Chapter 32 Spotted
Cathryn's POV
"Pick me up at two." I told Embry quickly as I got out of the truck. He nodded and drove off. I turned to face my punishment.
I would just like to say to anyone reading this that I fully believe in punishment when doing something wrong, and all that. I got a D for French for the school year, even with Collin's help. So I should be punished for that. It wasn't like I was doing my absolute best, or anything. I spent most of it on my DS or listening to my ipod. Or, when we were supposed to be taking notes, doodling in my notebook. Which now I very deeply regretted. But whatever happened to being grounded? No ipod, or no computer, or no TV, or no leaving my house. No seeing my friends. Extra chores. You know. Normal punishments. But art classes? A class a week, every week? Does that not seem just a bit harsh? And now I would be wasting my first official day of summer doing something that was offered as an elective in school.
The building in which I would be taking the classes confirmed my belief that this was going to be torture. Mr. GoodHart was supposed to teach from his house. And he did. It was one level, and made of brick. The really crumbly, brown kind, that looked like it would fall over at the next breeze. The yard was in desperate need of attention, overgrown crabgrass in some areas and bare patches of earth in others. The land had once been part of the forest, but somebody had cut the trees down to make room for the house and yard, leaving stumps everywhere.
I gulped, gathering my bearings. I had to remember that this wasn't Mr. Dobson's fault. My mom had been the one to send me here; it was her I should be angry with. I took a deep breath and walked down the little pathway and up the steps, knocking on the door.
Usually, when one knocks on a door, the thing that the recipient does is open said door. Not this time. "Come one in," A gravelly voice called.
I went in. The door creaked loudly as it opened, grating on my nerves. Once inside, I was hit with two things instantaneously. The first was the smell. Paint. And turpentine. I coughed inconspicuously. I was more of a nature, pine type of girl. Paint? Not my favorite scent. The second was more physical.
"Oof," I staggered back as a very strong force came careening into my thighs. It was only by clinging to the doorframe that I didn't fall over. I looked down. There, drooling all over my flip-flops and nose buried in my crotch, stood the saddest excuse for a canine I had ever seen.
Seriously. You know that thing I mentioned before, about trying not to hate on my teacher? Yeah, well, this sent that sentiment out the window. He was huge. A mutt. Almost definitely had some sheepdog in him. And Great Dane. He was matted all over, his fur gray in some areas and brown in others. Or maybe the brown was just dirt. Either way, I couldn't run my fingers through it. It was much too long. And tangled. And it had this sort of weird texture to it. And he smelled. A lot. Suddenly, I found myself wishing for the paint-and-turpentine smell I had shuddered at only seconds before.
"Mutt!" The gravelly voice again. A pair of very large, wrinkled, and calloused hands grabbed handfuls of the dogs fur and dragged him back. He was quickly distracted, turning around and jumping on his hind legs to lick the face of the man that stood before me.
He was about five ten, of stocky, burly build, and looked to be in his late forties. His hair was gray and sort of poofy, sticking out in all directions. He pushed the dog away firmly, revealing a pair of glasses even more ridiculous than the pair that Bob stubbornly refused to stop wearing, despite my best efforts. You know the kind. Like, really big, thick, black frame, eighties type? That you always see the geeks wearing in the movies. Or hippies.
He held out a hand. "Mr. Dobson," He said in a very no-nonsense voice. "And that idiot over there is Mutt." He nodded towards the dog. "Come on.
He turned and walked down the tiny hallway. I hastened to follow.
We found ourselves in a big, white room. It had little streaks of paint and pencil markings, and smelled even more strongly of paint then the rest of the house. There were posters and windows everywhere. The posters were all of completely random things,as far as I could tell. Rock bands. Abstract art. What I assumed was work his students had done. Animals. Those posters you see in the cafeterias all the time, that said 'got milk?' In ever electrical socket was, oddly enough, a hair dryer. In the back there was a he black shelf, with clay workings and unused canvasses mixed in with used canvases and big plastic bags filled with wet clay, and tool boxes filled with scissors and glue and paintbrushes and paints and glazes about a million little mental figurines that I could not identify.
Thirteen teenagers stood around three long, plastic tables. There were no chairs. "Go stand somewhere," Mr. Dobson commanded, "And we'll get strarted." I went over to stand next to a small, waifish blonde girl.
"All right." Mr. Dobson said. "Today, we're gonna be painting this." He stepped aside to reveal a large picture propped up against the wall. He launched into a long, detailed explanation of how wewere do do this,certain tactics that we could use. I, ofcourse, tuned him out. It was not a very good picture, a lot of trees got in the way of the subject, and it was raining, some of the drops having landed on the lens. But you could still see the wolf. Or at least, what Mr. Dobson had probably thought was a wolf.
I knew better.
My hand went to my chest, where the wooden wolf hung around my neck. I wore it every day now. As inconspicuously as possible, I put it under my shirt where nobody would see. It wasn't Sam. I knew that for sure. Or Leah. Sam had been black, Leah gray. This one was brown. A deep, chocolaty color. It sort of reminded me of Embry's eyes. Plus, this wolf was not shaped right. Leah had been smaller, gangly looking. Lean, you know. Sam had been too, but much bigger. And stronger looking. This one was about the height that Leah had been, but he was wide. Stocky, muscular. His eyes were almost impossible to make out, but I could see that they were looking directly at the camera. Like he had known the picture was being taken. They were too intelligent for an animal's.
"Gets started , guys." Mr. Dobson said.
Apparantly, being taught by Mr. Dobson meant spending half of the class listening to him talk and the other half trying to mirror what he had done without any help whatsoever. And I hadn't listened. So I pretty much did what I felt like doing, using whatever colors I thought were pretty. Leaving certain things out and adding in others. After a time, I found it kind of relaxing. Not really looking at the big picture, just the squiggles, dots, and lines that made it up. The sharp jagged cuts that made up the fur instead of the fur itself. The precise shade of green instead of the tree. And the way my brush moved in time to the oldies music that Mr. Dobson had put on…kind of melodic.
Like dancing. Almost.
Chapter 33 Lesson
Embry's POV
"Hey," I tried unsuccessfully to keep the smile off my face as Cathryn got in the truck. "Have fun?"
Cathryn glared at me. "Just shut up and take me home," She snapped.
This time I couldn't help the chuckle that escaped my lips. "I think you did have fun." I told her. "You just won't admit it. And we aren't going home. We are going to my house." I backed out of the driveway and started down the street, squinting to see through the rain.
Cathryn sighed. Apparantly, she wasn't in the mood for a fight. Too bad, as what I had in store for her was exactly that. "Why?" She demanded.
"I am going to teach you how to throw a punch." I turned to watch her reaction. She sat up straighter, and looked at me straight in the eyes. My heart skipped a little as I was momentarily distracted by the beauty of her own orbs.
"No," She said loudly. "You are not."
"Yep," I replied, keeping the same cheerful tone.
"Why would you do that?" Her voice grew higher in anger. "I have like, no arm strength. It doesn't matter what the strategy is, it still wouldn't-"
"But this will help you with your arm strength, too." I told her. "And we really don't want another Hart incident, now do we?"
That was, of course, my whole reason for this. I didn't want to see her that way again. Ever. And guys like that weren't going to let her just dump them. They'd do what Hart did. Cat had to learn to defend herself, though I desperately wished that she didn't. It wasn't like other girl had to be taught this. They knew how to judge men. They knew when they had gone too far. And Cat knew neither.
"There won't be another Hart incident." Cat muttered, turning away from me and glowering at the window as she turned on the radio. Her signal that she was done talking to me.
I sighed sadly, turning my eyes back to the road.
When we got to my house, however-well, mine and Quil's and Jake's-she proved to have plenty to say.
"This is so stupid." Cathryn told me as we opened the front door. It was still raining, and I wasn't going let her get sick out there.
"You know, I don't get why you're so against this." I said, leading her to my room. "You should be jumping up and down for this."
"Why?" Cathryn wrinkled her brow, looking genuinely confused by this.
"Because," I explained. "You are always so keen on pissing people off and stuff. This has been proven to do that. Plus, eventually you are going to go too far, and somebody is going to take a whack at you that you won't be able to return."
"Already happened." Cathryn said. " Our reason for doing this, remember?"
Yes, I did remember. Much, much, much too clearly.
'Okay," I said, spreading my arms wide. "Hit me."
"No." Cathryn snapped.
I rolled my eyes. "What happened to 'I have zero arm strength'? You wouldn't be able to hurt me even if I was still human. And I won't even feel it now that I'm superhuman and all that."
But instead of punching me, Cat opened her mouth. "Are there any brown wolves in the packs?" She asked me.
Anybody who had known Cat for a shorter amount of time than I had would have been confused by such a random question, But I was used to it. "Sure," I shrugged. "Jared. Jacob, Quil. Why?"
"My art teacher took a picture of a big brown wolf." Cat told me.
The way she looked at me clearly stated that she was well aware of the seriousness of this. I felt a moment of pride. I hadn't told her about what it was like in the beginning, when everybody was afraid of the wolves. Searching for them, on the lookout all the time. She knew the consequences automatically.
"he was only a little bit bigger than Leah," She continued. "But bigger, somehow. Burlier. And he was this really deep shade of like anything I'd ever seen on a wolf before."
I was already halfway down the hall. When I got to the living room, I saw Quil, lounging on the couch and watching a baseball game while stuffing his face with a family-sized bag of potato chips. I whacked him on the head.
"Dude!" Quil protested, sitting up.
"Quil. You are in trouble. Some one saw you." I informed him.
"What, as a wolf?" Quil looked confused. "Who?"
"My psychotic art teacher." Cathryn appeared at my side. "Don't worry though. He's not…all there, I don't think. You don't have anything to worry about."
Quil bit his lip, thinking. "Oh…" He said slowly. "You mean that guy with the glasses who smelled like a sharpie?"
Cat grinned. "Yes. That would be him."
Quil rolled his eyes. "He won't say a word, the idiot. Trust me."
I looked at Cathryn. She nodded in agreement. I turned back to Quil. "Yo realize that if Sam finds out about this you are a dead man."
"But Sam isn't my alpha anymore, now, is he? That Jacob, and he doesn't care. Now let me watch the game." He turned back to the television screen.
Cathryn and I looked at each other. "Am I supposed to hit you now?" Cathryn asked me.
"Yep.
So she let one fly. Which I caught in midair. "Uh, no." I told her. "You gotta keep your thumb outside your fist.
We spent about the next ten minutes with Cathryn hitting me, and I feeling absolutely nothing. Quil critiqued whenever he could drag his gaze away from the television screen. After that though, we got bored. I wrestled the remote away from Quil and changed it to the Simpson's, something Cathryn would like too. We made fun of each other, just hanging out for the rest of the afternoon. I was suprised by how much I liked it. I could see us doing this years from now, laying around on a rainy day with nothing to do. And, you know, maybe with Quil or Jake or Keilly or whichever of our idiot friends that decided to drop by.