Amity

Chapter 3: Predator vs Prey

Why did McManus have to say that? Dré thought to himself as they both walked outside in silence. The heat was nothing compared to his face heated up from standing this close to Megumi. He peeked at her from the corner of his eye, admiring the way her silky dark red hair danced slowly in the wind, the way she held her chocolate-brown satchel in front of her. Her pink lip gloss made her plump lips  shimmer in the sun; they were beckoning Dré's lips. She was beautiful, so beautiful that it was almost absurd.

"Why do you keep looking at me?" Megumi suddenly said.

"Huh? What do you mean?" Dré asked her, turning his eyes forward.

"I can literally feel you watching me, dude."

"Oh. Sorry," Dré said, trying to keep his composure.

They both walked in silence again. He felt himself sweating bullets from the embarrassment of McManus's outburst and his unfortunate staring habits. "So, you're Ke'Undré Wolf, huh? Are your parents Abigail and Raheem Wolf?"

"Yeah." Dré's face soured. "How did you know that?"

"They're friends with my mom and daddy. I think daddy said they've been friends for about twenty years."

"Did they fight in a war together, too?"

Megumi raised an eyebrow. "How did you know?"

"Because that's how long McManus has been friends with my mom and dad. They always told me that they met at some weird academy preparing for a war, but I'm still kinda skeptical."

"Why is that?"

"I don't know. Kind of a gut feeling, really."

"Hm." She sharply exhaled before saying, "God, this is insufferable."

Panic shot through Dré like an arrow. He hesitated. "S-sorry. I'm kind of a quiet person."

"No, not you. I mean this heat. How in the world do you all manage to live here?"

"Oh, that. It's just something that you'll have to get used to. It's always humid here, even in the winter." Megumi groaned as she patted sweat from her forehead with a pink handkerchief.

They walked the concrete steps to a wide building. The stone pillars erected in front of the entrance made it look more sophisticated, but the tin, warehouse-like appearance behind it said otherwise. "So, this is the cafeteria," he said as he held the door open for her. Inside were three long rows of tables, each with a set of maroon chairs set on top. The walls were filled with gold-painted plastic trophies behind glass doors. A stuffed gray wolf was in a glass box in the middle of the football trophies, an eternal snarl on its face.

They both stopped in front of the case. "And this is Wolfie."

"Wolfie?" Megumi repeated, bemused. "You guys just keep a stuffed wolf in here?"

"Well, yeah. Wolfie is our school mascot. Kinda. See, no one's really explained what exactly a Curley Wolf is, so we just got the next best thing, I guess."

"So, you guys just eat in front of a stuffed wolf. This school's weird."

"You have no idea."

Walking past Wolfie, they strode down a long narrow hallway to a pair of maroon double doors. "This is the pool," Dré said as he pushed the door open, both choking on the chlorine-filled air that spewed from the room. Catching the attention of the class, a smooth voice in a thick southern drawl immediately called out to them.

"Well, well, look who's here, ya'll," a young man sneered as he climbed out of the pool, walking towards them. He was a tall, fair-skinned man with blond, combed back hair. It was Doug Flowers, one of the best baseball players in the school. Everything about Doug bothered Dré. From his cocky grin to the way he acted like a tool to get people to like him, to the nickname he gave Dré. "You're runnin' a little bit late, ain't you, Mutt? Class ends in about ten minutes."