“Hey, please wait up.”

I slowed my pace. The December night air was frigid, but despite only wearing a sweatshirt and pants, I wasn’t too bothered. Timid steps crunched the gravel that covered this part of the base between the gyms and our barracks.

Being alone had its advantages. For one, I didn’t feel that constant emotional niggling I felt around other Changed. And after getting my delusion of specialness beaten out of me, being alone was certainly what I wanted.

But, there was no easy way to escape at this point.

I stopped and turned back. Clair was hurrying across the grounds, trying to catch me. It was almost funny, considering she could have just run and reached me considering we could be so very fast if we wanted. Instead, she was shuffling towards me, half staring at the ground as she approached.

“You’re gonna run into something if you don’t look up,” I said.

Her cheeks flushed as she neared me. In the distance behind her, I could see Marcus and Kemi talking as they meandered along.

When she fell in beside me, I continued walking back to our barracks.

“Sorry,” she mumbled.

“For what? Not watching where you were going?”

She looked up, blinking at me, before quickly looking away. “No, not for that.”

“For what then?”

There was no answer, not immediately. Only our feet crunching on loose gravel.

“For winning?” she said, finally.

“Are you telling me, or are you asking me?” I said, a bit too harshly. But my heart started beating fast and I clenched my hands in my pockets.

“For winning,” she muttered.

“Why?” I asked. Heat bloomed in my chest and my cheeks. I looked away from her, staring at the ground myself now.

“You just seemed so angry, after the fight. You barely said anything in the showers or talked to any of us.”

She wasn’t wrong. At first, I was fine, after the fight. But the more I thought about losing, the angrier I’d become. For a bit there, I’d been feeling special. Like I was really good at something. And then, predictably, the rug got yanked out from under me. “Yeah, well, I mean who wants to talk when you’re naked?” I grumbled.

“Oh,” she said quietly. “It’s just...I don’t know. The way you looked. You seemed upset. Upset with me.”

“Why would you care?” I asked, tensing.

She flinched. “I’m sorry Peri, I don’t know what I’m talking about.”

I sighed, pinching my eyes shut. Deep breath, one, two, three. What did she want? “Claire, don’t bullshit me.”

Wide eyes peered back at me from behind her glasses, her mouth a taut bow.

“Look, I get it, you’re shy or withdrawn or whatever, but I’d rather you were just straight with me. Yeah, I was upset. Of course, I was upset. Why wouldn’t I be?”

She blinked and looked away. “I didn’t mean to upset you. If I’d known, I wouldn’t have.”

“Wouldn’t have what? Wouldn’t have beaten me? Bullshit.”

The shrinking girl beside me couldn’t be the same person that overpowered me, that held me down despite my best efforts. How could she beat me?

And seriously, why did she care? Why was she apologizing? I was the one that lost. My neck hairs bristled. This was usually when some fellow foster-girl would reveal the ‘gotcha’ and start fucking with me.

“No,” she said, “that’s not what I meant. I mean, maybe?” She lowered her face into her hands and groaned. “Oh, this isn’t going how I thought it would.”

“How was that, exactly?” I asked, cocking an eyebrow.

“You know, with us...making up?” she said, waving her hands around her.

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

Stepping back, I asked, “What do you mean?”

“I don’t want you to be mad at me,” she said, eyes downcast and holding her arm with her other hand.

“Yeah, I get that. But why? What difference does it make?”

She blinked, her large eyes misty and wet.

“Oh fuck, don’t cry,” I said, feeling like I’d kicked a puppy.

Claire took off her glasses and rubbed her eyes. “Why are you being so cruel?”

That stopped me short. Was I the asshole here? I started to answer but closed my mouth. “Come on, let’s walk,” I said, nodding my head back towards the barracks.

She hesitated a moment but then fell in step beside me.

We didn’t say anything for several minutes. The words felt hot in my chest and the idea of getting them out was daunting. So I danced around them.

“You’re worried I’ll be mad at you because you beat me.”

She nodded. “Aren’t you?”

Taking a deep breath, I let out a big sigh. “Yeah, I am. No, wait, that’s not right. I’m mad...at this,” I said, now waving my hand aimlessly. “For a while, I was feeling special, I guess. Like everyone was telling me I was the big dog. And then, here you come and put me in my place. So yeah, I’m angry I lost.”

She grimaced again.

“But,” I said, rushing to fill the space, “I’m not mad at you. I mean, not really. I guess I’m mad at myself. Just mad for getting my hopes up, for believing any of the bullshit. I shouldn’t have let myself get sucked into this.”

Claire didn’t respond as we walked. After a moment she stopped again, but I took a few more steps before I realized it. “What?”

“That’s nonsense.”

“Excuse me?”

For a moment, all I could see was the light reflecting off her glasses, two large circles of white glaring at me like an owl in the moonlight. “Coming in second isn’t ‘special’ enough?”

“Well, that’s not what I meant,” I said.

“Sure it is. You felt special because you thought you were on top, but now that you aren’t, you what? You aren’t special at all? That’s pretty messed up Peri.”

I stared back at her, silenced by her chastening remark.

“You don’t understand,” I said, trying to dismiss her. “Besides, why do you care?”

“Because I thought you were...cool, I guess. You seemed so tough and brave and, well, everything I wish I were. And you were nice to me, the few times we interacted. I mean, I didn’t believe you liked me or that we were friends, but at least we had something in common. We both survived an attack.”

Now I flinched.

“And I didn’t want to fight you, not really,” she continued. “Because I was afraid of winning, especially after I beat Marcus. And now you are angry at losing and angry at me for winning. But when we started fighting, I didn’t have a choice to back down. It was like there was something inside me, some anger I’ve never felt and it was in control. I watched you fight Kemi. I know you know what I’m talking about. I planned on just losing when I got up there, but once we started fighting I couldn’t have thrown the fight if I wanted to. It’s like this itch I get when I’m around...Changed. It won’t go away either.”

She was right. I almost lost my head fighting Kemi, but I didn’t realize it wasn't just me. That wasn’t good.

Running my hands through my short hair, I let out another sigh. “I guess I am being a real bitch, huh?”

She looked down, the owl eyes disappearing into the darkness. “A bit.”

I chuckled.

“So you felt it too? That rage?” I asked.

She nodded.

“And that’s not normal for you, I take it?” I asked

“Not even a little.”

“I wonder if it's like this for everyone?” I said.

She shrugged. “We can ask the others later.”

‘Yeah, good idea,” I said.

“You aren’t used to people being friendly with you, are you?”

Surprised by the sudden tonal shift, I paused before shaking my head. I said, “No. Not really. I had a close friend until...well, no. I’ve had a hard time trusting people.”

She rubbed her arm. “Yeah, me too. I was the shy one, the quiet one, so I got picked on a lot. It’s hard to make friends when you have a hard time talking to people. Man, I wish I was this strong about 3 years ago. What I would have done in senior year,” she said, smirking.

“I’d just got myself into more trouble, I think,” I said.

Claire approached me. “Did you do that a lot? Get into trouble, I mean?”

Laughing, I said, “What gave me away? Surely my winning attitude must have covered my bad behavior.”

She let out a little laugh. “Well, please don’t take this the wrong way, but you do sometimes come across as a little bit…”

“Cool? Amazing? Awesome? Yeah, I get that a lot.”

She chuckled again. “Sure, we’ll say that’s true.”

I quit circling the issue. “Okay, you have a good point. I’m being defeatist about this whole thing. I shouldn’t have placed so much on ‘being number one’, whatever the heck that would even mean. I was never an overachiever, so I don’t know why I started now.”

Claire grinned and nodded.

Having opened up, I continued. “And no, I’m not mad at you. You just got luckier than I did. I mean, with the power thing. Kemi’s faster but weaker, you are stronger but slower than her. I guess I’m in the middle?”

“At least you aren’t on the bottom like Marcus!” she said.

The insult caught me by surprise and I burst out laughing. When I was done, I wiped my eyes. “Meow Claire! I didn’t know you had it in you.”

She grinned, blushing all the while. “Well, I guess I’m full of surprises.”

“All right, we should really get back now.”

Claire fell back alongside me and offered her arm.

“What the hell,” I said and took her up on it.

Together, we walked back to the barracks, talking like it wasn’t the end of the world.