A Pack for Summer (Cozyverse #4)

Prologue Summer

Prologue

Summer

Twelve years earlier

Starting at a new school in the spring was a bad omen.

I collided into my older sister Lina’s backpack as she stopped suddenly.

“Summer?” She spun and I panicked at the thought of losing my human shield. “I gotta go to Starlight Grove High, that way.” She pointed.

My heart was a jackhammer, knowing what was coming next.

“You’re this way, with the other middle schoolers. Remember?”

I did remember. But maybe pretending not to would force her to take me.

Lina bent down so we were eye to eye. I envied her long, pin-straight hair and the shimmery lip gloss she had snuck on after Má waved goodbye to us at the main gate.

“We can do this.”

It was very kind of her to use we . Only one of us had changed their outfit six times this morning.

“I’ll meet you after school and we’ll walk home together. Deal?”

Her outstretched pinky waited expectantly. I reluctantly hooked mine with hers and sealed her promise.

“Go on,” she encouraged me.

I expected her to have disappeared each time I turned around. But she was still there, watching me join the crowd of middle schoolers shuffling into the second half of the school year.

It didn’t matter that our parents had assured us this move was going to be for the best. Being promised bigger bedrooms and a backyard still made me miss our old, cramped apartment in the city.

Ba was so excited showing us the new restaurant space, but I couldn’t imagine the tables and chairs like he did.

My gaze kept latching on to the new faces around me.

Cataloging all the ways I was different.

Collecting reasons I might not belong. The teacher assigned me a buddy named Julie who was bubbly, spoke enough for the both of us, and invited me to sit with her friends at lunch.

The twist in my stomach loosened ever so slightly.

I had turned down Má’s offer to make me lunch and packed myself a sandwich.

Just in case. Julie and her friends pulled out their PB&Js, and I was ready to do the same.

But next to the string cheese and juice box I had begged for was a slice of Má’s pandan cake.

Vibrant green with a porous honeycomb texture.

She had probably slipped it in, wanting me to have my favorite treat on my first day.

Curious eyes landed on it immediately.

“What is that?”

“Why is it green?”

“That’s not…mold, is it?”

I didn’t want to be ashamed, but I didn’t know how to like being different. I was thirteen, and all I wanted was to fit into the cookie-cutter shape that everyone else had popped out of. I wasn’t ready to be the new girl with the green cake.

“It’s nothing!” I told them, the pitch of my voice higher than usual.

I shoved it back into my bag, ate it on my walk home with Lina, and quietly thanked Má for it later that night.

During the next couple of weeks, I tried my best to adjust to Starlight Grove.

Town events occurred with a frightening regularity, each one with a longer, weirder name than the last. I yawned during committee meetings my parents suddenly had to attend.

Everyone would stop to introduce themselves.

Was there such a thing as being too welcoming?

I was dizzy from trying to make a good impression.

My little brother, Alvin, collected high fives with his chubby toddler hand.

Red Lantern opened and I think the entire population of Starlight Grove tried to get a table.

My parents were thrilled with the turnout.

Later, I asked Lina if her cheeks hurt, too, from smiling as big as we could at everyone.

“This is good, Summer.” She wrapped her arm around my shoulders.

“I know, but aren’t you tired? Don’t you want to just curl up under a blanket for the next three days?”

“Something tells me you’re going to be an omega,” she teased before squeezing me in a hug. I was a tube of toothpaste and out came the last bit of energy I had left for socialization. By the time Monday lunchtime rolled around, all I wanted to do was hide in the school library.

That was when I met Jae.

He was hiding, too. With a pen and scribbles on a page, and a dark curtain of hair that fell over his eyes. His lanky limbs folded into a seat at the furthest table, partially blocked by shelves.

I didn’t mean to meet him. I was looking for my own sanctuary when I tripped and fell. To my dismay, my things skittered across his table—loudly and gleefully oblivious to my embarrassment.

“I’m sorry!” There was really no graceful way to scoop up a bunch of books, papers, and pens. My ears burned as I collected everything he politely pushed toward me.

“This is pandan, isn’t it?”

A broken-off corner of my honeycomb cake disappeared into his mouth. What? Suddenly my anxiety evaporated at the sight of this boy eating my afternoon snack.

“Did you just eat my cake?” I demanded.

“It’s good.” He shrugged.

He liked it? He didn’t think it was weird?

I have no idea what possessed me to say what I said next. “You can have the rest if I can sit here.”

He scoffed like it was a no-brainer. The chair opposite him kicked outward, and he ate the rest of my bánh bò n??ng in two large bites.

About five minutes after I sat down, his head began to bob rhythmically and I caught the faintest hum of a melody. Jae stopped himself when he noticed I had heard him. “Sorry. Habit.” His deep brown eyes were cautious.

“Doesn’t bother me,” I said, not looking up from my book.

He looked suspicious of my answer.

Park Jae-Yoon was fourteen, the youngest of three brothers from a large pack family, and also needed the quiet of the library sometimes.

For many packs, families were chosen. Alphas bonded an omega and sometimes fell in love themselves before having children who were considered the whole pack’s.

But Jae’s inclusion in Pack Beaufort was borne from tragedy.

His parents passed away when he was two and his uncle took him in.

Jae gained an omega mom and two additional pack fathers yet kept the hollow in his heart.

To be honest, large packs were kind of confusing, and I didn’t really pay much attention to adults. Plus, talking about parents (dead or alive) gave Jae the same pinched look as when he ate sour candy.

So we spoke about other things. How many chocolate chips would make a cookie stop being a cookie. Why having one earbud in constantly may have contributed to his falling grades. The correct way for dogs to wear pants (all four legs or just the back ones?).

When everything was so new and muddy and strange, his presence sparked like a lone flare.

We only shared that table once or twice a week, but I was relaxed around him.

His scribbles—lyrics, I discovered—occasionally found their way onto my margins.

I learned to bake the honeycomb cake and other sweets and shared them with him.

“Are you going to be a musician?” I asked him impulsively one day.

“Are you going to be a baker?” he shot back.

I blinked. “I think we’re supposed to get into good colleges, graduate, and land stable jobs,” I said finally.

Jae sighed and rocked onto the back legs of his chair. “That sounds boring.”

A lopsided smirk revealed a ghost of a dimple in his cheek.

I pressed my lips together to conceal my own smile. It did sound boring.

One year later, the town was buzzing with the news that his omega mother had left with only one of her alphas. Left left. For good, despite still being bonded to the other two. What remained of the broken Pack Beaufort abruptly moved away soon after, including Jae. It was a shock.

As the years passed, I gradually stopped hiding in the library. Starlight Grove started to feel like home.

But I never stopped wondering about what happened to the boy who stole my cake.