AN: Hey guys, so this is my first ever story! Hope you like it, and please review!!
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Chapter One: Stop and Stare
Brady
Realistically, I was never really the nervous type, so it didn't come as a surprise when I woke up on the morning of my first ever teaching placement job feeling quite mellowed and lax about the whole thing. I rolled out of bed at around seven, not too early, but definitely a stretch given that I'd spent six hours of the previous night running laps of the perimeter of the Reservation, before finally managing to hit the sheets at around 3 am. It may seem a little strange to you, yes, I mean, you'd probably question why any body in their right mind would bother with something like that, right?
But, actually, the whole thing gets a hell of a lot stranger than that.
Okay, I think the best way for me to explain it would be to give you a quick rundown of the day it all changed for me. So I was 13, bam smack in the middle of puberty when things started to change, fast. And I don't mean, awkward gangliness and weird semi-moustache fast, I mean fast. Within a month I had gone from a pretty average 13-year-old kid, to being six foot tall a whole lotta muscle heavier. And that was before the phase. Okay, so I'm getting a little ahead of myself, let me explain. My entire life, I've lived on a Native American Reservation in the Pacific Northwest. My family's tribe, the Quileutes, are supposedly descendant from wolves, which I had never really thought too much about until the day I turned into one. Yup. That's it. Seriously.
After the growing thing, which could mostly be pinned down to my preadolescence (and didn't seem quite so strange considering I was about the seventh guy on the rez to shoot up to massive in the last year or so), came the weird part. After a while, I started to get hot. Don't get the wrong idea, I don't mean hot in the Adriana Lima sense of the word, I mean hot. My body temperature skyrocketed. I was running a temp that meant I should theoretically be dead. I had no idea what was going on, so I sort of kept quiet at first, and it turned out I didn't need to ponder on it for long because around 10am the next day I was a massive, hairy wolf. Even remembering the pain of the first phase seems to hurt. Excruciating. It all happened so fast too, one minute my stupid sister runs over my BMX with the car, the next I'm transformed. It's the anger that triggers it initially. So of course, once I was met by my new brothers, and they explained everything to me it was a lot clearer. I grew like another four inches in the week or so following the phase, and by then I was officially buff. Growing pains were a bitch, but don't get me wrong, it didn't hurt to be tall and ripped at the age of 13. Sam, the pack's Alpha had to explain it all to my parents. I know it all seems to freaky for words, when you're on the rez, and you've grown up listening to stories and legends of the tribe, and you're ancestors, learning it's real is a shock, but as soon as you do know, everything seems kind of right. There is an initial freak out, but at the same time, on some other level, you're not really that surprised, that's how it was for me anyways. And my parents were really good about it. My mom grew up on the rez herself, but married a townie. One of the "pale faces" as legend would call him, who she met going to community college up in Port Angeles. Although not a Quileute, Dad had always been absorbed in the Native American culture. He and mom actually met in an advanced NA History class, and for as long as I can remember he'd been just as clued up on the legends of the tribe as anyone, so he found it, to be honest, somewhat fascinating that they turned out to be true, and over the moon about the fact that I was so involved in it all. It may sound like a weird reaction, but that's just us I guess.
That day I learned that myself, along with Sam, Jared, Paul, Embry, Jake, Quil, Leah and Seth, were officially the "protectors" of La Push, working to keep away our natural enemy: vampires. Yip, they were real too.
So then, now you're pretty much caught up, and I'll get on with it.
There I was, twenty-one years old, (finally I was the age I actually looked), and ready to start my first "big boy" job, as Collin had teased.
Collin was my best friend, a wolf who phased for the first time two days after myself, he too, only 13 at the time. We'd pretty much been through everything together. Although he had been in my grade at the rez school we had been more like acquaintances than friends, until we started to have something pretty major in common. Without trying to be sappy about it, Collin was pretty much the best friend I could imagine, and we'd just always had each other's backs, I guess.
So anyways, I'd gotten out of bed and made my way to the bathroom to shower: the one perk of being up at this hour being the lack of competition for it, since there was no chance anyone else'd be up and ready for one. I strolled into the somewhat grotty excuse for a bathroom and began what I was sure would become my morning routine. Yeah, the bathroom was gross but when you lived in an all male environment, you did the best you could. This is where I'd lived for the past 4 years, a reasonable sized apartment above the La Push Hardware store, which Seth managed. His job meant the owner cut us a great deal on the lease, and it'd pretty much been a chop and change situation for about five years. Seth lived there at first with Embry and Carlos (one of the 7 new wolves who phased in what is known as the Great Renesmee War). Later that year Collin moved into the fourth bedroom, followed by a brief period of Quil making five by squatting on the couch, before Carl left to go to college in Seattle with his brother and fellow wolf, Nick. Quil got his room, but that was right before Embry, Jake and Quil started up their auto shop. Jake got a loan from the Cullens, which allowed him to buy a great property which had a small house attached behind it, which they three then shared. So that was when I moved in to wolf manor, aka the hardware store apartment. At that point I was just there with Seth and Col, but it's changed several more times since, and now it's Me, Seth and Ozzy here, and, like always it works pretty well. I guess when you go into each other's minds on a regular basis you reach a kind of closeness that makes living together pretty natural.
After my shower I dressed in clothes I'd thought seemed typical of my new role as the young Gym teacher. After living through years of minimal clothing, wearing only what I picked up from the floor, consisting generally of a simple pair of cut off anything's, sans shirt, I'd realized it was probably time to at least give the illusion of normalcy, as I would be teaching groups of teenagers all day everyday from now on. So I had on one of the few pairs of simple navy sports shorts and a black and white adidas t-shirt, and headed out to grab some breakfast before I headed out. Of all the things I'd skip out on to save time, as a wolf, meals were not one of them. I threw back a massive bowl of frosted flakes and made for the door.
The Rez high school was only a fifteen minute walk from the apartment, (by regular people's standards that is), unphased, I still could have made it there in about 3, but I was early, so I just walked. I didn't have to meet with Mrs. Adik, the principal until 8.30, so I knew I was way too early anyways, but I'd planned to meet Rachel in her classroom so she could show me around before I started. Rach, the wife of Paul and sister of Jake, was probably the only teacher here who didn't teach me herself when I was in school. She had been here about 3 years teaching English, and had been a great help to me when I was trying to get the job in the first place.
When I made it to the main building everything was exactly as it had been in my days as a student. A little run down, a little graffiti here and there, but mostly that generic classic "school" feeling to it that seemed to ooze from the place. I myself hadn't even made the full four years. Both Collin and I had got fed up and dropped when we were fifteen. Collin's dad flipped and told him as long as he wasn't in school he was gonna work. So Collin was quickly given a job at his dad's friend's construction business, and had been there ever since. Being that it was one of my more stupid phases, after a couple months I realized it wasn't going to be as fun and relaxing as I'd thought. My parents weren't exactly thrilled either, and started talking to me about paying rent, which with no money, no job, commitments to the pack, and the removed attraction of being able to hang with Collin, pretty much woke me up a little. I didn't go back to school, the only attraction it held for me was playing sports, and I didn't know if they'd take me back anyway. So I ended up getting my GED at 17. By that time living poor and wasting my life didn't seem so attractive to me anymore, and when my Dad suggested teaching it was sort of a revelation. It's weird; it was almost like I'd always known that was what I'd wanted to be, without ever having really considered it.
So here I am, ready to start my first day, back at the place I'd once been desperate to leave, and I felt...excited.
Nola
"Shit!"
Of all the mornings in my life that my body had decided to be in tune enough to actually be woken by my alarm clock as soon as it went off, today had to be the day I slept right through it.
There was just no coming back from that, I was too late. I had no hope. I leapt out of bed with exactly 15 minutes to get ready and start the walk to school or I'd be late for sure. And even then, I'd have to take no longer than 5 minutes to make the stupid walk- which I might add was one I'd never taken before, only been told by Pete that it was "a simple 5-10 minute walk..that way".
Great, it was sure to be brilliant, first day at a new high school, first day of senior year, and I was going to show up late and disheveled.
After the fastest shower of my life I threw on the clothes I had thankfully selected for myself last night. It was September, but it was also the Pacific Northwest and a cold morning so I had to switch the denim shorts I'd picked for some regular jeans. My skinny legged dark wash ones, which went okay with the simple distressed Charcoal rolling stones t-shirt I'd picked.
I then went back to the bathroom to examine the damage in the mirror. Well, I'd worked with worse.
In the six minutes I had left I quickly brushed out my pale blonde hair, sweeping it into a simple ponytail. I put some moisturizer on my face, but decided against any actual make-up, just brushed my teeth, and put on a little apple lip balm, which I then shoved in my back pocket.
I grabbed my bag, threw in some gym clothes and my new books, and headed for the door.
Ran into the kitchen fast enough not to be heard coming. Never a good thing with newly weds around.
"Ahem" I said bitterly, as I tore through the room, pushing my feet into my black flats and grabbing my jacket.
Mom just laughed quietly as they pulled apart.
Gross. Pete was cool and all. I wasn't some petulant teenager, rejecting the stepfather or anything. I just didn't need to see the parentals sucking face at the breakfast table.
"Well, bye" I added as an after thought before running out the front door.
"See you later", and
"Good luck today" was what I got back.
Starting the walk to school, I realized I'd forgotten my watch, so I got my cell phone out of my bag to check the time.
8:52. Okay, so I'd saved some time skipping breakfast and racing through the morning. But I still only had eight minutes to get to school before it started.
I'd moved only once before in my life.
I was seven, in elementary school and we hadn't even changed states. I was born in Westminster, Maryland and had lived there those first seven years. My mom had been doing the single parent thing since I was a baby and my brother, Jordan was 3. So then, the year I was seven, mom had been working as a personal assistant for about 4 years and got a job earning a better salary in Bethesda. So we moved.
She met Pete, the Lawyer about two years ago, and they got married earlier this year. Pete is a Quileute, a Native American, and after a long amount of time across the other side of the country, he decided he was homesick. He reckoned he'd made enough money for us all to pack up and move back to his reservation, for him and mom to live out their married life there or something. My mother, the idealist, was over the moon about the move.
So I got uprooted from my comfortable enough life and friends on the east coast. But it was okay, I was getting over it. Slowly.
The one plus side to the whole thing was the new proximity to my brother.
Jordan had been going to Berkeley, which meant I'd seen him four or five times in the last two years. But now, we were just up the coastline from him, so seeing each other wouldn't be quite so difficult- or expensive.
Okay, so when I finally arrived at school I'd made all right time. Meaning I got there about 40 seconds before the first bell sounded, meaning I could make it to my first class alongside everybody else. I found it easily, as I had been shown the way when I came for a visit last Tuesday, and, let's face it, in a school with 107 students on the role, the building layout wasn't exactly complicated.
I was thankful, at least, for the fact that Mom and Pete had waited until August to move, so that I could at least start new on the fist day of the school year, and hopefully the transition wouldn't be quite so daunting.
The school was about eight times smaller to the one I was used to though, which made things a lot more difficult, everyone already knew each other- well.
Whatever. I was trying to make the best of it. I figured if there was nothing you could do about something, there was no use complaining about it for very long, it wasn't going to make a difference. So I would just grin and bare it. Well- maybe not grin- I didn't want to make myself look deranged or anything- but regardless, I was pushing through.
Brady
The morning pretty much went by in a whirlwind. God that sounds corny. But it did, anyway.
Obviously when I was training I did a few placement positions to get experience, so I'd done a few days here and there, but I always knew I'd never have to go back to the same place everyday, so there was a definite importance to the job I had now. It was mine, my job. Everyday I would come back and teach the same students, I was now Mr. Campbell. I was now…a teacher.
Okay, so don't let me get carried away, I was still teaching alongside the guy I was gonna replace, and would be for the first three weeks, as sort of a trial situation. It was quite unofficial. Normally I would have had to come on as a student teacher for a couple months before I started, but Coach Wade (I can't seem to call staff by their first names, I mean they were my teachers not so long ago…) was retiring, and needed to do so fast, do to health issues. So when I applied, Rachel helped to put in a good word, convincing the Principal I was responsible enough for the job, despite my lack of experience, and, quite frankly, they were desperate. There wasn't exactly a multitude of high school P.E. teachers floating around, and if there were, they sure as hell weren't applying for positions at tiny Rez schools anyway. It also probably helped that I was Quileute myself, and Reservation born and raised, which seemed to please parents around here. So that was how they came to this arrangement. Coach Wade didn't have to face another La Push Winter yelling at high schoolers, and I was in.
So there I was, 3 hours into my first day and everything had gone pretty smoothly. The weather was okay, considering it was early September, so some of the Summer warmth was left in the air, and it hadn't rained today, so we'd been able to have morning classes outside on the football field. I'd taught a class of shy freshmen this morning, before my juniors second period. I just had my free period, which I spent the most part of chatting to Rachel, who thankfully also had no class then, and was the only member of the staff I felt comfortable around- there's just something not right about sitting in a staff swapping water cooler chat with the guys who once made you scrape gum off the bottom of the bleachers.
"So any way, how's it all going?" Rach asked from her position behind her desk in her empty classroom.
"Yeah, surprisingly good" I replied.
We then talked for a while about nothing in particular. She warned me of a few potential problem kids, in the grades I hadn't taught yet, and just before the period was over went out to call Paul. They, and many of the other pack couples can't seem to go too long without talking to each other. Thing is, there's this thing, and it may sound kind of weird, but then after the whole werewolf thing I reckon you can handle it.
It's called imprinting. At first we thought it was just another of the crazy tribe legends, until we realized those weren't exactly as crazy as we'd thought. Sam, was the first, he imprinted on his now wife, Emily.
What it basically means is that you've sort of found your soul mate, it's like a love at first sight thing, but apparently it's more than that, something that means you're connected to that person forever, and they matter to you more than anything. I didn't really understand it that much until it happened to Collin. Just over a year ago now, he met Jaime. She's awesome, a 20 year old tom boy who fits in perfectly and makes Collin happier than I've ever seen him, so it's hard for me to feel bad in any way about the concept of imprinting.
It's supposed to be rare. At least we thought it was until it started happening more and more. As it stood the imprinted couples were, Sam and Emily, Jared and Kim, Paul and Rachel, Quil and Claire, Jake and Nessie, Mathew and Sarah, Ozzy and Avis, Nick and Carrie, and Collin and Jaime.
So anyway it was then time for my fourth period class.
Looking at my simplistic timetable, I found that they were a class of seniors. In theory, I thought, this should be easier than the younger students I'd had this morning, but regardless, that's the upside of this little arrangement I guess. If they don't shut up for me, they'll shut up for Coach, and by the time he's gone, I'll hopefully have their respect.
So I made my way outside, knowing full well how late most students tend to be to class, I felt no need to rush.
As I got there, there was about six or seven of the twenty-one students in the class changed into gym clothes and assembled on the football field. Coach wade stood in front of them, checking off his register.
After a while everyone seemed to be there, and Coach shushed everyone, and did the introduction bit.
"Alright everyone, new gym teacher this year" whoever didn't wasn't already shushed was now all ears,
"This is Mr. Campbell" the coach spluttered in his massive baritone "and as most of you know, I'll be done here in a few weeks, so he's going to be taking over for me when I go, and until then, we're running joint classes"
The hand of one of the more vocal boys at the back shot up at that,
"Yes Curtis" Coach blared
"I thought we weren't allowed pot in school sir" the boy said, feigning confusion which was met with a splutter of laughter from the boys in the class, It seemed he may have been one of the ones Rachel was talking about.
Coach didn't quite follow,
"Well I don't know what you boys think you're on abou-"
"It's just that you said we were going to be having 'joint' classes sir" he quipped, to more laughter.
I sensed the need to cut in "well, seeing as we do have that school rule, and considering Coach Wade and I smoked all of our supply during free period, I guess we're just going to have to settle for gym, alright?" I shot back. It seemed to work, as the laughter continued, this time, with us so I was then able to settle them down, before Coach set them off on a warm up.
"Wait just a minute" he yelled as the students started on their run, "get back here."
"Says here there's a new student I've gotta talk to, who's Nola Lincoln?"
"I am", said a voice from the crowd, who started to make her way forward.
"Right, the rest of you, get going!" he barked.
And the other students began to run their lap of the field, leaving the coach, myself and this blonde girl behind.
Coach began to ramble something to her about parental consent and getting things "straightened out", but I stopped listening. Because right then, the eyes which would become my favorite things to look at for the rest of my life met mine.