Scotty doesn't know
Scotty's gotta know
I'm gonna tell Scotty
Gonna tell him myself
~ Lustra "Scotty Doesn't Know"
It was Saturday afternoon, and Seth was hanging out at Sam and Emily's house again. Currently, he and Sam were discussing when he would be allowed to go back to school.
"Why do I have to go back?" Seth complains. "I'd rather stay here and hang out with the guys."
"Seth, you've been out of school for almost a month, and everyone else has already gone back," Sam reasons with him.
"Paul hasn't gone back," Seth sasses.
"Paul graduated," Sam says bluntly. "Look, you haven't accidentally phased in a while, and your mom really wants you to go back. You're ready— it's time."
"Fine," Seth groans. Seth wasn't into school— he found it boring and he didn't want to go to college, so he really didn't see the point. It drove his mom crazy, but he would figure it out. Actually, now that he was a protector of the tribe, he really saw no point in school at all— this pretty much a full time job, and the elders gave the older guys a salary. Seth was pretty much set for life.
"I made lunch," Emily calls as she begins moving large plates of food to the table. The pack began to gather around the table to eat.
Seth took a seat next to Leah, and filled his plate with food. The whole pack loved eating meals at Sam and Emily's— even Leah, though she would hardly admit it— because Emily was the best cook in all of La Push. The pack was talking and laughing, even Leah seemed to be in a better mood than usual. She wasn't smiling, but her glare seemed a lot less steely than normal.
Paul came into the house wordlessly, and sat down next to Jared.
"Hey, Paul," Jared greets his friend cheerfully.
"Hi," Paul replies less enthusiastically. He was emotionally burnt out— the last couple of days have been beyond stressful for him. If one more person cried this weekend, Paul was gonna lose it. And not in his normal angry way— it would be more along the lines of Britney circa 2007. Paul just kinda felt like he needed a nap.
After a few unsuccessful minutes of trying to engage Paul in a conversation, Jared finally acknowledges his friend's weird behavior.
"Dude, what is up with you today?" Jared asks.
"Nothing, man," Paul replies. "Just got a lot going on right now. Don't worry about it."
"Come on, dude. We're all gonna find out once you phase, so you might as well just spill it," Jared tries to convince Paul.
"It's just some stuff with my sister," Paul reveals. "I really shouldn't be talking about it though. It's not really my shit to share."
Seth's ears perked up at the mention of Brooklyn. Of course, Paul knew everyone in the pack could hear his conversation with Jared, so he was trying his best to respect Brooklyn's privacy— she had been very clear that she didn't want people to know she was pregnant unless she decided to keep the baby.
"Is she alright?" Jared asks. Paul's reaction to whatever was going on with his sister was concerning to Jared. Paul is his best friend after all, and he figured it probably couldn't be a good thing with how weird Paul was acting.
"Yeah. Well, kinda. I don't really know," Paul says. "Can we please talk about something else?"
"Yeah, okay," Jared says. "So... Have you seen any good movies lately?"
Okay, Jared knew it was a lame question, but it was the first thing he could think of.
"Not really," Paul said as he picked at his food. He didn't say anything else after that.
"Paul, you're not really giving me very much to work with here," Jared says. "We can't really talk about something else if you don't talk."
Paul groans and covers his face with his hands.
"You guys, I think Paul is broken," Jared announces to the table.
"Jared, shut up," Paul says forcefully.
"Seriously Paul, you might as well just tell us because you're gonna phase and think about it, and then we're all gonna know," Leah butts in.
"That's what I said!" Jared exclaims.
"You guys. Let Paul have his secret," Seth says. "Besides, if he stops thinking about it, then we have no way of finding out. It's not that complicated."
"Yeah, you would know," Jared snorts. Seth chucked a piece of bread at Jared's head.
"Dude, shut up," Seth says. "So uncool."
"You have a secret?" Leah looks at Seth.
"What? No. No secrets," Seth stammers. "You can read my mind. How could I have secrets?"
"Seth, you literally just explained how you could keep a secret," Paul points out.
"Shut up. I'm trying to help you," Seth argues back. "Okay. Can everyone just let people keep their own secrets?"
"So you admit that you have a secret, then?" Leah asks.
"No," Seth says, though he seemed unsure at this point. "Paul is the one with the secret. Let's focus on Paul's secret."
"Dude!" Paul groans. "Why?"
"Hey, I tried to help you, but you turned this around on me," Seth replies. "I'm just... un-turning it."
Leah turns to Jared. "You know Seth's secret."
"I don't know anything about anyone," Jared says quickly.
"No, you definitely do. You were the one who brought it up," Leah insists.
"Did I?" Jared says. "That's weird, because I definitely don't know anything about anyone or who they did or didn't do anything with."
"Jared, just stop talking. Please," Seth begs.
"It must be something pretty big if you're putting this much effort into hiding it," Leah insists.
"It's probably not as big as Paul's secret," Seth says. "Let's all focus on Paul now."
"Seth, I will punch you," Paul growls.
"Please don't," Seth says. "If anything you should punch Jared. He's the one who brought all of this up."
"You're right," Paul agreed. He turned to Jared.
"What? Don't hit me," Jared exclaims. "Seth definitely deserves it more than me."
"Jared!" Seth says.
"You're the one who told him to hit me first," Jared says pointedly.
"Why does Seth deserve it more?" Leah asks.
"I don't. Let's just forget about everyone's secrets," Seth pleads.
"Yeah," Jared agrees. "I'm not trying to be an accessory to murder."
"Jared. Seriously, just stop talking," Seth says. "Please."
"I just meant that—" Jared is cut off by Seth tackling him out of his chair.
"Sam! Sam! Help me," Jared shouts dramatically. "Seth is trying to kill me."
"What is going on in here?" Sam finally emerges from the backyard where he was eating with Emily. Seth scrambles to get up off of Jared.
"Apparently, Paul and Seth both have secrets, and Jared is kind of a blabber mouth," Leah says flatly.
"Okay, uh, these secrets— are they anything pack related?" Sam asks.
"No," Paul and Seth say.
"Okay. Cool," Sam replies. "Then I don't really care. Just don't break anything or make a mess in the house."
With that, Sam returns to the backyard to continue his eating his lunch with his imprint. The four remaining werewolves resumed eating their lunch as well.
"Seriously, Jared. Tell us Seth's secret," Leah says.
"Seriously, Jared. Don't," Seth glares at his sister who makes a face at him in response.
Seth continues eating his lunch.
"Brooklyn is pregnant," Paul blurts out of nowhere.
Seth starts choking on his food. "What?" he splutters between coughs.
"Shit, you can't tell her I told you guys, and you can't tell anyone," Paul continues. "This stays in the pack."
Nobody talks for a while. Quil, Jake, and Embry walk in— they were just coming back from running patrol.
"Yes! Emily made spaghetti," Embry cheers, oblivious to what was going on.
"Uh— Come on, Paul. We have to run patrol," Leah gets up to leave.
Jared starts laughing in disbelief— it's not that he thought this was funny, it wasn't, that was just the way he reacted to stress sometimes. "Dude, if there's something worse than killing you, Paul is going to figure it out, and he's gonna do it to you," he says to Seth.
Seth was so screwed.
"So what'd we miss?" Quil asks as Embry and Jake begin shoveling food into their mouths.