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4 | BLOODBORNE

“Moning, Sunshine,” Hale greets me as I walk into his class, pausing by his desk. It’s the same as it had been last year - well, same set up. When he told me he’d be my English teacher yet again, I was almost immediately annoyed by the news. But now…I feel a little smile pull my anxious expression loose and have a moment where I couldn’t be happier to see my father. “What happened?” He catches the tail-end of my expression and the nonchalance in his tone disappears. And so does my millisecond of calm.

“I think Darine knows.” I burst out, wrapping my arms tight around myself as he stands, a thoughtful expression on his face. It warms a few degrees and he sighs, leaning back to sit on the edge of his desk. A moment later, Ms. Jin walks into the room and patiently waits by his side. She’s much harder to read than Hale but her classic hair-in-chopsticks-with-bells gives me an extra feeling of comfort and familiarity.

“Darine Blithe. Human, sir.” She tells Hale without being asked, passing him an unmarked folder. I feel my eyes widen as Hale proceeds to flip open the thing and a photo of Darine’s student ID sits inside. Along with about fifty papers as associated report-looking documents. “Good morning, Scarlett. How are you feeling?” Ms. Jin asks me pleasantly while Hale shuffles through the papers. I stare at her for a long moment, silently asking her a million questions. The mind-reader stays silent.

“Um, is that a rhetorical question?” I finally choke out. She, of all people, should know exactly how I’m feeling. Ms. Jin gives me a small, sympathetic smile and pulls a little clear baggie from her pocket. About fifteen sin-a-cubes, a vampiric cinnamon-sugar invention that used to be my main source of blood before I gave into the thirst last winter, looks more and more like a delicious snack than it ever has before.

“You smell like death.” Ms. Jin confirms my fears, her blunt words make me flinch as I pull the baggie from her hands and pop a speckled pink-ish brown cube into my mouth. Unlike normal sugar cubes, the sin-a-cube instantly melts when it hits my tongue, becoming a soothing mass of thick liquid. I feel my fangs dart out, piercing my bottom lip for a second before they retract. I curse around the mouthful of blood - both mine and that of the cube as my skin heals almost as rapidly as it’d been punctured. My own blood tastes as it always has, like iron, but ever since I Bloomed, it’s also had a tinge of apple-cinnamon-y flavor. But right now, it’s ruining the flavor of the sin-a-cubes. My lips pucker as I swallow the funky combination, the mingling flavors hitting my tastebuds like something overly sweet and artificial.

“Huh, that’s new.” Hale’s mutter has me glancing up as I massage my lower lip from the now-healed punctures.

“Should I be worried about it?” I growl at him, not sure I can take another round of weirdness so soon after the events of last year. Hale shrugs, returning his eyes to the papers about Darine.

“It’s something you should try to control, but it’s not detrimental to your health.” He informs me and shuts the folder, handing it back to Ms. Jin. “Put a tail on her, Rita.”

“Yes, sir.” Ms. Jin salutes him and disappears in the blink of an eyes, leaving nothing but the faint tinkle of bells in her wake.

“W-wait,” I stand straighter and stare at Hale in a mix of horror and surprise, my stomach flip-flopping at the implications of his words. “Darine’s not dangerous-”

“She’s a Blithe, Sunshine.” Hale sighs, crossing his arms and giving me a calm yet resolute look.

“I don’t know what that means.” I reply, narrowing my eyes at him in annoyance before popping a few more sin-a-cubes into my mouth. He hesitates, glancing at the people passing in the hall outside.

“A few in her family have a reputation for sticking their noses in Pack business or Coven business. If we didn’t have evidence to the contrary, we’d have suspected them to be a family of Hunters.” I blink at him, then double over as hysterical laughter bubbles up from my stomach and pours from me like a song. The sin-a-cubes seem to have triggered my weird half-vamp form where my voice is melodic and laughter sounds like bells.

“D-Darine, a Hunter?” The notion is so hilarious I can’t seem to stop laughing. Hale’s expression, however, is so serious and grave I almost immediately stop laughing. Dread fills me as I process what he’s saying. Darine could be a Hunter. Darine could be against Wolven and all supernaturals. Darine might want to kill us all.

“How well do you trust this girl?” Hale asks me, his eye have gone cold, calm, cat-like. I can almost sense the secondary question: Is she a threat I should neutralize?

“Well enough.” I reply firmly, standing straight and looking my father in the eye. I many not have known Darine for long, but I know she has a good heart. I can see it, sense it. Just like I could tell the Azures were good by nature when I first met them. “So I guess telling her is out of the question?” I ask for clarification, feeling that bitter taste flooding my mouth as Hale gives me a dead-pan look.

“Not until we know more.” He tells me directly and I feel my shoulders sag a bit.

“She has Yuri’s seal of approval.” Blue’s suddenly beside me, his presence exploding across my skin and forcing out goosebumps of awareness. I grit my teeth and sidestep away from him, the movement not escaping Hale’s notice.

“Well, your cousin doesn’t have the final say in who the Coven does or doesn’t trust, Zane.” Hale tells Blue matter-of-factly. I half expect Blue to bristle at the bluntness of my father’s words but he only shrugs. My father raises an eyebrow at me, then looks at Blue - who gives him a little shake of his head. Annoyance pulses in place of pleasure, deep in my stomach at their silent exchange and I shuffle to the back of the class.

“Uh-uh. Not this year, Sunshine.” Hale stops me. When I turn to face him, he’s pointing to the first row of chairs I hadn’t noticed were set in the very front of the room. “This is a college-credit course.” He reminds me. Blue takes a seat in the center of the row, calmly pulling a spiral notebook and thick book from his bag. A book filled with colorful flags of bookmarked pages. “I take it you haven’t done the assigned reading?”

“A-Assigned reading?” I repeat, flabbergasted by this revelation. What have I gotten myself into? Hale lets out a disappointed sigh and points to the blackboard. On the perfect surface is the name of some sort of anthology and a writing prompt.

“I’m not going to go easy on your just because you’re my daughter,” Hale tells me bluntly, pulling out a composition book and turning to a particular page. “Sign the book.” My eyes widen, the pit in my stomach bottoming out as I see the title page: Strike One - Incomplete Work.

“Close your mouth, babe, you’ll catch flies.” Blue hums at me, his silvery-grey eyes alight with humor, though the rest of his face is entirely blank. My teeth click as I shut my gaping mouth and grind my jaw. I take a deep breath as I take the pen Hale’s holding out to me and sign the book of shame. The horror that I’ve royally screwed up on day one of my senior year pulsing in my skull and threatening to become a bone-splintering headache as I take a seat a few chairs away from Blue.

To my immense relief, a few of the other fifteen students who chose to take this class also neglected to do the ‘assigned reading’ which had apparently been emailed to our school emails. Which I had no idea existed. And neither Hale nor Blue mentioned. Hale gives a huge lecture over communication over the first thirty minutes, listing reasons why knowing what to expect in a college class on the first day is important and on how there are no ‘second chances’ or ‘do-overs’ in the ‘real world’. I have a heard time concentrating beyond that as the throbbing in my skull becomes a pounding headache and my jaw begins to ache.

Hale then has us go around the room, introducing ourselves and explaining why we all decided to take the class, yada yada yada… When my turn comes up, I give the generic reply about getting a head-start on college. I don’t know any of the others in the room aside from Blue, so they don’t need to know my honest answer. I took the class to help me decide on what I want to do with my future. I thought this might be a good opportunity to see if college would be a good option for me. I’m still on the fence about it.

When you find out you’re practically immortal, life has a way of shrinking in front of you, time slowing as you try to decide the next step.

All I know for sure is, the second the bell rings to dismiss us, I can’t leave the room fast enough.

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