***CW: Use of slurs at the end of this chapter.***

 Silas’s summer could be described in one word: Sticky. Southern summers were incredibly humid, he quickly realized. He couldn’t go outside for five seconds without feeling sweaty, his shirt clinging to his back. Then there was the fact that he’d never seen so many bugs in his entire life. Seriously, it was like the bugs only existed to hunt Silas down and bite him. By the end of it, his legs were covered in mosquito bites and he was battling two different cases of poison ivy. Calamine lotion and oatmeal baths were his new best friend.

Isaiah had wheedled his way into Silas’s heart, but not in the way that most people would think. Elizabeth and Jayson figured that they were dating and had tried to ban him from spending the night, although Isaiah snuck in through the window almost every night. They weren’t dating though. Silas had never had a best friend before, so at first, he had confused his feelings toward the human as something like a crush, but it wasn’t that. It wasn’t the same way that he felt about Keir, he didn’t get jealous when Isaiah talked about his celebrity crushes or angry when they were at a party and Isaiah disappeared with another guy. No, they were just best friends. Best friends who occasionally made out. That’s not weird, right?

Before he knew it, it was time for school to start.

He’d met the general teenage population in town from parties that Isaiah dragged him to, but he didn’t know anyone well enough to even consider them acquaintances. In general, they seemed to ignore Silas because he and Isaiah were basically joined at the hip, and Isaiah wasn’t exactly considered popular. He and Isaiah only had one class together, so he couldn’t bank on Isaiah keeping him company. Hopefully, there’d be some interesting humans in his classes, otherwise it was going to be a really boring school year.

Well, as boring as one could hope with werewolves crawling all over the school.

“Are you excited for you first day of school, sweetie?” Michael asked, his voice much more chipper than Silas thought was necessary for so early in the morning. Why the man had decided to call him so early was beyond him. He knew that there was a two-hour difference between them, meaning that for his stepdad, it was five in the morning. Not that he’d ever admit he secretly liked it, even to himself.

Silas hummed as he stepped into the muggy morning air, making sure to lock the door behind him and Ethan. Elizabeth had asked him to walk Ethan to the elementary school, the kid was in fifth grade this year. Ethan was buzzing with excitement, apparently this was the first year he was permitted to walk. He ran ahead to the other kids in the neighborhood, who also begun their two-block trek to the elementary school. “I have to walk to school.” He whined lightly, “Do you think Dad would buy me a car?”

“You’d have to ask him that yourself.” Michael answered noncommittally, though they both knew the answer would be yes. The Erebus name was not short of money, and his father could probably buy fifteen cars without it making a dent in his deep pockets. "We could probably look around for cars next time we visit. Now answer my question.”

“Sure, I’m so excited to be around teenage humans all day and learn stuff that I will never use in my life.” He grumbled, and Michael responded by calling him a brat.

“You know your father only makes you go to school for socialization. You and Nyx would both be more hermits than him if he allowed it.” The mention of his brother instantly grated on his nerves. Nyx had called a few times over the summer, but the conversation was always stilted and awkward. They’d never been particularly close, but they’d grown even farther apart since Keir. Keir had called exactly twice, and only to say that he missed him and then go on a rant about something Nyx did to upset him.

That always put him in a bad mood for the rest of the day.

“He should send us to a school for witches then.” He grumbled, even though he knew why his dad would never do that. Silas could hear the sound of feet slapping against the concrete as they approached him, and he turned just in time for Isaiah to slam into him with a stupid grin on his face. Another morning person who shouldn’t be so damn cheery. He quickly said goodbye to Michael and greeted Isaiah as if he hadn’t seen him but an hour ago when he slipped out of his window to avoid getting caught.

His first morning at a new school was boring. He and Isaiah had exactly one class together for last period, so they quickly went their separate ways. He was forced to participate in a few ice breakers, but for the most part, it seemed the humans were avoiding him. He supposed that it was because his aura screamed danger, even to the humans. He’d seen a few werewolves too, obviously, and they mostly sneered as he passed, but otherwise didn’t approach him.

“Oh hey.” He greeted as he approached his desk in third period, assigned seating. The guy sitting in the desk paired with his looked up, and Silas recognized him. Alpha Aurora’s son, the one who’d driven him home from the pack that day. His eyes were wide, making him resemble a deer caught in headlights. Silas didn’t think he was that intimidating, but the puppy was looking at him like he was about to eat his soul. He decided not to say anything about it. “We’ve met before. Camden, right?”

Camden blinked, and Silas thought he saw a flicker of sadness in his brown eyes. “Cohen. It says it on the sticky note.”

“Right. Sorry.” He sat down, ignoring the way the dude was staring at him. He really was a strange one.

Class was sluggish, just another day of going over the syllabus and playing yet another icebreaker. Everyone was pretty quiet, probably still trying to get a feel of the teacher’s limits before they started misbehaving. She seemed pretty chill, wearing a cardigan despite that it was August, and talked about reading Romeo and Juliet this year with reverence, like it was the height of English literature.

Things came to a lull at the end of class, she finished what she had to say for the day, leaving an awkward few minutes where people talked quietly to each other or played on their phones. Cohen was noticeably fidgeting beside him, had been all class when he wasn’t actively staring at Silas. He figured it was probably the dude’s werewolf instincts going haywire being so close to a natural enemy, but there was nothing malicious about it. He didn’t seem to be holding himself back from attacking Silas, he was just… nervous.

“How are you liking it here?” Cohen asked, so quietly that Silas wondered for a second if he’d actually said anything. But when he glanced over, the wolf was looking at him expectantly.

“You know.” Silas shrugged. “I think the bugs are out to get me.”

“Oh…”

“I haven’t harmed any humans, if that’s what you’re really asking.”

“No, just… last time I spoke to you, you seemed upset about being here.”

Silas turned to study him, trying to figure out exactly what the werewolf’s angle was.

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

The following weeks were boring. He got used to this new school, sat with Isaiah and his friends (a group of strange humans that he was surprised to get along with), and promptly ignored the werewolf in his English class. He hadn’t spoken to Silas since the first day, not even during their partner discussions of Animal Farm. The teacher, Ms. Smith, had scolded them for not participating, so the next time he just rambled about how stupid the book was. Honestly, he understood that it was supposed to be a story about the dangers of communism, but it was downright creepy. Just the idea of animals talking and taking over made a shiver crawl down his spine. Keir had maintained his ability to speak to animals when he was resurrected, and he’d always hated when the other had a conversation with a bird or a dog. It was unsettling. Then again, Cohen literally turned into a giant wolf on a regular basis, which was also kind of weird.

It was around the third week of school when he first started to get bullied. That statement in itself was laughable, considering that it was a group of humans, but Silas didn’t have a better word for it.

School had ended only fifteen minutes before, but the school was practically empty. Isaiah had tried to convince him to go to the school’s GSA club at the end of last period, which he was head of, apparently. Silas had promptly refused. He had no intentions of being at school any longer than he had to be, and frankly, he was tired of being around humans at the moment. He wanted to go home and make potions, not meet all the other LGBTQ+ kids of the school. After realizing he wasn’t going to budge, Isaiah had finally let him begin his walk home alone. It was when he was about to leave one of the side doors of the building that he ran into “trouble.”

A group of boys were standing near the exit, the kind of boys who thought they were hot shit because their dad’s owned boats and they were going to go to a good school and never leave the country in their short human lives. Generally, they didn’t do more than watch him with contempt in their eyes. Then again, he didn’t generally pass them alone in a deserted corridor.

“Hey, where’s your tranny girlfriend?” One sneered.

The question surprised him, if not because of the blatant transphobic-ness of the words, but also because they were speaking to him like that. It was like they had no survival instincts whatsoever. Still, he decided not to dignify it with a response, continuing on his way.

He didn’t get too far. Suddenly a hand was gripping his shoulder and slamming him into a wall. “I asked you a question, queer.” The boy sneered.

Silas reminded himself that he couldn’t hurt humans, even when they were being pests.

So instead he brushed the hand gripping his shoulder off, smirking in a way that came off cocky. “Asking because you’re jealous? It’s okay, he doesn’t mind sharing.” Then he ducked as the boy swung at him, having to run to keep them from bruising his pretty face.

Looks like he’d have to learn how to avoid humans rather than the other way around. How inconvenient.