'i just happen to be very, very attracted to her'

.

.

.

"What if she gets kicked out?"

Lizzie groaned as she pulled her pillow over her own face, trying to block out her twin's constant worrying and the repeated thumps of her feet against the wooden floor as she paced back and forth nervously. The question in the air had been asked six times now and Lizzie was almost 95% sure that it would be asked again within the next four minutes at this rate.

She had been doing it for almost forty minutes now, waiting to hear what was going to happen to Georgie Lockwood. Lizzie knew exactly what was happening here, she'd predicted it to MG in the first week of Georgie being at the school as she noticed how Josie had looked at the girl when she wasn't looking.

"Your adorable little crush will be fine," Lizzie groaned, slamming her pillow back on to her bed as she sat up to look at Josie incredulously, just wanting the girl to calm down and sit down so that they could both get some sleep. They only had a few weeks before summer was over and school started again, and Lizzie had been having this gut feeling ever since Georgie had arrived that this school year was going to be very different.

Obviously she didn't know about the extreme troubles they would face in the upcoming year, or she would have realised that Georgie hiding that she was a hybrid from them all was the least of their worries. Although later on they would all admit that finding out about her being a hybrid so early on would certainly help take the load off of things.

Josie spun around at her sister's accusation, her face going bright red of embarrassment as she stumbled over her words. Lizzie fake smiled at her as the darker haired girl tried to counteract what her blonde counter part had just said.

"She isn't my crush! We are friends, okay! I can be just friends with a pretty girl! She just happens to be very very pretty and I just happen to be very very attracted to her!" Josie exclaimed, stomping her foot slightly as she yelled at her sister. Lizzie snorted with laughter as she saw how much she had managed to tease Josie, the girl immediately blushing at her outburst.

A soft knock at the door caught both of the Saltzman's attentions as they turned to see a slightly sheepish looking Hope who had clearly just witnessed Josie's outburst about her roommate and was trying to hold back her own smile despite her rocky relationship with the duo. Josie blushed furiously as she realised that Hope had almost certainly just heard her outburst and also noted that she was probably the last person she wanted knowing that since Georgie was her roommate - and she guessed also her newest friend since they both shared the ability to be a wolf at will.

"That's eh... good to know," Hope half joked, knowing that the information might one day come in handy and storing it in her brain. She would never blackmail Josie - or anyone - for who they liked, but she did want to keep an eye on this potential relationship. To be fair, Hope wasn't even sure if Georgie was even in tune with what relationships felt like since it was becoming increasingly clear with every conversation the girl had with anyone in the school that she'd barely spent any time with anyone of her own age in her entire fifteen years of living.

Josie blinked a few times, turning to Lizzie with a look begging her to speak to Hope since the dark haired girl had no idea to come back from accidentally revealing her newest crush. It was almost funny, she thought, that two of the girls she now had fancied at one point both seemed to be either a hybrid or a tribrid. Maybe this was her now discovering that she had a supernatural type.

"What do you want?" Lizzie barked, rolling her eyes as she looked at the tribrid. Hope rolled her eyes back before shrugging as she looked between them both.

"Just thought I'd tell you that Georgie is here to stay. She was going to tell you herself but her transformation has tired her out so I offered to do it for her," Hope said, immediately making Lizzie feel bad for snapping at the girl. Just as Josie was about to ask if she could visit the girl, Hope started speaking as she knew exactly what the girl was going to ask. "It's probably best you wait until the morning to see her, she's been through a lot tonight."

_____

Georgie Lockwood certainly had been through a lot that day. If her wolf trip hadn't exhausted her out, then her evening spent in Dr Saltzman's office certainly would have.

One of the first things she was made aware of when she entered the office was that Emma had a sedative on hand in the off chance that she got angry again and felt like she was about to transform. Hope had warned them that in her experience it wasn't rare for her to have heightened emotions after her first couple of transformations before she started to get the hang of them. Alaric had promised the hybrid that it wasn't a threat, but was rather just him letting her know that if she felt like she needed it she was to tell them immediately.

Thankfully, it didn't come down to needing to use the sedative.

Alaric had just started straight away, asking her if she knew what she was to which she responded immediately that she was a vampire-werewolf hybrid that hadn't yet triggered her dominant vampirism that would come from her death. Him and Emma shared a surprise look at her sudden ease for sharing the truth, but then again it wasn't like she could lie and say she wasn't when they and almost the entire school that was home from the summer had seen her literally turn into the big black wolf.

He had then gone on to ask if the woman that Matt Donovan had heard about once or twice from Tyler Lockwood a few years before his death was her mother, to which she confirmed. He asked her if she knew how her mother had been a hybrid to which she again told him the truth straight away - she knew her mother was one, but her father had never told her how.

When Emma asked what she was like, Georgie could only pause for a second before telling them she would never know since the only person who knew her well was her dad since she had died giving birth to Georgie and he was dead.

They moved on pretty quickly after that revelation, feeling a deep pity for the girl as Alaric had started telling her about his disappointment at keeping it from them all as she hadn't just put herself in danger but the entire student body too. Unfortunately for Georgie who had hoped that she would now be able to just roam the grounds freely as a wolf whenever she needed to, Alaric also informed her that she probably wouldn't develop a complete control over herself for years - especially since she was only fifteen and still had a lot to learn.

All those issues aside, Georgie didn't cry until Alaric had finally told her she would be allowed to stay as long as she followed his newly updated rules for her. At first the man had assumed she was crying because she didn't want to follow his rules, but Emma was quick to help the girl explain to him it was because this was the first time she had felt like she had a proper family ever since her dad had died when she was three. Alaric was sure that was the moment that cemented his desire to make sure Tyler Lockwood's daughter was kept safe forever.

He knew that their entire group of friends from their supernatural days felt the same. Elena and Damon had contacted him once Caroline had informed all of their old circle about the sudden appearance of the girl, with Damon himself saying that if the girl ever needed anything that he could help her with then he owed it to her. Alaric wouldn't tell Georgie that for a long time as he knew the girl didn't exactly want to hear anything from her fathers murder, but he knew there would eventually come a time in her life when she most likely would end up activating her vampirism. She would maybe understand why Damon did what he did then - although Alaric could only pray she would never feel the need to turn her emotions off.

His updated rules for Georgie had seemed completely reasonable to the girl, even if she disliked the thought of a few of them. The first was that she would have 1-to-1 anger management / therapy lessons with Emma instead of the shared class that all the wolves had which Georgie had no opposition against; she herself knew that it was a great idea. The next was that she would have training sessions with Hope every other day on working how to find control with her wolf - whether that meant mediation or trying to transform again at will without relying on anger. Georgie agreed after he assured her that Hope had already agreed to it.

She hadn't been particularly sure about the third one but Alaric had told her it might help her out. He wanted to have sessions with her at least twice a week working on her fighting abilities, not wanting to risk having her in the normal self defence classes until she had some sort of control. He promised her he had once been a world wide renown vampire hunter and would be able to take her should something happen, but it didn't do much to ease her nerves.

She didn't really understand the need for his final rule but she guessed he was just trying to hit two birds with one stone. He wanted her to join their football team to help blend in more with the students, and she knew it was just another way of running the extra energy out of her to reduce potential accidents. She didn't mind that at all. Promising her that she would catch on to the rules quickly, he also informed her that it didn't matter if she sucked as they would always throw their games anyway so that no one suspected anything. To the outside world they were just preppy, rich kids whose parents sent them far away.

Hope had been waiting for her outside the office, walking with her in a comfortable silence as they headed back up to their shared dorm. The tribrid filled the emptiness with a story about how she had always had a single room and usually kicked up a fuss if Alaric tried to have any of the new students move into her room with her before admitting that her mind changed in Georige's case once she found out who Georgie's dad was. Even if Klaus and Tyler had hated each other, her mother was once friends with Tyler and that meant something to her.

The girls got changed into their pyjamas in silence after Hope's story before Georgie felt her eyes start to droop slightly. Hope interrupted her from fully falling asleep, aware that the girl had originally been wanting to go and tell the twins her future at the school remained safe before she went to bed because she didn't want Josie to worry. When Hope had then asked if it was just Josie she was worried about, Georgie had seemingly realised she hadn't even thought about Lizzie at all before hurrying to say that she obviously meant both of the twins.

"If it makes you feel any better, I already told them that you were staying."

The small grunt she received from where Georgie was burrowed under her covers told the girl that it was a thank you and also confirmed Hope's suspicion that she was already close to passing out any second.

Hope thought back to her trip to the twins room down the hall, thinking deeply about how she had overheard Josie's declaration that she was "very very" attracted to Georgie before the twins had even noticed she was standing there. Deep in thought about how Josie and Georgie could possibly one day be more than friends, she climbed back into her own bed after locking their dorm room door behind her.

"Have you ever been in love?"

Hope blinked slightly as she tried to figure out if she had heard the girl right or if her exhausted body was just playing tricks on herself. She had thought that the girl had been asleep the entire time that she had been back from seeing the twins but clearly her mind was on other things too.

"I think so. Have you?" Hope replied, not entirely sure what to tell Georgie. She knew the girl wasn't wanting to have some long chat about Hope's love life so she was very curious as to what this was about.

The silence between Hope's question and Georgie's answer almost made the tribrid think that her hybrid roommate had fallen asleep after asking the question. Eventually, Georgie answered almost surprising Hope.

"I don't think I'd know if I had been," Georgie admitted, sounding soft and almost broken as Hope realised the girl was crying softly in her bed across the room. "I've never known what it's like to have people who love you no matter what. Today's just made me realise the last person who loved me died when I was three."

Hope knew she was no longer just meaning romantically, but in a family and friendship manner too. Slowly standing up from her bed the tribrid found herself going completely out of character again as she walked over to Georgie's bed and sat on the side, her hand reaching out to lightly stroke at Georgie's hair as the girl shook with tears.

The raven haired girl seemed to accept this, scooting over and lifting the covers inviting Hope to climb in and lay in her bed with her. As soon as her arms wrapped around the younger girl, Georgie broke out into heavy and uncontrollable sobs, turning around and crying into Hope's shoulder.

"I killed them," she blubbered out, the days events finally catching up to her as she let herself get overwhelmed by the emotions she had been bottling up for the past month. "Tyers and that racoon. Tyers is dead because of me and now a racoon family has lost it's dad."

If this had been any other situation, Hope might have laughed at Georgie being so upset at killing a racoon but it didn't take a genius for Hope to figure out that she wasn't really upset about the racoon itself but rather the fact she almost seemed to see the racoon as an extension of her past trauma. Her family had been ripped apart by someone killing her dad just because they could, and in Georgie's mind she had just done the exact same to an innocent being.

Hope held her tightly again, letting her cry it all out to the girl. Once Georgie had finally cried herself to sleep out of the sheer exhaustion, Hope finally noticed the small soft toy that Georgie had been cradling to her chest the entire time and made a note to ask Alaric about the similarities between it and the wolf she had fought earlier.

She had the gut feeling he would tell her exactly what she thought she now knew: Georgie Lockwood shared her resemblance to her father even when she was in her wolf state.

___

The remaining two weeks of the school holidays passed with no glitches at all. Everyone found themselves hugely amazed at the difference in Georgie as the days passed, having been challenging all of her emotions into controlling the wolf inside of her while also keeping up friendships with her classmates. She'd even gone as far as apologising to Jed for trying to kill him, agreeing that while she wouldn't need to join the pack now that they both had acted poorly in their confrontation.

That being said, she wasn't going to rush into becoming their best friend. She was content with her current friendships which only seemed to be getting stronger every day, even if the twins had returned to their on-going feud with Hope as soon as they all had came to the silent agreement that Georgie would be able to handle it. Georgie never asked what it was about, choosing to rather just stay out of it than get involved.

Lizzie had been spending more time with MG who Georgie had been informed by Josie had a rather huge and obvious crush on the blonde twin. The revelation of that had lead to a pretty strange conversation between Georgie and Josie about relationships.

"So," Georgie said, watching the sun set over the lake as her and Josie sat on the dock, their feet dangling into the water. "I still can't believe you used to date Penelope Park."

Josie almost laughed at how Georgie said her name as if it would burn her tongue. They didn't use her name much as Lizzie did enjoy making the Voldemort jokes about the girl, but since Georgie had admitted she never had read or watched Harry Potter Josie had let the hybrid call her by her real name. Lizzie had been quick to notice this, her and MG even sharing a quick amused glance whenever she ket Georgie say it.

"I know," Josie laughed, throwing her head back as she chuckled. Georgie felt her eyes latch on to the girl and she was almost unable to look away from her. She didn't know much about what she was feeling, but part of her training with Hope meant that she had to tell the girl all of the different emotions she felt throughout the week so she made a mental note to tell her about this one. "Call it a temporary lapse in judgement."

"A four month lapse in judgement."

Josie smacked Georgie's arm as the hybrid laughed louder this time, a sound that was becoming much more common than they had all expected. Before finding out about Georgie's true abilities, she had always been so on edge that she had felt like laughing was a luxury whereas she was now feeling alive and comfortable enough around them to let her guard down.

Josie swore that by the end of the school year she would have fully convinced Georgie to let her guard down, no matter how impossible it seemed.