I woke up in a familiar place. A place I had come to know too well—a place where blood, sweat, and tears flowed to no end.

I woke up in the nurse’s office.

As usual, nurse Flaring, a white elf, was waiting for me to wake up. She was sitting with a magazine. I don’t think she noticed I was awake until I sat up in my usual paper-covered medical bed.

“How long was I out this time?” I asked, at which point she put down her magazine.

“You missed most of the day,” she said.

“What time is it?”

“3:30,” she replied with monotone.

I missed an entire day of school. My dad might have been pissed or concerned had the school bothered to call him. They stopped notifying him of every time I got hurt once people realized how frequently incidents occurred around Danger Rabbit. The only time they called my dad anymore was when someone else got hurt. Seeing how he wasn’t around the room that afternoon, whoever crashed into me must have been fine.

Getting hurt so often, I think my body healed faster than most. That being said, as I walked out of the nurse’s office, I was more than sore enough to regret being hit by an unidentified flying asshole.

Walking through the school after hours felt like wandering through an abandoned crime scene. It was too quiet. I knew people were there not too long ago, and something was bound to happen there if the right or wrong people were still lurking around. I made my way outside, and to my surprise, someone was waiting for me on the front steps.

BJ and Wesson were both outside. I assumed they stuck around for my sake, but it seemed they couldn’t help but argue while they waited.

“I wouldn’t need spells to beat you,” Wes said to BJ.

“You don’t have any,” BJ replied.

“Because I don’t want it. I don’t need it.”

“Only a fool would go through life, making things harder without magic.”

“Or someone strong enough to get by without cheating,” Wes said confidently.

“You would lose,” BJ argued, just as confidently.

“What are you guys arguing about?” I finally cut in.

I doubt they would have noticed me had I stayed silent.

“Pitch!” BJ exclaimed.

Wes walked over and wrapped his arm around my shoulder before he spoke.

“Buddy, will you please tell Bug Burner I would win in a fight?”

“A fight?” I asked.

“If he and I were on Wizard Wars,” BJ explained.

Wizard Wars was a popular TV show where contestants battled head-to-head in random and sometimes odd challenges. It was one of the few places people were allowed to use magic while competing. Magic was banned from most professional sports for the safety of players, but in Wizard Wars, contestants were encouraged to use whatever spells they knew in order to win.

“I think you’d both lose,” I said as we walked down the steps.

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“What!?” Wes exclaimed.

“Because I’d win,” I answered.

Normally I’d have to decide who I wanted to go home with, but that day was different. BJ and I needed to work on another spell to submit for the internships, and Wes lived down the street from me. For what might have been the first time ever, we were all together.

“You know he’s going with me to the internship,” BJ said.

“He’s going with me to the festival,” Wes replied.

It was like walking with toddlers. They couldn’t coexist in the same space for 10 minutes without going back and forth.

“I’m leaving you both if you keep arguing,” I said.

“You can’t do both, Pitch,” BJ said as she stopped walking.

Wes and I turned around to face her.

“As long as I don’t have to get a job this summer, I’d hang out with a zombie,” I joked.

“Come on, man, you know it be more fun at STR than at some job,” Wes added.

“No one wants to get with me now, so why would anyone want to at a festival full of more interesting people?” I asked, almost sarcastically.

“Dude, rabbits are cool,” he said.

“Until someone figures out I was born human, then I’ll be the idiot kid who cursed himself,” I replied.

“All the more reason to come with me, we could potentially learn ways of turning you back,” BJ interjected.

“Or get ourselves killed,” I quickly responded.

I didn’t mean to be so harsh. I was lucky to have friends who liked me enough to want me involved in their summer plans, but I would have been happy just to spend more time with my bed. STR might have been a fun idea with plenty of opportunities, but it had the potential to be another chance to embrace myself and be rejected. And the internship, as amazing an opportunity as it might have been, was still dangerous as hell. Someone had to be a realist out of us three, but I suppose I might have been swimming in pessimistic waters.

“I’m not saying I don’t want to go with you guys, but no matter what I do, with my luck, something bad is bound to happen,” I said.

The universe was gunning for me that day. Like magic, my words of pessimistic precaution seemed to summon danger. Before I could even turn around, I found myself knocked into the middle of the street.

Daybreak was a town home to many diverse people, human or otherwise. Two of those groups of people were Trolls and Orcs. Trolls were tall, lanky, and very tough. Orcs were fat, round, and very strong.

They both came in a variety of different colors, with trolls often being blue and Orcs typically being green.

From time to time, ordinary people confused the two races with one another, but Orcs and Trolls were like day and night. More importantly, they hated one another for some reason and would often cause mayhem when they clashed. Like most Fae, they didn’t need spells to be threatening.

For some reason, I got caught in the middle of a fight between an orc and a troll that day, and I never figured out why. I did my best to get out of the struggle, but they kept knocking me back into the mix. It all went down in the middle of the street, so I’m sure many passersby caught the show. I thought I might actually die until my friends jumped in.

“Don’t worry, Pitch! I got you,” Wes said as he rushed into the street to try to break up the fight.

BJ followed after him but kept a distance as she opened her spell book. She did a spell I remembered, but I couldn’t see why it was her first choice. If not for my high tolerance for pain, and my body learning to heal so quickly, I’m sure I might have passed out after the first misdirected punch that hit me in the face. BJ used her bug spell to create a snare of ladybugs that blinded the two battling creatures long enough for Wes to pull me out of the fray.

“Ladybugs?” Wes asked as we ran.

“They were butterflies last time,” BJ replied.

“Those wouldn’t have helped either.”

We kept running until we were breathless. By then, we were far from the fight, but the sound of property damage was still heard.

“My spell saved Pitch,” BJ said excitedly.

“Your spell killed more bugs, harmless, defenseless bugs,” Wes protested in an attempt to level BJ’s mood.

“But it saved Pitch,” she said.

“I saved Pitch,” he said.

“You guys,” I cut in.

It was the second time that day I’d been struck. I should have had a concussion.

“Can we just go home?” I said in a drained voice.

If nothing else, we figured out which of BJ’s spells to submit. Her bug spell made the perfect blinding agent. Despite its unpredictability when it came to which breed of bug might come to the rescue, it proved reliable enough to halt a fight between an orc and a troll. If only she’d used it before I got tossed around like a rag-doll.