To Better The Shattered; Scott McCall [2] ✔

0.60 In Which He Falls. Hard.

DISCLAIMER: I Don't Own Teen Wolf (though I do own the box sets)

When Ellie Argent walked into the lunch hall that same day, she didn't immediately make a bee-line for Scott's table. If it had been any other time she would've, but now her grandfather was the principal and he had spies everywhere.

So, with a resigned breath, she opted to wait, alone, at a table near his in hopes Lydia or Allison would appear soon. Her cousin had told her at the end of their last lesson together that she would be late to lunch (something about a detention with Harris), but Lydia had said nothing.

The chair opposite hers scraped back, a weight settled onto it, and a throat cleared. She barely glanced at the person, knowing it couldn't be her strawberry blonde friend.

"Ellie," they said, and she knew it was Jackson.

Since the night of the winter formal, she hadn't said more than two words to him. He was out of reach now; a person who listened to her problems way-back-when and let her live in the turmoil she had been during her brief time of insanity before the werewolf bomb was dropped.

He sighed impatiently. "Look, I don't get why you're angry with me, or whatever, but I have some stuff going on and – "

" – And you, what, you need support? I don't think you understand – I don't care." Ellie said bluntly. Jackson wasn't a friend to her now. He was just someone who used her to get to Scott and broke someone's heart in the process.

"You have to care. We're friends," Jackson hissed, head jerking toward the girl in a sharp, almost rolling intensity as his eyes seemed to glow. What the hell was wrong with him? He looked... monstrous.

"No." Ellie denied, leaning away from him in unease. "We haven't been friends in weeks. In fact, I'm starting to doubt if we ever were."

He scoffed loudly, the sound gaining the attention of several people around him. "Of course we were – are."

"Jackson, don't lie to me." She shook her head, standing up and thinking maybe sitting with her boyfriend wasn't a bad idea. "You used me to get to Scott, and now you're only talking to me because it didn't work. You want to be a werewolf? Go ahead. Howl at the moon, put on your Tyler Lockwood, sniff some butts – I don't give a damn. You're not my responsibility. You're not my pack, and you need to leave me the hell alone."

The teenage boy's mouth opened, prepared to yell like nobody's business, she assumed, but he suddenly froze. Males all over the hall were suddenly gaping, drooling, and whacking their friend's shoulders to direct all attention to the doors. The scene was shockingly similar to the moment in Grease when the T Bird's see Sandy at the carnival – only less cute, more disgusting and stinking more like hormones than romantic love.

At the doors, gliding through like a freaking supermodel, was Erica Reyes. It seemed she'd met Trini and Susanna for a real extreme makeover over the two periods she was supposed to be at the hospital.

Ellie had to admit it: the girl was hot.

Not the same hot as pretty celebrities like Nina Dobrev or Kristen Bell, though. It was the sleazy, I-don't-really-care-about-anything-but-boys look that was necessarily bad, but wasn't greatly appreciated either. Ellie had no qualms with the dress (she herself sported the less-than-classy look on multiple occasions and she definitely enjoyed a tussle in the sheets with Scott), but something about the way she held herself made the shorter girl angry.

Or maybe that was just because Scott himself was staring at the blonde with a renewed interest that rivalled Gerard in intensity and Stiles in hormones. Well, no. Actually, the two teenage boys sat together seemed to be more suspicious than lustful (and Ellie had never been more grateful for anything ever, seriously. She was the jealous type).