Frosty windows with a kiss of ice sprinkled the classroom with a dewy winter feeling. The teacher's monotone yet comforting voice that wasn't filled with malice nor hate resounded the quiet room. The all-boys boarding institute was currently in a snowy era that never seemed to end even in the summers of Canada. 

My warm breath fanned the window making a teeny canvas for me to draw on while the teacher isn't looking. I took my finger and pressed it down gently making a circle before adding smaller circles at the top of the big circles, I breathed on it again to keep up the momentum and drew a bigger circle underneath it adding stick hands and a small hat- a bear snowman! My eyes glittered at my masterpiece.

"Burr, are you distracted? Tell me what I just said." I flinched up guiltily as my eyes couldn't make contact with their own, I tried to remember what he was saying, I swear I remember! I just don't work well under pressure! 

"E-erm um I-it was about...class..work?" I blurted unsure of myself as I shrunk into my seat wanting it to swallow me whole, while hating the attention everyone was giving me at the moment.

"Rigghht, alright class pack up bells about to ring." I silently sighed in relief as I heard some laughs from the students, but I was quickly forgotten at the mention of the bell. My cheeks were still a tinge of pink from embarrassment but I'll live, hopefully...ugh I'm definitely gonna have an existential crisis about this mishap tonight. Zipping up my bag the bell rang and I waited until the halls cleared out a little more before leaving, my 4'5 stature made it difficult to roam the institute filled with teenage shifters high off puberty, also when their shift is at its peak of losing control. Depending on the species at least.

Trudging the halls listlessly the ending announcements pick up on the intercom giving news about tomorrow's events and stuff about an upcoming play.

"-Can I also have Tray Alove, Zack Bean, Merry Hoho, to the fourth-floor office along with Burr Berrys with his stuff packed to the first-floor office. Thank you, have a wonderful night Peach High!"

My walking faltered a few steps as my heart skipped plenty of beats to be named as a dead person for a few moments. Father couldn't be picking me up right? I stay in boarding school all year round excluding the breaks and holidays where I have to go back to being tormented.

I gripped my backpack opening my dorm door and anxiously stuffed things into the only bag I had. "Winnie the pooh where is ya going?" My roommate hummed snacking on a blood pack while typing away on his phone. "I don't know," I rolled my eyes before zipping up the bag that looked like it would burst any second now, my roommate is probably leaping with joy seeing me leave so he can sleep with his girlfriend more peacefully now. Gross. I stuck out my tongue at the thought and unwillingly walked to the office. Every step felt like cement added onto the weight of my heavy heart, I wonder what going on- AH dang it! It happened again! 

I growled in agitation and anxiety as I took a beany out of my bag quickly stuffing it on my mop of light brown with darker brown streaks of hair upon my head. Sometimes my grizzly bear features come out when I'm too anxious or stressed rarely it comes out when I feel the safest but that extremely rare. Father hates when he sees my features come out saying it's a show of weakness and that's why I'm a useless bear.

When I got to the office they explained that I'm moving to my mother's hometown in the countryside of Canada and that he's on his way to pick me up. I was struck with despair as my leg thumped on the gray/orange carpet below my feet in a rhythm of anxiety ticks. I bit my nails trying to keep my eyes from watering by looking up towards the ceiling as if it was the most interesting thing in the world.

I can't believe it. Am I going to die at 18? There's no way a small village with around 40-30 people will have a freaking boys boarding institution! I heard that villagers are loving to their families so there's no way they'd throw away their kids to boarding school like my own family, so even more reason that there won't be a boarding school. 

I had been shipped to boarding school at three years old and the only bond I had ever formed, was with my academics. It sounds stupid but that's the truth, every time I have to stay with my family I feel nothing towards them as they feel the same. I was the runt of my three siblings so this is my price to pay in exchange for death. My parents are old-fashioned and the runts usually get killed off to feed the mother or to dwindle competition for the father, but legal and modern time laws state that father can't do that so his alternative was shipping me off to boarding school. Plus it's not like runts get killed off all the time, for me, it wasn't because I was a runt but because I had a major birth defect. It wasn't notable the first few months of my birth but my father got wind of it the more time passed, my grizzly bear shift stopped growing at two and never grew further. That would mean death in the animal kingdom if times hadn't changed.

I was a weak bear that would never meet my dad's and mother's standards. I can feel his killing intent every time he looks at m- 

I gasped as I stood up feeling the deep gaze of my father's brown eyes as it bore into the side of my head. 

"Ready?" 

His tone felt more like a command than a question but I nodded stiffly following his back, cold sweat burning down old wounds made by the very monster in front of me. The monster I have nightmares about every night and made my shift completely submissive to his hand. I clenched my backpack strings to distract myself from my shaking limbs and my feet heavy with the need to run. 

We then walked out of the building into the freezing cold windy night. My nose watered as I squinted my sectoral heterochromia eyes trying to not dry them while puffs of my smokey breath blinded my path for a split second. 

My father got into the front of the gray van as I took the last seat, my siblings, 2 girls, and a boy chatter stopped as they looked at me in unveiled disgust before huddling closer whispering to each other and sometimes glancing at me. I lowered my head and stuck to my seat, the pine smell of the car making me feel almost nauseous as the radio blared country music. Mother didn't look at me once as she smiled at my father. 

I hugged my bag to my chest and tightened my seatbelt huddled in the corner of the car feeling very uncomfortable, it's a day's drive to my mother's hometown so in the meantime all I could do was try reading a book I brought but even then my instinct to run from predators was strong. I kept reading the same sentence over and over not getting a visual of a fantasy world to play out in my head. Luckily they got out to eat dinner leaving me in the car...with no heater. I thought I would be fine, they wouldn't take that long to eat, but I was wrong. It had been three hours and I felt like a human popsicle, I could see my breath in the vehicle as I tried warming up with my uniform sweater. 

My hands stung with bitter coldness when they came back and the heater was switched on my hands and lips felt numb and burned with the gush of hot air. Unlike the cold stinging, it felt a lot worse and I could only hide my watery eyes. I really am weak. 

I stayed up the whole night because I couldn't sleep especially knowing my monster is around, even when my head pounded with a headache, and my eyes lulled down, I never once got a once of sleep. A lump formed in my throat when I thought of having to stay with my family but I forced it down when the car came to a halting stop. It was early morning around 6 when my family started unpacking while I stood in the snow where my father told me to stay until they were done.

"Unpack my things will you?" One of my sisters chuffed hands on her hips, I scratched the back of my neck in nervousness as I looked up to her, one of my eyes was black and blue, the other a honeyed apricot brown that glowed in the morning sun. "F-father said for me to stay," I whispered quietly retracting my gaze from her brown ones to the snowy floor.

"UGH," She complained with a roll of her eyes before cupping her mouth yelling towards the door of what I assumed their new home. 

"DAD BURR ISNT DOING WHAT I ASKED!" 

My heart missed a beat as I stopped breathing to hear the response only for father to come prancing out striding to me with a snarl. I flinched into myself as he grabbed my beany with my hair pulling me into the house as panic shot through my blood, "I-I'm s-so-sorry I won't do it a-again!" Why cant they just ignore me! Why do I always disobey! "Little shit, didn't I say to never show your bear features?" He tugged the ears atop my head when my beany was accidentally removed and all I could do was shiver like a leaf, pained stings racking my ears as I gritted my teeth.

A punch to my jaw for not answering, a hit to the stomach for disobeying, hands on my neck for being so weak-

"Jarry, you keep doing that and the village will get suspicious, tomorrow he's got boarding school so don't overdo it." At that moment mother's voice was like heaven to my ears as I was jerked back onto the floor while father gave an angry huff, "you're right but he's sleeping outside tonight, no way a pest in sleeping in our new home." Grabbing my collar he threw me outside the snow heading the impact as the door shut with a bang.

So- my eyes glowed- I won't be staying with them! A cheery feeling bubbled in my gut as I stood up a little wonkily, that's the best relief I've heard in the last twenty-four hours! And it's a boarding school, in a village...weird but I'm sure it'll be fine. I'll get my space and hopefully get to be myself. The lazy person who likes shifting in my bear form, eating honeyed toast and blueberry pancakes! Well, the school rarely has sweet things and my lunch allowance is close to none. My roommate gave me them once before, only one time but it was the best thing I had ever had. Eh!?...why am I thinking like that, I shook my head finding a place void of less snow underneath a tree that could keep me a little warm for the rest of the day. It's not like I hadn't slept outside before but these country winds feel much colder than it was in the city, the smells have changed too. I hate these changes, I wish I could have finished the last few months of my senior year in the same institution and then got a job at a bakery or something, getting away from my parents and never seeing them again. Even if I can't drive, have a dwarfs height, and my left eye is a little blurry sometimes, I had it all planned out! At this point, my dream got a bit farther from my reach in this new village.

I was really sleepy, even with the cold winds lapping my face I plopped down in a fetal position under the tree and sucked on my sleeve in sub conscience comfort. My watery eyes closed by my heavy lids and didn't take long before I had completely passed out.

-

Name: Burr 

Height: 4'8. (Height has changed if you notice good for you, no longer the same person that wrote this a few years ago and more comfortable with a slightly taller character) 

Age: 18. 

Species: (Cub) Grizzly bear shifter. 

Description: Light brown hair with dark brown strands randomly mixed in. Sectoral heterochromia where the left eye has dots of black and bright icy blue coating the rest of the iris (If you've read the webtoon Lumine then it's like that but black and blue) Right eye is a honey apricot brown color. Grizzly Bear ears and tail comes out when feeling stressed, anxious, or rarely when he's in a very peaceful state of mind to bring it out naturally instead of pressuring the shift out. (EX: nekos but bear) He likes being in his bear form but hates showing people what his bear looks like and usually only comes out when feeling extremely threatened or anxious.