At Homeroom today, Mrs. Henderson told us she had three very exciting announcements:
Today we will be having a special health talk straight after homeroom. The boys will stay in class while the girls will go to the auditorium for a combined session with girls from other classes. Tomorrow there will be a special assembly with some band performances promoting the High School Battle of the Bands and a Spring Concert. The Student Council was taking early flower orders and song requests for Valentine's Day.
Starting from $10, you could have flowers delivered to someone special in school with a note.
For $5, you could request a song which would be broadcast to the whole school with your message read along with it.
Money collected would go to the Student Activity Fund. Since Valentine's Day was on a Sunday, we would be celebrating on Friday.
Flower orders were due by the end of the week. Song requests were on a first-come, first-served basis.
Mrs. Henderson asked Liam to pass out the brochure from the student council.
The class was naturally abuzz with excitement.
I felt Maria's dark flame next to me flicker. She was excited. I would never have expected Valentine's Day to be a thing for vamps, but this was Maria we were talking about.
"Don't forget to go for the health talk after this!" Mrs. Henderson reminded us as she left the classroom early. I assumed she had more marking to do.
The moment she left, the buzzing intensified, and the classroom erupted into a flurry of movement, punctuated with short exclamations, mostly about the Valentine's Day event.
Maria continued staring straight ahead with her creepy smile, but I didn't particularly want to ask. I felt sure it would be something to do with Dino.
My middle school didn't officially celebrate Valentine's Day. The principal actually banned it because we were too young to be wasting our time and money on these things and should focus on our studies instead.
Green Leaf Academy celebrated Valentine's Day with a V-Day Dance for its middle and high school sections. It was a big deal every year.
Kids could go to the dance as a group of friends or with "dates," who the principal referred to as "special friends." The kids were even allowed to take a non-student plus-one on the condition that the plus-one was from one of our local packs and had parents sign a consent form.
I went with Dean in our second year. Dad was surprisingly chill about it. He signed the consent form, remarking that we were just pups practicing for the real thing.
Practicing for what real thing? After Dad said that, I didn't feel too comfortable about it anymore. Mum said not to go too far, like just holding hands and dancing was fine. This made me feel really uncomfortable because I wasn't planning on holding hands or dancing.
After getting dressed up with Savy and taking photos, Beta Lucas drove us to the school together with his kids.
I met Dean there, and since I flat-out refused to dance, we just sat on the curb outside the hall talking all night.
Dean told me how, at the dance last year, some of the other boys stripped him and left him in the girls' toilet. He was stuck there until some of the high school girls heard him crying and helped him. I wanted to hunt down these boys and beat them up immediately, but Dean said he didn't want to make a scene at the dance.
We also talked about random other things, like spring... and what we could do once spring came. I really can't remember the rest of it, but eventually, Savy, Lizzy, Ben, and Drew had joined us on the curb.
Oh yeah, Drew had a big crush on Savy that year. Hahahaha. It was pretty cute. He was always hanging around her and would come report to her whenever another girl dropped him a love note or flower.
Savy just pretended she didn't notice.
Ben showed me how to chew ice into tiny pieces and use our straws to shoot it at passing kids. The tiny piece of ice would hit them and melt; they'd spin around, and we'd put our straws back in our cups and pretend to be drinking and minding our own business. After that, we decided to target the teachers... which went well until I hit the principal (how would I know which adult was the principal?).
Ben apologized for it, taking the rap, and was let off with a warning. I got mad at Ben for taking my rap, but Lizzy told me to leave it. Ben was the middle school's star pupil, so it wouldn't hurt him. Plus, it was really Ben's fault for teaching me that stupid boys' game to begin with.
It was a fun game. Why didn't the girls play it?
After the dance, middle school students had to stay back to clean up. The high school section had planned and done the setup, so the middle school section had to do the cleanup while the high school kids went off for after-parties and sleepovers. It was the school's tradition. I suspected this was the main reason why the middle schoolers got invited, though.
So I stayed back to help too, especially since Savy, Lizzy, and Ben were all down for cleaning up, and it was weird just sitting down and watching them pick up the trash.
I folded the tables and stacked the chairs because I was taller and stronger than the other kids my age. Then I took out the large black bags of trash with Drew, Jonah, and some of the bigger guys.
The next year, Dean and I had a major rift. It was so major, we didn't talk for half a year.
Basically, Dean wanted to travel around the world with his guitar and asked me to go with him. I told him I needed to stay with the pack because I was going to be the next Alpha.
He said that I was a girl, so I couldn't become an Alpha. I told him that I didn't want to leave our pack anyway.
He said that he was disappointed that I wouldn't be there for him. I told him that I was the Alpha, and the pack had to come first.
Later on, we realized we had no idea why we stopped talking to each other just because of that. We just did... sort of like right now. Since the jacket incident, I still hadn't really talked to Dean.
This year would be Savy's last year of middle school. I wasn't really planning on going this year either. It wasn't my school, and besides the excitement of getting dressed up with Savy, there wasn't much else at the dance that I couldn't do with my gang on a regular weekend.
It wasn't like I was actually going to dance.
Coach Williams came into the classroom and told us girls to skedaddle. He was about to have a man-to-man talk with the guys.
"Hey, no fair!" Terrence complained. "Why do the girls get special treatment?"
The girls laughed, and we were soon along the corridors with other girls, chatting and giggling toward the auditorium.
As far as I could tell, all the homerooms received the same three announcements. The health talk auditorium was buzzing with ideas and plans for V-day.
"What should we do for Valentine's Day?" one of the girls in our class wanted to know.
We were waiting for the guest speaker to set up. They had a video to show us, but they were having technical issues. The lady speaker apologized a few times, but it wasn't like any of us minded.
Every year, a team of nurses would travel to most of the schools on our continent, giving health talks to the girls from middle to high school. It was always the same talk about puberty and being safe.
After that, we get a small gift, usually a couple of sample sanitary pads, although I heard they also sometimes included tampons to high school girls. It always came with a little informational booklet. Last year, they also included a small bag to carry your pads in.
"We could make chocolates for the boys," one girl said.
"Should we make a V-Day song dedication to our class?" another girl asked.
Abigail gave it some thought. "What do you think, Jasmine?"
Jasmine was glowing with excitement next to me. "We could play secret angels. Like draw lots and buy something for someone in class. This way, everyone would get something on Valentine's Day."
"Who do you think would get the most chocolates?" Pearl asked.
"Liam for sure," the random girls said.
"Arlene would probably get a lot of flowers," Pearl said, flashing the other girl a wide smile.
Arlene smiled back and shrugged. "I don't know..."
"Come on," Pearl continued. "I bet you get lots of gifts every Valentine's Day."
"Of course she would," Zara said. "She's so pretty all the boys are like bees to honey."
"Valentine's Day is so troublesome," Krystal said with a sigh. "Now I need to get a boyfriend."
"What happened to that Fred guy?" Zara asked.
"I don't know... maybe I should get back with him," Krystal considered.
"I wonder if I could get a boyfriend by Valentine's Day too," Zara started worrying.
"Why do you need a boyfriend?" I asked.
"Because spending Valentine's Day by yourself is lonely," Zara told me.
"And if you had a boyfriend, he would have to take you out for a meal and buy you an expensive present," Krystal said.
"What are you doing with your prince charming?" Zara asked me.
Who?
Oh right. Harvey.
"Nothing," I answered honestly. "He's not my boyfriend or anything."
"Did you two break up?" Zara asked.
"We weren't like that to begin with, you know," I said.
"They broke up," Krystal concluded knowingly. "That's what they always say when it's over."
I decided to just leave it at that, but Krystal wasn't done yet. "It's okay, Zammi, we can look for boyfriends together."
"Or you can go out with Marcus," Zara said.
"Or Henry," Pearl added with a wide smile. "Henry is always extra nice to you."
"I don't want a boyfriend," I said. Then I suddenly remembered Bell. Uh oh. Was I expected to do something for my Luna? Dad bought Mum roses every year...
"I'm thinking of making chocolates," Jasmine said.
"I volunteer to eat your rejects," I quipped.
Jasmine laughed. "Okay, but I planned to make you some too. I wanted to use it to say thank you to everyone."
"If you get a boyfriend, you won't have to eat rejects. He would buy you expensive chocolates or a watch or a necklace," Krystal said.
I seriously doubt a fight dog could afford to buy you anything.
I shrugged. "You can't eat a watch or a necklace."
The girls laughed even though I wasn't entirely joking.
"What are you planning to do this Valentine's Day?" Jasmine asked me.
Nothing. Because it was troublesome. But then I remembered how the Lorents gave gifts with gracious words in a card.
Suddenly, I thought this might be a good time to say thank you to the people who had been running with me.
"I'll think about it," I promised Jasmine.
Abigail, who had been thinking about it, finally said, "Okay! Here are our class rules for Valentine's Day. You can give gifts to anyone you want, but any girl who wants to give a gift must also give gifts to all the other girls in our class. This way, all our class girls will go home with gifts, and no one would have to feel bad."
The other girls all felt this would be for the best.
Even the cool girls thought it was a good idea.
I looked at Jasmine and Pearl. I guess Jasmine was going to give everyone a gift anyway. Pearl was still smiling broadly. "That would make all the girls in our class look really popular."
Really? Even if it was given because of a class rule Abigail made up?
The technical difficulty was solved, and the health talk was ready to begin.
"Wow, girls," the lady speaker started, "You are all so excited today. I'm very excited to be here too."
I guess she thought we were excited to hear the health talk, but I'm just going to skip the rest of it, because you probably heard some variation of it before anyway.
And to be honest, I wasn't paying attention. I was a little excited and a little panicked about Valentine's Day. This year, I was actually going to do something. I didn't know what yet, but it would come with a card so I could thank them. And I probably needed something just in case Mate dream-traveled over on V-Day.
I know! I'll ask Savy! We could make whatever it was together. Plus, Savy could actually bake.
I used the rest of the time to make a list of all the people I wanted to thank. I wrote it within the health talk printouts because I didn't want any of my Betas to find it in my calendar or anything.
I bet they were going to be surprised!