Full Moon, Marisa Maichel [the red fox clan TXT] 📗

handed me a short textbook titled Creative Literature for High Schoolers and a thicker literature book full of short stories and poems. I sighed. I hadn't written anything worthwhile in months. Today's assignment was to review The Raven by Edgar Allan Poe. Mrs. Stevenson told me to just follow along and take notes as I went.

I'd read The Raven before, it used to be my favorite poem during my "soulless artist" phase. It's about a narrator who is grieving the loss of his love, a woman named Lenore. When he is falling asleep in his chair, he hears a tapping at the door, and lets in a raven, which can only speak one word: "Nevermore".

Mrs. Stevenson had us study the entire composition of the poem.

"Why does the narrator keep asking questions which can only be answered by 'Nevermore'?" she asked. "Anyone? Ember? Zoe?"

I bit my lip. "Edgar Allan Poe was trying to show the beauty of depression."

"Correct, Zoe. Have you read this before?"

I blushed. "Not in a classroom setting."

"Ah. Well, in either case, you were correct. Let's continue examining the poem."

When class ended, I spotted Prentice Willis standing against the lockers, arms folded across his chest, looking at me. I blushed again and asked Ember where my next class, Astronomy, might be. She pointed in the direction of the science wing, and I followed her instructions.

Astronomy was with a young dark-haired guy named Mr. Roth. He showed me to a seat in the back of the room and handed me a textbook. My tote bag was becoming quite full; I'd have to find my locker soon.

I looked up as several guys walked through the door, tossing around a football. Prentice Willis was right behind them. He was in this class, too?

"Nice to see you finally showed up, Mr. Willis," Mr. Roth said sarcastically. "I was beginning to think you had other obligations besides school."

"I do, but they're none of your business," Prentice mouthed off. I couldn't believe he talked that way to a teacher! Neither did Mr. Roth.

"Oh? Then I suppose we'll have to discuss it in detention. Today at three. My room."

Prentice shook his head and sat beside me. He's sitting beside me!

Butterflies attacked my tummy. Prentice was, well, gorgeous, and seemed dangerous. Not that any of that was a good excuse. In fact, the fact that he kept staring at me should have sent me running in the opposite direction. Alas, it was not to be.

"Hello," he said, looking at me. "I don't believe we've been introduced. I'm Prentice Willis."

"Zoe Westerfield," I told him.

"It's nice to meet you, Zoe," he said. "A pleasure, in fact." Oh, no. Not this. I'd heard horror stories of girls being attacked by psychotic guys who became obsessed with them.

"It's nice to meet you, too," I said as blandly as I could. I mentally winced as I heard my voice become more high-pitched when I spoke to him.

"What do you have after this?" Prentice asked. I looked at my schedule.

"Lunch."

"Don't eat the chicken-fried steak," he said. "It's made of fake meat."

"I brought my own lunch," I told him.

"That's good," he said, smiling slightly. Wow. He has a gorgeous smile.

The rest of the class filed in, and the bell rang.

"All right, if we can all get settled in!" Mr. Roth said. "If you would all open your textbooks to page one hundred and four! The Properties of The Moon Cycle."

Weird. I was thinking about the moon the night before. We ran through the different cycles of the moon, Prentice shooting me occasional looks. Okay, I was kind of hoping he would. I was interested.

"Mr. Willis, can you tell us what the full moon is most famous for?" Mr. Roth asked.

"Werewolves," Prentice said, looking back at the teacher.

"Which this town is famous for," said Mr. Roth. "Any other reasons? Mr. Willis?"

"Witches, vampires, ghosts," he replied.

"Exactly," Mr. Roth said. "Ladies and gentlemen, werewolves are among us."

The class burst into laughter. The only one not laughing was Prentice and a girl with long black hair sitting across the room.

The bell rang. Time for lunch. Ember pointed me in the direction of the cafeteria, and I walked to the lunchroom. I looked around. The tables were circular. I looked around. I noticed Kristi waving me over.

"Hey," she said. "We sit over by the center table. That's where the mean girls sit."

She led me to the table, right by the center. She, Tiffany, and Maggie were here.

"Christina and Ember have art and math class," Tiffany explained. "It sucks, because we're strongest when the whole group is here. Joanna doesn't give us as hard a time." She pointed out a girl with dark brown hair wearing a short pink skirt and hot pink sweater.

"Those bitches always wear pink on Fridays, Mondays, and Wednesdays," Maggie said.

"Do they have a clique name?" I asked.

"Heck yeah. They call themselves The Flowers. See, there's Joanna Flowers, the leader. See that girl with the blond braids? That's Ivy Depson. And then that little one with the dark hair? That's Penny Rose. They all have floral names, which is the only reason why they stick together. They secretly hate each other. Actually, it's not really a secret. Joanna stole Ivy's boyfriend last year, but Ivy was too afraid to say anything because she would have been kicked out of the group. Now Joanna has her eye on Prentice Willis."

"The guy with the long blond hair?" I asked. They nodded.

"Wait," Tiffany said, "Do you have your eye on Prentice?" I blushed and looked at my lunch bag. "Okay, I'm telling you as a friend: don't get involved. He's dangerous."

I pulled out an apple and a turkey sandwich. I looked over at Prentice. He had two trays full of food in front of him, shoveling down a burrito and pizza. He was somehow more attractive. I noticed Joanna Flowers looking at him with as much fascination as I felt. I didn't blame her. He was intriguing and mysterious.

After lunch, I had Spanish. Maggie also had it, and she showed me the way.

"Mr. Veno is brand new," she told me. "He's, like, fresh out of college. And totally hot!"

I introduced myself to Mr. Veno, a thin man with short dark curls and a five o'clock shadow, and he told me to sit by Maggie.

"So, my dad is Marshall Lough," Maggie said.

It dawned. "The bestselling author?"

"Yeah, and he, like, has this huge lake house, and every month we go to the lake house and have a sleepover," Maggie said. "Would you be interested?"

"Sure," I said. I could use some friends.

"Awesome! I'll pick you up Saturday night," she said.

"Okay. Wait, do you know where my aunt lives?"

"Of course! Everyone knows where everyone lives." Her voice took on a teasing tone. "Prentice Willis lives with several others in an old house deep in the country."

"Oh?" I replied, interest creeping into my tone unwillingly.

"Totes. His family is, like, super poor." She winced at the word "poor".

"He ate a lot at lunch," I said.

"He works at his dad's mechanic shop. He works on cars all day on weekends and after school."

Mr. Veno called the class to attention then.

For the rest of the class, I thought about what Maggie had told me. I studied from the Spanish textbook and talked with Maggie about the sleepover. They had been having this sleepover every month for five years. Always on the full moon, or the weekend of. They thought it was funny.

The rumor was also that the bigger the group, the safer you were from the werewolves.

Chapter 2 – Slumber Party

Maggie Lough picked me up Saturday afternoon like she promised. The rest of the girls were already in the SUV. Kristi was smoking a cigarette, and Tiffany was handing out bubblegum.

“I took it from my dad’s store,” she giggled. I took a piece as she offered it to me. “I can get cigarettes too. Daddy looks the other way, and the cute cashier, Tony, and I are…well, you know.” She giggled.

“We’re bad girls, Zoe,” Kristi said, grinning. “Badder than the baddest women on the planet.”

“We like to pretend we’re innocent, because we never get in trouble,” Christina said.

“Daddy stocked up on beer,” Maggie said. “So we have plenty of alcohol. Or I can get vodka from the cellar.”

“Bad girls, good drivers,” said Ember.

“Have you been drinking?” I asked.

“Maybe,” Tiffany giggled childishly.

“So what’s this I hear about you and Prentice Willis?” Christina innocently asked.

“I think he’s cute,” I defended, albeit a poor defense.

“Lots of guys are cute, and a lot of them are less dangerous than Prentice Willis,” Tiffany said. “You should stay away from him. Besides, his harem of girl admirers might kick your ass. A lot of them are part of the Goth clique.”

“We’re in a very witchy town,” I protested.

“Which is why you should keep away from him. Besides, there are good witches around.”

“Like who?” I asked.

“Like your aunt, for one. I don’t know if this is true, but rumor has it that she has a cat skull in a small casket and uses it to practice magic.”

“I doubt that,” I said. “She does have an urn with the ashes of her dead cat, but that’s it. I’m sure lots of people do that.”

“She’s not wrong,” Ember said. “Lots of people do keep the ashes of their dead pets. I’m sure Winifred Bones is an innocent subject of long-time rumor-mongering.”

“Why do you act dumb if you’re so smart?” I asked.

“Looks are all that counts in this town,” Kristi said, popping the top off a bottle of Mike’s Hard Lemonade.

“We’ve got a lot to teach you, Zoe,” Christina said. “Like why Kristi and I have similar names. Both of us were named after a dead aunt. We’re cousins. Both our mothers wanted us to have our dead aunt’s name, and both of them blame each other for her death, since they were drinking and she wasn’t. So they each named us after Aunt Christina with different spellings. Kristi and I didn’t even meet until we were ten. I remember it like it was yesterday.

“My mom and I were going to the beauty parlor for my first pedicure. I was seated next to Kristi, and the pedicurist called me Kristi by mistake. We started a conversation after that, and when our mothers came back to check on us, we were already friends. They got into a screaming match right there in the salon.”

“It was embarrassing,” Kristi added. “I wasn’t even able to get my hair done that day. I badly needed a trim.”

“I remember your curls,” Christina said, grinning.

Kristi groaned. “Don’t remind me. I was a total frizzball. Anyway, our moms got kicked out, and Christina wasn’t able to get her pedicure finished. Our moms kept screaming at each other until the cops came along and almost arrested Mom. It was humiliating.”

Imprint

Publication Date: 04-27-2020

All Rights Reserved

Dedication:
To everyone who felt like they weren't enough.