A WHOLE NEW WORLD AGAIN

15 FEBRUARY, MONDAY, MUSIC

We had music before lunch time so our class had to go down to the music studio.

"None of you guys are allowed to walk out of the studios this time, understand?" Abigail reminded us loudly just as we were entering the studio.

Ms Pitera looked up gratefully. She was early today and had set up something entirely different on the low stage. Now, there wasn't just the old carpet in the middle. She had also set up two mics, the projector and the background screen.

"Please take your seats, class. Today I have something special for you." Ms Pitera said.

"Karaoke!" Terrence recognized the machine the mics were hooked up too.

She smiled at us, "Yes, I still need to grade you, but I thought of a way to make it more interesting."

Did she mean more humiliating?

Basically, we still had to draw lots for a partner, and then sing "A Whole New World" in duet. But now, we get to sing it with the karaoke machine, background music and lyrics with a jumping ball and all. We could even adjust the key.

Liam raised a hand, "We had two new transfer students."

"Oh." Said Ms Pitera.

"Nice to meet you, beautiful teacher." Fluffy smiled.

EJ punched him, "You're not supposed to flirt with the teachers when you're in school."

"Then outside school?" Fluffy asked.

The class whooped.

I decided to pretend I didn't know them for now.

Anyway, with these two clowns, we now had two more guys. It couldn't be helped. Ms Pitera added their names to the paperbag of boys' names. The last two guys would have to perform with each other.

Or would the two new kids prefer to sit out? It didn't seem fair, since they hadn't learn the song.

EJ grinned, "Don't worry Miss Pretty. Fluffy and I are very good at this kind of thing. It's our specialty."

"It's Ms Pitera." Ivan corrected.

"Yes, Ms Prettier." EJ corrected.

And then Henry felt it was probably a good idea to explain to them, "Guys, this isn't a fight cage after-party. You don't need to flirt or strip."

The class went into a titter.

"Oh." Fluffy said with his usual smile, "So what are we supposed to do?"

"You're just supposed to sing." Marcus told them.

"You can dance too, if you want." Henry smirked, "I'm sure the girls won't mind."

"Hoi, hoi, pretty girls!" EJ crowed, "Let Fluffy and I entertain you today!"

More tittering and giggling. I seriously don't think these two knew what music class was.

Music class was supposed to be a once a week session of awkward singing, followed by embaressing episodes of performing in front of your classmates. Sometimes they let you watch a video to widen your musical exposure. Or try to teach you a simple instrument. But most of the time, it was a singing session where you and the entire class tried to get through a song without actually being heard by anyone around you.

Anyway, the girls all had to pick out names from a paper bag. I'm not sure who I'd rather get. By the time it was my turn to pick, there were only a few left.

I pulled out the small piece of paper, "Liam."

Uh. Okay.

Jasmine picked next, "Who did you get? Oh!"

I immediately switched my paper with the unopened one in her hand.

"But..." Jasmine worried.

"Shhhh..." I said and unfolded the small piece of paper. It said 'EJ'. I remembered finding his warrior jacket during the rogue hunt yesterday - was it only yesterday?

"Hoi, hoi! I'm with Alpha Sam. Lucky!" EJ burst out from behind us. I almost wanted to return the blasted piece of paper to Jasmine, but she just looked really shocked at EJ sudden appearance and I couldn't quite do something like that to her.

"Thanks, Sam." She said gratefully and moved away, presumably to find Liam. This left me alone to deal with the over energetic red head.

I sighed, "Do you know the words, EJ?"

"I don't need words to sing." EJ told me.

Oh boy.

I heard Henry laugh behind me, "Finally, you've met your match, Sam."

What was that supposed to mean? But Abigail called Henry's name just then. It looked like she had drawn his name. Henry smirked and moved to the other side of the room.

EJ was beaming, he was so enthusiastic that he was bouncing on the spot, "So... How do you want to do this, goddess?

I gave up. Henry was right. I've met my match. I remembered our instant rapport from the first time we sparred at the underground. Usually, I tried to play it cool in school. I tried to lie low and blend in with the human kids.

But hahaha, if you can't fight it... Might as well have fun with it.

I grinned at EJ, "Let's just wing it."

"Okay!" EJ agreed.

And then I remembered how my performance with Harvey had gone.

"I'm singing the girl's part, you sing the guy's part." I told him. Even though we're winging it, we should at least set who sang what.

EJ pouted, "Of course! I am a man afterall."

I huffed at that. Maybe in a hundred years, EJ. Hahahaha.

Ms Pitera clapped her hands together, "Alright, has everyone found their partner? Okay good. Who wants to go first?"

EJ 's hand shot up, "Us! Ms Pretty. Alpha Sam and me."

I facepalmed. No, no, no, EJ. In music class, you don't raise your hand to go first! You hung back and hope we ran out of time and won't have to go at all!

But wth, I was with EJ.

Usually, when I was running with another wolf, I had to make sure they were able to keep up with me. With EJ, I had to wonder if I could keep up with him. But I was the Alpha. I was the one who set the pace, not him.

I got up on the stage and picked up the mic and smiled widely at my friends. It was easy if I pretended I was back home with my pack again, and not facing a class of cynical and judgemental high school kids.

EJ picked up his mic and waved and bounced up and down, "Hoi, everyone! Alpha Sam and I are ready to sing!"

"Dance too!" Henry yell from the safety of the back of the studio. The other kids whooted a little, and laughed.

"If you're good, maybe we will!" EJ promised with a wink. WTH.

The music started and EJ turned to me as if completely unaware of the force of mortification I was atm experiencing, "Don't be shy, Alpha. Sing and dance with me!"

And then he put a hand behind his head, and thrusted out his hips to strike a pose, "I can show you the world~"

Oh goddess, send me a lighting bolt and kill me now. Why did I have to stand next to that?

This was my first and very natural thought. But then I also realized that if I let whatever EJ was doing get to me, I was going to end up standing on the side like a red tomato faced weakling - which was just humiliating.

I changed my prayer: Send me a lighting bolt and kill him instead.

But the goddess didn't. I guess I had no choice. It was my turn to sing too. I shrugged my shoulders to indicate to my classmates that I had no choice but to play along, "A whole new world~"

Halfway through, I noticed that EJ was actually really good. He wasn't kidding when he said this kind of thing was his specialty. By the time he sang, "Now I'm in a whole new world with you~", our classmates were actually just watching.

Of course, I wasn't going to let him dance circles around me in front of everyone, "Unbelievable sights~"

I didn't dance. I just sang, but I think now that I was really singing, it surprised everyone. EJ's face lit up and he came closer when he sang his parts in between mine, "Hold your breath - it gets better!"

When he put his face too close, I simply caught his cheek in my hand and pushed him away. He pretended to fall back.

"I'm like a shooting star, I've come so far, I can't go back to where I used to be~"

Which I realised even as the words passed my lips, that it was the truth of my life. Everything is changing. Even me. I can't go back to where I used to be.

After that, our class actually clapped and whooped a bit for us. Like not the sacarstic clap, or the "okay I'm glad that's over, can we clap and move on now?" kind of clap. They just clapped.

EJ took my hand and bowed, so I bowed too.

"That was very good." Ms Pitera sounded very surprised, "EJ... Are you training to be a professional?"

I froze, but EJ never missed a beat, "Hoi, you saw through me, Ms Pretty! Actually I used to perform, my stage name was The Red Prince."

"I... I can't say I've ever heard of you." Ms Pitera said apologetically.

"That's okay. My kind of performance isn't meant for nice ladies to watch." EJ grinned cheekily.

After that the song continued to be performed in many renditions. We saw it all, the good, the bad, and the ugly.

Liam and Jasmine's performance had to be the highlight for me. They stood next to each other, Liam smiling his usual closed mouth smile, Jasmine starting out shyly, but then they sung together, and it was just so sweet.

"Urgh... If they sang anymore, I would have to go test for diabetes." Leia had complained.

Her own performance was with Marcus, which was alright if you completely ignored the fact that Marcus sung completely flat throughout.

It turned out that Henry's partner wasn't Abigail. It was Janice. Abigail had tried to exchange lots with her, but in the end, Janice told Ms Pitera and got her piece of paper back.

Henry's baritone was actually quite pleasant to listen to, but Janice's voice was the showstopper. She wasn't like EJ, a highly skilled performer, but her natural singing voice was beautiful. She was shy and she didn't sing into the mic properly for the first part until Henry lost his patience and shoved her mic closer to her face, but Janice had a really special voice.

Who else had an interesting performance? Let me see...

Fluffy went up with Arlene. If I thought EJ was embaressing to stand next too, Fluffy was worse. Even just a shrug of his shoulders was provocative. Fluffy pretty much performed the whole song. Arlene just held the mic and smiled her megawatt smile and looked embaressed. She didn't even mouth the words. She really just smiled through the entire song while Fluffy serenaded her. Fluffy could sing too... And like EJ, he was obviously "professionally trained".

I asked EJ about it during the lull of performances where the song was just sung on repeat by various kids who didn't want to stand out - kids who knew how music class was supposed to be, and just sang as quietly as possible, just to get it over with.

According to EJ, not all fightdogs had "special training". That's why EJ has said it was their specialty. Keys had made "after party" entertainment popular among the vamps. Keys was EJ's hero. Keys was a super famous fightdog. Did I know about Keys? (I knew Keys was Ki... Did EJ? Omo)

Anyway, EJ much preferred these alternate forms of entertaining. Unfortunately, a fightdog still had to fight. No one would want to watch you perform unless you were also ranked high in the fight cage. EJ can't remember anything about the fight cages though, "I only remember the fun stuff."

EJ grinned at me, but I couldn't quite smile back. Even if he couldn't remember, his wolf did.

"It's okay." I said, but I was talking to his wolf, "Safe."

And EJ suddenly dropped his head on my shoulder, "Alpha Sam is the best!"

What was that? I pushed his head away. Was that his wolf? Wth.

The worst performance of the day was Terrence and Troy. They were the last two. I think they were hoping they didn't have to sing at all.

Ms Pitera asked if any girl would like to help them, but no one volunteer.

Terrence sang loudly and very off key. Troy sang very softly and also off key, which was ironic because of his usual his talking volume in class. To all our credit, no one laughed at them. We just sat there, acutely embaressed to witness it, and waited politely till it was over. And then we clapped because it was over... And because we felt sorry for them. What was worse than having to perform something lame in front of your entire class? Performing it badly, and still having to stand there till it was over. Those two got my applause for simply sucking it up standing through the entire duration of the stupid song.

"I never want to hear that song again." Henry said when we left the studio.

"Hear hear." Marcus agreed heartily.

"Do you still want to start a band, Marc?" Henry asked, "Nevermind, let's talk more over lunch."