Chapter 1

                                    

                                          
"3..2...1...HAPPY NEW YEAR," the crowd booms in unison. I clank my copper mug containing my Moscow mule into my best friend's vodka lemonade while giving her a side hug.
"We made it to 2040," she laughs while finishing her drink. 
"Who would have thought?" I sarcastically remark while rolling my eyes and taking another sip of my mule. 
"Ready?" She shrugs. Keelie and I have been together for every New Year's Eve since we were 12, and the night has always been so anticlimactic.   
I down my mule and smile.
"Ready," I grin.
"Don't you dare," she scolds as I put the copper mug under my leather jacket. She squints her sky-blue eyes at me, but doesn't cause a scene.
We make it out of the bar arm in arm. 
"Well," she sighs, "Maybe next year we will be celebrating with our mates."
She glances at me out of the corner of her eye.
"If we have mates there will be nothing to celebrate," I cut in.
Werewolves. They announced their presence 10 years ago now. It was the year 2030, if 2020 wasn't bad enough, now we have monsters living among us in society. 
They took over almost everything, or as they call it, "coexisting in peace." With the big announcement of werewolves came mates. The Alphas of the two packs in our state of Minnesota explained how they were experiencing a mate shortage. I remember chuckling at that.
Their species is struggling because less and less werewolves are being paired with a werewolf as a mate.
Once they started taking over it all happened so fast. The werewolves were claiming other people as "theirs." The sickest part of all, some humans wanted mates. They said it was like finding their true love, insert gag. 
My best friend, Keelie, was one of them. That is one topic her and I agree to disagree on. 
The worst part is they want to "educate" us on acceptance and value their presence in society, so now at college we are forced to take two general education courses in werewolf studies. 
I am knocking my two courses out this semester with Keelie. It is my spring semester of senior year, so it is now or I don't graduate. She wanted to take Mates 101 and History of our pack, so now every Friday we will have back-to-back lectures where we waste 100 minutes of our lives learning about irrelevant bullshit, but I mean it's general ed courses so what's new?
The creepiest part is that the lectures are taught by them. It's bad enough they are around campus, but at least they blend in for the most part. 
"Why so quiet? Are you worried about tomorrow?" Keelie asks while scrunching her eyebrows together. 
I look down at my short best friend and sigh.
"I don't know Keels, you know how my family is. It's why I've been putting off the classes. I'll feel better knowing we're in the same class, but I have a bad feeling about the entire thing," I confess.
"I know," she replies.
We make it in front of our apartment complex and head up the flight of stairs. 
"Night Keels," I say while walking to my door.
"Night Kayde," she smiles while heading to her door, right across the hall from mine. 
I unlock the door and give her a wave over my head before closing it. Once I am back in my small one-bedroom apartment, I put my copper mug in the sink. 
"Worth it," I laugh while making my way to the bathroom to shower.
"Don't wash your hair," I audibly remind myself while grabbing a hair tie. I put my long brown hair up into a bun and secure it in a shower cap. Once I am out of the shower, I brush my teeth and put my nightly moisturizer on. I look into my blue-green eyes and take a calming breath.
"You're being silly Kaydence. Just go to sleep and let's get tomorrow over with." I tell myself. I nod at myself in the mirror and go to bed wondering what this year will bring.
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Thanks for reading!
Any guesses on what the year will bring? ;)
Much Love,
A.Lynn