Chương 20: ONE OF THE COOL GIRLS

I had no proof, but I was sure Jasmine told the guys I was the culprit behind the lack of access to the female toilets on our level. Not that it inconvenienced them in any way. Next time I needed to punch something, I would choose more wisely what I hit. Besides being on the receiving end of sidelong glances from the guys when they thought I wasn't noticing, I think today would be the template for the typical school day from now on. Lunch break was taken at the side of the old school building.

Aladdin knew not to show himself again, and I could eat undisturbed. After eating, I headed to the library for a bit. Maria appeared at the end of lunch and we took a walk past Dino's class. She hadn't tried to mess with my head since yesterday, so I guess it was all good. I met up with my little school pack again after lunch. Today we had Home Ec though. That was new. In this school, the boys took woodwork class while the girls took Home Ec, which was mostly cooking lessons for the first half of the year.

Why can't girls take woodwork? Because the tools were sharp and dangerous. Let the girls play with knives and fire instead. Not that I was complaining. I would have chosen home ec anyway. Cooking lessons meant yummy food to eat after the lesson. (Here I'm assuming I won't burn anything.) Our Home Ec teacher, Mrs Martinez preassigned our cooking partners, so Jasmine couldn't sit with me. Thankfully, I wasn't paired with Maria either, because I don't think vampire princesses can cook. Just saying.

My cooking partner's name was Sarah Keeley. I learned her name when Mrs. Martinez called it out. I would have sworn I'd never seen her in my life, except that I also knew all the girls in this class shared the same homeroom with me for the last three days. Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings. Once our names were called, we picked a counter—actually, Sarah did. Although all the work counters looked the same to me, Sarah seemed to have a clear preference.

We took a middle bench. It smelled faintly of bleach and other generic cleaning agents, and there was no trace of decaying food scraps or grease. It became quite clear that Sarah's choice of work counter wasn't due to its cleanliness the moment she greeted the two girls already stationed at the counter behind us. Seeing Sarah with those two girls made me recognize them as a collective. They were the girls seated somewhere in front of me in homeroom. Maybe even directly in front of Liam?

I never paid attention since they were all human.

"I'm Zara," Sarah told me, "with a 'z' because it's cooler like that. This is Krystal—" The girl named Krystal cut her off.

"It's with a 'k.'" I nodded stupidly, mentally finding the 'k' in her name.

"And that's Leia," Sarah indicated to the third girl.

"Actually, it's Leah, but everyone calls me Leia," the third girl explained. I was beginning to see a pattern, although I still struggled to understand the purpose of it.

"I'm Sam," I said.

"Just Sam." Krystal-with-a-K nodded as if she'd made a decision.

"Well, Sam, since you're with us now, you can be Zammi." What?

"That's spelled Z-A-M-M-I, with two 'M's," explained Krystal, who sounded very much like an expert in this foreign etiquette.

"Why not just Sam?" I wanted to know.

"Because Zammi is cooler," Sarah—I mean, Zara—answered, sounding like she was holding back the "duh.""'Cos you're with us now, Zammi," Krystal said.

"You're one of the cool girls now." I eyed the three human girls. Should I take this to mean that I've been accepted into their pack? That was fast, and rather sudden. Human friendships always mystified me. We didn't cook anything on the first class of the year, which was disappointing but pretty much expected. Just another list of rules and an introduction to the subject. And then it was time to go home. Which I noticed yes, was me just shutting down my school life the moment the last bell rang.

I had never been the kind of wolf who brought school home with me. Lol. I was "disciplined" like that. I'm a busy wolf! I had dinner to eat, and a little sister to poke… probably a million school smells to shower off… Oh wait, Dad wanted me to report to Flynn AND Hank before tonight's training session? Wasn't tonight's training meant for shifted teens? I wonder what's up?