You need chaos in your soul to give birth to a dancing star.

Friedrich Nietzsche

Monday morning came far quicker than Daphne wanted it to come. And with that...it was time to face school and with that everybody that had seen her cry all over Luke at the funeral.

And as much as she wanted to hide it didn't seem like any of them were going to let her do that.

Oliver and she drove to school together, like they always did, her cousin telling her all about the football game that would happen on Friday evening and Daphne made noises to indicate that she was listening, even when she only understood every second word.

She had never watched a single football game. Why should she? But apparently the whole family always went to every game, so Daphne would spend her Friday evening in the stands next to some football field.

(Would it be very terrible of her if she decided to bring her sketchbooks and a few pencils to that match? Probably not, right? At least then she wouldn't die of boredom.)

By the time they arrived at school, Daphne had tried to tell herself that it wouldn't be that bad.

Yeah, right.

At least Luke and Grace were already waiting for them, leaning against the black pick-up truck that belonged to them.

And while Ollie and Grace were once again doing there best to starve each other of all air, Daphne was happy enough to talk to Luke, who still seemed completely nonchalant about her crying all over him.

He didn't mention it once, entertaining her with the newest gossip that was going on, brightly smiling at her and Daphne was more than happy to go along with that.

They made their way into the school, reaching their lockers when their topic of conversation also turned to that football game.

"So are you going to come to our game this Friday?" He asked her excitedly and Daphne chalked that up to his and Ollie's Y-Chromosome. The crazy excitement for running after a ball needed to be some kind of biological thing.

"I will. I'll even promise to cheer for you even when I have no idea how the game works or who even is the other team," Daphne told him, putting most of her books and art supplies in her locker and only keeping the ones she would need for the first few lessons.

"We are the Fairbury Wolverines and we are playing against the Riverside Rebels," Luke explained happily.

"You are the quarterback, aren't you?" Daphne asked him and watched how he seemed to preen under that it was amusing and adorable at the same time.

"I am. It's my third game this season."

"Have you won any?"

"We won them all," he answered her. "Maybe you can be our lucky charm this time."

"If you won all the games this season I doubt you'll need me as your lucky charm," Daphne snorted amused. "You seem to do well enough on your own."

"Who says no to a lucky charm though?" He asked her, grinning and Daphne couldn't help but blush. He seemed to have the ability to make her blush and stutter like some kind of idiotic little girl.

Why did he need to be so damn pretty?

Because maybe he wouldn't be so disconcerting if Daphne didn't want to stare at him all the time. Her fingers ached to draw him, to try and translate his face to a page, the green eyes, the brown hair, the sharp jawline.

"Daphne?" His voice pulled her out of her thoughts and she shook her head, trying to shake off that line of thoughts.

Stop it, she chided herself. You can't go around and have a crush on Ollie's best friend. And it's not like you would ever have a chance with him.

"Everything alright?" He asked her gently and she put a smile on her face.

"Yeah, I was just..."

"Far, far away?" He ended her sentence with a smile. "Let's get to our English lesson."

She happily complied with that, following after him and taking the seat next to him. She liked English class, easily followed along and only when they were paired up to work in pairs for the rest of the week Daphne was dreading it.

There had been no reason for that though, because before she had an opportunity to even turn around, Luke had already decided that they were going to work together. That was probably the best news of that day.

They had most of the lesson in the morning together and Daphne enjoyed that. He was easily one of the best students in the class and so every time Daphne had a question he was easily able to answer it or show her the pages in her book that would explain it in more depth to her.

The lesson before Lunch was French together with Grace, who caught her up on the newest gossip about people that Daphne still didn't know.

Daphne did by now know most of their bigger friend groups in school, including Kiana, Jason Collins and also Olivia Morgan and Wesley McKnight who easily pushed Ollie and Grace from their first place as most affectionate couple.

Grace already went to lunch, while Daphne searched for the restroom, thankful when she finally managed to find it. She was just washing her hands when she heard the door open, not bothering to look up.

"Keep your hands off him," that were the hissed words that caught her attention, when Haley Webster came to stand next to her.

"I don't know..." what you are talking about. It was a lie, of course, Daphne knew what Haley talked about.

"Don't play dumb. You know exactly who I am talking about," Haley interrupted her but Daphne just shook her head and kept washing her hands.

Really, couldn't she just be left in relative peace?

"Do you really think you have any chance with Luke?" Haley asked her, sounding amused and laughed a high tinkling sound. Her words cut like a scalpel though, exactly chosen to give the most possible hurt. And Daphne could just listen and hope that Haley wouldn't realise how much these words actually did hurt Daphne.

"He's a junior and he's still the quarterback of the football team. He's well-liked by practically everybody...and one day he's going to inherit the biggest construction firm in the state. He's worth ." The way Haley said that made it clear that all of that...all of that were the things that she cared about. She didn't care that Luke was smart and sweet and thoughtful. She didn#t care that he was loyal and took care of his friends and even whoever was connected to them, however loosely that was. She didn't care about how Luke was the patient big brother to his sister, always indulgently smiling at Grace.

Haley didn't care about that, Daphne realised at that moment. She cared about the status that being Luke's girlfriend would bring her. She cared about what it would be like to be Luke#s girlfriend and probably prom King and Queen.

"And you think he would throw a second look way?" Haley continued and Daphne still didn't lookup.

He wouldn't. She knew that. She was content to be his...friend. That would need to be enough for her. Anything else never would go anywhere.

"Luke is . Keep your hands off him. It's embarrassing that you are even trying," Hayley snapped and finally Daphne looked up and just shook her head.

"I am not trying." She wasn't. She was aware that she had a snowflake's chance in hell and to be honest, she didn't want to embarrass herself more than she had already done. And she also...it was safe to have her little crush or whatever it was as long as he was as unattainable as he was. She would be his friend.

"You cried all over him at your mother's funeral. Nice acting by the way," Haley snorted and Daphne needed to bite back the tears that threatened to overwhelm her. It hadn't been acting. None of it had been acting. All of it had been her emotions getting the better of her. And even the idea of...trying to manipulate anybody with her grief was making her want to throw up. "The little hysterical crying girl...did you think he was going to have sympathy with you?" Haley continued to taunt her.

She didn't react. By now Daphne had learned the painful lesson that standing up to bullies never went the way she wanted it to be.

Still, there was heat in her chest unfurling, something pressing against her skin from within and she bit her teeth to hold back the fury that wanted to overcome her.

"The only reason he even talks to you is pity," Haley whispered. "So you are going to leave him alone and you aren't going to try and...seduce him or whatever you were doing a pretty bad job at."

***

Something was off.

Daphne was even quieter as usual when she finally arrived for Lunch, slipping into the seat between him and Grace and got out her sketchbook and her lunchbox but seemingly ignored everybody else at the table.

He left her to it because he had no idea what else he was supposed to do. At least that was until he caught a whiff of her scent and caught Haley's scent all over her.

Haley wouldn't have...or would she?

It probably shouldn't have surprised him as much as it did. If Haley had cornered Daphne to talk to her...he could make an educated guess to what exactly had happened and it pissed him off.

Haley saying anything to his mate was already making him see red.

Who did she think she was that she had the right to have any opinion at all about whatever relationship he and Daphne had?

He looked over to Daphne again, now drawing what looked like a cow in her sketchbook.

Whatever made him angry, if he just watched her small hands move over the page, her completely in her own little world that seemingly nothing could reach, he felt better.

She was safe and content and tucked against his side he knew he could keep her that way for the moment.

"I have no idea why you enjoy football. If you want to play fetch I even throw your ball," Kiana snorted at that moment, Ollie just rolled his eyes.

"." The barking sound he made sounded eerily real. What was that about now?

And the rest of their table had decided to be assholes as well that day.

"Oh, I have a appetite today," Jason announced when he finally sat down. Luke glared at him but the other werewolf just happily smiled at him.

Did he really need to have a talk with them to knock off their dog metaphors?

Apparently he did if Ollie's continuing talking was any indication.

From "Let's hope everybody has got their vaccines and doesn't get " over "Well, you should never cry wolf either way" to "Luke hopefully doesn't start hunting rabbits again like he did the last time."

"You hunt?" Daphne asked him softly and he glared at Ollie, who just shrugged.

"We all do," he answered her honestly. There was no use in lying to her. She was going to need to get used to them and their quirks if this was supposed to go somewhere. She nodded thoughtfully, seemingly filing that information away somewhere, but didn't seem to upset by that realisation.

"Rabbits are cute..." she finally said and he sighed softly. And there came the city girl out.

"Not if there are too many of them," he told her. "That's not good for them nor nature. It's not...we don't kill for sport, Daphne. All of it actually gets eaten." That was the first thing that their father had taught them. They didn't kill for fun. The killed for food. They killed only as much as they needed and as quickly as they could so the animals wouldn't be in pain.

"Why do you do it and not buy it from the grocery shop?" She asked him, real interest painting her voice and he wanted to groan.

Trying to explain to her how it was a prideful thing to do, how it felt to provide themselves and their pack with food...that wasn't really possible.

"We prefer to know where our meat has come from," he finally told her and she nodded her understanding. He hadn't managed to completely scare her away. .

"Do you also have chickens? For eggs?" She asked him and Luke could just stare at her for a moment. He was still surprised how well she took this.

"A robbed the chicken coop the last time we tried," Ollie told her calmly. What Ollie didn't mention was that it had been a group of 5 of the younger members of the pack and it had been an actual bloodbath. Also having feathers stuck in your teeth in wolf form was everything but fun.

Still, Luke glared at him but Ollie just shrugged his shoulders.

"What are you playing at?" He hissed at his friend on the way to football training nearly 2 hours later. That was the first time he had actually gotten the opportunity to talk to Ollie, who just snorted.

"I figured we would hurry up her introduction to the supernatural world. She didn't seem too interested at it though."

"Geez, I wonder why?" Luke snapped. "For god's sake, Ollie, don't you think she had enough things to worry about?"

Her mother's death. Thrown headfirst into life in a small town. Him. And through all of that Daphne just looked...scared. Her scent had a bitter tinge to it the whole time and Luke didn't like it. At all.

It put him on edge, searching for an imaginary enemy that didn't really exist as Daphne's fear seemed to skyrocket at a lot of random things. If people got too loud he watched her clam up, if somebody moved too fast.

"I don't want to keep it a secret from her. It's not helping anybody, least of all her," Ollie told him, crossing his arms. "We told her we had a neighbourhood meeting to come over for the run on Sunday. She believed it, Luke," Ollie snorted. "So either she's dumb, which I don't think or she's around as perceptive as a loaf of bread."

"Or maybe she wants to believe that we tell her the truth," Luke said softly. Daphne seemed to desperately want normalcy. Craved it even. She wanted to go to school even when he knew that both Caroline and Matthew had offered to hold her out of it for a few days. She wanted to move on, to leave her old life behind her. New York or her mother was never mentioned in any conversation. She didn't talk about it.

"One reason more to tell her," Ollie commented. "I don't want to lie to her any longer," he finally admitted.

"Wouldn't we all?" Luke sighed. What would he give to just be able to tell her the truth and know that she wasn't going to run away screaming from him? What would he give to just be able to ask her out on a date and tell her that he liked her, that he wanted to spend time with her?

He didn't allow himself to go down that path for very long though. It wouldn't help him. Right now, the best thing he could do was to give her freedom to find whatever bit of happiness she could have, help her find her footing here in Fairbury...and then he would need to rip off the bandaid and tell her the whole truth and nothing but the truth.

"I just doubt that dog jokes are the way to go," he finally joked to Ollie who stuck out his tongue.

"Whatever, I am hilarious."

***

Apart from that run-in with Haley early in the week, Daphne just tried to keep her head down. It worked well enough for the remainder of the week. She answered if she was called up in class, did her homework after school and when Ollie, Grace and Luke did god knows what in the evenings, she curled up on her bed and draw.

It had started to get colder though and as November had officially started, it wouldn't take much longer until the first snow would come.

Daphne was actually looking forward to that.

Snow would be nice.

Friday evening they drove the 40 minutes to Riverside to watch that football game that the whole school had been waiting for with bated breath.

What she hadn't expected though was that Kiana would just literally hand her younger sister named Talia and then go away to buy popcorn.

Caroline and Matthew were left talking with some other parents and now Daphne stood in front of that school, a 4-year-old, black-haired, brown-eyed girl next to her.

"Kiana!" She called after her friend because children were really not...Daphne never had much contact with them apart from one terrible time trying to babysit her neighbour's kids.

It hadn't ended well. At all.

Her friends didn't react and Daphne wanted to curse her out but turned around to the little girl at her side.

"So...do you want to go inside already?" She offered from the lack of a better idea. At least they could sit down there, right? And they wouldn't be jostled by so many people.

Talia nodded shyly and Daphne offered her hand which she happily took, still keeping a tight hold of her stuffed animal. It was a bunny the look after.

They managed three steps before they were nearly run over by somebody who didn't even offer an apology, resulting in Talia pressing herself against Daphne's leg and her wondering how that was going to end.

"Am I allowed to lift you up?" Daphne asked her because she figured she should probably ask before she did that. Talia looked at her, big brown eyes huge and lifted up her arms.

Lifting Talia up had been a great idea in theory, while in practice, this was really not great. There was a ripping pain in Daphne's back and she was unable to keep a soft gasp from escaping her mouth as she did her best to settle the little girl on her hip who happily threw her arms around Daphne's neck.

It hurt.

She had thought her back would have gotten better, the bruises had healed up well enough by now, but the cuts that the belt buckle had left were still there, deep and tender and Daphne would be money that she just managed to rip one open again.

"Let's go find our seats then," Daphne told her, putting on a smile and ignored the pain still stabbing her back with every move she made.

She managed to get on the stands and then find the right row quickly enough. Right now it was still empty but Daphne knew that it probably wouldn't stay that way.

She let Talia down as they reached their seats, helping her out of the pink coat she wore and then shrugged as carefully as she could out of the small bag she had worn and her coat as well.

Talia looked at her expectantly, probably expecting her to do something with her. Problem was only that Daphne had no idea what. What did 4-year-olds do for fun?

"Do you want to draw?" Daphne finally asked because that was the single thing that she had actually the supplies for.

Thankfully she hit smack dab in the bullseye with it.

"Yes!" Talia cheered, garnering looks from the few people around her and Daphne got out her sketchbook and happily handed it over to the girl as well as giving her a pencil.

She watched Talia happily draw for a while, something that looked like a bunny, that only had one ear was quickly enough joined by something that probably was supposed to be a fox.

"Can you draw me something? Please?" Talia asked her shyly and Daphne easily nodded her agreement, getting another pencil and taking the sketchbook when Talia handed it to her.

"Sure! What do you want?" She asked her.

"A dragon!" Talia decided near immediately and Daphne smiled at that.