Her afternoon classes all passed by quickly and easily and before Katherine knew it, the end of the day had come. Everyone filed out of the physics room and she grabbed her bag, tossing her hair over her shoulder, sparing a glance at the open door. She couldn't help but smile when she realized Liam was waiting for her.

The moment she stepped out the door, he began chattering away at something that happened during his math block. "Anyway," he huffed, after hardly breathing through a two and a half minute rant. "Tonight, you me and Mason are going—"

"—I can't, actually," Katherine cut him off without being fully aware that the words had left her mouth. The moment she realized that they had, she cringed; visibly. "Sorry, I mean I'm busy tonight."

Curiously, Liam raised his brows. "Doing what?" He frowned. "Scott normally asks me to go with you if he's got you out doing something."

"It's not for Scott," she explained poorly, mumbling a quiet thank you as he held the front door open for her. "It's — I'm going out for dinner...tonight."

"With who?"

The dreaded question.

With a small grimace, Katherine ruffled the hair on top of her head to give it a messier appearance before pulling it up into a loose and quick ponytail. "Well, I haven't seen him since I got back and I had to postpone it once already, but Brett asked me if we could have dinner." An irritated look appeared on Liam's face, whatever trace of relief that had been there when he first saw her vanishing, and she rushed to add that Lori would be there too.

She wanted to be sure he knew it wasn't a date.

"Do you know where you're going?" Liam asked carefully, a guardedness taking over his voice.

Katherine merely shrugged in response, though she could feel her heart twinge with nervousness. "Not a clue," she murmured. "A diner out in Devonford, I think. He didn't say, just that...just that it was a really early dinner type thing."

"Oh." Liam pauses for a moment, and Katherine could feel something twist in the pit of her stomach. "Well um, then text me if plans change then, okay?"

"Alright," she nodded quietly. Before she could say anything else, he was stalking down the hallway.

Katherine stood in the hallway for a moment, a slight grimace on her face as she processed the conversation. Got dammit Brett, she thought to herself as she raked a hand through her hair. Why did you have to go and make him hate you so much. Then her phone buzzed in her pocket and Shen she pulled it out, she sighed. "Speak of the devil," she muttered while unlocking it.

BRETT
I'm waiting in the parking
lot, so move your short butt
faster

I've been here for, like,
five minutes already

She rolled her eyes at him, muttering incoherently about smug prep-school dumb-asses while she hurriedly typed her response.

KAT
whatever pretty boy, I'll
be there in a sec

Wait, "I'm"???

Not we???

BRETT
Nah, Lori got a better
offer and went to her friends house instead

She says hi, though

And pretty boy???

I thought I was an attractive asshole???

KAT
oh shit

You know, thinking
back on it it totally
makes sense that
you heard that
conversation

I'm weirded out now

You suck

I'll be there in a minute

Of course she isn't there.

And of course he heard me call him a hot asshole one time a year ago.

Of course he felt the need to bring it up and make me want to die of uncomfy and awkward.

Of course.

It took her mere minutes to push her way through the crowd of students standing in the hallway and chatting with their friends, and smiled lightly at Scott, Stiles and Lydia standing by the Jeep before passing another row of parked cars and reaching Brett, who was standing with his hanging off the top of his car door.

"You look grumpy," he snickered.

"Shut up," Katherine grumbled. "Lets just go, okay?"

Brett shrugged and closed his door almost at the same time she did. "Alright. But I'm going to go ahead and assume that this has nothing to do with me and everything to do with a different Lacrosse player."

Immediately Katherine groaned and slouched in her seat so she could hide from the nosy people in the parking lot that hadn't stopped staring since she got in his car. "Who even told you that," she whined, dragging a hand down the side of her face.

"No one you'd know," he shrugged easily, hardly even sparing her a glance.

Katherine squinted at him, still practically horizontal in her seat. "So Lydia told you."

Letting out a small laugh, Brett glanced over at her before abruptly turning the wheel and causing her to jolt in her seat. "Yes, Lydia told me."

"Great," she muttered quietly. "That's fantastic. Love that...I'm definitely going to kill her, but that's fantastic...wait why are we on the highway now?"

"Shut up and don't worry about that," Brett waves her off, laughing quietly when Katherine huffed. "And you don't need to kill her," he chuckled amusedly, sparing her another brief glance. "She just said she knew what unrequited love feels like and she wanted to make sure you were okay, since you weren't taking her advice."

Katherine blinked, trying to put together the pieces of who the hell do you have unrequited feelings for, and then it clicked. "Wait, she told you—" she clicked her tongue, laughing breathily. "Oh m—if she's talking about who I think she's talking about then I swear to god I'm going to kick her—"

"I'm not here to talk to you about Lydia's problems, dumbass," Brett rolled his eyes rather dramatically. "I'm here to talk about you, and all your weird little problems and issues because Scott and Stiles are busy with other things, which is fair."

"So you're saying you're gonna play fill-in-big-brother, then?" Katherine hummed, catching a glimpse of flashing lights in the corner of her eye from one of the buildings signs up ahead.

"That's exactly what I'm saying."

The car pulled into the parking lot of an old, charming diner with a sign reading EDITH'S handing above the door, the words SINCE 1956 visible below it. When they walked inside, Katherine could tell that no one had renovated it since the 50's either. Everything was brightly coloured, floor to ceiling pink wallpaper with a blue accent wall. The floors were checkered black and white. The tables were white with blue stools. Old movie posters and article clippings were plastered all over the place, giving the room and very comfortable atmosphere.

"Woah," Katherine breathed out, briefly forgetting the metallic creatures, Stiles' obsession with Theo, and Liam.

"Pretty cool, right?" Brett grinned as they claimed a booth in the far back corner and right next to the wall of windows.

"Cool doesn't even cover it, dude," she laughed softly, turning to look up at him. "It's amazing. How did you even find it? It's like ten minutes off the highway."

"Lori did, actually," he shrugged lightly. "She recommended it."

"Well, tell her I say thank you."

After ordering burgers, lots of fries, and soda's so they had unlimited refills, Katherine made attempts to steer the conversation away from her and her problems, but Brett had a younger sister and knew all the tactics she was using, so it proved to be a difficult task. Eventually, he was able to distract her into starting the conversation herself, which earned himself a hard glare and a long sigh.

"What do you want me to say, Brett?" She groaned, slouching back in her chair in defeat. "That I like him? Because I do...you already know that, apparently."

"I want you to tell me why you're acting like it's a bad thing," he countered, leaning back in his seat to mimic her, "Because you're acting like having a crush on a boy — a really stupid one, at that — is the end of the world."

"It feels like it is," Katherine huffed, aggressively taking a sip of her drink. "I've never liked anyone like this before in my life, I've never had time to and it's really stressing me out so please don't look at me like I'm not normal because in cause you hadn't noticed, my life is anything but normal!" She cleared her throat, grimacing when she realized her voice was beginning to rise. "Sorry," she mumbled quietly, then ate a fry. "I'm just..."

"Tired," Brett finished for her in a tone that conveyed just how well he knew what she was feeling.

"Yeah," Katherine confirmed. "And..."

"And what?"

"And the person I want to tell about the whole Liam situation, well, she isn't here," she admitted weakly,  I know Lydia knows, which is nice because she gives me advice like an older sister does and it's great, but I want to tell Allison." Her brows shot up immediately, surprised she was able to say the name without the usual of grief spiking in her chest.

"Well where is Allison?" Brett asked so casually it hurt, and she knew it only was because he didn't knew. "You could always call her."

"Do you remember Chris Argent, from last year?"

"The one who helped save me and my pack from the rogue hunters?" He questioned.

"Yes, him," she nodded. "And did you hear about anything that happened in the first semester of last year?" Katherine asked hesitantly, hand rising up to the nail marks in her neck while her heart skipped a couple beats. "About everything with the Nematon and Alpha Pack, the Oni? How Stiles was possessed by a Nogitsune? Or, like, ritual killings, a freak storm that created a tornado and hurricane warning but only lasted two hours, and Coach Finstock getting shot with an arrow on the cross country trail?"

"I heard about the arrow thing, but a Nogitsune? Really?" Brett gaped slightly with a fry halfway up to his mouth. "Satomi briefly told us about one once but..."

"It was the same one as in her story," Katherine shuddered. "And yeah, it was possessing my brother. He gave me these—" she angled her head to the side so he could see the marks on her neck, grimacing when his expression hardened as he put together how she would've gotten them "—to piss Scott off. But a whole bunch of other things happened and a different version of him — please don't ask it's really hard to explain to people who weren't there, and even the ones who were there don't really know how it happened — wound up in control of the Oni and um..." she trailed off and swallowed the lump in her throat before drinking some of her root beer. "And Allison, Chris' daughter and Scott's ex girlfriend, was stabbed with one of their Ninjato's, and she...um...she didn't make it. I was there, and she died in Scott's arms while Isaac — he held onto me, but, um, yeah. I can't tell her about Liam, and I really want to."

"Oh, woah," Brett breathed, staring at her with something in her eyes Katherine couldn't quite place, but it looked like new found respect. "Okay, I get that," he nodded slowly. "You could always still tell her, you know," he commented after a moment of silence. "Do you have anything of hers? Anything special?"

"I have a bunch of her clothes, and um...I was allowed to keep one of her arrow bolts," Katherine nodded.

"You could tell her while holding that, I do that when I want to talk to my parents," he told her with some hesitance to it. She didn't know what happened to his parents, but she could take a guess if he was willing to give her this kind of advice so she stayed silent. "Don't try any of that Ouija stuff, god knows we already have enough of that crap in this town, but..."

"But I can still tell her," Katherine finished. "I...never thought of that."

"I do have my genius moments."

"Yeah okay Mr Cocky. You know, this is probably why Liam doesn't like you."

"Ever think that maybe I don't like him, either?"

"Is that a true statment?"

"...Shut up...he's decent now."

"Mhmmm."

A/N: BOOM DOUBLE UPDATE BECAUSE TODAY IS THE OFFICIAL END OF MY SEMESTER, I JUST ONE EXAM TO TAKE NEXT WEEK AND THAT'S IT, I'LL BE DONE G11 (Grad stresses me out because that's next year but we're not talking about that yet)

also I'm in a good and semi-confident mood so if a face reveal is something you guys want then I'll do that in the next update lol