The White Wolf (2020)

Chapter Twenty-Five

Sydney

The blaring white lights illuminated the pristinely maintained turf of the multipurpose field.

It was harsh on her eyes and was beginning to make her headache. She cradled her camera close to her thick 'nearing-winter' coat as she dubbed it. Over her shoulder and pumping against her lower back, Sydney toted an extra camera bag full of different lenses.

Making laps around the field Sydney predicted what would make for interesting angles and good places to shoot from throughout the lacrosse game.

Their previous conversation during Jay's class had offered some hope for Sydney that they could get over their disagreement and continue to push forward for tomorrow's plans. A thought briefly crossed Sydney's mind though.

What would happen if I just dropped Jay from my life?

She felt physically sick at the mere implication of the void.

The moment had been broken between Jay and Sydney earlier in the day by the sounding of the bell. She hadn't realized how much time had passed between them before she had spoken up. Annoyance ate at her as the wasted time cost her whatever could've followed Jaycen's sweet words.

They had both packed up in silence and with a spare glance, she had left the room to go back to journalism and proceed throughout her class schedule.

The day went about pretty quietly as she mingled with Meg and Emery throughout the classes they were lucky enough to share. During lunch, the glaring absence of Mat was more prominent. Her fingers wanted to send him a text checking in on him, but she felt whatever their next conversation would be deserved to be in person.

It had almost been the end of her day when her phone dinged notifying Sydney of an email from Mr. Greg's, asking her to fill in for a lacrosse game after one of the students was reported to be out of school sick.

Reaffirming herself she wasn't gonna let some silly drama make her avoid doing what she loved and she quickly shot out and replied to her teacher saying that she would be there before the game to see about scoping out good places to take photos on the field then possibly getting some locker interviews.

Sydney was pleased to get a swift response from the teacher thanking her for stepping in, so that's how she found herself out in the cold field on a Friday night.

Going back to thinking about a life of avoiding or ignoring Jay and his werewolf friends, Sydney pushes aside those emotional feelings and seriously considers what the outcome would be.

Despite the sprinkling of college applications across the country for early acceptance, I have always been planning to stay within the state to stay close to family but far enough away where I could gain my own independence. Was it possible that I could just ignore this and ride out the rest of the year incident-free?

Something nagged at the back of her mind telling her that it would be too good to be true.

A pain stabbed at her head causing her to groan and her eyes slam shut. Pinching the bridge of her nose she hopped this headache would go away.

Squeezing her eyes closed harder, an image vividly flashed in her mind. A man with long black hair tumbling down his bareback shouting while in the distance in the tumbling of massive spiders crawled towards her.

Eyes opening, Sydney tried to focus in on the thoughts but it slipped away from her like being frustratedly awaken from an amazing dream and not being able to dive back into it.

Sighing in frustration, Sydney strode across the field.

Her journalistic instinct said she only had one instance of violence and terror to gather any information from. That coupled with the small abilities that Logan had shown her the day before felt like a push towards properly defending herself.