GIRL TALK

6 FEBRUARY, SATURDAY, PLAYDATE

"So, tell us about the boys in your pack!" Pearl's eyes gleamed with excitement.

I looked around for help, but it seemed like the other girls were all wearing the same eyes. Even Krystal who usually played it cool looked rather interested.

Okay, I've finally gotten a playdate. I had never been very successful with this girl talk business, but I really didn't want to disappoint my friends so I tried very hard to think of a good answer.

I mean, the first answer that came to mind was that "They're just like normal boys."

Like normal werewolf boys, like urm... Yeah. I tried very hard to think how Jessica or Lizzy would have answered and then I remembered, "There is a hotness scale!"

"A what?" Zara asked.

"The girls (aka Lizzy and Savy) have a ranking of the guys by how hot they are." I explained.

Yes! I'm nailing it! My friends actually looked very pleased at this.

"That's perfect! Tell us who is on top." Krystal ordered.

"And don't say it's your boyfriend, because then we'd know you're just making it up." Leia added.

My boyfriend? I didn't have a boyfriend... unless they meant Bell. Was boyfriend the equivalent to mate/fiancé? Urm... List. I tried really hard to recall the list.

The problem was, these things had never been that important to me, so I didn't exactly commit it to memory...

"Well?" Abigail's smile was somewhat frozen like she had it on a few minutes too long.

"I'm trying to remember." I argued.

It's like asking me to recite the periodic table on the spot. And then I remembered how the girls at Thursday's training said that their tier ranking corresponded to their hotness.

"Ki." I answered. I decided to leave Mate out of the ranking, "Ki is number 1. And then Harvey, and urm probably Ben."

"So all the hottest guys are your betas?" Pearl asked.

Oh.

"Wait no! That can't be right!" I mean, that didn't make sense at all. My betas were not that hot.

Okay, I know Lizzy and Savy had a thing for Harvey, and Savy said Ki was drool worthy, but Ben? Hmmm...

"I'm probably mixing them up. How about I just tell you the ones on the list in no particular order?" I asked.

"Yeah, okay. Fair enough." Krystal said.

"Like Top 10?" Zara said.

"Yeah." I said.

"Okay, you tell us, and later after we meet them at the party later, we will come back and rank them for you." Abigail decided.

Urm... Okay. Although a guy's hotness was of very little consequence to me... But okay... Girl talk was like that.

(And I was actually participating properly! Level up!)

"I think there's a Jonah and Nix and Marlow and Ethan too. Maybe Drew. I can't remember. And oh yeah, Shannon. Maybe Tim? Dean? Was Dean hot?" Now I'm just listing out my buddies.

That's not right either.

"And urm... Jack, and Link, and Kevy, and..."

"Are you just sprouting random names?" Leia asked me.

"Very suspicious." Zara agreed.

No, I wasn't! But I was just sprouting the names of every guy I knew. So much for girl talk. Looks like I hadn't leveled up after all.

"It's okay, we'll probably see a lot of cool guys at the party later anyway." Jasmine tried to soothe.

"Sam! You must introduce us, okay?" Krystal ordered.

This I knew how to do, "Okay, okay. But I have no idea who's hot and who's not. So just like point them out and I'll intro you."

I'm very good an intros. AND I felt pretty confident I would know everyone at the party.

I mean, it was an by invite only due to the limited number of pax, and already my whole gang was going. Plus 9 school friends here. We probably hit max. I'm actually surprised Angela's group was coming too.

"Next question: what kind of girls do the guys in your pack like?" Abigail asked.

Urm... "Girls not like me?" I asked.

"Awww... Sam, I'm sure there are guys who like you." Jasmine said, and then she added, "Actually I'm sure a lot of them do like you."

"Wait, or are the other girls here like super-model beautiful?" Leia asked.

Urm... "Yes?" I answered.

"Super model like you?" Zara asked.

Urm... "No?"

Actually I had no idea. Oh right! They had a list for that too... I think Savy and Lizzy were on top... But then again, this list was made by Ben and Jonah under duress from the same two girls.

"I don't know." I admitted at last, "It's not about looks. I meant the guys don't treat me like a girl here. I'm like a guy to them cos we grew up playing together."

"I don't know what kind of girls the guys like. Probably something dumb like quiet and demure. Or I can just ask!" That's right! Ben was just somewhere nearby.

"BEN!!!" I hollered.

"Shhhhh...." The girls panicked.

Someone grabbed me. Someone else stuffed a pillow in my face.

"Don't call him over!" Krystal hissed.

"It's girl talk! What don't you understand about girl talk?" Abigail scolded.

There were those two raps on the door and it was opened, "Did you call me- "

Ben froze. The girls froze. Then they let me go. I pushed the pillow away.

The other guys came in to see what the commotion was.

"Ben, what kind of girls do the guys like?" I asked.

"Easy girls." Ben smirked.

I threw the pillow on him hard, "One day, I'll have you neutered!"

Ben just laughed it off.

And then Ben smiled at my friends, "Are you girls looking for dates? What kind of guy do you like? I'll try to put you in the same team during the games."

Oh, and with that, Ben just ignited some kind of unseeable explosive in my friends.

"Someone nice." Zara answered immediately.

"But not too nice." Krystal said.

"Tall dark and handsome is always welcomed." Abigail flashed Henry a flirty smile.

He has to be cool, and kinda hot.

Must be taller.

Not fat. Not thin either.

Muscular, but not too muscular.

Maybe a bit flirty. But not too flirty. There was no such thing as too flirty.

Serious.

Funny is good too.

Maybe seriously funny. But not too funny.

Serious, he has to be cool and serious.

But he should know how to make a girl laugh.

Not clingy.

Sweet.

Rich, or enough to pay for dates.

"Okay. Got it. I'll introduce you at the party." Ben said. What he "got", I had no idea, but Ben sounded so reliable about it.

"Really?" Krystal asked, she smiled coyly at Ben, "You have someone in mind for me too?"

"You're with me tonight, babe." Ben promised.

I flared immediately, "No! No babe! None of my friends are in your babe zone."

Grrr... I'm going to neuter him!

"Sam, if you're like this, the poor guy will never get a girlfriend." Abigail admonished me ever so gently, "We should be more supportive."

"Do you have any idea how many babes this guy has?" I retorted.

"It's just for a night, Sam." Krystal said.

"Yeah, she'll give him back to you tomorrow." Pearl inserted.

Grrr...

"Ben you better treat her right." I said, "If you make her cry, I'm going to beat you up!"

"Don't worry, I'll make sure your friend has a good time." Ben promised and then he had the sense to leave the room before I really decided to castrate him.

"Well, I'll be showing Alpha Henry the Future Alpha Office now." Ki said, "Princess, would you come up too? Harvey has papers on hand for your signature."

Eh? Really? But I didn't have a signature. I didn't dare to admit that out loud though. I'm sure one of my friends would say, "What? You don't know how to write your own name?" And everyone would laugh at me.

Which I guess was not really that big a deal now that I'm writing this, but when it was happening, it was something I had every intention of avoiding.

"Harvey's at the office?" Jasmine asked.

Now all the girls were going to come up to check out Harvey - I mean, the Future Alpha Office. Sigh.

Why was I friends with them again?

Because they were fun. That's right, and they were my friends.

There really wasn't any reason for our friendship except that we just happened to be. Friendship was unreasonable that way.

Getting to the Future Alpha Office with this many people was really troublesome. We should've just called Harvey down for the girls and went up ourselves.

Anyway, after taking two lifts back down to the main lobby on the ground floor, we had to walk up to the third floor over to the private lobby tucked on the right, where the Alpha's private lift was because the Alpha's penthouse was only accessible from there.

It wasn't a large lift and there was only one of it - so we needed to go up in three groups and wait for the lift to go all the way up, and down again, till all of us were up on the top floor.

On the bright side, my new office was probably located in the safest space in the packhouse. I mean, if anyone were to attack it, they would only be able to send up 4-6 warriors at a time, depending on the size of their warriors. Or they would run out of breath from climbing up all those flights of stairs.

Either way, they wouldn't be much of the threat by the time they got to the top.

Once there though, Harvey opened the front door for us in his usual calm smile, and the girls seemed to feel it was all worth it.

Ben was there too. Did he think he could escape my wrath here? Or did he think I would forget? I would've punched him because I was still mad at him for trying to pick up my friend when I noticed his mood was unusually subdued.

"What's up?" I mindlinked.

"Harvey just lectured me for my indiscrete flirting." Ben mindlinked back.

So, was flirting okay if they were discrete?

"Is Harvey coming for the party? Who's team is he on?" Abigail asked.

I guess no one was going to lecture my friends on indiscrete flirting.

Ben looked at the girls, "Jasmine? You're Jasmine right?"

Jasmine nodded.

"Yeah, Harvey will be in your team." Ben said.

"Ohhhh... Jasmine! You hit jackpot!" Zara rejoiced for her friend.

Jasmine blushed a little. She cast a quick glance at Liam, "It's just a party game right?"

"Yeah. There are other guys and girls in the team too." Ben clarified.

Jasmine nodded, "Okay."

If this arrangement bothered Liam, he didn't show it. Except for a one sided shrug, he acted like he hadn't heard it.

Maybe this was alright.

Zara tried to whisper but she was still very audible to wolf ears, "It's okay Jazz, it's still your chance."

Jasmine didn't answer her.

Ki launched into tour guide mode and offered to show Henry the office chairs that were designed like sports car seats. I don't know where Ki got all this tour guide material from. I'm also wondering where my betas got the money for the fancy chairs and dark glass tables... Were they bullet proof too? Just wondering.

Once my friends moved to follow tour guide Ki, Harvey invited me into my own office to deal with the papers.

He shut the door behind us, "I thought I should let you know, I've already spoken to Ben about his unacceptable behavior earlier."