Risks of Absurdity

Chapter 1

Risks of Absurdity

Chapter 1

“Sydney you’re going to be late.” That was the point but that fact seemed to bypass my mother every weekday. I was in my last months of high school and I was damn sick of the place. School was easy, it was the drama I was over, normal drama would be tolerable but being a werewolf caused more problems than an eighteen year old girl wanted.

I wasn’t the only one, there were a few of us; the next generations of the Carter pack. Being close in age we were all in high school and some of us were smarter than others. It seemed sometimes my fellow pack mates let all the pressure and drama get to them and mistakes could happen. Werewolves were not public and we wanted to keep it that way. Being the first born son of the pack leader, Austin Carter, and me the first female of the next generation were in charge in keeping the other rug rats in place.

It wasn’t an easy job especially working with Austin, it was safe to say we didn’t get along.  I didn’t let his alpha status affect me, he was just another pain in the ass and I didn’t mind telling him so, he didn’t like the disrespect. Or the fact our parents wanted us to get married, all our years of history, the first male and female always married, they were the strongest. We rarely agreed but we agreed to break the chain of tradition, we’d rather kill each other than ever get married.

I pulled on a pair of blue jeans, red t-shirt, black hoodie, and I slipped my sneakers on as I ran down the stairs.  I nearly crashed into my sister in the living room. She was waiting with an annoyed expression for me. She was younger by two years and still not allowed to drive. “Don’t give me that look, I’ll get you to school on time so you can meet your prissy friends and talk nonstop.” My sister was very much the girly girl that liked to be popular and she was along with her group of friends that gave me a toothache.

“Don’t talk about my friends; they’re way better than yours.”

I grinned; it was too fun to banter with your siblings. “How would you feel if I told that to Connor?” he was my best guy friend and my little sister had a huge crush on him for the last year. I was a mean older sister and teased her when I could but never in front of him of course.

“Bitch.” The sixteen year old hissed as she pulled open the front door and marched outside.

“Bye mom!” I called out as we left. As I followed Andrea to the car I spotted my arch nemesis next door leaving for school as well. Did I forget to mention Austin lived next door? I liked to forget he did. Almost the whole pack lived on the same street. 

My sister being mad at me took this time to make jokes. “There goes your future husband. Should I tell him how you’ve changed your mind and you’d love to bare his children?”

“You could and then I’d have to get even, wanna find out what I’ll do? Thought so now get in the car before we really are late.” I held open the passenger side door and closed it when she was inside, at the same moment I felt little hands pulling at my pant leg. I looked down and spotted Austin’s little six year old brother, I picked him up. “Hey little man, what’s up?”

 “Mom wanted me to give you this.” He handed me a closed white card envelope as his face twisted into a frown.

“Do you know what it is?” I asked, he nodded. I did some mental math and remembered it was the third Wednesday of the month. “Fancy dinner?” he nodded again. All the pack families gathered, my mom would say it was a nice way to keep in touch and spend time with your extended family. It wasn’t my favorite pastime and judging by his frown Chris knew it. “Well since we have to go, want to be my date?” I got the little boy to smile and offered him a ride to school. We’d be a little late but I didn’t care, Chris was my favorite Carter brother out of the five. They could fight like, well wolves, and during those moments I was glad I only had Andrea.

After dropping Chris off it was Andrea’s turn, she sighed heavily and left the car. “You’re welcome!” I yelled as she rushed away to meet up with her best friend Stacey. I grabbed my backpack and locked up the car.

Mary caught up with my long strides. Mary was a fellow pack mate and dating Connor, she didn’t like lying to him anymore than I did but telling a human our secret would cause a world of trouble within the pack. “You’re early.” Mary said.

“Yeah tell that to my sister. Anything new going on around here?”

“Rumor is Starr Howard is gunning for you.”

I laughed, now that was funny, if she only knew how easily I could hurt her. “And why is the head cheerleader upset now?”

“She saw you talking to Austin, I guess she hasn’t gotten the memo they’ve been broken up for the last two weeks.”

“I have to talk to Austin as much as it pains me. Remember that party Saturday? Marcus got stupid fucking drunk and it was our job to cover with the parents.” It was a good thing when Austin and I found Marcus and got him out of there because minutes later he decided to take a run, on four legs.

Mary and I stepped inside the school and through the halls I spotted Starr and smiled. It was a safe to say we did not like each other, since middle school we were considered complete opposites, she believed that was reason enough to ride my ass, later I gave her plenty of reasons. 

“Look what the cat dragged in.” Starr said, as luck would have it our lockers were next to each other. I had the crappiest luck in the world and when I thought it couldn’t get any worst it always found a way but more on that later.

I laughed at the cat joke. “Nah my crawls are longer than a cat’s wanna find out? This is getting old Starr, leave me alone.” I actually didn’t like fighting and arguing even though everyone including my parents would say different.

With a heated glare she walked away. “What crawled up her ass?” Connor asked as he joined us.

I shrugged. “The usual.”

By lunchtime as always I was thinking about ditching the rest of the day. I figured I was done with high school, I already had a high grade point average, and did I really need to waste eight hours on pointless classes? Since winter had come and gone the lunch room were the scattered tables outside. I sat on the table and put my feet on the bench before I pulled out the invention Chris had given me.

Mary soon joined me. “Ah the monthly dinner. I’m going with Jeremy: you?” our parents always made a big deal with the dinner, you dressed nicely and came with someone of the opposite sex, but within the pack.

I smiled. “I’m taking Chris.”

“You can’t go wrong with a six year old.”

“Exactly.”