They met back with the rest of the class for lunch, and the little girl who'd been brave enough to ask Jax about his legs demanded that he sit next to her.

"Bossy little alpha, isn't she?" Carter murmured to Brand. The adults were scattered around the group, overseeing without interfering. Carter recognized two women, Janice and her sister Liza, from pack events. There was another wolf he assumed was from the Taylor Road pack, and two humans.

"I was actually thinking omega," Brand said.

"Really?" Carter paused, his sandwich halfway to his mouth. "What makes you say that?"

"The nurturing instinct can come across as bossiness. It's possible she's an alpha, you can never be a hundred percent sure until they present, but watch how she's managing the interactions between their little group."

Their group had split up, mingling and choosing to sit with their friends. And Brand was right. Allie was watching Jax and the others carefully, calling attention to herself when any minor upset seemed about to burst into a full disagreement. She was loud, but every time she called attention to herself, it was to distract from something else.

"You could be right," Carter conceded.

"Now that hyper little boy," Brand went on. "He's probably going to be an alpha."

Again, Brand surprised Carter. "What's your reasoning behind that?"

"All that pent-up energy. Again, it's not always true, but most of the kids I've seen who run around crazy like him at this age develop into alphas. Most of them learn to focus it, use it to skyrocket it to whatever their goal is. I bet you most of the super stereotypical alphas you know, the top businessmen, the jocks, they were probably like him when they were little. If he doesn't learn to control it, he'll have a much harder time of it than a beta or omega with those same energy levels. People expect alphas to have it together. Rightly or wrongly, they give betas and omegas more leeway."

"Huh." Carter could see how everything Brand said might have played out. "Okay, what do you think I was like as a child?"

Brand laughed. "That's not even a tough one. You were born a little old man. You never really had to learn focus, you've possessed it from birth. You probably never had a big circle of friends, just one or two who really got you. They were probably a little louder or more rambunctious than you were." Brand smiled. "I think you forgot your jaw on the floor."

Brand had nailed him. Carter took a too-large bite of his sandwich to cover his amazement. When he finally finished chewing, he asked, "How do you know all this?"

"I just really like watching and understanding people. I've delivered a lot of babies and watched them grow up."

And not just watched, clearly. Carter could see that Brand was just as analytical as Carter was, in his own way. While Carter preferred numbers, Brand liked people.

"It's super impressive," Carter said.

Brand blushed. "It's not very useful, but I enjoy it."

"Are you kidding me?" Carter asked. "It's extremely useful. I'm sure you don't have a problem knowing what to say to people no matter what the situation. If they're happy, sad, angry. I—"

Carter stopped mid-sentence as the tone of Allie's loud voice changed. He zeroed in on their group, waiting to see if he needed to step in.

"How could you stand in the waves with those skinny legs?" a dark-haired boy sneered. Carter couldn't see the boy's face, but Carter could tell he was speaking to Jax. " You can't even stand on regular ground without crutches."

Brand held Carter back, his hand like steel around Carter's forearm.

Allie's tone was cool as she stood up for Jax. "You don't stand in the waves, Dave, that's kinda the whole point of it. But did you see Jax's super cool scars? He was in a really bad car accident that broke him into like, a million pieces, and the doctors put him back together."

"Like Humpty Dumpty?" a little girl who wasn't part of their original group asked.

"They didn't fix Humpty Dumpty," the annoying boy, Dave, said. "Jeez, Faye, everyone knows that."

"So yeah, like Humpty Dumpty, but even better, right Jax?" Allie looked to Jax for confirmation, and he shyly nodded. Carter was impressed at the little girl’s ability to side step Dave's rude comments while making both Jax and the dark-haired girl feel heard and included.

"What happened?" the little girl ventured to ask, shooting Dave a nasty look. The boy sulkily chomped on a pickle.

"My other dad and I were in a really bad car accident," Jax said. "And my legs were crushed. They had to cut me out with saws and everything."

"Did it hurt? " the little girl asked. By now, Jax had the eyes of everyone at their table and more than a few from the surrounding tables.

"I don't remember," Jax said, "but probably. The doctors said I have traumatic amnesia." He sounded out the last two words slowly.

"What's amnesia?" another child asked.

"When you forget things," Allie answered.

"Then I have amnesia all the time," Dave scoffed. "That's not special."

Jax shrunk a little under his animosity, but Allie wasn't deterred. "That's different. Amnesia is when you forget for a really long time. Like days."

"How long did you forget?" Faye asked.

"A month, I think," Jax said. "It's hard to tell, because I was in the hospital for a long time."

"He had seventy-two stitches," Allie said proudly, as if she'd sewn him up herself.

"Can I see?" asked Faye.

After a look to Allie for support, Jax stood up and propped his foot on the bench, pulling his shorts up so she could have a clear view of his knee. "They had to put a fake bone in there," he said.

"That's so cool," Faye cooed.

"I've got a scar," Dave interjected. "But it's not as cool as yours," he admitted.

"Can I see?" Jax asked.

Dave stood and lifted his shirt to reveal a small appendectomy scar. "They took my guts out," he said proudly.

Brand smothered a laugh and Carter relaxed, realizing the moment of crisis was over. And then the magnitude of what had happened hit him. Jax had weathered what could have been a bullying incident without any adult intervention. And he had probably made friends in the process. Carter cleared his throat and chugged his Coke to try and wash away the swell of emotion that threatened to overcome him. It wouldn't be the last time Jax had to deal with something like that, and he might not come away as well each time, but he knew he could handle it now. And he had at least one friend, that little Allie, who would back him up at school. As Brand had said, all he needed was that one friend to believe in him. Carter hoped the seeds for that kind of friendship had been planted today.