Words break through my thoughts unprecedented, "So any other important person in your life I should know about?" She asks, smiling up at me bemused as her questions evade her lips.
Suddenly my synapses snapped back into focus and it clicked in the posterior end of my brain what's nagging at me. It did strike me as odd that the teacher waved at her AND smiles at her as if they knew her. Whether by proxy or I don't know.
“ Daisy, do you have any relatives that work as a teacher?"
Cursory surveillance glides past my facial expression darts into my eyes before her eyelids press down on each other as she blinks. "Yeah, why?" My lips twitch but I try to keep my composure.
I continue my line of questioning, my curiosity burning brighter and brighter with each passing second as it flares up to know the who's, where's and what’s. "Do they work here? In our school?" Unsure silence beats between us, the pleasing tone hitting a note into the drum, as she contemplated my next question, nose scrunched up in thought.
"Yea....." She slowly lets out, still unsure. My lips twitch wanting to form an amused smile but I remain my composure which isn't so easy with that look on her face.
"Do they teach a science subject?"
This time she pauses and stares at me for an extended amount of time before she nods, a slow reply. "But what has that got to do with anything?" She questions, reservations about what answer she may have to give, reluctant to answer but brave enough to proceed.
I shrug, put off by her sudden secretive attitude. "Just wanted to know why the teachers were so friendly with you and all." Although it is not uncommon for subject teachers or specialty teachers to be friendly with their teen students, it struck me as odd that it would as far as a hug in front of a class.
Staring at me in quiet point black contemplation in those reserved eyes, she purses her lips into a thin line, I see a little snippet of reluctance to believe my words. And try not to feel hurt about it. I shoot a sharp glance at her only to come face to face with her unreadable and closed off countenance that strikes me as an odd, if not unusual facial expression for her, thing that doesn't belong on its host. I turn away. I can't help but wonder though.
What did I say wrong?
All and any intentions to continue conversing with each other flee and soon simmer to nothingness as we walk down the long hallway. The students of Albanian Design Academy all of who had just come out of their boring and no doubt long-suffering classes shift and scramble out of the way, giving us a wide berth as if sensing the conflict that exists and yet does not between us, sticking their bodies to the horrific sight that is the green and black walls, stretching the space that exists between us from a safe distance.
Their countenance reminds me of that of prey against its predator, scared and intimidated. Their movement is jerky and their hands are trembly as they stare at us with wide frightened eyes, inching away bit by bit from the threat they perceive us to be. It is no wonder then that they should be easily intimidated and frightened by Adena who has no qualms about harming people in whatever ways she sees fit and any means she is opportune enough to find.
I groan quietly in the back of my throat but there is no purpose for me to force them to change their personality; naive and willing to be afraid of someone.
One cannot confront what one cannot trust or see.
I purse my lips and head to my locker, fingers matching onto the steel rusted dial that begins to twist and twiddle in clockwise turns. I give a satisfactory nod when it clicks and the door freely swings away from its metal counterpart. Stretching and grabbing the subject textbooks I had for the remainder of the day, I catch a few snippets of conversation going on a few feet away from me. Using my heightened wolf abilities and posing as if I'm still filling with my locker, I listen in without turning in her direction.
What's that about? Who's she speaking to?
Adena's voice floats into my eardrums loud and clear, unfiltered and thought through week enough to let out into the open. I frown.
Is she arguing with Daisy over something? Cause I'm not having that. Nuh-uh.
I stalk up to them. She stands in Daisy's path breathing heavily, blocking her left side, looking like an angry bull ready to sell into whatever imbecile being made it angry, and slams her open locker shut, Daisy removes her hand quickly seconds before it slams shut, a close save, and stares at the perpetrator that is supposed to be her friend in shock and fear.
My eyes widen and, although I am relieved she managed to get her hand out in time, my blood rages within me, boiling with bloodthirst.
How dare she!? How dare Adena!?
I try not to let my worried eyes linger on Daisy for too long and set my sights on Adena. My eyes harden. People move in closer.
With clenched hands, she stood trembling in full murderous fury. "I see that you have a new friend."
Daisy, having recovered from her earlier spook but still shook up as her trembling hands could tell not different. She curves them into her palm. "Yea......"
She swiped a hand across her forehead which, now that I looked closer at it, was smudged with dark shades, soling her perfect tanned creamy complexion, a mirror of her brother's skin tone. I wondered what else they had in common other than their bullying and intimidating ways. "And you tossed your old one out for your new one. Am I wrong?"
She spat out, crossing her arms over her bosom, challenging her to prove she wrong even though there’d be hell to pay if she did.
I tremble, shaking at a furious velocity, my heartbeat pumping furiously against my chest and, my breath coming out in toils of hot air, take more steps towards them, each step, feeling like it didn’t belonged to me, even while my thoughts whiled and twisted in panic.
Why hadn't he texted me about this? No signal, no warning, no nothing. Even now as I was trying to search for him with our mind link, something I hadn't used in years, I couldn't sense out heads or tails of him much less see him. Stupid weak mind link.
I let out a low growl of frustration, even though I knew getting upset would not solve anything but irritate me more. I had to grit my teeth to dissuade more inhuman sounds like that from escaping my lips to make sure Daisy doesn’t hear it. I don’t want to scare her off, that is the last thing I want to do, when she’s already scared and upset enough.
“I never implied that with my actions. We can still be friends, there’s no reason why we can’t be a groupie.” Daisy refutes softly, keeping a levelled tone as well as calm eye contact with her. Adena doesn’t like the offer though.
“Can we?” I feel my claws start to rise up from my fingernails, the head of a sharp curved claw sporting out at the response that is barely a tone away from her usual with my Daisy, a tone that is cruel and heartless in nature. I try to relegate their lengthening and will it down to a small unnoticeable but sharp peak. I struggle to move closer, having to shimmy my way through a crowd of bodies that don't seem to know the meaning of personal space as they stay and stare, transfixed on the scene before them.
“Can’t we?” Daisy sputters, beginning to lose a little bit of confidence at the indirect refusal, a response she had not anticipated, taken aback. Adena throws her head back and laughs. It is not a nice laugh but rather a “are you kidding me? You’re not seriously thinking that’s a good or smart idea, are you?” mocking laugh.
“Not if you’re friends with that thing.” She sends a glare behind Daisy directed right at me. I send one back and walk right next to Daisy to drag her away from this minefield but she doesn’t budge in the slightest. Baffled, I turn to look at Daisy and see a fire of determination burning brightly in her eyes. I turn my attention back to Adena.
Her countenance doesn’t change once from its steel hostile gaze, not even as she gazes as someone she formerly recognized as a friend of hers. I turn back to look at Daisy an it hits me in the face what she means to do.
Nothing good will surely come out of trying to calm the storm before it blows over. She has to know that. Surely.
Daisy’s shoulders lift up and down with the smooth and quick inhale of air. She lets it out, unmoving and unrelenting, even to my futile gentle small tugs admit my own frustration. Inwardly, I groan.
“Why do I always have to choose between you and someone else?’ She asks without stumbling her words, although there is deep-rooted pain in her voice that whisper she might break and wonders if anyone would bother trying to put her back together with cracked and breaking pieces. My heart hurts for her, even though I don't know what else she has gone through, the girl that is breaking apart piece by piece in front of everyone but yet they are too self-absorbed to notice it, to notice her, and my arms ache to comfort her in their warmth.
Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.
My hand keep tugging, trying to pull her along with me, trying to save her from her irrational want to keep trying to find something that isn’t there even when the person has shown time and time again that they have shown time and time again that they aren’t capable of giving her what she wants.
Again, I am puzzled with the reason she is putting herself through this hurtful encounter though she need not to for her own well being. I may have not known her that long but surely she must see that doesn’t even make sense on the part of her personality these last few days. Right?
"Because you keep making friends that would ever love you as I have loved you. And trust me, they ain't gonna do half of what I did for you." She smirks after the poisonous words leave her tainted lips. My fury spikes and finally tips over, too much and too full to stay in the entirety of my body by the next thing that happens, the action that breaks the camel’s back.
Daisy blinks, eyelashes and eyelids fluttering in rapid synchronization with each other, teardrops simultaneously welling up in her eyes, believing in Adena's false manipulative words.
Enough is enough. "Enough Adena. You can admit that you're jealous but you do not get to speak to her that way. Who do you think you are to be rude and mean like that? We’re all students here and if you don’t like that then I suggest you take it up with the principal." I say firmly loud and clear enough for her to hear every word, every threat in my words, staring at her dead in the eyes as I stand in a protective stance in front of Daisy. Her head snaps to me.
I can see the shock register in her face before she has time to cover it back up with angered disbelief, her face turning a little bit more coloured. I'm surprised smoke hasn't started coming out of her ears.
"This doesn't involve you." She hisses now.
I snort angrily and move back closer to hide Daisy from her peripheral vision, folding my arms across my bosom, soft flesh tickling my skin upon contact. "The hell it doesn’t. She's my friend and as long as she is," I pause and harden my eyes, fire burning within me now at the lock onto hers, scalding anyone and anything in its path of sweet vengeance and flickering wildly like an untamed flame of passion, "anything you have to say to her, you can surely say it in my presence because it IS my business."
At this point, Riley and Eberlyn have now joined the pressing crowd that forever says silence throughout the spurtle of words flowing from my mouth, neither of my peers lending a helping hand in taking down the school bully. I guess she must scare off everyone's sense of morality too.
They, I would have to presume we are now former friends even if it hurt to acknowledge them as such, both openly stare at me in a manner that I can only perceive as they think they are being betrayed by the one person they’d never have thought would betray the man’s a camera shutter of emotions pass through their face, each captured frame stating for no longer than a few seconds, each emotion slid into its perfect slot ranging from betrayal and hurt to anger and suspicion.
Then the final click of captured picture of human feelings, indifference. That one hurt the most but do you want to know what hurt more? Them turning their back on me and leaving. The hurt lurches inside my chest and threatens to spill out in a torrent of unkind words.
I want to scream. But my throat shuts down on me as the hurt of the last two days of silence since Monday and Tuesday pile up into bile stuck to the back of my throat. So I scream in my mind instead.
WHY WON’T YOU JUST APOLOGIZE! You almost sent the guillotine for almost revealing my werewolf secret and making my whole species hate me! How am I being selfish for not apologizing for something im not guilty of!? Don’t you think I don’t want you back, the very thought of losing you as my sister makes me want to cry from the heartbreak and puke at the disgusting thought? I scream at Riley.
And you! You actually betrayed me when you chose her over me! Wasn't it me that held your hand while you grieved for your beloved lovely father when he passed away due to a diarrhoeal disease? Wasn't it me that took care of you and took you in when your mother couldn't make ends meet for a while? Hasn't it been me that has struck through thick and thin with even Riley couldn't? Why do choose her over me when I have loved and cared for you even when I too was hurting? Why? Why am I playing the second fiddle to you? I scream at Eberlyn.
I'm tired. I'm so tired. This madness has to stop one way or another.
Daisy tugs at my hand. I turn my eyes back to her, the person who needs me right now, and shove my problems deep down where they won't be found for the time being even though it hurts too much.
Her downcast eyes gaze at nothing but the floor. "Leave it. I just want to leave. Can we?" She spoke lowly, voice thick with emotion although she tried to keep it levelled. My eyes soften and-I can't help it- an emotion of full affection swirls like a tornado inside me- I push a stubborn dark lock of hair like there's no one else in the room apart from us and squeeze her hand as I reply "Anything you want."
My anger at Adena subsides, almost too insignificant proportions for me to care about it, as my priority becomes protecting and making sure she's alright no matter what the cost. I engulf her hand in mine and lead her away crowd, throwing my last glare at the students so they can dissipate enough for us to pass. They happily oblige. I lead her to the empty classroom at the other end of the building, far away enough from prying eyes and eavesdropping ears. Salty teardrops hit my long sleeve, melting into my skin as it seeps into the polyester fabric.
My heart squeezes in my upper body at the pain she must be going through. I push open the door and hold it out for her to pass as she walks out.
"Why does she always have to be this way?" She cries out, teardrops dripping down past her cheeks as they slide down in a torrent.
"Why can't I just have a normal best friend?"
She blubbers. “Am I not good enough?" She asks her head resting on my shoulder, wetting my shirt with her tears(not that I mind, she can cry on my all she needs to.) I stroke her hair, offering solace to her hurt, and choose my next words with great care.
"No, you are not good enough. You're better than what she makes you think are and you deserve the world. Even though we've only been friends for a short while, I know I would do anything to make you happy and know that you deserve that." She sniffles and faces me. "Really?"
"Yes really. Even if the world were to be ravaged by zombies and I had the anecdote, I'd give it to you first." I tell her, my hands cupping her face, smiling down at her. She laughs at the odd example and the use of zombies.
I reach out a hand to move a lock of hair that was hiding the beauty behind it. She smiles shyly but the remnants of teardrops still shine in her eyes like the moon's reflection on the deep blue brine in the night.
What did I say wrong?
"Thank you. You're so nice to me." She confesses shy still, deep gratitude spreading across her light-brown lips. I shrug. " It's no big deal. We're friends anyway aren't we?"
The light in her eyes dim a smidgen bit but not such that you'd notice if you weren't looking for it and if you weren't looking closely enough, (which I was, how else am I going to talk to her? Look at the fucking wall?) But then it quickly blinked away as if it never happened or never existed for whatever its purpose was in the first place, too soon for me to study closely. I could have sworn I just saw an emoti8n passes through her pupils before it exploded into the dark pools of brown irises, almost hiding so it is not caught or perceived by an outer human eye, blending in we’ll into plain sight, one that I cannot place.
Was that anger? Embarrassment? Jealousy? Hurt? Trepidation? What? No matter how much I try to decipher the emotion, no matter how much I try to change the picture so that it fits the frame that wears it, though I barely had a good long look at it bends and distorts in my ray of vision. I was stumped.
“Yeah, we are.” The quiet agreement loudly rings with resignation at that im not sure is only a figment of my own imagination that startles my eardrums and floats somewhere over and against my skull, a screeching tone of recognition. I furrow my brows into a reflective worrisome and curious crease in the space between my eyelids and my straightforward forehead.
Her lowered sights brought me no comfort as they stayed trained on the space between us, never once rising up to meet mine, trouble festering up inside me like its forever home nest. The thing that also irked me about this was that she didn't want to tell me about what was bothering her so much that she had to break eye contact with me.
Don't make her do anything she doesn't want to, my subconscious advised. I hissed at it, irritated with its self-entitled need to remind me of the promise I made to myself. As if I need the reminder. I roll my eyes.
"Does she always do things like this? Again, you don't have to talk about it if you don't want to which you don't since it makes you upset." I whisper, the need to know if things were as bad as I thought them to be; paranoid that things had gotten physical once. I silently bed for it not to be so.
She turns away and fidgets with her sleeves but answers nonetheless. " She has this stare like she's stealing all the air in your lungs and puts fear in your heart. She-she threatens to leave me enough she knows, she knows I don't want her to, I don't want to lose my best friend, and then I'd cry and she'd -shed take me into her arms and tell me that she wasn't going to abandon me, that she was just kidding. A joke she said."
Tears stream and streak their way down her cheeks. But some tears are unshed, unspent, unspilled, or unspecified. Seeing her cry in silence made me hurt more than it should have and just as much did the rage swell up in me, heart seething and boiling in a hot syrup of emotion that called for justice to be served.
"You know you don't have to....." I start but then she called her head firmly. "I want to." She sniffles. I say nothing and let her continue. She takes a few seconds to wipe her tears away, an impatient swipe across her forehead.
"For the time that I've been her friend, she always had to have something against me, something to start an argument with between us, even if she had to create an issue that hadn't existed before." She shakes her head.
"Don't get me wrong the early days were nice but," she bites her lip and lets it go a moment late, my eyes follow their movement of snapping back into freedom, "sometimes she wouldn't speak to me for days on end, weeks and months even, leaving me to wonder what I'd supposedly done wrong to make her mad. I often wondered where that would leave us and if, I know it was stupid now but I couldn't help it, she would willingly go through the same thing for me because she cherished me the same way I did her. I wondered if she'd against her own demons to keep me. But she didn't and it doesn't look like she has yet."
She shrugs as if it doesn't bother her, as if it still doesn't kill her every time, as if it hasn't broken her more times than she can count, but I see right through her even with her back turned to me. "She would never look at me on those days but allow me to come with her on whatever errand she was on. Instead of at me, she stared right through me. It made ne feel like I was a ghost, non-existent but see-through."
Her voice broke halfway through and I had to steel myself, feet stock firm on the floor, so that I wouldn't jump up and haunt her down for what she was-and had- caused Daisy to go through for so long before a so broken whimper crashed through my ears, snapping me out of my Adena torture filled reverie.
"I've never felt so alone." Her shoulders shook in suppressed wails that barely escaped her lips in coordination, broken sobs falling off of her life in disconnected calls. I grit my teeth but move closer to comfort her. She pushes her head into my neck and cries to her hearts pain. I want to wring Adena's neck and bite off her fingers one by one with my human teeth. Human teeth are sharp enough to cut into flesh anyway.
Soon, soon justice will be served, my fury croons, a tempestuous lover. I smile. And I will be its executioner.