The moment Isaura alighted from the bus, her eyes shone and she ran over to the front of the gate.
There, at that moment, was the same car she had seen Alex gone into yesterday to go home at the gate. Sure enough, when the door opened, she saw Alex coming out of the said car.
It was Fate!
Yes!
She knew it that Alex was going to be her best friend.
This just confirmed it.
She couldn't wait to tell Zue but for now, what was more important was to go and greet Alex.
Who, at that moment, was already well aware of the tornado that was coming towards him.
At the last moment, he slipped behind the door that he had yet to shut, effectively blocking Isaura from hugging him. Once her momentum had been disrupted, Alex made sure that she was not going to hug him before closing the car door.
"Alex!" Isaura called out loudly, despite the fact that Alex was right in front of her. She was just that excited.
"Yes?" Alex replied calmly, his entire being on high alert.
He wouldn't put it past Isaura to still try and hug him, even though 'the moment' had passed.
One could never be too careful with the girl, after all. She was just too unpredictable and did not really conform to 'normal' people.
Sure enough, Isaura seemed to lunge at him upon his reply and he put up his hand, saying, "You can tell me from where you are, you know."
"Oh," Isaura responded, nodding her head. Then she was distracted as the car door beside her opened, for Aurora wanted to get out.
Aurora had seen Isaura dashing over, and thus, had not opened the car door as yet so as to allow Isaura to come forward.
Perhaps she would be able to see her brother getting hugged again.
Unfortunately, it was not meant to be and Aurora was destined to be disappointed that morning. Still, from the looks of it, Aurora surmised that this was going to be a daily occurrence.
It was at that moment she suddenly thought of Uncle Xing Han. How he'd just dash over and hug her father, causing Uncle Nick's face to scrunch up.
Most of the time, Uncle Xing Han would fail.
Not because Daddy avoided him, but rather, because Uncle Nick would reach out and grab Uncle Xing Han before he could reach Daddy.
Aurora turned to look at Fleur, saying, "You used to do that with Ziad."
Fleur rolled her eyes, "That was way back when I was younger, okay."
Alex turned towards Fleur slowly and said, "It was just two years ago, you know. Hardly 'way back' then."
Plus, the words 'younger' remained silent, hanging in the air, though one could tell from the way Alex looked at Fleur, that he found her statement ridiculous.
Though technically, she wasn't wrong.
It definitely was when she was younger.
It's just that hearing it from an eight-year-old sounded pretty ridiculous.
…. Well, to most people, at least.
"Wow! Really?!" exclaimed Isaura as all of them started making a move towards the school. It wasn't a Monday, so there was no assembly and they could go straight to their classrooms.
"When I was younger, I used to play with my best friend Zue all the time," Isaura said with a small sigh, "but since we moved, I can only talk to her."
"Moved? I thought you grew up here," Alex said, thinking back on what Isaura had said yesterday, during the ice-breaking session.
At that question, Isaura frowned a bit, as if she was confused herself. She began thinking, lost in thought and almost bumped into Alex.
Almost, because he stepped aside.
Aurora reached out and grabbed Isaura by the shoulder, but Isaura still didn't seem to snap out of her deep thoughts.
"Isaura?" Aurora called out and shook her a bit when Isaura didn't respond.
They had nearly reached their classroom by now and Isaura blinked a bit before turning her head towards the direction of Aurora's voice. Aurora saw the rather glazed look in her eyes before it cleared up and Isaura looked at her in confusion.
Then, she looked around her and realised where she was.
Isaura's shoulders slumped down and she said, "I did it again, didn't I?"
Aurora raised her eyebrows, glanced towards her brother for a second before asking, "Did what?"
Isaura sighed and replied, "I don't know."
Aurora led Isaura to her desk, and watched as Isaura sat down in her chair and put her chin on the table.
"You seemed a bit lost just now," Aurora said, "As in, lost in thought. You were thinking so hard that you zoned out."
"Oh," Isaura said then looked at them, asking, "Do you think I'm strange?
"Of course," Alex replied before Aurora could.
Aurora glared at Alex and smacked him on the shoulder, "Why did you say that for?"
Alex gave her a bored look and then turned to Isaura, saying, "We all are. That's why we're in the Accelerated Class."
Aurora understood immediately what Alex was trying to say, so she continued, "That's true."
"But Mummy said we're in this class because we're super smart," Isaura said, "not strange."
"Being super smart is strange," Alex replied.
"Because we think differently, and we sometimes act differently," Aurora said.
"So you also forget things? Sometimes my mind is blank, or that I just can't remember how I got somewhere or something."
The Fantastic Four listened intently, glad that the rest of their classmates had not arrived yet. Well, there were a couple but they were at the other end of the classroom so their conversation couldn't be heard.
Alex didn't think that it was that unusual to get so lost in thought that they lose sight of themselves and the world around them. He felt that Isaura was simply different from them - the biggest hint was the way she thinks and sees things.
It dawned on him then that this was probably why Isaura's parents insisted that she held their hands when they were walking. Isaura said that she could get lost easily, and that was most likely attributed to the fact that she zoned out once in a while.
Seeing Isaura's dejected look, plus how small she was, Alex felt that just like Fleur - Isaura needed lots of protection and care. Taking her under their wing wouldn't be a bad thing,
They had, after all, been taking care of her yesterday so it wasn't a big deal to continue doing so. She was the baby of the class at the moment.
Most likely to be the baby of the class for a long time, too.
It's not like the place was full of genius seven-year-olds. What are the odds of another showing up next year?
"We don't," Ziad told her, "but each person is different, with our own strange things."
Ziad pointed to Alex, "Take him, for example. He spent one year sleeping outside with his pet wolf."
Isaura's eyes went wide open and she jumped up. She looked completely rejuvenated, a stark contrast to the earlier dejected mode.
"You have a pet wolf?!" she nearly screamed that out, grabbing Alex's hands and gripping them tightly, "That's so cool!"
"Wolfdog," Alex corrected, "It's a mix between wolf and dog."
"That's still so cool!" Isaura replied, swinging Alex's hands.
Aurora rolled her eyes at Isaura's reaction.
"Trust you to only focus on that, and not on the fact that my dear brother slept outside with Max, the wolf," Aurora said with a slight grin, "Heck, sometimes Daddy would find him inside the wolf den, instead of the tent!"
Aurora remembered the day when Alex had to come back and sleep in the house.
When Alex had first started sleeping in the den, Daddy hadn't been too angry but he did tell Alex to stop. When Alex didn't, and continued to sleep in the den, Daddy seemed to have snapped.
Sleeping outside was one thing but when Alex started being more wolf, Daddy put his foot down and literally dragged him back into the house and dumped him onto the bed.
Max had initially protested, howling and even daring to growl at Daddy but somehow, just one look from Daddy and Max whined, backing down. When Daddy allowed Max to follow and come into the house, Max did so happily.
Max was rather cautious of Daddy after that, but when Daddy didn't seem to do anything else to 'usurp' Alex's position in the pack, Max settled down and things went back to normal.
"So awesome," Isaura continued to fawn, staring at Alex with bright eyes. It got so bad that Alex was rather uncomfortable with the stare and he gently pried his hands away from hers.
"Class is about to start," Alex said and Isaura nodded reluctantly. She watched as Alex went back to his seat and she sighed
Alex was so much more awesome than she ever thought.
Zue would surely scream in excitement as well.
With that, Isaura settled down and started to get ready for class.
Alex and the others went over to their desk.
"Guys?" Aurora called out as they were about to sit down.
They all looked at her and she said, as she jerked her chin towards Isaura's back, "I think we should take care of her. What do you think?"
"Sure," Alex replied, shrugging, glad that his sister was the one that brought it up and he didn't have to. That way, the teasing would lessen.
At least, he hoped it would.
Everyone agreed. Without a word, they looked towards Isaura who seemed to be engrossed at looking at her pencil as she took it out of her pencil box.
Alex shook his head. It looks like they just adopted a new pet.