"Do you belive in wereworlves?" he asked and I instantly twichted in irritation. I wanted take his pencil out of his oversized gorrila hand and shove it up his own eye socket.
I glanced his way. He was so damn tall. His head was down, his black hair covering his eyes and his earing gleamed in the sunlight for a brief moment. His full attention was on the textbook in front of him. The way he was focused, you'd think he was contributing to the research for breast cancer. But no, he was doodling sunglasses on the picture of famous biologist Gregor Mendel.
And then it hit me, he was drawing on MY textbook.
I've been stuck doing ALL of OUR assignment by myself for the last 45 minutes and I'm not suprised. In fact, I am desensitised.
I've never been into homicides. But the concept was slowly starting to appeal to me. I reminded myself that purgatory wasn't exactly something I'd want to enter into so the idea of killing this poor neanderthal was once again pushed in the back of my head.
What have I done to the cosmos that was so damn horrendous that I had to be stuck with this complete inconsequential douchlord as lab partner?
I thought nothing of his question and just took it as an unfortunate soul having a dumb conversation with her classmate during biology class. I shrugged and then tilted my head while pouring the formula into the beaker.
"Depends which type, If it's the Medieval age European folklore version developed from early Christian interpretation, then...well, no, I don't believe in mythical creatures.. but I sure wish those existed...", I answered as politely as I could.
"Mythical hm?..", he said to himself.
Instantly, this one guy across the classroom raised his head towards me like I just talked about his mother. I frowned.
What's his deal?
He starred at me for a solid 10 seconds with a grin on his face and I felt mildly incomfortable.
I knew his name. River Carlton, he was tall and oddly overly muscular. Quite popular with the ladies. He only ever hung out with two other guys from this classroom, who coincidentally are just as tall and just as strangely ripped. One of them being my very own assignment partner who made it his personal mission to ruin my textbooks instead of helping, and the other was his own lab partner ;
Cole Brown.
Bare with me, this guy is weird. I can't pinpoint it and I know it's judgmental because I've never spoken to him, but there's something dark, and "mystifying" almost sounds too cliche but that's the best way to put it.
Why am I talking about those two you might ask ? Well, for one, River was the other side of the lab but for some reason, he looked at me the moment I spoke about werewolves like he could hear everything and was interested in the conversation. For a brief moment I saw the corner of his lips twitch in a little smirk as he turned towards his lab partner Cole and said something and then they both grinned.
I realised I was starring shamelessly at him when he turned back my way and our eyes locked. I looked down into my own textbook, ignoring the annoying shiver that went down my spine.
Those two are to be avoided, they are shady.
"What exactly is European Folklore werewolves?" asked my own curse of a lab partner.
I looked around. Everyone else was working in pairs. Helping eachother like civilized students who cared about their grades. I looked like a mom and her toddeler. Yelling at him for dropping beakers and messing up our station.
I cranked my neck to look at his face, pissed. He was so tall and buff for a 18 year old it freaked me out. Actually, the three of them all looked like giant forest trees, I don't know what was in their baby milk formula but it worked.
"Do you honestly enjoy being a useless overgrown neaderthal whom, instead of doing his share of the work, would rather draw endlessly on the walls of his cave ? This isn't art class and even if it was, you'd be doing an awful job anyway !" I said while pointing at a frog doodle he did earlier.
He rolled his eyes at me and I flinched again. Like it wasn't enough that I was scolding him for drawing, he had to do the eyeroll to fully establish our mother/son roles. He then closed the book in a giant "thud" sound before taking one of the bottles of Sodium Hydroxide solution and I gasped while backing away from him slightly.
I would like to insist on the fact that I was not asking him to handle dangerous liquids. But if he happens to spill it on himself, who am I to stand in the way of natural selection ?
Since he listened to me and I felt douchy for the way I snapped, I breathed out and decided to answer him.
"I mean that the ancient Greek literature werewolves had a certain texture to them that has sadly been butchered by the introduction of the creatures in modern pop culture, and by pop culture I mean Twilight obviously, alongside the toxicity of its fandom comes a novel of misconceptions about the creatures that is to blame for every bad wattpad fanfiction ever. I mean , way to take an amazingly dauting creature with so much history behind it and turn it into a deplorable excuse of a tatted teen who's just begging for a t-shirt and a girl to stick his penis into"
I swear I'm not making this up, but as I said those last words, River crackled and then Cole Browned followed shortly with a smirk on his face while looking down his manual. They were quiet this entire time it's not like they were laughing at something one of them said. But again, it's not like they could hear me ? They're too far! Unless that baby milk formula was back at it again with the Supersonic hearing.
Am I being too loud ? It's not like I said anything funny either...
I turned towards my own lab partner to analyse the situation.
He had a smirk on his face and was looking down at the textbook before raising his eyes up to the two guys for a split second and then back at his book with a bigger smile.
"I thought the twilight werewolves were very popular with girls?" he asked almost annoyed at me for what I just said but still amused.
"To a straight hormonal preteen girl, any living organism carrying a Y chromosome in his cells with a touch of a missing item of clothing will be undoubtedly attractive. Then again, movies are a billion dollar industry so nobody's gonna protest that slaughter" I shrugged.
"What if you meet a real werewolf and they happen to be just like the modern versions you hate so much?" he smirked again.
Then I would seriously stab myself.
I looked at him curious.
"What an odd question, let me make it less stupid and return it to you, have you ever met a wolf?"
At this point, he was holding in laughter, which I didn't understand because I said nothing that was funny. It was just a question.
"I might have stublmed across a few in my lifetime", he smiled smugly.
"So have I !" I answered, smug in my own way, "And from that one experience, I truly believe they have emotional intelligence and aren't just dumb wild dogs..."
"That's an intresting input comming from a human.."
Why was he being so damn condescending? I had no idea and it mildly rubbed me the wrong way. Little did I know he had a reason. A good one.
"However crossed with a human being, I would hope we'd get something more decent than a half naked denim shorts wearing sausage fest.. " I continued.
"you mean the... pack in twilight ?"
I nodded.
"that's not what I asked though" he smiled.
"what did you ask ?"
"I asked if you believed werewolves could exist.."
I was about to answer but a gasp escaped my lips as he accidentally spilled some of the Sodium Hydroxide solution over his fingers and I braced myself for the sight of peeling human skin but nothing happend. I narrowed my eyes at him.
That should have chemically burned his hand by now and it was as if he didn't feel anything. I was beyond confused; any other student would start screaming bloody murder and ask for the nurse.
He just stood there silently smirking and wiped his hand on the paper tissue available on the table. I looked at River and Cole both looking our way as if they have been part of the conversation this whole time then swallowed the lump that formed in my throat.
"I don't know" I responded confused.
Why was I confused at that moment? I knew the answer. It was a hard, solid, obvious "no" but I couldn't help but observe as the paper towel he wipped his hand on disintegrated from the solution on the table.
Did the teacher dilute the solution to avoid students getting chemical burns in case of spillings ?
Do I really believe in mythical creatures or do I want to ? I felt put on the spot. And he was being so omnipotent and sketchy, like he knew things I didn't.
"I guess I'd have to see it to believe it" I whispered to myself so low nobody could've heared me.
As the ringing of the bells echoed in the room, he let out a sigh.
"Some people see yet still can't believe..." he smirked again while giving me back the chemical bottle and brushing past me, "later, Alexa.."
I quickly put the bottle down and washed my hands on the sink. I just stood there as he left the classroom along with River and Cole.
I'm not an easily shaken person, but he shook me for a second. I felt weird. What was wrong with me? This idiot shook me? Really?..
Out of all people;
Alexander Miles...