WHERE THE WOLVES RUN, teen wolf

𝟏𝟎 - the princess's view from the castle

LYDIA MARTIN MAY be a lot of things, but she was, emphatically, not stupid.

Despite the forced airhead giggles she lets escape her mouth whenever Jackson made an incredibly bad joke or tried to say something that'll go over her head; despite the purposefully blank stares she gave people when they tried to talk to her about classes, whether or not they're unaware of the AP credits she has wracked up; and despite how her parents insisted on treating her like a third-grader a second away from eating a crayon or shoving it up her nose. She was not dumb.

     No, she probably — she sighed as she surveyed the crowd at her party, all rowdy and sloppy as a number of them gyrated against each other — most likely, had the highest IQ here.

Not that she'd ever let that secret slip out from under her, no matter how badly Allison Argent was seemingly catching on — and really, Allison was a lot more observant than Lydia gave her credit for and it was really starting to bother her.

Sure, Lydia had been the one to march up to her and declare her as her new best friend; that had been all her and she can't take that back. But she hadn't actually expected Allison to be...a good friend.

  But she was. And it was a little unnerving. Strange, unfamiliar.

   Half of the people Lydia talked to at Beacon Hills High School only knew her as far as they could throw her, or even less, considering they knew her name and more often than not, she couldn't exactly say the same for them.

Whoops.

Though, she couldn't deny the small thrill that ran through her at the possibility that she didn't have to keep up with being such a moronic dunce around someone for a while, even if it was in between moments when she would chat with Allison, picking outfits absentmindedly, and suddenly let her large vocabulary take over, words slipping in that Allison wouldn't point out, but didn't ignore either.

Whatever. Point is — Lydia Martin was far from an idiot. So, when Scott McCall's little friend — Stalkowski? Bilinski? Blah blah blah — and New Girl #2 — Girl with the Cute Boots, as Lydia calls her in her head — sauntered in through the doors, she knew that they weren't invited.

The pair of them stooped down by one of her patio doors, talking amongst themselves as they leaned in against each other, their voices far too quiet to be heard over the music that continued to drown about everything else lower than a million decibels out.

Lydia glanced around, following their gazes until it landed on the dance floor. Scott and Allison danced, or, well, Allison danced while Scott did the best two-step he could muster, arms flailing about occasionally until Allison grabbed them and held them at her side.

    Lydia cocked a brow, before looking back at the pair a few feet away from her, her head tilting. Truth be told, she didn't know what she was looking at. Or how she felt about them showing up to her party technically uninvited.

But she was feeling nice. And, well, if she wanted to be all dramatic about it, she had to consider the logistics. She had — again, technically — invited the entire lacrosse team to celebrate, and because if Jackson wanted his bonehead friends from the team there, she wasn't going to deny herself a night of eye-candy of all the other very attractive players.

And so, by inviting the entire lacrosse team, she had, admittedly, invited the bench warmers. Bench warmer being the boy she currently looked at, with his buzzcut and wrinkled button up shirt and casual blazer, and his supposed plus-one, Girl with the Cute Boots. So okay, yeah, they weren't actually crashing, so she wasn't going to suddenly get all anal about it.