BREAKFAST WITH BENSON

Ten minutes later, Kat and I hurried downstairs. I was now fully dressed in the Silvercrest Academy school uniform, except unlike Kat, I had opted to not wear the school blazer and went with the standard blue button down knit sweater instead and my skirt wasn’t as short as Kat’s, it was the standard length. But then again with Kat’s long legs, skirts always seemed to be too short on her.

The scent of bacon immediately caught my attention, the dining room table had already been set and Aunt Sarah’s delicacies awaited us.

We found Aunt Sarah in the kitchen, she was in the process of bagging some peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and Parker was seated at the island eyeing her sternly.

“Mother, we talked about the crusts.” His tone sounded threatening. Parker is the cutest five year old I’ve ever met but his cuteness easily crosses into scary when something isn’t done his way.

Aunt Sarah rose her brows at her youngest son in shock.

“Morning Auntie S!” I greeted as I went over to place a kiss on her cheek. “Crust problems?”

“Yes, apparently my son is my boss now.” She spoke before playfully pinching his chubby cheek.

“I wouldn’t say I’m your boss, mummy, I’m more of a su -per-viser.” Parker spoke innocently before going back to his colouring book.

Aunt Sarah shook her head. “What are they teaching these kids at that school?”

“He’s just growing older, Aunt Sarah. Next thing you know he won’t want to drink from his sippy cup.” 

“Aw, my little man is growing up so quickly.” She bent over and pinched his cheeks.

“Mummy!” Parker whined.

Aunt Sarah responded by placing a million kisses on his face until he eventually burst out laughing.

“Mama wolf’s still got it.” She spoke proudly.

“We talked about you calling yourself that mum, it’s not cool.” Kat spoke as she came up behind Parker and ruffled up his short curls.

“The kids in my class think it’s cool.” Aunt Sarah told her oldest daughter.

”They’re like five, mum.” Kat responded as she stole a grape from the bowl in front of Parker.

Aunt Sarah swatted at her playfully with a tea towel.

“Well I’ll take it.” She spoke proudly.

”I think you’re cool, Aunt Sarah.” I told her.

 I bent over to pick up a crayon that Parker had dropped.

”Thank you, Crystal!” Aunt Sarah spoke, giving Kat a victorious look.

”Suck up.” Kat told me as she stole another of her little brother’s grapes.

I stuck my tongue out at her childishly and she just tossed a grape at me.

I think Kat looks the most like Aunt Sarah among her siblings. They have the same slim facial features with their roundish small noses. Kat, however, has the cutest freckles sprinkled across her face. And she gets her height from Uncle Victor. 

But all in all, the Benson parents both have some mad baby making skills . All the Benson kids came out  beautifully with their caramel skin and golden accented soft curly hair.

I, on the other hand look nothing like my cousins.

The only person I resemble among the Bensons really is Uncle Victor. Which makes sense because he’s my mother’s little brother. We both have a warm tan skin tone and extremely dark tightly coiled hair.

Right at that moment, Uncle Victor walks in with Hazel skipping in front of him. He’s carrying a hammer in his left hand.

“Good morning guys.” He greets.

“Why do you have that?” Aunt Sarah asks looking between the hammer and her husband.

“There was an incident... Hazel kind of got her werewolf teeth stuck in the wall.” He explained.

“Daddy! Don’t tell them!” Hazel whined.

“Okay, okay, princess!”

Hazel is currently going through puberty and as if the process isn’t awkward enough for humans, for werewolves, puberty involves you slowly approaching your ‘first change’. That being your first shift into a full wolf.

Hazel hates it. I can’t blame her, it’s a pretty unpredictable process, one minute you’re walking down the street and next thing you know you have paws instead of feet and you’ve ruined your cute new shoes. 

Hazel is getting there fast, and I suspect she’ll experience her first change during one of these upcoming full moons.

I experienced my first change at fourteen - late bloomer. Kat was twelve when she experienced hers.

“Oh no, someone will be getting ‘the talk’ soon.” Kat spoke in a sing song voice.

“Can I get it from you instead of mum?” Hazel asked desperately.

“What’s wrong with me?” Aunt Sarah asked sounding offended.

“You make things weird, mummy.” Hazel spoke bluntly.

Aunt Sarah placed her hand on her chest and turned to look at her husband.

Uncle Victor shrugged. “Well...”

Aunt Sarah gasped.

Uncle Victor wrapped his arms around her and placed a kiss on her cheek. “We like weird though, don’t we kids?”

Me, “yeah.”

Kat, “totally, mum.”

Hazel, “what’s better than weird?”

Parker, “I need more crayons.”

Aunt Sarah rolled her eyes. “Okay, liars. Let’s go have breakfast now before you kids are late for school.”

“Crayons, mummy!” Parker yelled. “This masterpiece isn’t going to finish itself!”

The ‘master piece’ was a multi coloured blob but of course none of us would ever tell him that.

“Wait, Crystal, can we talk outside for a minute?” Uncle Victor asked just as we were about to make our way to the dining room.

I turned around and saw the looks on his and Aunt Sarah’s faces, they weren’t quite sympathetic but they were close.

I looked at Kat and I could tell she felt bad for me.

I nodded at them. “Sure.”

“Kat, take your brother and sister, you can start eating without us.” Aunt Sarah spoke.

Kat nodded and lifted Parker from the stool he sat on, ignoring his cries for more crayons.

Hazel quietly followed behind, glancing at me with a frown.

They tried to hide it but I know that they all still felt sorry for me.

Uncle Victor led the way out through the kitchen door onto the patio.

He took a seat on the outdoor swing that sat on the porch with Aunt Sarah and I took one of the lawn chairs and turned to face them.

They both seemed as uncomfortable as I was. This was worse than getting the super awkward ‘changing talk’ with Aunt Sarah. 

Uncle Victor looked at Aunt Sarah as if looking for moral support. She slid her hand into his and nodded in encouragement.

He looked back at me. “Crystal, I know the past few months haven’t been easy.”

Understatement of the century.

“But I want you to know that we’re proud of how much you’ve recovered.”

Had I recovered? It didn’t feel like it. I was still restless and confused all the time and... sad. Definitely sad.

“You’re so strong for overcoming all that.” Aunt Sarah told me.

“Yes,” Uncle Victor continued. “I know it was easier to deal with it in the safety of our house over the summer but now you’re going back to school. People will talk and maybe they might even provoke you but you need to stay strong and just ignore them, okay sweetie? We already talked to headmaster Forbes and he said he’ll do anything to help the situation but there’s only so much he can do. We know you were already having a tough time at school before. But we urge you to keep handling it with the same patience and composure you’ve been handling it with this far.”

Aunt Sarah leaned forward. “It’s not a bad thing to be different. It’s just that - not everyone gets it.”

Roman got it. I wanted to say.

I nodded at both of them. “I’ll be okay.”

Lie.

Uncle Victor nodded. “If it gets too tough, just call me and I’ll come and get you.”

I nodded but I wasn’t planning on doing that.

Uncle Victor and Aunt Sarah already did me a huge favour by taking me in, I didn’t like adding more stress to their lives.

I could handle a few bullies. As Aunt Sarah said, I was different and I had gotten used to it.

I clutched the crescent moon crystal necklace that hang around my neck. I could handle it.