- Chapter One -


Emily Deaton and her little group of friends held their breath as the dead girl in the plaid skirt walked past them, oblivious to what they were thinking. The transculcent lights were kind to dead, making their skin as pale and even more ghastly as ever. Kamara Simmons shook her head, making her silver teardrop earrings dance among the bright pink spikes of her hair.

"Even I don't wear skirts that short," she said. She took a bite of her egg-salad sandwhich in disgust. "Those dead-heads shouldn't even be on the face of Earth, let alone at school. They should go rot in their nicely-dug graves, where they belong. Not here, with us living kids. They just shouldn't be here, period." Kamara told her small group of friends, and they all nodded their heads in agreement. Everyone except Emily.

"Kamara, don't say that. It's not fair to make fun of them for who they are if it isn't their fault. And you know you're supposed to call them the Nonliving, not 'DeadHeads.'" Now it was Emily's turn to shake her head, making her long, silver-blond hair swing with her. "And besides, Kamy, even though Laura's skirt is short, she's probably a nice girl." Emily said, taking a small sip of her lemonade.

Kamara snorted, "Psh, yeah. Okay," and then she muttered something that sounded like, "A nice - slutty - girl." Emily sighed, slouching in her seat. She wished Kamara, Adam, Kasey and Ryan would just . . understand. Understand that the Nonliving kids are here for a reason, not just to walk around all sulky-ish. The reason, though, Emily did not know.

"I agree with Kam, Emily. She does have a point, if you're not into all of that 'Oh since all those kids are dead why don't we all just be as nice as we can to them' shit." Adam stood up after he said that, his shadow of muscles wrapping around Kasey and Emily like a blanket. "Emily, you're just gonna have to learn they don't belong," with that, he walked over to the conveyor belt that took the lunch trays to the sink, and walked out the doors. Probably to gym, Emily thought.

Emily was getting fired-up at that point. Just because they're not supposed to be. . . real, exactly, doesn't mean that people can just be. . . racist. The vampires, witches, werewolves, wizards, and shapeshifters that went to Cresent-Valley High were really nice. Well, most of them were, anyway. But, no kid had had the courage to go up to one and talk to them with a one-on-one conversation, instead of the worded "Get out of my way, Freak." People just don't get it. And Emily thought that she would probably be dead - or not - before they ever did finally understand. She grabbed her lemonade, swung her backpack over her shoulder and stormed out of the cafeteria, about ready to blow her stack.

Emily ended up in the library, a nice - and quiet - place. There was a Geography report due on Thursday, so she grabbed the most reliable-looking book and sat down in one of the creaky wooden chairs. After she pulled out her notebook, she took her iPod out of her pocket and put her earbuds in; put on the song: 'BloodDrunk' by Children Of Bodom. The few people that were scattered around the room turned her way when they heard the lead-singer loudly singing through her ears; turned away in disinterest.

After Emily was done with her notes on Japan and The Koreas, she gathered up her things and made her way to gym, the last period of the day. She grabbed her bag of gym clothes and made her way into the Girls' Locker Room, changed, and started running laps with the rest of students. Casey met up with Emily at the bus stop.

"Hey, Em." Casey said, flicking her cigarette. She offered Emily one, and she took it.

Emily lit the cigarette, and took a few puffs. "Hi," was her short response.

"Are you okay?" Casey asked, flicking her cigarette. Emily gave her a look, and Casey took that as a no. "Listen, Em, I'm sorry about earlier, but Kamara and Adam are right. Those fucking corpsicles are not supposed to be here. And those bloodsuckers could hurt you in a flash, just like the wolves,"

"What?" Emily asked, putting out her cigarette.

Casey rolled her eyes. "Oh, come on. We all know you have a certain interest in the monsters. You do, too. Those things could snap you in a millisecond. Especially the wizards, with their stupid little wands." she said, flicking her cigarette.

"Whatever."

"Yeah; whatever."

A few minutes later, the yellow bus pulled up to them, and they got on. Emily sat in a seat near the front, where nobody ever sat. She pulled out her iPod once again, and began listening to a song by Three Days Grace. Some people began getting off, and when she saw Caleb Henderson get up, she knew it was her stop. Caleb was a werewolf, although he looked nothing like the ones described in the book Twilight. His light brown hair swept over his forehead, making it look like the 'skater-style.' He had kind-of light skin, but you can tell he got tans easily. His eyes were a dark blue, almost a navy color. That's one thing Emily had always envied about the "Nonhuman" creatures: their eyes. The vampires usually had black, violet, or orange-colored eyes. The wizards had only grey eyes, and they sparkled. The shapeshifters; green. The witches, usually black, or a dark red. And the werewolves: dark-blue, green, or black. Emily had big brown eyes, pale skin (although not as pale as the 'undead' kids), and long, one-length silver/white-blond hair.

The bus pulled up to their stop, and Caleb let her get off first. After Emily walked down her long driveway, she said hello to her mom, grabbed a bottle of Pepsi, and sat down at her desk. The song "Disengage" by Suicide Silence came on when she turned her stereo on. She decided that she might as well finish her report, so she turned her laptop and went to OfficeWork2007.

She finished that quickly, and pushed off her converse. The bed sqeaked when she jumped on her queen-sized bed. Her eyes lingered over the swirls of paint on her ceiling, and then she hear the door downstairs open, and her fathers work-boots on the wooden-floor. The television turned on to the local sports station, and Emily heard the couch groan under her dads' weight. Emily knew that Steven Deaton wouldn't get up from that spot, no unless there was a deathly fire, or her mother was dying.

Emily thought about the presentation that her social studies' class was going to do the next day, and she fell asleep with her stomach twisted in nervousness. She had always hated standing in front of people alone, and the thought oh her standing in front of a whole class and talking brought her into hysterics.

Her mother had been the same way, and whenever Lydia Deaton got nervous like Emily, she cured it by a nice cat-nap.

-[~]-

Emily woke up to the feel of her cell phone vibrating on her chest.

"Hello?" she answered groggly. She sat up on her bed and wiped the sleep away from her eyes. She then checked her alarm clock, and it said that it was 7:30. She could have atleast checked her window, because the dark purple curtain was blowing lightly, and the sun was low in the sky. Even though it was only mid-October, around Clarksville it still held the summer vibe. Little kids were riding their bikes down the winding road, and she could hear their playfull little giggles and squeals.

"Hey Emily, it's Ryan. Kamara has been trying to call you. Are you alright?" he asked. Emily swung her legs over the side of the bed and stood.

"Yea, yea. I just took a little nap," she told him. "What did Kamara want? Is she okay?" She started to panic, because everybody knew that Kamara was one of the clumziest people she has ever met.

"Huh? Oh, yeah, she's fine. She just wanted to know if you had the algebra notes from last Thursday. And I wanted to ask you something, also." Emily sat down at her desk and played with the pencils that were stuffed inside the little black mug beside her computer.

"Well I don't have the notes, so tell her I'm sorry. And what is it that you want to ask me?" she asked.

"Would you like to go to the park with Adam and I? I think we have a lot to talk about," Ryan sighed deeply. Oh boy, Emily thought. What could he possibly want to talk about?

"I didn't think that we were on speaking terms, but okay. What time will you pick me up?" Ryan and Adam never liked to talk about things with others, but maybe Emily was the breaking point for that.

"Um, how about . . . 8:30?" Ryan asked.

"Sure; sounds good. See you then, bye." Before Ryan could bid her goodbye, she hung up eagerly. What should she wear? It was just the park, right?

She went over to her closet and pulled out a pair of black baggy jeans, and an oversized "Slipknot" tee-shirt. Emily put the clothes on and went into the bathroom, which was adjacent to her parents room in the hallway. She got undressed and turned on the hotwater, and jumped in the shower. The shampoo and conditioner took longer than she thought it would have been to wash it all out, but soon enough it did. Her hair smelled like coconut; her body smelled of vanilla. When she finished, she wrapped a large towel around her body and blow-dried her hair. It was already straight, so Emily didn't have to worry about expensive hair products. She did her eyes with the smokey look, and added some eyeliner and mascara. She never wore lip-gloss or anything like that, because her lips looked very pale if she didn't; when she was done, she went into her bedroom and let the towel slip off of her. She pulled on the clothes and added a studded belt so the baggy jeans wouldn't fall off of her slim figure. A moment later, her cell-phone rang. Emily checked the I.D., and it was Ryan.

"Hey." She said, lacing up her ripped converse.

Instead of answering with your average "Hello" he said, "Are you ready? I'll be there in a few minutes."

"Yeah, I'm ready to go," she checked her clock, "but aren't you a little early?"

"Yup. Practice ended early today; Coach Brogle said that we did good all week, so he gave us a break." He told her, and she could hear the rumble of his old rustbucket of a truck getting started.

"Oh, that's good I guess. And okay, I'll be waiting. Bye." She hung up before he could again. There was a knock at her door, so she spun around.

"Hun, you going somewhere?" It was her mom, Lydia.

Emily nodded her head once and told her, "Yeah, with Adam and Ryan. I'll make sure to be home at a decent hour, mom," there was a horn being honked several times outside her window. "Well, they're here. Love ya' mom!"

"Well okay sweetie. Make sure you have your phone. Love you too, baby. Have fun."

Emily grabbed her phone off of her nightstand and ran downstairs and out the door. Ryan and Adam were waiting in Ryan's truck, the music blasting, and the windows rolled down all they could. She got in the back, having trouble getting up on the step.

"Emily, change of plans. We might just go to Adam's house, because the park is over-filled with little girls." Ryan said, turning the volume down.

"Oh yeah, there's a softball tournament today. I forgot to tell you. Sorry." Emily put her arm out the windown, liking the cool breeze she got as they drove down the road to highway, on their way to Adam's huge house.

Adam turned his torso, and faced Emily. She thought he would say something to her, but he just turned back around and looked out at the darkening sky.

After about twenty minutes, they were pulling into Adam's driveway. The put the car in the garage, and Ryan opened the door for Emily, and the three of them walked into Adam's house.

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