The Not So Sad Rejection

Chapter One

Happy Birthday

I shut off my alarm clock the moment it started beeping. I'd been up for about two hours. Normally I would have been downstairs eating or going out to pick up my best friend so we could grab coffee before school. Unfortunatly that was not in the cards.

I was currently avoiding leaving my room. I'd been ready for school for over an hour. I had worked on the little homework that I still hadn't done and finished reading a book. I really did not want to go out.

It's my birthday.

It's not that I don't like my birthday. Usually I enjoy it. Just not this year. In my family turning sixteen is special. We aren't like everyone else. We evolved to shift between two forms. The form of a wolf and the form of a human. Werewolves, though we just call ourselves wolves.

There are many of us and we live pretty similarly to humans. We have jobs and families and parents that make their children attend high school. Most of us are organized into packs much like actually wolves. The leaders of these packs are called Alphas. Alpha families protect the members of their packs and in return the members of the pack are forced to obey the Alpha.

Forced seems a little strong but with a direct order from the Alpha you have no choice to obey. Most Alphas rarely ever use Alpha orders.

Another factor that makes us much like real wolves is that we have mates. Unfortunately we do not get to choose our mates. Once a wolf turns sixteen he or she can recognize his or her mate if they are also sixteen.

My mother is particularly excited about my new ability to discover my mate. I guess it's like that with your first-born. Sadly, I do not share her sentiment. Don't get me wrong, it isn't that I don't want to find my mate. I just don't want to find my mate right now. Maybe a few years from now when I've finished college and started my career. I will be Beta, second in command, of the Silver Moon Pack. My pack. My father is the current Beta and as his first born I have been train as the heir to the position.

"Katie!" Tyler yelled loudly outside my door. "I know you're awake! You'll have to come out sooner or later, might as well get it over with!"

I groaned grabbed my book bag. "It's not necessary to yell if you are aware that I'm awake," I informed him darkly as I opened the door.

He gave me an overly sunny smile. "Happy sixteenth birthday!"

I glared. "Utter a word about it being my birthday at school and I will end you."

It was bad enough that my baby brother was taller than me despite being a year and a half younger but I just knew he was going to make today so much longer than it needed to be. If any male wolves realized I was now sixteen they would try to see if we were mates. There were several signs but the favorite among hormonal teenage boys is contact. Once both wolves were sixteen supposedly when they touched they would feel sparks.

I'm not really a firm believer but what do I know.

I followed Tyler downstairs. "It smells like food," I observed.

"I made myself pancakes while you were pouting up in your bedroom," Tyler explained jumping up to sit on the kitchen counter and placing a plate with three large pancakes.

"We make food on that counter," I said making a metal note to wipe it down later. I saw he go for the syrup and swooped in, stealing a pancake before it could be drowned in maple-flavored liquid sugar.

"Hey!" Tyler cried is mock outrage. "I was going to eat that!"

I rolled it up into a burrito. "It's my birthday. Consider it my present." I took a huge bite, moaning dramatically despite it was dry and slightly undercook. It was stolen and stolen food tastes so much better.