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"You what?!" Will suddenly barked, causing a couple of otters standing to his left to jump; they scowled at him and stepped a few feet farther away.

"You're telling me that the only reason you came here to talk to me was because you left your math homework at home, so you want to copy mine!"

Will buried his face in his paws. He wasn't sure whether to to laugh with relief or take off on an angry rant, so his face displayed a mix of the two emotions in a twisted expression that Will was pretty sure just made him look crazy. Besides, the cute look on his friend's face didn't help either.

The red husky whimpered, his ears folded back and eyes focused on a point somewhere on the ground in front of him; he rocked back and forth on the pads of his feet. Looking uncertainly up at Will with his bright blue eyes, Ethan stammered out an apology.

"I-I'm sorry, Will. I know I shouldn't but I just wanted to avoid a zero because, you know, I did do it but I just left it at home and I was hop-"

He cut off Ethan with a wave and a snort of laughter. After taking a deep breath to calm himself, Will rummaged around in his backpack for a moment, pushing aside an odd assortment of crumpled papers and too-old granola bars that he was too lazy to take out of his bag.

"Here it is," Will chortled, an amused look on his face as he pulled out the correct homework and held it out to Ethan.

"I honestly couldn't care less if you copy my work, but dude, no need to be so secretive about something so insignificant, okay?" Will smirked, "You had me scared; I thought that someone might have died."

Ethan's face lit up like a flashlight. Ears springing back into place and eyes brightening like a kid's on Christmas Day, he gave a blinding smile before pouncing forward and wrapping Will in a hug.

"Thank-you-thank-you-thank-you-thank-you!" he shouted gleefully, standing on his toes in order properly hug the taller husky. Needless to say, Will was caught off-guard.

"Yeah...it's...uh...don't worry about it," Will squeaked out through the hug, his face red and eyes constantly scanning the hallway to see if anyone had just noticed the two huskies' embrace: it looked like he was safe. He gave Ethan an awkward pat on the back before disengaging himself and saying his goodbyes.

Will smiled awkwardly and scratched his head; his cheeks still burned. "I'll...uh...see you in math I guess. Just don't lose my homework too."

"Oh shut up," Ethan replied with a grin before turning and bounding down the hallway towards his homeroom.

Will watched him go and sighed quietly to himself, "How the hell is that kid straight?"

But Ethan had always been like that, and not just with Will either; Ethan was affectionate with of his friends. For as long as he could remember the husky had been very shy towards new people, however, once you got to know him you could easily see just how friendly he really was. It was kind of weird and charming at the same time, and Will chalked it up to the fact that Ethan preferred to have a few really close friends rather than a bunch of slightly more distant ones.

Turning in place, Will shook his head and laughed, a mystified look on his face. He was never sure what to do in a situation like that. He planned on coming out to his friends later this year, and he could only hope that they wouldn't act any differently around him than they did now.

The black and white husky released a sigh and made up his mind to worry about it later. He'd taken only three steps down the tiled hall, however, before the bell rang for homeroom. Lost in his own thoughts, Will had failed to noticed the silence that gripped the usually booming halls.

Will grimaced, "Crap, Mr. Peters is going to kill me!"

Mr. Peters, Will's home room teacher, was an old-fashioned, ex-college, English professor who had grown grumpy in his old age as society moved on without him. A fox of God-knows-how-many years old, Mr. Peter's once glossy red coat had faded with age. He was an interesting individual, to say the least. Will could never tell what was going through that ancient mind of his at any one moment, and it was often quite amusing to sit there and watch the vast array of facial expressions the aged teacher would cycle through as he muttered to himself at his desk.

Panting slightly from the panicked run he'd taken to get to homeroom, Will stood outside the door to room A193 and peered in through the glass insert.

"Good," Will thought to himself, "Mr. Peters is reading a book at his desk. Maybe I can slip in and sit down before he takes attendance."

He reached out a paw and lightly grasped the door handle, silently turning it before giving the door a gentle push. Luck was not on his side that day. The resulting wail that sounded from the door's hinges was on par with a banshee's screech; everyone in the class looked at him and a silence louder than the door's squeak filled the room. Will now stood at the center of attention with a pained look on his face, silently wondering how a door could possibly make that much noise.

Unsurprisingly, Mr. Peters looked up from his book. Looking over his glasses and peering down his grey muzzle at Will, his gaze radiating disappointment, he coughed very purposefully before closing his book and placing it heavily on the desk in front of him. Brave New World by Aldous Husky, Will noted fondly. He'd had to read it over summer vacation for one of his English classes.

"You're late, Mr. Cotter," boomed the old fox; his voice was surprisingly loud for his small stature. "Now please, take your seat before I am forced to mark you absent!"

"Yes sir. Sorry sir," responded Will, quickly sitting down in his spot at the back of the room. Mr. Peters must have been in a good mood that day, because he said nothing else and instead adjusted his glasses and focused once again on the novel in front of him.

As far as Will knew, the old fox was the only teacher in the school who asked his students to address him as "sir", but Will didn't mind; he only saw him once a day, and showing a little extra respect wasn't a bad thing. Besides, he felt sorry for the aging teacher. He was badly out of touch with society, and he clearly knew it too. One day, when Mr. Peters was out of the room, some students found a bit of handwritten poetry on his desk and read it out loud for the class. It went something like this.

I spend every waking moment in a dream

the likes of which I cannot escape from.

And above me, the unbearable weight of societal conformity

has begun to crack the protective dome of my self-identity.

It was some deep shit, and ever since then Will had been careful to be a little kinder to the old guy.

Around him the constant buzz of soft chatter died down, making way for the daily drone of the morning announcements.

The old intercom system crackled to life. "Good morning Eastview High. This is your principal wishing you a happy Monday and hoping that you had an enjoyable February break..."

Will lost interest after the laughable oxymoron. Since when had "happy" and "Monday" belonged in a sentence together?

After a short while, Natalie, a rather outgoing cheetah and good friend of his, leaned forward and whispered in his ear.

"You're lucky, man," she breathed. "Remember what happened last time someone came in late? He went straight to the principal's office."

"I know!" Will laughed, earning a scowl from the teacher in question. He continued in a whisper, "I think the principal's actually getting tired of dealing with his students. They usually aren't gone from the classroom for more than 5 minutes before they're sent back to class".

Natalie sat back in her seat, a smile and a small flick of her tail giving away her amusement.

The rest of homeroom continued without incident, and Will rushed off to history class once the bell rang.

He had decided to take AP U.S. History as his last high school history course, and he'd been regretting it ever since. The teacher was dreadful; he usually forced the students to work on activities during class that were completely irrelevant to the topic at hand. Will and the other students agreed that they mostly taught the course to themselves at home using the assigned reading. But whatever; at least it helped his GPA.

After suffering through an hour of breathing air that dripped with boredom and learning about the Panama Canal (even though the next test was going to be on Civil War Reconstruction) the bell finally rang. His next class was math.

Will's trigonometry class was located only fifteen feet down the hallway from the history room, so he was usually the first one there. It was also Will's favorite subject and the only class that all of his friends had together; not to mention it had the coolest teacher in the school.

Mr. Johnson was a young, muscular, and quite attractive German Shepherd, but his looks weren't his only attribute. He was indisputably smart and good with kids. Without taking the fun out of learning, he found a way to capture the undivided attention of his students, one way or another. Sometimes Will would zone out when he was teaching, his attention focused on the teacher instead of the lesson; eyes captivated by the way that Mr. Johnson's biceps filled out the sleeves of his t-shirt. Just out of college, the teacher could relate to his students much easier than any of the other faculty, and this only increased his popularity. It was a fun class, to say the least.

Will entered the empty classroom and took his seat at a table facing the door: Mr. Johnson used rectangular tables instead of desks. The shepherd sat in his computer-desk chair, leaning back and thumbing through some notes for the the day's lesson. He looked up at the sound of the door closing and gave the husky a toothy smile.

"Morning, Will. Have any trouble with the homework last night?" he inquired.

Will's thoughts flashed back to Ethan, whom he'd entrusted with the possession of his math homework; Will hoped the teacher hadn't somehow figured out he'd lent his homework to a friend. He gave a nervous grin, "No it was good."

Either Mr. Johnson didn't notice the shaky timbre of his voice or he chose to ignore it because he simply nodded and looked back down at the papers in his hand.

Sitting anxiously in his chair, Will waited for Ethan to walk through the door; he was usually the second one there. He sat up a little straighter and smiled when the door handle turned and swung inward. But it was Aaron.

"Hey Mr. Johnson! I was pulling my math book out of my locker today when suddenly, all hell broke loose and my papers fell out EVERYWHERE. I wasn't sure if I should come to class today; I think it was some kind of sine."

Behind him, Will heard Mr. Johnson sigh.

"Aaron, I think it has less to do with the supernatural, and more to do with the fact that you keep the binders in your locker stacked like blocks in a Tetris game. And please, wait for class to begin before starting the bad math puns. That one was a stretch, even for you."

Aaron emerald eyes gleamed as he pulled out a chair and sat down next to Will, his tail accidentally brushing against Will's leg.

"Yah yah, you're right, I guess. I do have the tendency to go off on a tangent every now and again."

Mr. Johnson glared at the back of Aaron's head as the student in question tried not to laugh. Will normally loved watching the friendly rivalry between his math teacher and his friend, but at the moment only one thing was on his mind: Ethan.

The door to the classroom opened once again and Will smiled to see the husky he adored step inside. Ethan's eyes were still focused on someone in the hallway; he was laughing. Pulling a black lab into the classroom by her paw, Ethan suddenly stopped walking and focused all of his attention on Mikayla. She whispered something in his ear and he closed his eyes and went in for a quick kiss with his girlfriend, meeting her paw instead.

"Ethan!" she hissed, " You know Mr. Johnson doesn't like any PDA in his classroom". Seeing the hurt expression on his face, however, she was quick to follow up with a "But I'll see you after class, okay?"

Ethan's fluffy tail began wagging again, albeit somewhat more slowly than it had been before. "Yah, sure!" he whispered through a smile. Will resented the gaze he gave her.

Needless to say, Will's good mood was gone and he wasn't smiling any more. He hated himself, too, for hating their relationship. They were such a cute couple, and for the three years they had been dating it seemed as if Ethan and Mikayla were made for each other. Perhaps that was what Will resented; it wasn't so much that Ethan was taken, but that Will couldn't find someone for himself. It was an extremely selfish thought, and Will knew it, so he tried to never let it surface when he was around them. Sometimes, however, it couldn't be helped.

Ethan spotted Will and began walking over, math homework in hand, but accidentally knocked some of Mr. Johnson's books off of his desk with his tail. Apologizing profusely, he bent over to pick it up; Will tried not to stare at the view.

The red husky finally padded across the rest of the distance between Will and himself and held out the paper that was in his paw.

Ethan genuinely beamed. "Thanks so much Will. I don't know what I'd do without you."

Will muttered a quick "Don't worry about it," before taking his homework back from Ethan. Underneath him the plastic chair creaked as he turned to face the front of the room.

Ethan hesitated. "Are you okay?" he whispered, eyes full of concern at Will's gruff reply. "You seem kind of angry." He paused a moment to think to himself. "Oh! You just came from history, right? Hah, I guess I'd be acting like that too if I were you".

"Yah, that's what it is," Will sighed softly.

Ethan gave an annoyed huff. He wasn't stupid; he knew when his friend wasn't telling the truth, but he left it alone and sat in his seat at the table to Will's left.

Will's mood had hardly improved by the time class began, and he stared blankly at the dry erase board at the front of the room as Mr. Johnson scribbled down equations and drew triangles. Will thought he caught something about deriving periodic formulas, but the thought just floated above him, circling overhead with thousands of other ideas that would bring him nothing but heartache and confusion. If only he just had some time to fig-

"Will, you're fairly good with these problems, what did you get for number seven?"

Will snapped back to reality at the mention of his name; somewhere in the bottom of a ravine his train of thought lay wrecked.

"Uh...forty-two?" he guessed. The class around him giggled.

Mr. Johnson raised his eyebrows, "No, Mr. Cotter. Unfortunately, the sine of theta over the cosine of theta does not equal forty-two."

Will scowled and sat back in his seat, silently scolding himself. The rest of math class passed in a blur of frustration and equations. His attention was hardly more focused on the lesson than before he had embarrassed himself, but Mr. Johnson left him alone for the most part.

Finally hearing the bell ring, the husky was quick to gather up his things and head for the door, pushing through the elbows and backpacks of his classmates as they spilled into the hallway. He'd made it only a few feet, however, before he was called back by a concerned teacher.

"Will!" shouted Mr. Johnson from the back of the room, "I'd like to talk to you for a moment."

Great, he thought to himself, My day just keeps getting better and better.

The teacher sat at his desk, arms crossed, eyes scanning up and down the husky standing before him. "Are you okay, Will? You're usually very attentive, but today your mind seemed to be somewhere else."

He scratched an imaginary itch on the back of his neck; at least he wasn't in trouble. "Yeah, Mr. Johnson. I'm fine."

"There's not many things that can do that to a guy like you...Girl troubles?" the German shepherd smirked.

"Hah," Will laughed nervously before replying. "Something like that."

The teacher may have been a bit mistaken, but Will was glad that he was concerned enough about his students to talk to him personally. It was a short conversation but it helped to lighten Will's mood, and by the time he'd left the classroom he was already beginning to forget the frustration of the past hour.

The rest of the school day passed without incident, and the normal ending to the day was a comforting change of pace.

After the final bell rang, signaling the end to the school day, Will grabbed a few books out of his locker and waited by the exit for Aaron. As always, he could hear the tiny canine about a minute before he saw him coming.

Aaron was chatting with Natalie; their conversation had something to do with how much he hated those websites that make you view lists in a slideshow instead of putting it all on one page. Will suppressed a smile when he came into view.

He loved the way Aaron's tail swung behind him 24/7, like the rudder of a ship that was constantly changing directions. It didn't matter when you saw him, Aaron always had a naturally positive and likable personality.

When he saw the husky standing by the door watching him, Aaron left Natalie with a parting hug and jogged over.

"Hah, what was that! Are you two dating now?" Will teased.

Aaron stuck his tongue out of his mouth, imitating a gag. "Gross dude! You know we're like siblings. There's almost no one in our friend group that I'd consider dating; we're all just too close".

Will laughed and pushed open the door that led outside. It wasn't until after a frigid blast of air struck him in the face that the implications of what Aaron had said fully hit him. Will stopped in the doorway and whirled around, a devious grin on his face; the short wolf ran into his chest and bounced back, obviously surprised at the husky's sudden halt.

"Hold on a moment," Will smirked. "You said ALMOST. Who wouldn't you mind dating?"

Will never thought he'd see the day when Aaron would be embarrassed. The canine stared at the ground, ears folded back and cheeks red as he fumbled for words; his tail had stopped wagging.

"I...uh...I didn't say...I mean...it's not like I like them...I was just-"

"Is she hot?" Will interrupted before continuing their walk home.

"Well...I" Aaron paused, obviously uncomfortable with the topic at hand. "I guess I like the way they look."

Will sighed in exasperation, "Oh come on. How much more vague can you be?"

"Maybe I just don't feel like telling you! How about you? Who do you like?"

Will growled playfully, "Touché."

In the distance some kids screeched as they played in snow. The high school and middle school got out at the same time, so there were always a couple of the younger kids that Will and Aaron would have to share the sidewalk with on their way home. One middle schooler in particular seemed especially eager to walk with them.

From behind him, Will heard a muffled "Ack!" Followed by the floof of a body landing in a snowdrift. Jonathan had shown up and tackled Aaron from behind.

The little Akita had long been Will's neighbor and Aaron's friend. Now in 7th grade, the energetic dog was like a little brother to them; at the very least Jonathan annoyed them just as much as one.

Aaron was now coated in snow, and the Akita giggled from the sidewalk.

"John! Remember how I said it's impossible to give you a piggyback ride while I'm wearing a backpack?" Aaron scolded. "Last time you tried that I almost fell into the street!"

John laughing slowed and he peered up at Aaron, but there was still a small smile on his face. "I know," he said, "but you always look so funny when you're covered in snow".

"Actually he just looks that way all the time", commented Will.

Aaron punched him in the arm, "Shut up".

The three dogs worked their way down the winding rural streets, occasionally bursting out in laughter and snowball fights, but for the most part they remained quiet; they were just happy to be in someone else's company.

Every now and then the wind would pick up and Will would take a deep breath of the fresh, crisp air, laden with the scents of spruce and pine. Something about the winter wind always put Will in his happy place. A smile crept onto his face.

After a short while, Will saw that the group was finally approaching his house, so he bid Aaron farewell and ruffled the fur on top of John's head, much to the little akita's displeasure, before crunching up the snowy pathway to his front door. Away from the shouts of children and Aaron's crude puns, the silence of Winter was calming. Like an artist pouring oil paints into the sky, the lengthening sunlight filled the horizon with brilliant shades of orange, pink, and red, and bounced its orange rays off of the snowy ground. Above him, the breeze whispered its secrets into the barren branches, and the trees glowed with the light of the sun as they reached up to scrape the sky.

It was good to be home.