That Monday, Aspen lazily made her way through the school. Her classes blurred together and she found herself drifting off from time to time. She thought back to the glowing red orbs she had seen the other night and she tried to figure out what it could be. Was it just a rippled reflection of the stoplight down the street? That would make sense. Or maybe she just imagined the whole thing. She's done that plenty of times before. Her eyes just loved to play tricks on her. It was typically nothing more than a mere afterimage of light, but the red orbs were ingrained in her memory, and she was dying to know what they were.

The bell rang, shaking Aspen out of her haze. She gathered up her textbooks and shoved them into her bag, barely acknowledging Coach Finnstock's obnoxious comments as she brushed past him. She hurried to her locker and when she closed the door she immediately recognized the presence of two annoying males.

" Stiles, Scott, to what do I owe this pleasure?" The annoyance in her voice was clear. She just wasn't in the mood for nonsense today. She wanted a nice day all to herself. She was still getting used to the area after all, she just wanted time to adjust before she was thrust into a whole bunch of friendships.

" We just wanted to say hi to our friend, what's so suspicious about that?" Stiles questioned, causing Aspen to cross her arms and raise her brows at him.

" Okay, I just wanted to know what happened with Allison and Derek the other night. I don't trust him." Scott replied honestly. Aspen could hear the concern in his voice and she sighed, her avoidance of new friendships would have to start later. He was so much like a puppy. It frustrated her to see him hurt. Might as well tell him the truth, him and Allison were pretty good together.

" I have no idea what happened Scott. I didn't accept his offer for a ride home, but when I asked him about it he said nothing fishy happened." She explained, walking past the two boys towards her last class.

" Wait! When did you see Derek again?" Scott almost yelled. She paused, glancing back at him to see a look of confusion cross his face. Why did he care? Derek was just an obnoxious guy with a superiority complex. As far as she was concerned, he was no threat to Scott and Allison.

" I saw him over the weekend. He insulted my car, so I brushed him off when he tried talking to me." Aspen shrugged, walking away as the boys stood back in confusion.

Weird.


After school was over, Lydia ended up cornering Aspen at her locker and tricked her into joining her to watch lacrosse practice after school. Lydia was insistent on mending the relationship between Aspen and Pete after the 'accident' at her party. Apparently Pete had talked about how lame Aspen was and Lydia was outraged at the idea that her friend wasn't willing to cater to lacrosse boy's every need.

" You two have to get together, he's totally perfect for you." Lydia gossiped as she dragged Aspen out onto the bleachers. Perfect for Aspen? Lydia had just met her a few days ago, how would she know who was perfect for her. She probably couldn't even name Aspen's favorite book. Or what she does when she's completely alone. Nobody at that school was perfect for her. But since when does everything have to convey perfection?

" Not even in the slightest. Besides, someone else has caught my eye." Aspen responded, playing with a loose string on her sleeve.

" WHO?" Lydia whispered loudly. Aspen opened her mouth to respond, but stopped when she noticed that Scott had gone still on the field. She gestured towards the field as she ignored Lydia's question.

" What's wrong?" Aspen asked, straightening up to try and get a better look as Stiles rushed out onto the field. He whispered something in his friend's ear and they both ran off towards the locker room.

" Who knows? Scott's a freak." Lydia responded, not even bothering to look after where the two boys disappeared.

" Now tell me who it is!" Lydia insisted, poking Aspen in the side repeatedly until Aspen spoke.

" I've got to go Lydia." Aspen said, hopping off the bleachers and going after the two boys.

She stumbled into the hallway and paused, listening for their location. A noise clattered from the locker room and Aspen tried to shove the door open, but it was locked.

" Stiles! Scott! Are you guys okay?" She hollered, pounding on the door with her fist.

After a few moments, the door clicked and Stiles slipped into the hall. He grabbed Aspen by the elbow and led her away from the locker room. He guided her into an empty classroom and shut the door behind them.

" I told you Stiles, not interested." Aspen scoffed, Stiles just rolled his eyes at her as he paced around the room. Aspen hopped up on the teacher's desk, brushing away the cluttered papers so she could comfortably lounge about as Stiles wasted her time.

" You need to stay away from Derek." Stiles finally said, coming around full circle to be face to face with Aspen.

" How the hell did you even know about that?" Aspen questioned. She didn't see what the big deal was. She had only spoken to Derek twice, she was sure that nothing would come out of it but it wasn't a crime for a girl to crush.

" I know more than you do. Derek is a bad guy, Aspen. Like REALLY bad." Stiles had his hands on Aspen's shoulders at this point and he shook her for emphasis.

" How bad?" Aspen asked, gently brushing Stiles' hands off her shoulders.

" Like REALLY bad. Like a whole lot of badness. Like if you took all the bad in the world and put it into one bad person, you'd get Derek." Aspen just rolled her eyes at him. Stiles sighed.

" That body in the woods… that was Derek's doing." Stiles whispered. There was a note of worry in his tone and Aspen could see it in his eyes.

" Okay, that's pretty bad. I'll stay away from him. It's not like I'm chasing after him anyways, he's the one that keeps popping up in unwanted places." Aspen exclaimed, throwing her arms up and rolling her eyes.

" Just stay away from him, promise?" Stiles held up his pinky and winked and Aspen let out a laugh, linking pinkies with Stiles.

" I promise."


Aspen didn't arrive at home until late that night. By the time she got home from her first shift at 'Betsy's Books', Oliver was already passed out on the couch with the TV still on. Aspen clicked it off and walked over to the fridge, hoping for some leftovers. She yanked open the fridge, finding a box of leftover Chinese food with a note reading 'dinner'. She shut the fridge, opening up the box quickly as her other hand searched for a fork.

She vacuumed up the food in minutes and went searching through the pantry for a snack before she started her homework. Grabbing a box of Oreos, she snatched her backpack off the floor and quietly snuck upstairs. She pushed her door open using her hip and tossed her bag and the box of Oreos on the bed.

She snatched a pair of pajamas off the floor and strutted into the bathroom, closing the door behind her. She changed into a loose t-shirt and shorts and turned on the water to wash her face.

She emerged from her bathroom a few minutes later and climbed into bed, flipping open her laptop to finish off her homework. Once she finished she decided to do a little research.

She knew there was something off about Beacon Hills, and she needed to know what that was. Scott had been acting super weird the past few days and she suspected something was up. The way he just miraculously became a pro at lacrosse, and how he seemed to be almost fighting something off earlier on the field. It seemed almost like he was fighting himself.

Aspen searched for any weird drugs that could change a person like that and came up with nothing. So maybe drugs weren't Scott's thing. But what was going on with him? Aspen shut her laptop, curling up and shutting off the lights. The last thought on her mind before she drifted off to sleep was the image of the floating red orbs.


Aspen woke up the next morning to hear that Derek had been arrested for the murder of the Jane Doe in the woods. She had expected to hear it on the news, but instead she heard it through the several voice mails and twenty texts from Stiles. Her phone vibrated so much it nearly made its way off the counter.

Oliver left early that morning for work, leaving Aspen alone until her shift at Betsy's Books later that night. Aspen spent the length of her morning ditching school and stretched out on the couch with the package of Oreos from the previous night lying on her stomach. When noon rolled around, Aspen decided to give Stiles a call back.

" Aspen! Where have you been, you aren't at school? I was just about to call you again! Actually, I was just about to drive over to your house to see if you were okay." Stiles began to ramble and Aspen was immediately confused.

" Is there a reason why you are freaking out?" Aspen questioned, becoming increasingly annoyed with Stiles' random rants.

" YES! Scott thinks that Derek was watching you last night. Then he threatened me with it when I was interrogating him in my dad's cop car!" Stiles replied as if it was the most obvious answer.

" Oh shit, are you serious? Damn that guy's got to work on his creep factors. It's too high for the amount of hotness." Aspen mused, popping another Oreo into her mouth.

" What? No, listen, I'm coming over anyways, I lost Scott and I need some help figuring out where he'd go. I'll be there in thirty seconds." Stiles replied, hanging up.

Seconds later the front door swung open and Stiles came rushing in, closing and locking it behind him. He spun around only to freeze in place. Aspen was still in her pajamas from the night before, which consisted of a loose t-shirt and underwear, nothing else. Stiles' eyes swept over her figure, lingering on her long legs and finally settling on her annoyed expression plastered on her face.

" I'm gonna go put on some pants, maybe if you had given me a warning and knocked, this wouldn't be so AWKWARD!" She yelled at Stiles as she sprinted upstairs.

Aspen emerged from her bedroom minutes later in the same t-shirt and some yoga pants. Stiles had made himself at home and was currently snacking on her Oreos.

" So why weren't you wearing pants?" Stiles questioned.

" Why are you?" Aspen replied, sticking her tongue out and causing Stiles to turn beet red.

He was about to reply when his phone started buzzing on the glass coffee table, echoing through the whole house. He snatched it up and read the message on the screen before tossing it back on the couch and popping another Oreo in his mouth.

" Found him, he's fine." Stiles mumbled between Oreos.

" And you are still here because…?" Aspen questioned.

" I'm keeping you company!" Stiles replied, rolling his eyes at her angered expression.

" I have work in an hour. Get out." Aspen hissed, grabbing Stiles by his arm and dragging him, quite easily actually, out the front door, slamming it shut behind him. She looked back at the coffee table, opened the door again and snatched the Oreos out of Stiles' hands before slamming it again.

She hated to admit it, but she loved messing with Stiles. He was actually kind of cute when he wasn't barging in on her pants-less. Maybe if he stopped with the whole 'Derek's a murderer' thing she would actually hang out with him. Oh well, he wasn't about to do that anytime soon so why bother thinking about it.


With a half-hour left until closing, Aspen had resorted to doing the little bit of homework she had in order to keep her grades up. Betsy had left her in charge after Bill had a little accident at home. Aspen hadn't paid too much attention, all she could really pick out was something about a chicken and some other southern thing she had no clue about.

She scribbled down the answer to her chemistry problem and glanced up at the sound of the bell ringing. A boy with short curly hair and blue eyes immediately disappeared behind one of the shelves. Aspen chewed on her bottom lip, recognizing him, but unable to come up with a name.

He peaked around the corner with a book in hand, glancing up at her for a second before replacing that book with a different one. Isaac! That was his name. He was in her Chemistry class, the only class she had with the sophomores.

" Hey, Isaac! Can I help you find anything?" At the sound of her voice, the boy nervously dropped the book in his hand and muttered an apology.

" Oh, um, hey Aspen, no, I'm just, uh, looking." Aspen smiled. The boy's stuttering was adorable.

" At pirate romance erotica novels?" She questioned, looking at the book he had dropped on the floor. His face turned red as he mumbled an apology.

" I'm just messing with you. But really, what are you interested in?" Besides pirate romance erotica novels, she thought to herself with a smile.

" Um, do you have any textbooks, I kind of dropped one of mine in the rain the other day…" Isaac muttered with a small smile. Aspen nodded, hopping onto the counter and flipping her legs around before sliding off and bounding to a section of books in the very back of the store.

" Which one do you need?" She questioned, unlocking a cabinet that contained several fairly used copies of the local high school's textbooks. Betsy kept them down there so she could trick people into buying the newer ones for more money before eventually filling the shelves with the undesirables.

" Chemistry and American Literature." Isaac replied, pointing out two used books under the counter.

" I'll give you these ones, they're cheaper." Aspen explained as she pulled out one copy of each textbook. She carried them over to the counter and used the swinging door to enter the back this time. She emerged a moment later with the books in tow. She set them on the counter as she searched for a sturdy enough bag behind the counter.

" I can carry them, it's fine." Isaac mumbled nervously and Aspen nodded in understanding.

" Alright, that will be $60 then." Aspen rang up his books and handed them to him as he pulled out a wad of crumpled up fives and ones. He gave a sheepish smile and Aspen accepted the crumpled up cash, smoothing it out before she counted it and entered it into the register.

" Have a nice night, Isaac." Aspen said, watching as he picked up his two used textbooks and walked out the front door, the bell clinging with a satisfying ring.

Twenty minutes later she began to circle the store, shelving the books that people had either sold back or donated earlier that day. When she was finished with that, she pulled out the mop and went about cleaning the shop. With five minutes left in her shift, she bagged the money in the register and locked it in the safe that Betsy kept hidden in the back. She paused when she heard the bell ring from the front of the store. She had already flipped the sign so she knew that whoever had decided to enter didn't care if they were open or not.

She hesitantly snuck around the corner and noticed a dark looming figure slip behind one of the bookshelves. She froze, reaching for her chemistry book to use as a weapon as a flash of a shadow came from further down the row. She glanced down at her cellphone on the counter and looked back up to see a familiar but excruciatingly unwelcome face standing in front of her.

" Derek? What the hell are you doing here? Aren't you in jail?" Aspen questioned, backing away from the counter and towards the back room as he hopped over the counter with ease and glared at her retreating figure.

" We need to talk." Derek growled as his hand shot out and blocked her escape route. She glanced in the other direction but he caught on and slammed his other hand on the wall behind her. She was trapped in his arms and shaking with nerves.

"I'm good." Aspen smiled and slammed the chemistry textbook down on Derek's manhood. He crumpled over in pain and she took that as her chance to bolt. She darted into the back room and out the back door, snatched her keys off the table and didn't stop running until she reached her car.

" You're more annoying than Stiles." A voice said behind her and suddenly she was yanked backwards before being pushed up against her car. She was face to face with the fairly rude green-eyed murderer and her cell phone was still inside. She mentally swore at herself, seeing as how the other day, she didn't think he had actually committed the murder, but now she was seeing him in a whole new light.

" Get away from me!" Aspen screamed, thrashing out from underneath him as his grip on her tightened.

" Listen! I didn't do it, and Scott and Stiles need to tell you what's really going on. Then maybe you'll get what's going on around here." Derek snarled, pushing himself off her and turning to walk away.

She was left there, shaking as she tried to process what had just happened. It wasn't until a familiar soft voice interrupted her thoughts that she realized she was still standing against her car.

" Aspen, are you okay? Who was that guy?" She lifted her eyes to see Isaac standing in front of her, concern lacing his blue eyes. She sighed, rubbing her eyes before she stood up and walked back towards the bookstore to grab her phone.

" Come with me, I don't want to be alone." Aspen explained, turning back around and taking Isaac's hand in hers as she led him back into the shop.

After she grabbed her phone, she let go of Isaac's hand. Gathering the rest of her school supplies and shoving them into her bag. She went and locked the front door and turned back to see Isaac staring at her. He blushed and quickly looked back at his feet.

" You need a ride home?" Aspen asked as she led him back out the back door and onto the street.

" I actually was just heading there, you don't have to though." Isaac mumbled, causing Aspen to automatically decide that she was going to do exactly that.

She pulled up at the address Isaac had given her and he gave her a quick thank you before moving to exit her car. Her hand shot out and she grabbed his arm, causing him to jump slightly. She made a split decision right then and leaned in to give him a kiss on the cheek.

" Thanks, for staying with me." Aspen smiled, pulling back and watching as a huge smile spread across his face as he stumbled out of her car.

She laughed at his goofy smile before driving off and arriving home twelve minutes later. She pulled into the driveway, sleepily crawled up the porch steps and slipped into the house unnoticed. She made her way upstairs and collapsed on her bed seconds later, the exhaustion overcoming her as she slipped into blissful dreams of boys with blue eyes.