SYMMETRY ➽ D. HALE [1]

15 ; another problem

15 ➽ ANOTHER PROBLEM [UNEDITED]

The last thing that Elise McCall had expected to hear when she approached her brother in the halls of their school was that Jackson Whittemore had somehow managed to figure out that Scott was a werewolf.

"I mean, did he say it?" she asked, changing direction to walk with the two boys. "Like outright? Did he say 'I know you're a werewolf'?"

"No, but he implied it pretty clearly."

"Maybe it's not as bad as it seems," Stiles suggested. His optimism earned him a simultaneous glare from the McCall siblings as he continued, "He doesn't have any proof."

"Stiles is right," Elise said, "No one would believe him even if he did decide to tell somebody. He'd probably end up chained to a wall in Eichen House." The brunette added the last part with a click of her tongue.

"Who would believe him?" Scott rolled his eyes. "How about Allison's father?"

"You're right, this sucks."

"I need a cure. Now," Scott sighed.

➽

If there was one word to describe Elise McCall, it was short-tempered. Especially when some jackass decided to threaten her family.

That was what had led her to the back seat of Stiles' Jeep, parked ominously in the otherwise empty hospital lot. She stared at the hospital doors; they had never before felt so daunting. Not even during seventh grade, where she had tried to prove to that she could, in fact, jump the distance between the roof and the tree that stood in their yard. Not even a broken leg could compare to what she was feeling.

Elise and Stiles had managed to convince a boy- Danny Māhealani- to trace the messages that had lured Jenessa and Allison to the school on the night of the attack. Stiles may have used Derek Hale's physique to earn Danny's cooperation- which, Elise had to admit, she had quite a bit of difficulty averting her eyes from Derek's shirtless torso, but that was aside from the point- but they nonetheless were able to secure a name. However, it was far from what any of them expected.

The texts send to Jenessa and Allison on the night of the attack at the school had been traced back to Melissa McCall. Elise knew that her mother wasn't the one sending the texts. There was no way she was the Alpha- which meant that whoever was the Alpha had access to her mom. For all they knew, Melissa was friends with the Alpha.

"You alright?"

Elise's gaze flicked from where it was trained on the sliding doors of the hospital to the owner of the voice. She hadn't even looked at Derek since he'd shown up a few nights prior with Elise's partially conscious brother in tow. Derek had gone on being his usual distant self. It was as if nothing had happened between the two of them, and Elise wasn't sure that she wanted that. At the same time, though, she wasn't sure she didn't want that.

"Yeah." She nodded, her words barely audible as she pushed open the door to the Jeep and hopped out.

➽

Elise crinkled her nose, inhaling the scent of bleached bed sheets and hand sanitizer that she had always associated with hospitals. Elise never had anything personally against hospitals, but every time she was in one, she'd always felt... uncomfortable. It was as if she was supposed to feel guilty for so many to suffer within the same halls she walked through while she felt perfectly fine. Elise knew it was crazy- just as crazy as she knew it was to walk through a mostly abandoned hospital in the dead of night in search for an Alpha.

"She's not here. I can't find her anywhere," Elise sighed, hearing her voice echo grainily on the other end of the phone. It had taken some convincing, but eventually, Elise had convinced the other two that she was best suited to wander the halls of the hospital after-hours. After all, she could simply claim to be looking for her mother, despite knowing that her mother was actually at Scott's lacrosse game.