Skinny Love

Extended Summary

 Skin-ny Love

(n.) When two people love each other but are too shy to admit it

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 The academy had four rules:

1. Trust your family.

2. Family is a choice.

3. Family first, Academy second

4. When your family can't be there for you, the Academy will.

              I, Ariana Elpis Sorensen, daughter of the Blackbourne Team, despise the Academy. The very organization that made those rules, broke them. It became corrupt under the reign of greedy souls. Everything was about favors and what it's people could do for them. It takes more than it gives, and it turns families against each other when it benefits the Academy's Council.

                  It wasn't always like that. There was a time where it actually did the opposite. It's how my parents met. But nothing gold ever stays, as Robert Frost once put it.

                 Ever since I was young, I had always liked to sit back and blend in with the chaos that surrounded me. As time passed, I had grown aware of the way my siblings had flaunted their talents to the Academy so that they would make Mom and our dads proud. Yet, I was the odd one of the bunch. I never showed anyone what I was capable of.

                My heart shattered in one night in ways I wish not on anyone else. My family had sent me to bed early under the guise of a "field trip" tomorrow and that I should get some sleep. They had a family meeting without me. It wasn't the first time, either. What had made this worse than any other time was what I overheard them discussing. The issue of me.

              I had shown no talent. I wasn't beneficial to their precious Academy. They were going to send me to live with Aunt Jess. Even my best friend wanted me gone. My big brother, who I'd admired for as long as I remembered, my partner in crime, wanted me to leave. So, I did. I ran away that night.

               I ran away to a friend who I met when he texted the wrong number years ago, Scott McCall. I was 12 and it was hard to get there, but I did safely. Through him, I met Stiles Stilinski, the guy I grew to love in secret. After all he had his eyes on Lydia. I would never compare.

              Little did I know how much our lives would change when we go out on an adventure in the woods at night...