Life's Tough With The Odds Against You - Chapter 1 - Karma and Coincidence
#1 of Life's Tough With The Odds Against You
Life's Tough With The Odds Against You - Chapter 1 - Karma and Coincidence
Well, this is my first series I've started with the intentions of it being really long, almost novel length. This first chapter alone is like 20 pages long, so it took me a lot longer to write and I even went over it and reviewed it. With so much wrong with the world today and the image of love almost non-existent, I just had to do something to right this injustice.
I laid in my bed, still unable to sleep during the entire night. I jolted even more awake as my alarm went off, meaning it was 6:30 on the dot. I didn't understand why I was so restless. True, it was the first day of high school, but this was my sophomore year, I'd already been through the process once before, why was it different this time?
Tiredly, I threw the covers aside and rose from my bed, allowing the brisk chill of morning to envelope my nude body. It was times like these where I was very thankful I had fur and not scales, because the mornings would be extra cold without my tan-ish black fur keeping me nice and toasty. I reached up and stretched my arms out and leaned back, hearing multiple cracks. Yawning, I stepped over to the mirror and took a quick look at my extremely tired body. I wasn't really a muscle head, but by no means was I out of shape. I was about average height, average weight, muscular but not really all too toned, per say. I swished my fluffy tail behind me, looking at the unique shade of dark tan with the last bit of it black with a ring of white along the base. My shoulders met my torso with black fur, as did my elbows, wrists, knees, pretty much every major joint had black fur contrasting the deep tan color, which was lighter on my belly than the rest of my body. My cheekbones were again, highlighted with black while the rest of my face was light tan. If I wasn't a unique enough fox already, my left eye was a deep blue while my right changed from a deep hazel to a light green throughout the day.
"Come on Ierlex, get up! I'm making breakfast in ten minutes and I know you want to shower so hurry up or your pancakes will be cold before you get to them!" Ohh yea, to top it off I had a very strange name, pronounced I-ur-lex, but by now though I'd gotten use to all the shit that others at school would give me about it. I shuffled over to my dresser and pulled open a few drawers. First I grabbed some boxers and threw them on, and then I grabbed a pair of cargo shorts and a t-shirt before heading out of my room towards the bathroom.
I closed the door and took off my boxers before turning the knobs on the shower, letting it run for a while to warm up before jumping in. While I was waiting I grabbed a towel from the cabinet as well as a bottle of three-in-one soap/conditioner/shampoo stuff. I looked in the mirror quickly, running a paw through my silver-white hair, which was long and thick, and always styled up in thick spikes. I saw steam begin to form and push over top the curtains so I figured the water was warm enough for me.
With the bottle in one hand, I dropped the towel on the floor and pushed the curtain aside, stepping over the ridge of the shower/tub hybrid thing, whatever it was. I moved directly under the stream of water, letting the hot liquid soak my hair and slowly move down my fur, causing shivers as my body slowly warmed up. I could've stood there for hours and let the warm water work it's magic on my tired body, but my moment of Zen was harshly interrupted by a rough knocking at the closed door.
"Come on Ierlex, hurry up! I've got stuff to do to get ready as well!" I groaned to myself. I knew that was my sister, Cindy, who was also a fox, but had dark brown fur and brown eyes more like my father. Slowly I shut off the water, shuddering slightly as the cold began to penetrate my fur. I popped open the lid and poured some of the substance into my paw. The subtle smell of pine trees or something close to that started to disperse throughout the air as I lathered the shampoo between my two paws. I started with my hair, running my soapy paws through it and scratching my scalp in attempt to get as clean as I could. Once I was content with the job I did on my head, I moved down to my shoulders and arms, rubbing my fur through and covering it in the suds. Wanting to feel the warmth of the shower again, I quickly rubbed down my chest and stomach, then my legs, before coming back to my crotch, making sure to clean it well. Then I reached around many different ways to try to wash my back, a near impossible task for someone as inflexible as me.
Deciding that I'd done all I could, I turned the warm water back on and sighed deeply as the rush of heat passed through me once more. I decided to let the water wash away all the suds without my help, so I closed my eyes and felt my muscles relax and loosen.
Even with my eyes closed I could slightly see my vision becoming spotty and felt myself swaying slightly. All of a sudden I began to fall forwards and wasn't able to catch myself in my half-conscious state of mind. The loud thud was accompanied by a grunt from me as the side of my muzzle slammed into the floor of the shower. Quickly I pushed myself back up quickly out of embarrassment and felt my muzzle. Around my eye I found a small trickle of blood begin to run down the side of my muzzle.
"Ierlex, what happened?"
"Umm, nothing ma', nothing." I could tell she didn't buy it, but thankfully she decided to leave it be.
I finished washing the soap from my fur and turned off the water, shaking out a little before throwing the curtains open. I grabbed the towel from the ground and started the assault on my wet fur to dry it before it got all matted up.
"Ierlex, pancakes are getting cold!"
"I know mom, I'm coming!" I finished drying my fur and gave my hair a quick rub down before grabbing my clothes and putting them on. I shook out my hair once more before I opened the door to see Cindy standing there, hands on her hips.
"About fucking time Ierlex." She said, pushing me into the doorframe as she stomped by.
"Jesus, calm down sis." I said, brushing my shoulder lightly before heading to the stairs.
"Ierlex, for the last time, come get your breakfast!"
"Hang on mom I'm coming!" Damn, why was she always so impatient and always on my ass about what I'm doing.
I clambered down the stairs to see my mother standing there, her arms crossed.
"Yea ma' I know." I said as she opened her mouth to bitch at me some more, cutting her off. Everyone in my house was on edge in the morning it seemed, except for my dad, but he was away on business making tons of money, but almost never any time off.
I sat down and grabbed the syrup for my pancakes, pouring a small amount on top and spreading it around with my fork. After spending the entire night in a restless state of mind, I was two things, one being very tired and the other being very hungry, the latter of the two become increasingly so evident as I stared down my plate, eager to wolf down the pancakes.
Blink
Hmm, one minute my plate had pancakes on it, and now the plate had syrup residue while my fork held the last bite of fluffy pancake. I shrugged and put the rest of my breakfast in my mouth and collected my dishes. I threw them in the sink and ran a little bit of water over them; just to make sure there was one less thing that someone could yell at me about.
I wiped my muzzle with my arm as I headed towards the door.
"See ya!" I shouted, slinging my backpack over my shoulder and walking out the door. The high school wasn't much more than a mile away, so I generally walked all year long, even during the winter. However, we lived down near the equator, so it was pretty warm year round. I walked down my short driveway before heading right down the dirt road. I yawned once more as the warm and gentle morning air met my nose and tickled at my fur.
A few houses down the road I saw the door open on the only blue house on this road and a beautiful arctic fox walk out and close the door behind her. I began to jog to catch up with her.
As I got within her range of hearing she turned around and greeted me with a smile.
"Ierlex, oh my god it's been too long! I would have stopped by and said hello yesterday but we got back from up north at like ten at night so I didn't want to bother you."
"Oh that wouldn'ta been a problem," I said, catching my breath. "I've been up since Sunday morning. Couldn't sleep a blink last night for some reason."
"Really, you don't look tired at all though."
"Believe me Alexis, even if I don't look all too tired, I am running on reserves here, and it'll be a miracle if I make it through the day without falling asleep." She giggled cutely, which just made the bad start of the day a thousand times better. My eyes locked on her amazingly fluffy white tail swaying gracefully back and forth in the wind while we walked. From there my eyes traveled up her hips and along her smooth curves up to her neck, then to her beautiful face, then finally to her ears, which I just realized had suddenly perked up, then dropped.
"What are you doing?" She asked lightly.
"It's just that you've been gone all summer, so now that you're back not only am I excited, but I also realize just how much you've changed since I last saw you. You look so, different, but as always amazingly beautiful." I saw her cheeks blush a light red as she nudged me with her elbow playfully.
"Aww, how sweet. You're such a great friend."
"Yea, how long have we known each other, by the way? Like ten, eleven years or something?"
"Yea, I remember how we met too. First day of school way back then, my mom had dropped me off early, and there wasn't a single other fox there, and the only canine in the class was a wolf, but he was mean to this one other kid I saw, so I stayed away from him and just sorta sat down on my own away from everyone."
"Yea, then my mom dropped me off and I saw you, and we were almost inseparable, just like that."
"We did almost everything together from then on out, all the way up to now pretty much."
"And you've changed so much since then. But even now if I look hard enough I can still see the cute little shy fox that was sitting alone by herself that grew up to be you."
"And I can still see the shy little tan fox that walked up to me almost eleven years ago that grew up to be you." I chuckled a little and ran my hand through my hair. Looking back at the time we had spent as friends, the hundreds of recesses in elementary school, switching classes to have the same schedule in middle school, and taking on freshman year at high school together. We were always the closest of friends and always understood each other, whether it was problems with family or the death of someone close, we had always had each other's back.
"Hey, remember back in like, was it fourth grade, when we both found out we were moving away? For weeks we cried and were sad and everything, but then after we said our final goodbyes and got in our cars we discovered that we both moved to the same place, the same road even?" I said, looking down the road, the school only about half a mile away.
"Oh yea, I remember that! We were absolutely devastated about that until we saw each other moving things from the moving vans just down the road from each other."
"Yea, we would spend almost everyday at either yours or my house."
"Ahh, weren't those the simple days." She said with a light sigh. The dirt turned to pavement, meaning there was about a quarter mile from the school. An awkward silence passed over us in anticipation as we drew closer and closer to the school, accompanied by the occasional glance at each other. When we got to the front doors, I reached out to pull the handle, but it swung viciously open and someone crashed into me.
"What the?" I shouted before I realized who it was. "Reiken? What are you doing?" I said to my friend as he got up and lent a hand to me. "And wait, why aren't you wearing a shirt?" I said, realizing the wolf was only in a pair of shorts.
"Well, in my haste this morning I forgot to put on a shirt, and they said I had to wear one, so now I have to run back to my house and get a shirt."
"So, did you forget a shirt or did you chose not to wear one?" I asked with a smile. He shrugged and smiled guiltily before taking off towards his house.
"See ya Ierlex, see ya Alexis! I might be back" We both chuckled at what had just happened as we entered the high school for the first time since summer. We had lost our schedules that came over the summer, so we headed to the office to grab another.
"Let me guess, schedules right?" The secretary said, reaching for a pile of papers. With a chuckle we nodded, walking up to her desk.
"One for Ierlex, and one for Alexis." She said, handing us our respective schedules.
"Thank you!" Alexis called back on our way out. The first thing we checked was our locker numbers.
"Hey, where's your locker?" I asked curiously.
"It looks like, 214, what about you?"
"Aww, mines on a whole different floor, I got 186." We compared our classes and we didn't have anything together except for lunch. I groaned a little bit after seeing our last hours were also different.
"Don't worry, we still got lunch together at least." She said, trying to cheer me up a little.
"Yea, I guess."
"Hey you two!" We both looked at who had said that, and walking towards us was one of Alexis's closer friends, Melissa, who was a tigress.
"Oh my god Melissa! How have you been I haven't even talked with you since my family left on the trip up north a week after last school year got out!" Melissa took Alexis in a friendly hug before looking at me and playfully shoving my shoulder.
"Wow, look at you Ierlex! You sure did grow up while I was gone! Gotten taller, filled out, you're pretty good looking I must say." I grinned and ran my paw through my hair nervously.
"Thanks Melissa, you've matured a bit too." I said back. She blushed lightly before glancing at the clock.
"Well, it's been nice seeing you two, but the bell's gonna ring soon so we should find our lockers." Melissa said.
"All right, see you later!" I said, heading off to the general direction of the lockers.
"Let's see, 184, 185, and 186." I mumbled to myself, twirling the combination lock. Luckily I had gotten the combination right the first time as I pulled the door open. I shrugged my bag off my shoulder and hung it on the rung. Just before I slammed it shut, something scratched on the inside of the door caught my eye. I took a second look and saw it was my name with hearts drawn around it. Hmm, it appears I have a secret admirer, or at least the last person who had this locker had a crush on me.
"Ierlex, do you know the answer to the equation?"
"Nlhaa what?" I murmured incomprehensibly, jolting awake.
"That's exactly what I thought. Class, please try and stay awake, and not doze off like Ierlex here. Moving on..."
You'd think I would have stayed awake after that, but as soon as she continued talking about logarithms and inverses, I quietly fell back asleep, this time with my head upright and not peeled over on the desk.
"So, now your homework is page two hundred thirteen, questions one to seventeen." I woke up again near the end of the hour and thankfully didn't make much of a scene. I turned my book to the page and couldn't make sense of the mathematic equations, so I decided to nap quickly before the bell rang.
Someone nudged my shoulder and whispered to me. "Hey, guy, wake up. She's looking at you." Slowly I opened my eyes and pretended to be working on my homework. I looked over to the badger who'd given me the warning.
"Hey, thanks man."
"No problem, just do the same for me if I doze off, this is so boring."
The bell rang and we all rose, heading to the door. As I crossed the room the teacher kept her eyes trained on me the whole time until I was in the halls. I walked quickly to my locker and entered the comm to my locker, swinging it open, and tossing my algebra 2 book to the bottom where it shall be left until tomorrow. Lets see, next class was English perspectives.
"Oh, hey Ierlex!"
"Wow, Melissa, your not following me are you?" I said sarcastically.
"Ha ha ha, no, my next class is English and I just happened to see you."
"Yeeea boii! Get sum!" I turned to see Zach, a rabbit, and one of the biggest jocks in the school, and in my mind the most immature douche of the entire sophomore year.
"Ohh shut up Zach." I said, trying to ignore his stupid laughter. "Damn I can't stand him sometimes." I said to Melissa as we began walking to our next class.
"Believe me, I hate him too. Well, the class is here." She said as I followed her into the room.
"Ierlex! No way man, I thought I'd have to suffer through English on my own, now I've got you to copy off of!" Reiken yelled jokingly.
"Hey Reiken," I said, sitting next to him. "Good to see you have a shirt on now." Melissa gave us a confused look before just shaking her head and sitting behind us.
As the English lesson went on, it became more of a competition between Reiken and I of who could stay awake longer, and whoever would fall asleep first would receive a swift swat on the back of our head by Melissa, who was sitting behind us. By the end of the period, Reiken won by only receiving fourteen smacks, while I sported an impressive sixteen.
"Really guys? Grow up some." Melissa said after we were in the halls and out of earshot of the teacher.
"Hey, I don't know what sort of excuse that Reiken has, but I didn't get any sleep last night at all, so cut me some slack, please."
"Ohh you, you're so silly."
"Yeeea boi! Still at it eh!"
"Oh my fucking god," I whispered to myself. "Get the hell outta here Zach you asshole!"
"Just ignore him, alright?"
"Melissa you don't understand how much that pisses me off. Society has become so damn skewed on the idea of love that guys can't be good friends to girls without them being thought of only wanting to fuck them, and it makes women shut out any guy they see, and the good guys like me now can't ever just have a nice conversation with a woman because of jackasses like him!" I said, fury running through me.
"Don't worry Ierlex, I get what you mean. You're really a nice guy, so don't let them get you down." She said, heading into her class.
"Yea, thanks a lot." I said, heading to my own class.
"Hola clase, ¿como estas?"
Great, Spanish with a boring monotone teacher. Fkin amazing. I think I'll just close my eyes for a second...
"¿Cuantas minutos quedan? ¿Solamente un minuto?"
Hmm, blrg what? How the hell did I sleep through the entire period without her noticing? I smirked as the bell rang, collected my stuff, and headed out to my locker for lunch.
Besides the occasional yawn of tiredness, nothing too exciting happened from entering the halls and shutting my locker, lunch in hand. I walked down the hall to the lunchroom, searching for a table with someone I knew. As I looked on the left side of the lunchroom, I saw a table with Reiken, Melissa, and Alexis. No f-in, way, this year was going to be sweet.
"Dude this is awesome, we're all here for lunch together." I said, taking the seat between Alexis and Melissa.
"Hey, Ierlex, guess what I found scrawled in my locker?" Alexis said to me.
"What?"
"It was my name with hearts scratched around it. Weird huh?"
"No way, me too. But it was my name, not yours. It looks like we have secret admirers of some sort ehh?" I said.
Before I could even see what I had for lunch, someone had to nuke my last nerve from orbit.
"Yea boi, goin for two in the sack at once!" I turned around to see Zach sitting on top of the table next to me, snickering to himself and his little posse.
"What did you just imply about my friends?" I said, standing up and walking right up to his smug little face.
"Hey man, chill, I'm just sayin that if you reel em in, you got two bitches at once serving you." I clenched my fists, having no one holding me back now.
"Disrespect my friends again, and you won't taste anything but blood for the next century."
"Bitc-hes." My fist flew through the air, smashing the rabbit square in his nose, sending him crashing onto the ground from the table.
"We got a fight over here!" Someone nearby yelled, drawing the entire lunch into a circle. Zach leapt back to his feet, rubbing his paw by his nose, wiping the blood that began to run down. He grunted as I jumped over the table to him, bringing my fist into a downward strike on the side of his head, causing him to reel back. As I drew closer to him, he brought his fist to my chest, causing me to bend over. His knee came up and smashed into my head, then as I leaned back from the force, his elbow drove into my upper thigh. He laughed smugly and dropped his hands in a taunt. Bad move. With his hands down I threw my fist headlong into his neck, making him gag as I struck true, bringing my other quickly up to his chin, sending him flying back, with the only reason he was still standing being he was bracing his body on a table with both arms. My entire body hurt, my head throbbed in pain, and my leg was hardly able to support any weight on it, but I still stood strong, and it was time to end this.
I lunged at him and jumped into the air, bringing both my legs up together and kicked out simultaneously, the force of my entire body flying through my legs and into his chest sent him over the table and crashing to the ground, knocking him out cold. I slammed on the ground, landing on my elbow, which sent bolts of pain through my body. Reiken came over to me and helped me up, myself being unable to support my body at all.
A voice came over the PA system. "Zach and Ierlex, to the office immediately."
Great, just what I needed for the first day back.
"Damn that was fast. Reiken, could you, ya know, help me there? I don't think I could get there myself."
"Dude, after you doing what we all wanted to happen for years, of course I will."
I sat in the office chair for almost ten minutes before Zach must've came to and gotten carried down.
"Both of you, that room. And don't fight each other in there or you'll be suspended for the entire rest of the year." The secretary said coldly. We walked past her and sat down in the room, not even looking at each other. It took almost forty more minutes before the principal, a gryphon, came in and sat down.
"Obviously you know why you're down here, and I've heard all I need to hear from very dependable sources. It seems Zach here was speaking derogatorily to your female friends, and you were defending their honor. That was very brave thing you did. And as for you Zach," He said, turning to the rabbit and hardened his facial expression. "You, if I'm not mistaken, and I'm not, were harassing Ierlex here and sexually harassing two females, and provoked a fight. Therefore you have in school suspension for a month, Saturday detention nine till five for two months, and lunch detention for the rest of the year."
"That's bullshit!" Zach shouted, rising from his seat.
"You will not take that tone with me, or do I need to increase the severity of your punishment?"
"No sir." He mumbled as he sat back down with his head rolled down in shame.
"As for you Ierlex, detention for the rest of today, and try to not start any more fights." I looked at the principle in shock and disbelief, who then smiled back at me.
Apparently I was allowed to sleep from after the talk with the principal to when school for the day was finished, while Zach was only allowed to stare evilly at a wall. A ha ha, karma beotch!
I walked out of the office and to my locker to grab my stuff. I spun the lock around a few times before entering the comm. I got it open just as Melissa came up behind me.
"Hey Ierlex, I just wanted to say thanks a lot for what you did for Alexis and me at lunch, it was very valiant."
"Yea, thanks, it wasn't anything much. He sure did deserve it though." I said as I collected my things.
"Hey, I just remembered that this was Alexis's locker last year."
"What? Really?" Melissa nodded before saying goodbye and walking off. So, it was Alexis who had scratched my name in the door of the locker. I smiled happily; perhaps this day would get better yet. I always did like Alexis; sometimes I thought I liked her more than just friends would.
I walked, well, hobbled down the stairs and looked for the numbers on the lockers to find Alexis. As the numbers drew closer to her locker I began noticing that they became more familiar.
"Hey Alexis." I said as she was shutting her locker. "Wait a second, that was my locker last year..." I said, my voice trailing off at the end. "And I got yours from last year... too."
We both looked at each other nervously, realizing that it was the other who had scratched each other's names in the lockers.
"Eh he he, huh." I said as I turned away and ran my paw through my hair in embarrassment.
"Yea, umm, well yea." We both shuffled back and forth in place as the awkward moment washed over us. "Should we, you know, head home?"
"Umm, yea, sure."
We walked out of the school, walking slightly further apart from each other than this morning. For over half a mile we walked in silence, exchanging awkward glances and nervous sounds before Alexis finally broke the silence.
"You know, I've always sorta, liked you. Not just liked you, but really liked you, liked you." I stopped walking, frozen in shock for a moment. My heart was thumping in my head, thousands of thoughts swirled around my mind, rendering me speechless. She looked away embarrassed before she started running down the road, a few tears brewing in her eyes as she thought that my reaction was disgust and rejection.
"Wait!" I shouted, taking off too fast then my leg condition would allow. She stopped and turned just in time to catch me as my legs gave out from under me and I fell into her. She helped support me as I regained my balance, but I didn't let go or back away from her, but instead moved closer and brought her into an embrace. At first she was stunned, but then wrapped her arms around me, being careful not to hurt my ribs.
"Ever since the first day I saw you, I felt something, like an instant connection of some sort. Whenever I would see you it would make me smile and whenever you would laugh it would make the days worth living. It took until now that I realize that, I don't want you as a friend anymore, because I need you, because without you I'd die. You are my rising sun, my shining star, my guiding moon. You are not just some friend I know, but you are a part of me, just as inseparable now as we were ten years ago." I looked into her eyes, which just started to water slightly, and brought my hand behind her head, slowly running it down her neck and on her shoulders. Slowly, I moved my muzzle closer to hers and waited a moment before she closed the final few inches, completing the kiss.
Our eyes closed and minds sent reeling, our thoughts only focused on each other. The seconds that passed felt like hours, each moment of true and pure love being shared between us caused our tails to sway blissfully in unison. Just before I had run out of breath, Alexis broke the kiss, panting heavily.
"Not even death shall tear me from you, for you shall be the only one I love, and without you I would surely die." She managed to say between breaths. I pulled her into another loving hug before stepping back slightly. She moved right to my side and wrapped her arms around my waist while I wrapped mine around her shoulders. Together we slowly walked the last stretch of road before our houses in silence. This time, however; we were not at a lack of words, but rather a lack of needing them to be spoken.