• The sky over Willow Crest was bleak and grey, and the air was heavy with moisture. Kian gave a long sigh, pulling the collar of his coat nearer to his numb red cheeks and watching his breath scatter into the bone-chilling breeze. His gloves weren’t nearly thick enough to fight off the wind, nor was his coat for that matter. Kian had never been the biggest fan of the winter here in the city. I’ll never get use to this cold, he told himself with a grimace as he started his walk home. This was the walk he made every weekday of the school year. Willow Crest High faded into the backdrop as he began to pick up his pace.
    Kian liked his school. Known as the Willow Crest Wolves, they had a “stable learning environment” that had earned them numerous awards, and a state-of-the-art campus that did everything right to ensure the safety and comfort of the students. Most of the staff seemed to be relatively friendly, with a few exceptions here and there, most prominently in the math department. Kian wasn’t on any sports teams. His closest affiliation with extra curricular classes was with his friend Gage and the marching band, which had a lot more too it than most students realized. In fact, the band geeks were probably the closest thing Kian had to a clique. Of course, he was proud of that, considering that the band kids he knew were among the nicest of any students that he had met.
    But, of course, when it came down to it, Kian had no real group to which he felt tightly linked. He was generally more of a loner. The Willow Crest Wolves’ lone wolf. He was a bright kid, finally in his last year of school, and his teachers all said he had great potential. Kian, however, didn’t spend much time worrying about his potential. He just knew that he was Kian Akers, and that was all.