Can't Love a Werewolf, Without Getting Fleas.

Blake went after me, and easily knocked over the pins. In fact they all did.

I ended up missing one of them, and getting a gutterball.

Annie laughed at me, and Blake gave me a “it’s ok” sympathy glance.

But like he promised, Blake bought me nachos.

Everyone else continued on with another game, except for Blake and I.

“Thanks. These are just the way I like them.”

“How so?” He laughed, watching me dunk my chips into the cheesy goodness.

“Nice ‘n Salty!”

He laughed. “You’re just like you were when we were younger.”

I swallowed my food hard.

“You guys act like we ruled the world when we were younger. We were just seven.”

I said, grabbing the giant coke ice I bought myself and slurping it down rather loudly.

Couldn’t live without those things.

“Yeah… just seven.” He said, looking off in the distance at nothing in particular.

“What do you remember about us?”

Blake said; his eyes turned stormy and glassy.

“Not much. I remember glimpses of your faces. You both having those bright blue eyes, and trademark blond hair.” I admitted.

“Do you remember the day you left?”

I blinked, all I remember was getting in the car. I was seven- for sure. My mom and dad were driving me… somewhere, I didn’t know. But it hadn’t felt like we were moving away. It just felt like they were taking me a short distance- to the park maybe, and had planned on coming right back.

I couldn’t remember where they took me though… should I be worried?

“I just remember getting in the car and listening to the radio. I don’t remember arriving in New York, and I don’t remember packing up my stuff.”

I inhaled deeply. “Should I be worried I don’t remember anything?” I looked up into Blake’s eyes.

They were warm and melted. They looked sad, tormented, and…. Guilty? Maybe?

I rubbed my elbow. Feeling suddenly alone. Suddenly cold, like I didn’t belong with Blake, Brooke, and everyone else.

“No. I’m sure it’s perfectly fine. I don’t remember a lot of stuff from my childhood. I just know I couldn’t forget you. At all.”

He leaned in closer, so both elbows were resting on the sticky marble table.

His blonde hair looked disheveled. I felt a little self-conscious around him.

Why does he look at me like that?

Unexpectedly, a memory flashed through my mind.

Blake’s blue eyes in front of me were replaced with deep chocolate brown ones. They swam with feeling. The pupils contracted. Light brown hair hung directly above them. Tan skin laid around them. The same intense emotion swam in his eyes.

It looked like happiness, like love, like adoration.

Those brown eyes…. I’ve seen them before in my dreams. They looked safe, secure. They looked like home.

A quick change in picture revealed long black hair, straight and messy. But those brown eyes… you couldn’t mistake them.

“Lees?” My attention went back to Blake, who looked concerned for me.

“Lees?” I repeated him.

His cheeks looked like they went a light shade of pink.

“It’s what we use to call you when you were younger. You called me B, and Brooke- Brookie.”

I frowned. “I’m sorry, I don’t remember that.”

Disappointment crowded over his features.

It made me feel bad.

But something didn’t escape my mind. Those eyes, they reminded me of a name. Colty. I didn’t know why, or where that came from, but it reminded me of that name. That name had a face. The face of the boy from the woods, except his features were drained, and filled with sorrow now, his brown eyes in reality didn’t swim with happiness like they did in my memory.

“Hey Blake?”

“Yeah?” His loving eyes held mine for a moment.

“Are you sure there wasn’t someone else in our little group? No one we use to hang out with, that doesn’t hang out with us anymore. A boy with brown hair?”

My question was innocent enough, but Blake’s reaction was strange.

His eyes almost look tinted red, his pupils constricted into a thin line. His jaw went rigid and tense. He was motionless; a statue of hate.

I felt myself backing up in my seat, till my back hit the back of it.

“No.” His voice was filled with subsided rage.

“We hung out with no one. Why?”

“Uh… nothing. Just a memory. Something that keeps popping up in my mind.”

He never relaxed, in fact he looked even madder now.

“We should be getting you home.” Was all he said, as he got up immediately and left the table.

I was kind of dumb founded. What about what I had said made him so angry all of a sudden.

I frowned to myself. I hadn’t even finished my nachos…

I threw them away anyway. I use to be a Waitress back home in the summer once, and I always hated when people left food on the table for me to clean up, when it was a ‘throw your own food away’ restaurant.

So I saved the pore girl with freckles the extra work.

As I approached the rest of the group, Annie and Rachel had their coats on ready to go. Richey and Fredrick were chatting away like normal, and Blake was whispering something in Brooke’s ear. Her soft smile turned into a hard line. She nodded once at him, and turned to get her stuff together.

The girls ended up winning. Don’t ask me how, as I felt I was the one who brought us down to loserville.

Brooke was as rigid as Blake. Something about the two of them… when they got mad, they looked scary; almost dangerous.

Fredrick’s concerned face let me know he wanted to know what was wrong with Brooke. She leaned up and whispered something in his ear.

He too went rigid.

Was there something I wasn’t understanding?

*

We went past the front desk on our way out, and I couldn’t help but glance over; in hopes he was there.

The fact that his face kept appearing in my head as the only thing I could remember from my childhood was important to me. I wanted to know why.

*

The night are was a little more chilly than this morning, but wasn’t too bad as we stepped out of the building.

“Brooke! Brooke! Over here. I did what you told me to! I dyed my hair puke green! You said I could join your posse if I dyed it right!?”

Everyone stopped to look at this frail little girl with indeed-puke green hair. She looked skinny and confused. Her eyes glanced around to everyone at a rapid speed. She looked so lost and scared.

I felt so bad for her…

High-pitched laughter echoed the almost deserted parking lot.

“No Nessa. I made you dye your hair because it’s funny. Do you know how ugly you look right now?” More of Brooke’s laughter erupted from her chest.

It made chills run up my spine.

The girl’s lips quivered, as if she were going to cry.

Annie and Rachel came up behind Brooke.

“You know what a good name for her is Brooke?” Annie chimed in on the making-fun.

“What Annie?” Brooke smiled wickedly.

“Nasty Nessa.” All three girls laughed, making the girl burst into tears. The sound broke my heart.

“Good one.” They high-fived. “Nasty Nessa. Maybe if you shave your head this time, I’ll let you hang out with us. Let you feel like royalty for a few days.”

“If you’re lucky that is.” Brooke finished.

Blake grabbed me gingerly by the arm, and started walking away from the where all four girls were standing.

I couldn’t keep my eyes off of Brooke and Nessa.

How could Brooke be so cruel? She was so nice to me…

I couldn’t believe this was happening.

Correction- I wouldn’t let this happen.

----* COLTON’S POV: *-----

I hated this town. It was fucked on so many levels.

I was just glad to have my pack. I don’t think I could stand it here without them.

But nothing was the same… not since I was ten. Not since that horrible night.

I would never forgive them for killing her.

I lit a cigarette outside “Pin Heads.” The bowling alley I worked at.

We use to come here all the time when we were little….

My heart clenched in my chest. I told myself I’d forget about her, that I wouldn’t dwell on what happened, I wouldn’t dwell on her death.

I took a long puff in, and held it. Loving the feel of Nicotine in my lungs and veins. It was even better knowing it couldn't kill me.

I breathed out, my black hair sticking to my face as the wind blew the smoke away.

I tapped on the cig to let the ash fall to the ground.

Barely, in the distance I could hear crying. Hard crying.

I glanced up.

Nessa Withers was being picked on by The Terrible Trio- once again.

I scoffed. They thought they ran this town.

They were severely wrong.

I watched, debating whether or not this was a fight I wanted to pick.

There was only one of me, and…seven of them?

I shook my head and re-counted.

Who was the new girl Blake had his arm around?

Before I could make since of anything, she ran out of Blake’s arm and up to pore Nessa. She kneeled down at the crying girl, and laid a hand on her shoulder.

I perked my hearing up to hear what was going on.

“Hey. I like your hair. My best friend once died her hair blue. I miss her. You remind me of her, and I like that. I know I’m not Brooke or anything, but if you ever want to hang out with me, I’d be perfectly fine with that.”

My nose crinkled in disgust. Why was this kind girl hanging around the Cunningham twins and their gang?

‘Kind’ and ‘Cunningham’ were like antonyms.

Brooke’s face was priceless – utter shock.

Blake looked surprised as well, but he soon smiled. The affection he had for this girl was evident.

I hadn’t seen him look at a girl like that since… I refused to go there.

Annie and Rachel looked mad as hell.

I laughed to myself.

Nessa smiled and thanked the girl. The girl went back walking towards Blake’s car, and he followed her, waving goodbye to the shocked crowd of people.

I smiled. I liked her already.