IN THE DEN OF THE LYCAN PRINCES

Chapter Four: The Hendrix Brothers

ADALYDE

They didn’t die.

Melanie and the others didn’t die.

For the first time in my life, I looked up the ‘Internet’ and couldn’t stop myself from following up every detail of their lives, and every bit of info that I sucked in drained the little life I had remaining out of me.

Of course, I was trending all over the Internet.

Everywhere that I looked, I saw pictures and videos of me from that night at Melanie’s house that haunted me. They had the decency to blur out my exposed parts at least, but only on the social media forms that my videos had been going viral on. However, I had stalked the popular kids down to all their individual pages and caught a chat in some of the comments from guys like Grayson and Smurf who were apparently selling the original videos – exclusive only – to the students of Prestige Academy who wanted to see the full thing.

These people were exploiting me, and making a mockery and embarrassment of me everywhere on the ‘net and it gutted me to see that all these were plotted by none other than Melanie, whom I thought was genuinely the only friend I had.

I was a laughing stock.

And I felt like I never wanted to show my damn face in Prestige Academy ever again.

The shame was overwhelming, and I spent the entire weekend, locked up in my special private dorm in the Sanctuary, locked out away from the other girls and never stepping out for even food or water.

It was a shocker that Gertrudia had not come to check up on me yet.

In fact, after what happened that night in the Farroway Mansion, I had not heard from the woman again. The closest thing to a reminder of her existence was when – in the process of my stalking – I had come across a post from Melanie just yesterday, showing off the brand new SUV that she had gotten customised and personally branded from the company as a gift from her mother.

Gertrudia was busy disappearing from the Sanctuary these days and buying Melanie gifts.

What irked me was the fact that thousands were in her comment sections drooling over Melanie herself more than the new flashy sparkling white car she was flaunting to the f*****g world. She was like a barbie in her new whip, and with Stacey and Precious Valerie couped into the backseats and posing for an aesthetic picture, they looked like they were on a girls day out. They could actually go out with new rides, buy vanilla ice cream and spoil themselves on expensive mall trips after the evil that they had done to me. No remorse. Living their best life after making my life miserable.

It was even appalling to see how much engagement they still had, even after exposing to the world how terrible they are as human beings by doing such an awful thing and posting it online. Melanie’s followers were her worshipers and so were the students of Prestige who kissed her feet in the comments sections, it was a blinding fest of wannabes and ass kissers in her under every f*****g post she made.

My heart had skipped a beat when I came across a message from Oscar himself calling her ‘babe’ and I counted the love eye emojis; they were six in number. It irritated me to imagine the fact that they could have been an item and all the while, I was nothing but a pawn for their own sick satisfaction.

All I wanted to do was crawl up in a hole and die.

“To hell with this.” I cussed, swiping past yet another post from the school blog that had not stopped talking about the Hendrix Brothers since yesterday evening.

I had no idea who they were and frankly, I could not bring myself to give a f**k. However, it was all over the school blog and a trending topic of discussion – asides me– that had been going round, saying that the sons of Alvario, the city’s most influential business mogul, were going to be starting with us in Prestige Academy on Monday — Today.

Apparently, the boys were into some major privacy obsession. I looked up all their social media handles – not that I cared about them – and each and every one of them had private accounts. It made me curious for a bit, why they were so enclosed and preferring to segregate themselves away from a world that was clearly obsessed with them. All four of them had at least 10 million followers, and according to the figures on their handles, they followed zero people.

It confused me a little,

But I figured that The Hendrix Brothers were not my concern and would never be.

There was no proof that they were even coming to the Academy, it was all just rumours and hearsay. And frankly, whether they did come or not, one thing was for sure and that was the fact that they would probably be like the rest of the jocks and mean girls in Prestige; I could see them easily mixing in with the likes of Oscar, Grayson and Connor, and joining the assholes to make my existence a living, breathing hell.

My ride would soon be here, anyway, and there was nothing I could do to avoid school today. It was only a routine that I was carried back and forth on school days to the Academy from the Sanctuary, and today was not any different.

I’d just do what I do best in school…

Ignoring the f**k out of everyone.

***

I, Adalyde Sanctuary, was the object of ridicule in Prestige Academy.

“Sanctuary Girl!” Someone had shouted from across the hallway the second that my two feet had stepped into the premises, “Or should I say Oscar’s w***e?!”

And following the taunt was wild laughter, the entire Hallway bursting into mad chaotic laughter that whipped me from all angles. I felt shame all over me, trickling down the line of my back and scorning mercilessly at my face.

“I’d pay a fortune to get me some of that too!” A random guy mocked me, laughing hard. “Come on, all that cake can’t be for Oscar alone, baby girl!”

“She’s not even that hot!” Another random girl commented as I started to walk through that crowd of mockery, in a walk of shame. “What on earth made her think that Oscar Mitchell, the f*****g star quarterback of Prestige Academy, would have wanted her? Delulu is the new solulu!”

I held back a pang of tears that burned at the lids of my eyes as heaving bodies collided into me, hitting me as they fell over one another in uncontrollable laughter.

“Somebody had to set her delusions straight!” Another person cackled, “And aww! Oscar and Melanie Farroway are the hottest couple, such a highlight to our senior year! Such a big f*****g fan!”

“Excuse me!” I huffed as I tried to walk faster, to slide past the people around me who only said mean things, mocking me and laughing at me. “Excuse me, please!–”

THUD!

I came falling down onto the ground of the Hallway as someone set their foot in front of me, my body hitting the ground painfully and my balance, giving, making me to start rolling down the Hallways like Humpty Dumpty.

Humiliated, I stayed on the floor and felt like I wanted the grounds to swallow me and bury my shame as the entire Hallway turned into a noisy chaos. Laughter and screaming were so loud, it was deafening. My books were all scattered on the floor, my backpack was torn, and in the heat of all these, I hurriedly packed my books back in the bag, trying to finish as fast as possible and run away from this f*****g chivalry.

“Hey, you missed this one.–”

“–Thank you!” I snatched the Encyclopedia from the manicured hands of the girl who just spoke to me and without even glancing one look at her face, I stood up in an attempt to flee.

Right before I had dashed in to hide in the closest classroom, I caught an eye burning sight of Melanie Farroway.

She was there at the end of the Hallway, right in the midst of the savagery and barbarism being displayed towards me, clinging onto Oscar’s bulging biceps and making out with him so passionately.

The sight of both of them disgusted me.

But I had no will to stand there and watch those monsters. I raced into the empty classroom and hoped I was going to be able to stay there, hidden, for the rest of the entire school day.

***

I wasn’t able to.

In fact, I was dumb to even think that I would. Forgetting that today is a long anticipated day in Prestige where everyone was expecting to see the Hendrix Brothers join the school, it came off to me as a surprise when the classes got even ten times fuller.

I didn’t attend one class. However, switching hiding spots from one class to the other was extremely difficult.

The worst part was that if I had not found a way to leave the school before Cafeteria time, I was doomed. Skipping classes alone was very difficult in a school like Prestige that was very particular about their rules and regulations, and the thought of running away completely before school actually closes was a utopia fantasy.

However, it was one delusional idea that I was willing to give hope to. Only for it to unfortunately flop.

The classes were locked when it was time for Lunch, and no students were not forced to go to the Cafeteria per se, it was just a way of getting ready to officially close the school day since Lunchtime was the last thing before the school day ended. And subconsciously, all students were expected to be hanging around in the Cafeteria by this time. Or at least Hallways and the school surrounding premises.

Unfortunately, those were places that I was trying to avoid, because having those classes locked during Lunchtime, there was no other way to say it so that every nook and cranny of the School had Prestige students lurking around.

Walking to the Cafeteria was a f*****g nightmare.

“Move, Sanctuary Girl!” Someone had pushed me, shoving me into the Diner themed aesthetic Cafeteria that all the other students were throwing themselves inside.

I gulped, analysing the crowd that was in the Cafeteria.

We had never been this full before, it was clear that every Prestige student was active and present today in school, all in anticipation for the coming of the Hendrix Brothers whose names were in the air every two seconds.

“Why is everyone so obsessed with these Hendrix Brothers anyway?” I said to myself as I took careful steps in a dual attempt to not have anyone bump into me and find a good, isolated seat in the Cafeteria.

If the noisy whispers in the arena were not about me, my tiny boobs, or my delusional crush on the school’s football quarterback, it was on the new power couple of the School that was Melanie Farroway and Oscar Mitchell.

Nothing took the cake more than the buzz that was going round all in the name of the Hendrix Brothers.

“I heard that Melanie Farroway is planning to dump Oscar and date the hottest Hendrix Brother!” A girl who passed by me was gossiping with her friend, “Melanie has it all! She’s such a goddess! She can pull anyone she wants, even the stone cold sons of Alvario Hendrix!”

I fought the urge to gag.

“Not if I date one of the Hendrix Brothers first,” the other friend came in, giggling, “Oh come on! Mel can’t be taking all the hot guys all the time! Every girl in Prestige wants the Hendrix Brothers too, so we all can pull them too if we want!”

All I needed to do was find a quiet seat that was hidden a bit from the rest of the Cafeteria, and in thirty minutes, just thirty minutes, I would be done with this nonsense and be gone back to the Sanctuary.

“Thank goodness.” I breathed a sigh of relief when I found the perfect spot, a round table at the corner of the large Cafeteria Hall that was empty.

I was in no mood to even eat. All I wanted to do was wait and pass time here until Lunch time was over and I could get the f**k out of here.

“Room for one more?”

I froze, a lump forming in my throat at the new voice that joined in on the table I just thought was isolated enough to not gather any attention.

“Sometimes, I like to sit here too,” the voice came again, “It’s like it has a superpower – shielding your visibility from the rest of the Cafeteria.”

Her hands came into my view yet, just as she placed a tray of food on the table. The neatly done manicure on her blue-coloured fingernails made me instantly realise that she was the same girl from earlier today in the Hallway, the one who helped me pick up my Encyclopedia after I was tripped.

“I’m Hope,” she said to me, “And if it means anything, I think Mel and Oscar are total jerks for what they did to you. That was really uncalled for. I hope you’re okay.”

It seemed surreal that someone could even be nice to me in the heat of all these.

“Thank you,” I said quietly as I raised my head to look at the nice stranger of a girl who was the only person in the entire Cafeteria that had the damn courage to commit social suicide by deciding to sit with me.

A smile crept onto my lips when I saw that warm bright colour abiding around her plus sized frame, a fine shade of yellow ray lights beautifying her already adorable features from her chubby cheeks and her almond shaped brown eyes to her short ginger hair and fine freckles.

“Hi Hope.” I said, quipping a soft smile at her.

“Hi Adalyde,” she answered back with an equally sweet smile as she unpacked her lunch.

“I didn’t even tell you my name,” I said with a sigh, “I guess everyone really knows who I am now.”

Hope stopped and looked at me, a soft look in her brown eyes.

“If it makes you feel any better, I actually always wanted to be your friend,” she confided, “But, I gave up when Melanie Farroway befriended you, people like her never mix with people like me. You don’t understand how relieved I am that you didn’t end up being one of them.”

“Such a close call, right?” I concurred.

“Right,” she agreed.

“And you deserve better than Oscar,” she told me, leaning in to whisper conspiringly as she told me, “I have heard from multiple of his conquests that he’s got a peanut d**k!”

I choked on a laugh, sniggering messily.

“Must be a blow to his Alpha male ego. At least, now, we can see what caused his major asshole canon event,” Hope said and I lost it, bursting into ugly messy laughter immediately.

I was laughing. I was actually laughing. I couldn’t believe that I could still have it in me to laugh, after everything that had happened up until this point. But here Hope was, making me cackle endlessly.

“Mel and her friends reserved a seat for the Hendrix Brothers,” Hope told me, “The whole school has been buzzing and the gods of Prestige Academy think they can recruit the Hendrix Brothers into their circle that easily.”

“Can they?” I asked Hope.

“Through what I have seen, those boys love their privacy,” she said to me, “Their anti-social level deserves an actual Oscar. I think the chances of them joining forces with high-pitched chatterboxes and smelly jocks will be extremely low, Adalyde.”

“Then, I wonder where the so-worshipped Hendrix Brothers would sit if not in the confines where the King and Queen of Prestige Academy abide,” I said, mockingly. My head reflexively turned back to catch a glimpse of the table I knew that Melanie and the rest sat during Lunchtime.

It was full, and like Hope said, there were four empty seats right in the middle, all of them on the table were prepping in anticipation for the Hendrix Brothers.

“They kicked Emery out of the clique,” she told me, and I frowned upon hearing that. “Apparently, they had this big fight after what they did to you in the Party, and Emery doesn’t hang out with them anymore.”

I remembered Emery and how she was repulsed by them even in the party where I had met her, and needless to say, she was nowhere to be found in the Cafeteria.

However, I had little time to analyse Emery’s suspicious disappearance.

The entire Cafeteria was suddenly in a fit of crazed madness as the noise that was there before even tripled, the entire place was a damn market centre. Whispers were now too loud and with the way that people jumped out from their seats, frantic, I needed no one to hint out what had happened to cause the sudden chaotic change in the room.

“They’re here,” Hope said, her voice surprisingly calm and collected, in contrast with the rest of the arena.

My eyes stayed fixated at the door, narrowing in to get the focus of the centre of attention right now. All it took was three counts...

One.

Two.

Three.

The Hendrix Brothers walked in.

My jaw slacked, dropping at the sight of them as the buzz in the Cafeteria tripled, the remnants of peace in the atmosphere completely shutting the f**k down.

It wasn’t just the striking, devilish good looks these boys possessed, nor was it the air of elegance and maddening stench of new luxury that strayed along with them with each step they took.

It was the fact that one of them, the one who seemed to lead the rest of his brothers, looked disturbingly familiar.

I had seen those silver-blue eyes before, but it didn’t click where.

And that shell necklace…

The one identical to the one around my neck,

The same one I had seen the Wolf from the other night, wearing around its neck,

It shined almost as bright as the thick golden aura rays that hovered around the boys, and my eyes couldn’t look away from that same shell necklace that wrapped there around the neck of that silver-blue eyed Hendrix Brother.