One Foot in the Grave

“Alright class, you all know the rules of dodge ball right?” Coach Carter asked after he finished taking attendance.

“Wipe out the opposing team!” Dean yelled, I shoved him after his little outburst and he just grinned at me and sat back up. We were seated on the gym floor around Coach in a half circle, I had Rafael on one side of me and Dean and Sam on the other side of me.

“Without any serious injuries,” Coach added, pointing a finger at Dean as if to warn him from committing any rule breaking. I snorted in amusement; these three wouldn’t listen to Coach if their lives depended on it.

“Yes sir!” Dean replied, saluting Coach.

“The rules are simple, you may not tag an opposing player on the head, the chest, or the groin area,” he was interrupted by a few snickers from some of the more immature students, “and once you are tagged you are out until someone on your team catches a ball and they call you back in. And you three,” he added, pointing his finger at Rafael, Dean, and Sam, “keep yourselves in check,” he warned, throwing the ball towards Rafael.

Rafael stood up in a flash, utilizing his werewolf abilities, and caught the ball with ease. He snorted, “we’re not animals Coach,” he muttered, his wolf-like eyes locking with Coach’s.

Coach Carter didn’t say anything else to Rafael, “I have to go finish some grading so I’ll be in my office. William, Carson, you’re captains, pick your teams.” And with that our pudgy Coach was in his office. He was always behind in his paperwork and whenever our class did dodge ball we knew it was because Coach had to catch up with it.

William and Carson were both the top jocks at St. Reynolds. William was the quarterback on the school’s football team, and Carson was the line backer. They were coach’s favorites. William was any girl’s dream, in fact, when I first came to this school I had a crush on him. He had light blond hair that was cut slightly close to his head, maybe a little more than an inch long, and he had bright blue eyes. Carson was William’s best friend; he had dark brown hair cut similar to William’s and brown eyes to match. His skin tone suggested a Native American descent, he had a natural tan and even a tribal tattoo around his upper arm. He wasn’t the normal type of line backer though, of course he was built like he was carved from muscle but he wasn’t huge like most line backers. He was very lean and used his techniques from years of karate and the other fighting lessons he took to protect his quarter back.

To put it simply, the two of them could have any girl they wanted in a heartbeat.

The two of them settled who would pick first with a coin toss. William won.

“Jake!” William called and a short guy walked over to William and high fived him.

“Alex,” Carson called out, a tall, lanky guy joined his team.

The pattern went on, Rafael and Dean were called to join Carson’s team and Sam was put on William’s team. Mandi grinned her evil grin at me when Carson called her to his team, I sneered in response. In the end it was down to me and the nerd in our class, Harold. I knew I didn’t have that many friends here but really? Was I seriously going to be the last one picked again? I sighed and crossed my arms; I had my fair share of toned muscle on my body. I did amazing in almost all of the sports we played in class, but whenever it came down to picking teams I was always last.

“Harold,” Carson called out and Harold gave me a pitying smile. The little twerp.

“I guess you’re with me Sara,” William said, grinning at me.

“It’s Sigrid,” I corrected, frowning at him.

“Sorry,” he said with a chuckle.

“Whatever.”

William seemed taken aback by my attitude towards him; I guess he expected every girl to swoon over him. Think again hot stuff, I thought smugly.

“You ready?” Carson shouted, grinning as we lined up on opposite sides of the gym with five red balls in the middle of the floor. William just grinned in response.

“Good luck Sara!” Rafael called, cracking up after he said it. I glared at him and he just winked.

“Go!” William shouted.

Both teams rushed to the middle of the floor, of course Raf, Dean, and Sam got the first but I was close behind. Once again I was frustrated from holding back; I could have beaten all three of them. I snatched up a red ball and hurled it at Rafael, it hit him square in his chest and he looked at me with wide eyes.

“Don’t call me Sara,” I warned, winking at him with a wicked smile on my lips.

I managed to dodge all of the balls thrown at me, trying not to make it obvious I was much more agile than the humans around me. Carson had caught a ball and had brought Rafael back into the game. Raf had gotten Sam out, but not before Sam got Dean out. After another ten minutes, it was down to just me and William on his team, and Carson and Rafael on Carson’s team.

“Ha! All you’ve got left is that chick! You’re going down bro!” Carson yelled, I was happy to see Raf give Carson a dirty look for the comment.

William gave me a look that said he doubted I was going to be of any help. Well, he was wrong. I was sick of being picked last, sick of people forgetting my name, and sick of guys treating me like some typical girl. Our mini time out was over when Carson hurled his dodge ball straight at me, I was standing next to William so I just spun around quickly so I was on his other side. In the same fluid movement I grabbed William’s ball he was holding and spun once more to gain some momentum. Then I let go of the ball, aiming for Carson. It had taken a considerable amount of effort to hold back, I didn’t want to knock out Carson. The ball hit Carson on his shoulder and he actually stumbled back from the force of the hit.

Dean and Sam erupted into cheers at this, “you go girl!” Sam yelled with Dean laughing at his friend’s choice of words. “Dude, they’re going to think you’re gay,” Dean said, causing Sam to playfully shove his friend off the bleacher they were sitting on.

“Lucky shot,” Carson muttered as he left the gym floor. Rafael was giving me an appreciative look, tossing the ball I had used to tag out Carson up in the air and catching it again.

“Leave this to the big boys babe,” William said, obviously reasserting his ego. He picked up a dodge ball from the floor and tried to get out Rafael but he missed.

“Nice aim,” I muttered.

William turned to me and was about to say something when Rafael threw his dodge ball at him and it hit him on his arm. “Out!” Raf called, grinning. William jerked around to glare at Rafael and then he turned on me.

“Why didn’t you warn me?!” William yelled, advancing towards me. Before he could get any closer I took a few steps towards him and once I reached him I jabbed my finger into his chest and looked up to meet his eyes.

“I told you my name, and it’s not babe,” I hissed. Flattening my hand on his chest and pushing him away from me. He gave me a hard stare and turned and left the gym.

“Sore loser much?” Rafael said to me.

“Seems like it,” I replied, turning back to him. I dropped down onto my stomach on the floor as I saw a dodge ball coming straight at me. I heard it whizz over my head. The movement had been too fast, too inhuman, I had let go of too much of my control.

“Oh, so close!” Rafael called out, hurrying to grab another dodge ball. I picked one up myself and hurled it at Raf as he bent over to pick one up. He quickly straightened and the ball shot by him, his eyes were wide once more. This continued for almost five minutes, him throwing a ball at me, me dodging it with some type of spin or flip, me throwing a ball at him, him dodging it with his supernatural speed.

As I was running to grab another dodge ball I saw Rafael throw his from the corner of my eye, I did a front flip, scissoring my legs so that I landed backwards on my left foot. The move earned me a few murmurs from the bleachers and I made a mental note to keep myself in check. I grabbed a dodge ball just as Raf did, but I took aim and threw mine faster than he did. The ball hit him on his shoulder as he tried to dodge it, he just stared at me with his mouth wide open for a moment. I just hoped he wasn’t suspecting anything about me. Showing off was not worth getting found out for what I really am. The class broke out in applause after a moment of stunned silence. Dean and Sam rushed down from the bleachers and wrapped me in a hug, “we’re never going to let you live this down Raf! The future alpha just got beat by a girl!” Dean called out. The class stopped clapping but the whispers didn’t stop. I could hear them clearly with my supernatural hearing; a few of them noted that I moved like a cat, one guy said he’d like to see how I was in bed after such a show of flexibility. I caught sight of William standing by the gym doors and I grinned at him, I could see from his expression that he wasn’t very fond of me. So, I went from the girl he didn’t know, to the girl he hated. Go me!

“I let her get me out,” Rafael muttered as he came over to join us. I untangled myself from Dean and Sam and slung my arms around Rafael’s neck, bringing my lips close to his. I had to go up on my tip toes. He actually placed his arms around my waist and pulled me closer to him, “are you being a sore loser?” I purred. I gave him a peck on the cheek before pulling away from him. Letting the leopard inside me go just that little bit had my heart pounding and my eyes blazing with everything wild and untamed. Raf noticed this and stared at me for a moment with a soft smile on his lips before I twisted out of his arms and went back over to Dean and Sam who were playing their own game of mini dodge ball.

The rest of the time we were in gym Rafael was sneaking glances at me, his eyes always searching for mine. I always made sure to meet his gazes, finally feeling that sense of pack he had always talked about. The next time he met my eyes, I knew they were wet with happy tears.