O N E

M O O N S T R U C K:  mentally deranged, supposedly by the influence of the moon (see: Aaemi's driving)

Road rage has always been a serious weakness of mine. I absolutely couldn't stand drivers who challenged me for a spot on the road. Even before I could drive, I'd jump around in the back seat yelling instructions at the driver. Call me an aggressive driver, but I will engage in battle without even blinking. Blame it on my chronic urge to rule the road.

So when a glossy black sports car slunk in front of me, cutting me off without any indication, causing me to slam on the brakes, I almost spit fire. Several curse words rang in my head as my wolf growled annoyance. I settled my hands on the steering wheel securely and leaned forward in my seat just a smidge. My mouth curled into a smile.

“Aaemi,” Justin Blake whined as he caught the glint in my eyes, “come on. It's the first day of school. Just let it go.” My pack mate sat next to me, he'd been watching the entire thing and now his hand closed over his seatbelt in hopes of self-preservation.

I turned to him, then back at the black car in front of me, trying to convince myself that I didn't need this kind of adrenaline rush on our first day of school. But then the car broke sharply, even though there was clearly no one in front of us, and paused there teasingly for at least two seconds.

My eyes lit in glee. The car was asking for it.

“Damn,” Justin tipped his head back, smacking it against the headrest several times as I jerked the steering wheel to the left and sped into the other lane. I barely missed the car but I was kind of disappointed I didn't scrape off any paint. The shiny finish flashed in the sunlight as we sped past it. I glanced at the windows. They were as heavily tinted as mine, but I flipped the driver off anyways.

“Careful,” Justin yelped as I swooped into our previous lane, in front of the black car this time. The horn bellowed from behind us.

The sound of the obnoxiously loud trumpet from the car made our younger packmate Angel Clark, who had previously been sleeping draped across the back seat, jump upright in surprise.

“What's going on?” She cried, swaying a little as I slowed my speed down to a crawl. More honking ensured as the car tried switching lanes to overtake me. My wolf growled. Don't let them win.

Like hell, I was going to.

I jerked the steering wheel to the right and cut them off again. That earned me another round of pissed off honking. I laughed.

“Aaemi.” Angel shoved light blond hair out of her face, “are you quarreling with someone again?” She asked, in the rear view mirror I could see her grab her seat to keep herself from falling off of it.

“Quarreling? You are probably the only person in the universe that uses that word, Angel.” I said, my eyes darting from the car's position on the road to my speedometer. I've gotten my share of tickets, and even though most of them laid unpaid in my glove box, I wasn't not too fond of the pink slips.

“I think the word is appropriate in this situation,” Angel muttered. I heard her rustling around on the ground for something. Probably her phone so she could complain to Jaron about this.
“Oh god,” Justin turned green as I spun our car into a dizzying turn where only my werewolf reflexives kept me from crashing. Angel clutched her head but I kept my eyes glued on the car behind us who seemed to be slowing down in defeat.

The headlights flashed once.

Surrender.

Grinning, I stepped on the gas pedal and shot forward. My wolf howled in triumph but one pained groan from Angel had me plastering a half-apologetic smile onto my face as I caught her eyes in the rear view mirror.

“I'm sorry,” I said sheepishly, slowing my speed down now that the car was out of sight.

“You're really not.” Angel brushed off my apology and beside me, Justin nodded in agreement. I scoffed but didn't deny it. I enjoyed that. The bastard deserved it.

“We're almost there,” I said, noticing just how close we were to the school, “Nervous?”

I didn't need to ask, I could smell the citrus tinge of nervousness that rolled off their bodies. This was our first time attending a school that accepted shifters, we didn't have to hide who we were, and there was something nerve-racking about attending a school knowing you may not be the strongest person there.

“You'll be fine,” I said, mostly to Angel. She was a grade lower that Justin and I, and she had to face her entire graduating class by herself while Justin had me to keep him company. “It's just school. Since when did we give a ?”

“I like school,” Angel said quietly. I couldn't turn around to look at her because I was currently trying to maneuver around what appeared to be a truck with a giant plastic cockroach hanging on the hood, but I directed my Alpha Current in Angel's direction in hopes of reassuring