoulder. Will doesn't have a roommate so we always prepare our weapons in his halls. It'd be too hard to do it while Bee is away, hoping that she won't catch me cleaning my rifle while singing some Disney songs. If it wasn't forbidden for boys and girls to share a room, I'd moved in with Will long ago. But then, I'd have missed Bee a little... a little more than little, maybe. I know we could be best friends if I wasn't so afraid of trusting people like her.
"Hmm, am I smelling spring rolls?" Says Will as soon as I enter his room. He was laying on his bed, polishing some arrowheads with one earphone on. I could hear the heavy metal song playing in his headphones like it was on speaker. I always tell him that he'll be deaf before forty if he continues to listen to music like this, but he doesn't appear to care.
I sit on the empty bed beside the window and open the food bag. I throw the box with spring rolls at him, searching for the spicy rice I've bought.
"Sorry mate," I tell him when I find two vegetable fried rice and I realise I forgot to check the order before heading out, "but you're going to eat veggie rice."
"Gross." He seems disappointed when he opens the rice box and looks and the many vegetables inside it. He rolls his eyes but sticks his chopsticks in the food and starts eating. I take some few bites from my sweet and sour chicken, then start preparing my weapons. It's almost sunset and we can't be late on Halloween.
The plan was to go by the Yeti centre, have a chat with the other hunters and head to the campus. If monsters love something more than Halloween, is to crash house parties during this night. The biggest party here will be at Kappa Theta Pi, which means will be spending a lot of time there. There are other hunters on the field tonight, who will watch over the dormitories and the library. I know things will be pretty dull, but I hope that at least after midnight to get some action. I don't wish for something big and disastrous, but maybe some dark witches on the loose, a group of vampires who are trying to have a little too much fun or a werewolf who forgot that this Halloween is also a Full Moon.
You know, the usual hunts.