I'm in Love with a Monster

New Salem, (like the old one, but less misogynistic)

Elena sighed as she unloaded the last of the boxes from the moving van and into the living room of her new house. Why did they have to leave Japan? She liked Izumo, it was where all of her crazy extended family lived and where she had spent many days running around the countryside and visiting shrines with her dad. Now she had to spend her freshman year in a school filled with loud teenagers. Sure, the kids back at Izumo could be loud, too, but they at least had manners. She was regretting her decision already.

"That's the last of them!", she called out to her mom, Eiko, as she came through the front door.

"Really? I thought it would take longer.", she said, wiping her brow with the back of her hand.

Her daughter shrugged, "Well, I guess we're faster than we think we are."

The two of them plopped down onto the couch they had brought from Izumo. All the furniture was set up, as well as the electronics, courtesy of Elena and her dad. They could both be quite handy when they wanted to be.

Elena sighed again, causing her mother to look at her. The brown haired woman smiled softly and put her hand on her daughter's knee.

"I know you feel conflicted about the move. I feel the same, but we had to do this. Your school was... well, we both know what it was. American schools will be more self aware of your quirks, and you need that, Elena. It may seem scary now but... it'll get better. I promise.", she finished, pulling her daughter into a hug.

Elena only frowned. The reason they had moved here was because of her. Japanese schools were too closed minded for her to actually learn there, and it was taking a toll on her mental health. Her parents saw this, and decided to take her to her father's home country of America for the first time. This place, New Salem, though it was just called Salem by the locals, given that had been its original name way back when, was just a hundred miles away from where her father was born. It was slightly exciting, getting to see the country her dad had come from, but it was also very nerve racking being in a place she had never been to before.

"Your mom's right, sweetie. It will get better, I'll make sure of it.", her dad, Aslan Callenreese or Ash as he sometimes preferred to be called, said as he walked into the house. His blonde hair glinted in the sun that shined through the open front door. The man may have been nearing his mid thirties, but he didn't look a day over twenty. Same went for her mother. Elena wondered if she would inherit those miracle genetics.

Eiko narrowed her eyes at her husband of fifteen years, "Aslan Jade Callenreese, you better not drive up to that school with your gun and threaten to shoot anyone. Just because guns are legal here, doesn't mean you should use them to threaten minors."

Ash rolled his eyes, "I won't. I'll just intimidate any punks who would dare try and mess with my daughter. It's what a good father would do."

Eiko rolled her eyes and Elena blinked, "I don't think that'll be necessary, dad. I'll be fine on my own."

Ash smirked, "If you say so. But if anything changes, just give me a name and I'll make sure they don't so much as look at you wrong.", he promised as he ruffled his daughter's long blonde hair.

Elena had always been told she looked just like her father. They had the same eyes, hair, IQ and skin tone. The only things she seemed to get from her mother was her general disposition and face shape. In everyone's eyes, she was her father's daughter. A fact that was reinforced by his protective nature.

"Dad, I'll be fine. I'm just worried about going to a school I know nothing about. Why the hell don't they have a website?", she finished, muttering to herself.