Where is my Weretiger?

At lunch I guided my skittish Tiger into the cafeteria not knowing if he needed to eat. I know that personally my friends and I usually avoided this room like the plague but if he needed to eat then his wish was my command. My Tiger eyed everything warily his eyes wide.

He looked very much like a cornered animal as his eyes darted from the line of chatting teenagers to the inedible food arrayed for our selection. What made him stop short and refuse to be drug another inch however was a tall red headed boy I like to call Mickey.

Their reaction to one another was immediate and unpleasant. Max wretched his hand from mine and quickly shoved me behind him, not unlike his reaction to Oliver earlier. Mickey who had come up to me with a smile glared at Max his happy greeting dyeing on his lips.

I glanced between the two who both looked as if they had swallowed something rather unpleasant.

Trying to ease the tension I awkwardly spoke “Hey Mickey what’s up?”

“Pen what are ye doin here with this ‘thing’?”

He growled in his accent. I glanced around the window lit cafeteria and my gaze landed on Max who had not relaxed his stiff posture of protection. I slipped between the two of them.
“This is Max, hes the exchange student.”

“Is he, now?”

“Yeah.”

Then Tiger started flinging words that sounded like insults at Mickey. To my surprise Mickey responded in the same tongue with just as much vehemence.

I was surprised. “You speak whatever that language is called?”

Mickey looked uncomfortable. “Yeah” He gave me a small smile.

Tiger did not appreciate it apparently because he began a speech in his language that sounded like he was reprimanding Mickey. Mickey even more to my surprise hung his head.
I raised an eyebrow. This was… interesting.

“So, whats he saying?”

Mickey looked up at me. “Something along the lines of” he stopped “actually you don’t really want to know.”

I was about to demand the information out of him but noticed the ring of curious eyes surrounding us. I sighed frustrated, grabbing both of them by the hand I towed them out of the chamber of gossip and lunchroom fights.

I drug them into an alcove out side of the lunchroom behind a rose bush.

“Now I want some answers, If you don’t mind being a translator Mickey.”

My tone implied that he defiantly did not have any choice. So being the kind hearted, Irish accented boy I knew him to be Mickey quickly relayed something to Tiger in the other language.

Tigers posture relaxed some and he gave me an indulgent smile before speaking his voice flowing around the words he spoke like soft velvet.

“He says that he greets ye and that he has enjoyed his time with ye and that it has been very… pleasurable.” The look Mickey gave me left no doubt at the incidents that my Tiger must be referring to. Mickey quickly added “But you know that’s just a rough translation”
I felt the blush rise on my cheeks. “Just ask him his name, ok?”

“Right.” He sighed and proceeded to ask what I assumed must be my question.

“He says that his name is Nakashi but ye can keep on calling him Max or Tiger, he dosnt mind.” He translated when Tiger responded.

“Right, I like Tiger.”

“If that would be all yer ladyship I jus be headed out now” He said with a mock bow.
I grabbed his arm before he turned to leave.

“We are still going on our date right?”

The joy he had, had earlier returned to his eyes and he nodded.

Tiger said something in a low rough voice and Mickey snapped something back at him before quickly brushing his warm lips across my cheek. I smiled as I watched him walk away.

I heard his muttered cruses again as I turned to Tiger who was glaring at Mickey’s retreating figure. I turned back to him.

He looked at me for a moment and walked away. To quickly for me to follow easily. He was out of my sight before I could have counted to ten.

I entered the center of the school and decided my best bet for finding him was probably in the halls so I quickly chose a building and rushed down the corridor.

He wasn’t there so I tried the process of elimination when I reached the fourth building I found him.

He was being brutally attacked by a monster in red stilletos.

Felisha had him pinned against the locker and had her lips locked on his. If not for the look of shock and terror on his face I would never forgiven him for kissing her. But from the look of things he had no choice in the matter.

I walked stealthily behind her and then in the most polite way I could manage tapped her on the shoulder.

She turned expecting one of her friends and triumphant smile on her face when she regongnized me however it twisted into a gloating one that marred her Barbie doll face.

I drew back my fist and let it slam into her face with only part of the power I could have unleashed upon her. As it was she still let go of her vipers grasp on my Tiger and her nose began gushing blood as she spat “Bitch!”

“Learn you lesson then don’t mess with a bitch’s boy, comprende?” I said smiling sweetly.
She shrieked and ran from the room dripping blood.

I turned to Tiger who was shaking violently as if afraid he would be attacked by another inquisition of cherry chapstick trying to force secrets from his lips.

I noticed something then, something I had been trying to define about him and had only succeeded in that moment with that errant thought going through my head.

But then I realized that when he smiled a secret played on his lips. He had lips that would whisper that secret in your ear.

I slowly closed the space between us and ran my fingers through his hair calming him in the only way I knew how. Like a frightened animal all he needed was love.

Slowly he calmed and his shaking stopped then the bell rang. It echoed noisily in the empty halls reverberating back ten times louder then the original sound. It seemed to effect his sensitive hearing because one second he was finally relaxed against the lockers, calm, and then he was gone left in his place where his cloths falling swiftly to the floor as a white tiger skid on its claws across the slippery linoleum.

It took a couple of moments for me to understand before I shoved the cloths in my bag and took off at a sprint after my Tiger who was now loose in the school and very much a tiger.