Chapter 19

The chrome square disappeared and then I noticed everybody crowded in the gymnasium. Chelsea got up and Fulton was at her side in minutes. Mr. Russia came up to me and then he announced in a highly authoritative voice.

"You all stand as witnesses to this duel. Avril Mavra is the winner and now she is the official organiser for the masquerade dance committee. This is adjourned and this matter is resolved and now we may all resume our daily activities." Anton spoke to him afterwards in Russian. Why didn’t I know any Russian? Apparently, it comes in mighty handy here at Saint Rurik’s Academy. When Mr. Russia had finished talking to Anton, he came up to me and whispered, "You have the makings of a great fighter." I wanted to say to him that he should know that better than anyone but because he was the headmaster, I tried to refrain from it. I had no more classes today, except organising the masquerade. That was a class in itself. I had spent most of my time in the library designing a new flyer for the masquerade because by this time, everyone else had probably thrown their pink ones away and hoped to wake up from a nightmare. When I printed them, they actually looked pretty cool; they had bats and jack-o-lanterns and scary things like that. When I came out of the library, Chase and Tikaye met up with me.

"Reporting for duty, boss." They said in unison, saluting me. I grinned at them and then put my facetious military voice on,

"Alright, comrades; your mission for the week is to harass people via flyer! Do you think you can do that?"

"Ma’am, yes, ma’am." Tikaye and Chase smiled back, holding back a laugh. Then, I put my serious face on,

"No, seriously piss off and give everyone flyers," and then we all cracked up laughing. Chelsea caught up to me when they left and I was surprised she was daring enough to come out after lights out, but then, if it was committee business, she was authorised and wouldn’t risk a detention. Great. She frowned and even in the dim light of the courtyard, I could see the rage in her eyes - the hate.

"Your plan is going to fall through. No-one will come if you change the theme." I couldn’t help but smile at her scepticism,

"Oh, I haven’t changed the theme," I told her and she stared at me with disbelieving eyes, "I think that because you’re on the committee, your ideas should be taken into consideration. I’m not a total b***h." She raised an eyebrow as if to say, are you sure about that one? In return, I shot her a look that said, like you’re one to talk, graffiti artist. Her eyes dropped and then I filled her in, "the theme will still be romance, but it is gothic romance because no-one really likes the fairytale s**t." I shrugged. She nodded slowly and she almost looked defeated and I felt a random, strange urge to apologise to her. It suddenly dawned on me that I was more of a b***h to her than she was to me... sort of. "Chelsea, I’m sorry. For everything." She just rolled her eyes at me,

"Apology declined. Look, you publically humiliated me, stole my job and my date for the ball and now you’re trying to be my best friend. You can’t everything, you selfish b***h!" Okay, so that settled that. We were to remain enemies until further notice, "and to think; our entire species depends on you to become normal again. We’re doomed!" She added venomously. I went through the list of things she said that I took from her and I didn’t recall taking her date... She was talking about Chase, I realised. I bit my lip and laughed to myself, when she turned her back on me.

Tikaye didn’t return to the courtyard, where Chelsea and I stood - probably because she had gone to bed. It was pretty close to midnight.

Chelsea instantly lit up when Chase joined us and when he stopped and stood beside me,

"All done," he whispered and I nodded and then, Chelsea shuffled as close to him as she possibly could and then said,

"Hi, Chase. All ready for the ball tomorrow night?" she sounded too enthusiastic and Chase shifted his weight uncomfortably, putting his arm around me, pretending to ignore Chelsea.

"Let’s go, babe," he smiled and I followed his lead, grateful to get away from Chelsea. When we got out of the courtyard and Chelsea’s view, he let his arm drop. I kind of regretted its absence... Quickly, I dispelled the thought and mentally scolded myself; Chase is only my roommate. When we got upstairs, I wanted to tease him about what had happened in the courtyard with Chelsea as payback from when I’d rescued him similarly.

"Babe?" I challenged and he just shrugged, smiling in that facetious way of his.

"I am your boyfriend, remember?" He still could not use that against me. He sighed and then he ran a hand through his hair, bothered, "When will she get the message? I don’t like her. She needs to stop trying so hard to..." He was at a loss for this and so I prompted,

"Get into your pants?" He bit his lip and then nodded. I mocked him and then studied him. His black hair was messy and pointing out in all directions, but it was covering his left eye. It always was. His jade green eyes had bigger bags underneath them tonight; he hadn’t been sleeping.

"I honestly don’t see the appeal," I smiled, lightening the mood. He smiled slightly, but then that faded and a shadow crossed his face.

"Neither would she if she knew about... Y’know, what? I think I’m just gonna go to bed and have a shower tomorrow. Feel free to take ages." I smiled and went upstairs.

I was awoken the next day by Chase’s voice,

"Hey, Avril, wake up! We have to set up for the masquerade. You know it’s tonight right?" That instantly made me awake. Since when?

"Huh? Since when?" I asked, fully awake, which wasn’t like me at... Four in the morning! There was preparation and then there was exploitation. He chuckled,

"Uh, it was on the flyer. You should have known that. You printed over six thousand of them." I smiled and then it sunk in and I remembered. How everybody adapted to the change in theme so quickly would be interesting to watch and then I looked at Chase, who was standing at the edge of my bed. "Why so early?" I asked,

"Because you changed the theme really abruptly and Chelsea had all things fairytale sorted and it was kind of freaky." I smiled and then got up. Chase took that as a sign to go and have a shower, while I got dressed. I found my old Asking Alexandria t-shirt and my red and black plaid jeans and put them on. I also looked in my drawers for a hat, so I didn’t have to do my hair and luckily, I found one - a black cap. My hair was too curly for its own good. Especially in the mornings.

Quickly, I made my bed and did a whiz-clean. Charlie had always taught us to do that if we were going to be staying in one place for a while. Chase was still in the shower, so I thought to write in my diary because I hadn’t written in my diary for two days and I had a lot to catch up on. Usually, I wouldn’t write in my diary for about one month because I was always in a hurry, but at St. ‘Rik’s, I had all the time in the world because I wasn’t on the run.

Day 5 - Actually, I’ve sort of lost count.

Okay, so what’s happened over the last couple of days? Well, I punched Chelsea, got put in detention, was forced to join a dance committee and then I battled Chelsea for the position of head of the dance committee all because I wanted to change the theme. I won the fight and then was made head and instead of having the fairytale stuff, I changed it a little. Of course, to seem merciful in some way, I kept the theme as romance. Whoever said I wasn’t nice? I also learnt this week that lycans have some random abilities. I learnt this when Jake fainted in the strategy session. Adrik (Russian doctor from orphanage; see page... I dunno, somewhere near the start) said that Jake was using his powers too much and then Chase explained that every werewolf has one. I have no idea what mine is though and I also have no idea why Charlie and Jake would keep such a big thing a secret from Tegan and I! It’s outrageous! Anyways, I’m waiting for Chase to finish in the shower, so that we can go and prepare for the dance. Apparently, it’s tonight and I completely forgot. Some head of the dance committee I am. Here I am, in my room. At four in the morning, ready to start organising a dance. I am a changed wolf girl. Chase is on his way down now, I wish I could talk more, but I can’t.

Chase came down from the shower, looking more refreshed and then said,

"Ready to go and organise a dance?" I rolled my eyes and then we ventured down the stairs. "Avril," he began, as we were halfway down the staircase, "I hope Anton can give us an extension because there’s no way we can organise it in just one day." I agreed, but I knew that that wasn’t what he wanted to say. He wanted to say something different that wasn’t even related to the dance, but then he must have thought better of it.

Chelsea was waiting for us at the bottom of the staircase and so was Tikaye. Tikaye was as far apart from Chelsea as the narrow hallway would allow. There were a lot of narrow hallways in this school; most of them played host to staircases. When Chelsea caught sight of Chase, her eyes lit up and then she grinned a very wide - and kind of scary - grin.

"Hey, guys; ready to do this?" He smiled at them both. He was too nice for his own good sometimes. Tikaye rolled her eyes, much like I had and then Chelsea took his fake enthusiasm too seriously and reciprocated with,

"Yeah! Let’s do this!" Tikaye and I looked at each other, suppressing a laugh. Together, we all walked to the hall, which was on the fifth floor of the castle-like structured academy. I still hadn’t gotten used to how big it was.

It was a vast hall, with white wallpaper and varnished wooden floors. It looked perfect for the dance but it wasn’t gothic enough. We had to Goth it up before anyone went dancing in here and I had to give Chelsea some credit. The staircase was a peach-coloured spiral staircase, like you’d see on Cinderella but it was too fairytale to me. They always disguise the end and make it seem like it was happy. But there’s no such thing as happy endings.

"I’ll go get the paint," Tikaye said, trying to get away from Chelsea.

"I’ll go find some black ribbons," I said, also trying to get away from Chelsea and that just left those two - Chase and Chelsea - there to figure something out amongst themselves.

As I was running around like a headless chicken in the dark school, I ran into Anton.

"Careful, Avril," he said as we collided. I felt like I just ran into a brick wall. He had washboard abs. "What are you looking for?" I told him.

"Could you use my help, Avril?"