“It hurt so bad, I really wished I was dead. I was just staring into Brandon’s eyes, trying to breathe. And then Jamie gave me the pain medication, and everything faded away.”
Quietly, Lucy asked, “How long were you out for?”
“I’m not sure,” I admitted. “A long time. Until the next day. And then… when I woke up, I found out what I am.” It was hard for me to say it, hard for me to believe or admit.
“Which is?” Emma asked, her eyebrows arched above the frame of her glasses.
“I’m… a Hybrid,” I replied, wishing I could own it more. “I’m half-Vampire, half-Hunter.”
“Shut up…” Lucy whispered. “How do you know?”
With a sigh, I reached up and carefully removed my colored contact lens. Both of them gasped, but neither of them jerked away like I thought they would. “Jamie also says I have fangs,
The football game was at home again this week, so we warmed up in front of the high school for about thirty minutes before the game—which consisted mostly of gossiping, something I’ve always tried to avoid, but really try to keep my nose out of these days since I’ve realized none of that junk is really important. I knew it was killing some of the other girls not to say anything about Liam, especially Jessica. She just kept looking at me and shaking her head, like she couldn’t believe how pathetic I am. I wanted to straighten her out but didn’t see the point. If she wanted to believe Liam White and his little black lies, then so be it.“Girls, it’s time to head over to the field,” our cheerleading sponsor, Mrs. Jones, who also happens to teach some of the freshmen and sophomore science classes, shouted to us. We grabbed our poms, water bottles, and other necessities, and followed her over. She’s not too much older than us a
When the song was over, we headed to our spots on the track, and I watched Lucy, trying to keep pace with her. It was really cool having my own cheering section, even if having creepy Christian there made it a little hard to look at my sister (since he was sitting right behind her.) They all seemed to be enjoying the game, though, and Emma and Brandon were chatting it up. I hoped she wasn’t telling him anything I wouldn’t want him to know. I wasn’t worried about anything going on between them since Emma thinks most boys are disgusting. She doesn’t really like girls either. Basically, Emma thinks all people are revolting in general. It was a wonder she was talking to him at all….I was super careful with my movements, taking things nice and slow and sticking to the beat. When we did our dances to the music the band played, I tried not to bounce too high, and when I jumped, I gave it as little effort as possible. I knew our half-time performance w
Holt’s house isn’t exactly in town. It’s kind of on the edge, away from close neighbors, but not out into the farm fields yet, either. So… it wouldn’t necessarily be easy for my sister and Aaron to sit on a rooftop and hide, but they insisted I not worry about them, and Aaron tossed Brandon the keys. To the Lamborghini. I’m not sure I closed my mouth until we were about halfway to Holt’s house.Emma had decided she had no problem riding with Lucy and Jason since I told her I wouldn’t be staying long due to the fact that I would rather be at home with the rest of the LIGHTS team than at this stupid party, and she decided if she was going to go, she may as well make the most of it. When Lucy told Jason she’d changed her mind and wanted to go, he was almost as excited as he was about the football team’s big win.So I’d showered and thrown on jeans and a nice sweater, fixing my makeup the best I could and d
Lucy was out, talking and gesturing with her hands, as Jason came around to join her and Emma lagged behind. Luce saw me and waved, even though she didn’t stop talking, and a few seconds later, they joined us on the sidewalk in front of Holt’s house. Some other kids circled, like they really wanted to talk to Brandon, but he literally waved them away and they backed up quickly like a startled murder of crows.“Hey, aren’t you freezing, standing out here in just a jacket?” Lucy asked, huddling her arms around herself.I hadn’t notice the cold. At all. “Were you cold at the game?”“No, but at the game I was cheering.”“I wasn’t cold at the game,” Emma chimed in. “But then… I was surrounded by hot guys.”“What?” Lucy and I both asked at the same time.“Yes, their body temperatures are higher than normal.”“Oh,&rd
I lurched forward and grabbed Liam around the collar before Brandon could even move, though I’m sure he’d hesitated because he was doing his best not to annihilate Liam. I had lost my cool, and I could no longer control myself. I backed him up into the closest wall, my free hand in a tight fist. “You’re the biggest jerk I’ve ever met in my whole life, William White!” I spat, wishing I could punctuate my sentence with a few of my father’s choice words. “I ought to punch you in the face! Then we’ll see who’s not as pretty as Cadence!”I saw an expression of sheer terror sweep across Liam’s face as his pupils dilated, his lips began to quiver, and his skin went pale. And I realized it wasn’t my fist he was afraid of. I closed my mouth and ran my tongue across my teeth. They were there. They’d dropped. Becoming angry had made my fangs appear. Horrified, I began to panic. How would I get out of thi
The end of October and the beginning of November seemed to drag on like an old man accompanying his wife to the beauty parlor. No matter how desperately I wanted time to move along, it continued at a pace that would make snails seem speedy.No one at school had anything negative to say about me again, though, at least not where I could hear them. Liam showed up with a real nice shiner the Monday after Holt’s party, and he tried to tell everyone he ran into a doorknob, but it didn’t matter because there were enough witnesses to know the truth. Brandon had managed to erase or replace any memory of my fangs from Liam’s mind, so at least he didn’t go around telling everyone he thought I was a Vampire. And on Halloween, when Lucy insisted it would be great for me to actually go as a Vampire and use my real fangs, I said no thanks and stayed at home passing out candy to little kids, dressed like my former self, a high school student who desperately wanted to
I hopped up off the couch and beat him to the door, giddy with excitement at the possibility of getting my IAC soon. Even if it hurt, even if creepy Christian was right up in my face, I was still excited about the possibility.“Well, someone seems to be getting her hopes up for absolutely no reason,” Brandon muttered as he called the elevator.“I know,” I said, grabbing ahold of his arm. “Isn’t it exciting?”“To get your hopes up for no reason?”“Yes—to have something to hope about.” Ever since my Transformation, the only things I could possibly get excited about where the chances that someone from the team might call me—which other than Brandon was rare—or someone from the team might show up at my house—which only happened at the one football game. I wasn’t even excited about Christmas this year, which was a major change for me since I am usually a Christmasah
Christian was behind his computer—which was meganormous—when we walked in. It’s seriously the biggest desktop monitor I’ve ever seen in real life. He didn’t look up at first, and I remembered that he really isn’t unattractive. He has dark blonde hair and a fairly handsome face. He’s tallish and muscular, of course. But there’s just something about when he looks at me that makes me think he would be very happy driving around a neighborhood in a white van looking for kids to help him find puppies. I’m not sure what it is that makes me feel that way either, which I think makes it worse. Maybe it’s because I heard the story about him recording my sister before I actually had a chance to meet him.He looked up at us and didn’t smile, and then I remembered. It’s because he’s creepy.“Hey, Christian,” I said, taking a few steps inside the room, not holding on to Brandon but bumping up ag