Chapter Eighteen ✧Just Breathe✧

Whenever I had a chance between my classes I tried to retrace my steps from the day before and look the lost necklace. I didn't have any luck. Feeling on edge on what that could mean, I went to the bleachers during Liam's gym class like I had told him I would. But instead of sitting watching him play, which I had complete intentions of doing, I instead found myself drawing in the notebook. 

What I was currently sketching was a face I could vividly picture in the back of my head and therefore easily translate to the paper. It was the face of Genevieve Carodine. As I carefully traced and retraced her eyes, which took me a while to get just right, I didn't know if drawing made me feel better or worse about my current situation. Even though I knew they were just a creation from the tip of my pencil, her dark eyes seemed to be trained accusingly on me, knowing that I'd lost her prize possession. Unfortunately even under her still-gaze, I still had no hope of were to find the necklace. 

"Well, well, well, if it isn't Little Lahey," Mason said jokingly as he approached. "Who's that?" 

Mason paused over my shoulder, where he had appeared all too suddenly, and I hurried to close the book before he could take a good look. Genevieve was still my dirty little secret whether I liked it or not. 

"N-nothing," I shook my head. I put the journal into my backpack before finally looking back at Mason to see he was trying to shove something into his own backpack. He looked up at me with the same quickness that I had answered. I furrowed my eyebrows. "What are you doing?" 

Mason opened his mouth to respond, but then hesitated. In that hesitation, Brett too appeared suddenly behind me. They both dropped to sit on either side of me on the bleachers. Mason didn't seemed surprised by the other boys presence, but I had no idea why he was at our school instead of his and so I shot him a questioning look. 

Brett shot me a kind smile which not to long ago I wouldn't have even thought he was capable of. "Mason asked me to come over so we could have a mini run down on what to look out for." 

"You mean like Chimera wise?" I guessed. Both of the boys nodded. 

"Yup, because if those holes in the ground mean what I think it means then we have eight more of them to look out for," Mason added on. "Eight more people with potential super healing, super strength, super agility, and even, as fate would have it, scorpion stingers that protrude from people's skin." 

"And glowing eyes," Brett tagged on. 

I sighed, trying to remember what life was like before everything got so supernatural. Then I remembered that my life wasn't actually any better. At least now I had some friends outside of my two brothers. 

My eyes drifted out towards the field. Just as I did, I caught Liam looking up at the bleachers, a sideways frown on his face as he probably tried figuring out why Brett was here. Somewhere nearby, a whistle blew, causing Liam to jump when he realized it was his turn to take the shot. Rushing since he had already held people up, he hurriedly cocked back his lacrosse stick and launched the lacrosse ball. It soared clear over the net. The goalie, probably knowing it wasn't going in, didn't even make an attempt to stop it. 

Hayden, who was apparently also in Liam's gym class, appeared to be snickering snidely at Liam's failure. Liam, who was close enough to actually hear her laughter, turned to her and frowned. Then, he turned to look back at me with a sheepish expression, as if I would be embarrassed or something that he missed. As if that could even be something that could possibly waiver my feeling for him in our world.

"So I see that's definitely still a thing." Brett cut into my thoughts with an amused tone. "You and Dunbar I mean." 

Not knowing quite how to respond to that, I just laughed under my breath.

Watching me brush my hair away from my face with my hand instead of responding to Brett, Mason sighed loudly before leaning forward to look around me to Brett. "Yeah, and they're like totally in love with each other but won't even admit that they're dating. Not that the whole world doesn't just believe that they are, though." 

"Seriously?" Brett questioned. Frowning in disapproval, he looked from Mason to me. "You guys really haven't officially said you were dating yet?" 

My face suddenly felt so warm from embarrassment I thought they were going to catch on fire. I wanted to bury my face into my hands, but I knew each boy on either side of me were to stubborn to just let that happen. Taking a deep breath and making a point to not look at either of them, i mumbled under my breath. "Well, actually..." 

Mason gasped to loudly I thought for a second one of his lungs must've collapsed. "I'm sorry, what?" 

"It's not a big deal." I felt my whole face go red. Trying to hide some of my embarrassment, I covered my face with my hands. "Earlier we were just talking and he was trying to cheer me up and he might've mentioned how I was 'dating a werewolf' or whatever. And he's kind of the only werewolf that could refer to." 

Once I had finished my explanation, I slowly pulled my hands down from my eyes to my cheeks so I could look out on to the field. My eyes found Liam who was once again standing at the front of the line to shoot. Although he wasn't quite facing me, I caught a glimpse of a proud smirk on his lips and something told me he had been listening in to the conversation. He scooped a ball in his lacrosse stick and once again shot it, this time the ball easily finding it's mark in the back of the net. 

Over from where she was playing soccer, Hayden was glancing over at Liam still and, upon seeing him make a goal, the girl rolled her eyes and placed a soccer ball in front of herself. Looking over to Liam to make sure he was watching, she took a few steps back and then sailed the ball into the top corner of the net with ease. With her own proud smirk gracing her lips, Hayden turned to look back at Liam, who was now frowning in stead of smirking, and raised her eyebrows expectantly at him. It seemed obvious that she was trying to challenge him even though they were playing two completely different sports. 

"Wait, so are you telling me Liam never specified that he was the werewolf you're dating?" Brett asked absently. I looked over to him to see he had a playful smirk on his face. I had a feeling that he was up to something. "Maybe that's why he's never actually officially said anything about you being his girlfriend. Maybe he think's you're dating another werewolf, like me. Maybe we should start making out, or something." 

I could tell Brett was joking by the way he'd began laughing at the end of his sentence. I tried hiding my own smile as I elbowed him in the rib cage. "Oh, be quite." 

This time when I looked out onto the field, it didn't seem like Liam was listening to the conversation still, which probably was for the better. Instead, he seemed to still be caught up in his shooting competition with Hayden, and I honestly wasn't sure who was supposed to be winning. 

"My bad, my bad," Brett chuckled. His eyes then followed my gaze. "So what exactly is the story on those two anyways? I mean, where the hell did this rivalry come from." 

Realizing I'd never had time to get the story from Liam as to why Hayden seemed to hate him with a burning passion, I shrugged honestly. Brett and I then looked over to Mason to see if he had any answers for us. Naturally, Mason was already pulling out his phone to show us something. 

"So, sixth grade - which was not the best year for Liam's anger management issues - there was this fight in the hallway between Liam and this other guy," Mason explained. He angled his phone so we could see the picture of a young girl with a busted nose and a black eye. "Hayden sort of accidentally walked into it, and this is her yearbook photo." 

Brett tried to cover his mouth with his hand to muffle his laugh. "Damn. What did she do to him?" 

Chuckling slightly, Mason scrolled his phone to the next picture. This time it was clearly a picture of Liam, his face looking just as bad - if not worse - then Hayden's. Brett didn't bother trying to hide his laughter when he saw that photo. Once again, I found myself elbowing him for his laughter. 

Before I had a chance to comment on that anecdote, I realized there was a sudden commotion on the field. Sprinting out onto it was a boy shouting about something, but I couldn't quite make out what. 

Leaning towards Brett but not taking my eyes of the field, I asked him, "Can you here what he's saying?" 

Brett nodded, paused for a moment, and then responded. "He's asking if anyone out on the field has asthma. I think he needs an inhaler for someone having an asthma attack inside the school." 

With that, my eyes widened in fear. Liam and I immediately made eye contact despite the distance between us, our minds clearly thinking the same thing. 

Scott. 

Neither of us hesitated in rushing off in the direction the boy asking for the inhaler had come from. Liam was closer, though, and definitely a lot faster then me, so he was long gone from the field by the time I was off the bleachers and racing across from them. I didn't even think about what the current class thought of me running through them all until I rammed into Hayden, who hadn't seen me coming as she began backing up to take another shot. 

Hayden stumbled back as I nearly fell forward. Obviously, I felt bad, especially since it wasn't the first time I had run into her. Luckily, this time I hadn't caused her to drop dozens of viles of alcohol. And as bad as I felt for once again carelessly almost knocking her over, my mind had trouble comprehending the situation at all when it knew that Scott was in trouble. 

Backing away from her so I could restart my trek to get to Scott, I looked at Hayden and tried moving my mouth to apologize, but words weren't my strong suit, especially when I was being pulled in so many directions. I fumbled over moving my tongue and lips to make something coherent come out, and I'm pretty sure the word 'sorry' stumbled out at some point, but my mind was in too much of a haze to actually be sure about anything. 

By the time I had gotten into school, I had recalled that Scott should've just had AP Biology, so I headed towards the direction of that class. With a group gathering around the outside of the classroom, I made the assumption that he must still be there and everyone was watching the spectacle of the lacrosse captain having a asthma attack. 

Liam had arrived at the same time I did seeing as he had made the detour to get the inhaler, probably from Scott's gym locker. Shouting that he had Scott's inhaler, Liam pushed through the small but dense crowd and I struggle to follow after him. 

When the entered the room, we immediately saw Scott on the ground leaning limply against the teachers desk. Liam and I dropped to out knee's beside him. Seeing Scott like this was both eerie and terrifying. His ragged breathe seemed to be pounding into my ears and for a moment my empathy towards him it was almost painful. 

"Scott, you need to use your inhaler," Liam urged. He pressed the inhaler into Scott's hand. 

Scott made no attempt to move and for a second I felt my heart stop. Reaching up quickly, I  moved Scott's head so he was looking at me. His eyes were unfocused and distant and I could only hope that he knew it was me and i was trying to help him. 

"Scott, please. Use your inhaler and just breathe." 

There was still no response. This had to be the effect of reading the Dread Doctor book, which meant this was far from an average asthma attack. Scott was a true alpha and yet an illness he had been cured of was back to haunt him, so of course it couldn't just be easy to get around. 

Liam looked over his shoulder at the gathering crowd before shifting his body to turn away from them so they couldn't see the next approach he was going to attempt. He closed his eyes for a moment and by the time he opened them again they were golden. He opened his mouth to speak again, this time his voice cloaked by a definite growl. "Scott." 

Apparently, Liam acting in his werewolf state was what it took to finally get through the barrier between Scott and the rest of the world. Jolting upright, Scott held his inhaler tight before raising it up to use it. My heart didn't start beating again until I heard the outake of air from the inhaler, and Scott calmly withdrew it from his lips. 

Scott didn't immediately recover from his attack. He took a moment to collect himself, his brain clearly working in over time behind his distracted eyes. After a few deep breathes, he was back to sounding normal again. He looked from Liam to me. 

"Thanks," The true alpha breathed out. 

Letting out my own breath of relief, I sat back on the floor. Thankful that Scott was okay again, I looked over to Liam to see he looked just as glad that it was over. Then my eyes fell past Liam to the doorway were people were still hanging around, apparently wondering if anything else interesting might happen. I was more then happy to disappoint them. 

To my surprise, among the people in the crowd was Hayden Romero. For a brief second the two of us made eye contact, but almost as soon as we did the other girl looked down before pushing her way back through the crowd and out of sight. I felt myself begin to frown, not sure at what had just happened. Just as I seemed to learn something about Hayden, more confusing things seemed to rise up. I looked back at Liam, who was still watchfully checking up on Scott's condition, and remembered what Mason had told me about him and Hayden. I'm not one who has ever been any good at making things better, but an idea popped in to my that I knew that I at least had to try. 

After my last experience at Sinema, I hadn't had any intentions of coming back. But now I was once again standing in front of it on a self-proclaimed revival mission. Since I had forced myself to come back, though, I had been smart about it and made sure to come before the real club business got started. 

A man who I assumed to be a bouncer had been hesitant to let me in at first, even when I told him I was just coming to give Hayden something quickly. But after a moment of begging, and him looking down at my small stature, he must've assumed that if he really wanted me out it wouldn't be much trouble to come after me, so he let me in to the empty club as it's workers began setting it up. 

In all honesty, I wasn't complete sure why it felt so important to me to do this. A part of me must've felt like I had something to prove, that after everything I was good and that I could still do good. What ever I was going through wasn't going to change that. This paranoia and anxiety that hung over my head about the necklace, Genevieve, and these twisted powers growing inside of me couldn't be what defined me. Because maybe if I pushed it away it would actually eventually go away. 

Of course I knew all of that was wishful thinking and that fate wasn't something that you could just out run because it sucked. But maybe I could pretend for a little while longer. 

"Charlotte Lahey?" Hayden nearly dropped the candles when she turned around at the bar to see me standing there lost in thought. "What the hell are you doing here?" 

that's right ladies and gentleman, another update. it's like christmas, i know. i wanted to have something a little light-hearted before things get dark and twisty again. also, i'm really excited for what i have planned out, which has real started to go into full motion now so yay. plus, you guys were requesting this story like crazy and i know me being gone for so long has caused some people to lose interest and i'm hoping i am earning it back here. thank you all for you patience and please, be sure to comment so I know some of you are still out there! 

Question - what do you think of charlotte and hayden's story / relationship so far?