Author's Note: A lot of info at the end of this chapter. Be sure to check it out after enjoying the feature presentation!
Chapter Seven
Kate's morning seemed to slowly drag by with "The Dream" still in her mind. She ate breakfast slowly, she responded slowly, she even talked slowly! It did not take too long for Kate's family to realize that something was wrong.
Winston could not take it any longer, so he spoke up. "Kate, is something troubling you?"
Kate had zoned into a trance. When her father spoke, she snapped out of it. "Oh! Wha-what?!"
Winston repeated the question.
"Oh, not really," Kate answered, "I just had a weird dream last night and can't remember anything about it."
"Oh, I HATE it when that happens!" Eve blurted out.
Winston shook his head and then continued the conversation, "You can't remember a thing at all?"
Kate could not remember a single thing EXCEPT the fact that Humphrey was somehow involved in her dream. Unfortunately, Kate's parents did not know that Kate had met Humphrey. This was a BIG problem. How Kate would work herself out of this one is currently a mystery even to the author.
"Well…" Kate racked her brain. "I… I guess not."
"Awww, that's too bad," Lilly said. "I like hearing other wolves' dreams!"
"Right." Kate said. "Well, I can't remember it, I haven't the slightest clue as to what it was about, so that is that!" Kate then rapidly ate her caribou share and got up from her sitting position. "So," she continued with meat in her mouth, "Am I ungrounded now?"
Winston looked at Eve. "What do you think?"
Eve shrugged. "Maybe, if she behaves…" Eve thought for a second. "Well, she did accept her punishment and sit in the corner all day yesterday. Okay, you can go out IF you behave! Deal?"
Kate thought for a second with her paw on her chin. "Define 'behave,'" she finally said.
"KATE!" Eve yelled.
"YES MA'AM!" Kate answered.
Eve smiled at Winston as Kate left the den. "Such a good little daughter we have," she said in her sweet voice.
With wide eyes, Winston nodded his head and then exited the den to go and make sure that all the alphas were doing what they were supposed to be doing.
When Kate got outside of the den, she breathed in the fresh, midmorning air and set off to find her friends. Before long, she found Carly and Nicki down at the stream. They were talking to each other, of course.
Approaching her friends, Kate jumped in on the conversation. "Hey girls, what's up?"
Carly laughed. "A ha! Actually, we were talking about you and Humphrey."
"CARLY! REALLY?!" Kate said startled to hear this news. "You know it's just a teensy weensy crush, right?"
"Sure it is," Nicki said. "So what do you say when we tell you that we're going over to play with them in a few minutes and aren't inviting you?"
Kate's jaw dropped open. "WHAT?!" she exclaimed. "You can't go see Humphrey without me."
"She's kidding," Carly quickly said in an attempt to calm Kate's nerves. "We would not go see Humphrey and not invite you."
"But, are you really going to see him?" Kate questioned her friends.
"Only if you come," Nicki said.
"Right behind you!" Kate said.
Carly, Kate, and Nicki set out to find the guys. It didn't take too long before they found them at the top of a grassy hill gathered around a hollowed out log that had been split in two. The girls' ears gradually tuned into what the boys were saying.
"Dude! That's crazy!" Salty said. "We'll die or something!"
"I think it would be fun," Mooch said. "Dangerous, but fun."
"Salty's right," Shakey began, "I mean you don't just slide down the hill in a log for the heck of it."
"Come on guys! It will be fun, I promise," Humphrey tried to convince his friends.
Just then, Kate, Carly, and Nicki walked up.
"Hey guys. What's up?" Carly casually said.
"Your face is up!" Salty said.
Humphrey turned to Salty with an angry and shocked look on his face. Then he whispered, "Salty! Shut up! These are HER friends."
"Relax, Humphrey," Salty whispered, "I got this."
Humphrey turned to Shakey with a look of "HELP" on his face.
"Oh! Um, Mooch, let's go with Salty down to the valley to… uh, to…"
"To get FOOD!" Mooch finished for him.
"Works for me!" Shakey said as he grabbed Salty and began walking down the hill.
"I'll catch up with you guys later!" Humphrey yelled down to his friends as they continued to walk down the hill.
"Where were we?" Humphrey said mostly to himself. "Oh right! Hi girls."
"Hey," all three girls said simultaneously.
"Oh gosh!" Nicki suddenly exclaimed. "I know we just got here, but um, yeah… Carly and I were supposed to meet our parents five minutes ago so we'll just leave you two here. Later guys!"
Nicki and Carly then walked back down the hill occasionally glancing over their shoulders to get a look at Humphrey and Kate.
When Kate realized she was alone with her crush, she freaked out. Oh gosh! she thought. I'm alone! What do I say? How do I act? Why have I never been around boys before!/?
"Kate, are you okay?" Humphrey asked.
"Hmm?" Kate said snapping out of her trance. "Oh yeah, I just… yeah… Um, OH NO!" Kate realized she was screwing up her very first one on one encounter with Humphrey and slapped her paw to her face.
Humphrey noticed Kate was not doing well in socializing with him, so he quickly thought of something to help her out. "Hey, listen, do you wanna start, I don't know, hanging out with me and the guys every now and then?"
"What?" Kate said looking up at Humphrey? "But… You're a guy! And you want a girl hanging out with you?"
"Well, why not?" Humphrey asked.
Kate thought to herself for a moment. Why shouldn't she hang out with Humphrey? The only bad thing that could go wrong was her parents did not like it. But lately, Kate did not really care what her parents did or thought...
"Okay," Kate agreed to Humphrey's offer. "I gotta… Go, now. But yeah, I'll see you around. Kay?"
"Sure thing," Humphrey said as he turned around and began to walk away.
Kate's eyes widened when Humphrey turned around. HIS FLUFFY TAIL WAS RIGHT THERE IN FRONT OF HER! It's so fluffy…. It's so fluffy… and cute! But more fluffy! Kate thought to herself. She did not realize it at first, but she had the biggest smile ever on her face. It took every ounce of willpower that she had for her to resist the urge to go up and play with it. Fortunately, Humphrey was soon outside of Kate's view, and thus the urge died down.
Author's Note: Okay, guys, I'm really really sad right now because this really sweet ninth grade girl in my community has had cancer for the past three years maybe and I found out that she died sometime yesterday on 10/2/2012. She wasn't in my school, but she was really sweet to everyone and I did get the chance to meet her once. I'm really upset! Here's what I wrote about her on FB:
It's hard to believe, but I actually talked to her for maybe 7 minutes a year ago in an AT&T store. It didn't even take that long for me to realize that she was such a sweet person. It's kind of strange: I never knew her, but somehow, I miss her. :'/
