12: Flannel, Friends, and Fate

Quincy St. Martin

I smell food even before I open my eyes. The morning sunlight is filtering through the gaps in the blinds. Saturday. How I love Saturday. The clock on the wall shows that it’s just after 8 a.m. Too early to get up, but the smell of food is making my mouth water.

Hmmm... food or bed? Such tough decisions so early in the morning. The struggle. Life is unfair. I finally come to a decision after ten minutes of debating. That’s it! Stomach is growling.

Layla is standing by the stove making breakfast. Scrambled eggs and hash browns. The smell of coffee in the percolator is heavenly.

“Good morning, sleepyhead!” says Layla cheerfully.

“Morning, Layla. God, woman, you’re making breakfast! I could marry you,” I tell her. “If I swung that way.”

Layla laughs, while Isaac, who is tucking into his breakfast at the small breakfast table, gives me a wink. Mainly because his mouth is full. Lana, who is popping the bread into the toaster, just ignores us. I get along better with Isaac these days. He doesn’t flirt with me as much anymore. I think Jonah might have had something to do with it.

Lana mostly ignores me, which I don’t mind at all.

“It would be better if you cook us bacon as well,” Isaac says, looking at Layla hopefully.

“I don’t eat bacon. You want bacon, you cook it yourself,” replies Layla.

She plates our food near Isaac when the door to Jonah’s bedroom swings open and a girl about my age comes strolling out.

She’s wearing a red and white flannel shirt, tied at the waist, Daisy Dukes, and cowboy boots.

Her dirty blond hair looks stiff and stuck to one side of her head, and her eyeliner and mascara are smeared underneath her eyes. If this is not a walk of shame, I don’t know what is.

“Hello,” she says with a big, happy smile. Very friendly, this girl.

“I thought he had a different girlfriend last weekend,” I whisper to Layla as the strange girl peeks at the food on the stove.

“He has a different girl every week,” Isaac whispers to me with a smirk. “None of them is his girlfriend. Oh-uh, drama. Watch.”

“Why are you still here?” asks Lana. “He doesn’t offer breakfast for an easy lay."

Her eyes shoot daggers at the girl. The girl reels back as if she’s been slapped, and I can see that she’s struggling to come up with a comeback.

I think there’s something close to jealousy and hurt in Lana’s expression when she looks at Jonah walking out of his room with a set of keys dangling from his fingers.

“Ready, Lisa? I have someplace else to be,” says Jonah.

“It’s Abby,” replies the girl. “My name is Abby.”

“Sure,” says Jonah with a shrug as if it doesn’t matter.

“I’ll go get my purse and my phone. They’re still in your room,” the girl, Abby, answers with a pout.

Isaac, Layla, and I just sit silently watching with our mouths wide open. Suddenly, a realization sets in. My cousin is a manwhore! I can see that it’s not hard for him to find willing girls in this college area.

I run a critical eye over my cousin for the first time, trying to see him the way other girls see him. He’s not bad looking in that rough-around-the-edges kinda way. Tall with shiny dark hair, piercing dark brown eyes, chiseled features, golden tanned skin, a muscled body with tattoos, pierced ears, a lip ring.

I guess some girls might even say that he’s hot, but he’s my cousin, so, ewww.

“Hey, do STDs only affect humans or do they affect, errr…other creatures too?” I ask Jonah when he steals a bite of my scrambled eggs.

By other creatures, I mean werewolves.

“What’s with the judgy question?”

Judgy question? I thought that was a legitimate concern.

“Somebody’s touchy,” I sing.

“You’re very annoying,” he says. That’s true, but what’s with him stating the obvious?

***

It’s Monday morning, and I’m humming to myself as I get ready for class. Most people hate Mondays, but I don’t mind it, even though I do like Saturdays better. I’m actually looking forward to this one especially since today, for the first time, I’m no longer wearing the abominable hobo hoodie to college.

I have on a cute little white sundress this morning. It has a pink-roses print around the hem and the neckline.

I put my hair into a loose side fishtail hair braid, smooth some lip gloss over my lips, and wear a pair of strappy tan sandals on my feet. I adjust the tiny white gold chain around my neck. A small round pendant engraved with the letter Q hangs from it.

It was a gift from Nana, and it’s been around my neck for as long as I can remember.

Layla’s bed is already made. She is already up this morning even though she doesn’t have morning classes today. I try not to call myself a sexy beast again, especially after that first day, just in case Layla is listening.

Jonah looks at me disapprovingly when I step out of my room. I try not to roll my eyes. Jonah is acting like such a dad, and he’s not even old enough to be my father. He wants to keep me covered in that hobo hoodie so that I will stay hidden from men. He wants me to stay away from parties.

He probably would have liked to keep me locked in my room till I’m eighty if he could.

Too bad I have other plans, which include normal hot human men…lots of them.

I don’t have a mate like werewolves, so I have to kiss lots of frogs and toads before I find my Prince Charming, right?

The image of Mr. Golden-blond God flashes in my mind. Oh, no, no, no. He’s no Prince Charming. He’s exactly the type to stay away from. I hate that I can’t keep him out of my mind. I even dream about him some nights. I’d rather poke my eyeballs with a spork than admit this to another living soul.

***

My first class without my hobo hoodie is going well so far. I haven’t made any friends yet, but a few girls smile at me, and I catch a couple of guys checking me out. It feels good because I felt invisible before. Call me vain but I’m not used to feeling invisible.

I know I’m not a sexy beast, but I know I’m not ugly. Besides, I’m a very friendly person, despite being a tad annoying.

“Hi, I’m Evelyn,” whispers a girl sitting beside me at the end of the lecture.

She has an open friendly smile and kind but mischievous eyes. Her short dark brown hair brushes her shoulders.

“Quincy,” I tell her.

“Nice to meet you, Quincy. This is my friend Travis,” she says. “He’s been bugging me to talk to you.”

I raise an eyebrow and lean over to look at the guy sitting beside her. He kicks her leg, and she laughs.

“Ow. Sorry, I wasn’t supposed to tell you that. Ow.”

I think he’s kicked her leg again under the table. Travis is really cute in a nerdy type of way. He’s skinny and wearing dark-rimmed glasses. He could be Clark Kent if Clark Kent was skinny and had blushing red cheeks.

Totally adorable.

Both Evelyn and Travis are totally human. Just what I need. Evelyn and Travis have been best friends since high school, and now they’re my first two friends at college. How awesome is that? I spend time talking and making plans to join their study group, and now I’m a bit late for my second class. Well, not really late but I’m usually very early for it.

Today, I’m actually just on time. I run to the next building and nearly sag in relief when I join the large group of students rushing to get in through the door of the lecture hall.

As I enter the hall, my eyes are automatically drawn to that magnificent figure lounging lazily and carelessly as usual on the chair in the middle of the auditorium.

The golden god. How my heart squeezes and my stomach clenches every time I see him.

He’s wearing a white polo shirt that stretches tight across his chest. His golden locks are perfectly in place as usual.

The wind blows in through the open doorway, and suddenly he sits up straight, lifting his face up like he’s sniffing the air, and his nostrils flare, like a predator smelling its prey.

He turns his face, and his eyes scan the crowd. His intense, searching eyes stop when they land on me. Dark and fierce. I feel the air shift around me.