The same person

"It really makes me sad to know that Maddie had to go through all of that and she pretends like it wasn't that terrible." said Ollie.

"Oh trust me, she doesn't pretend... Or at least not with us, maybe only with you because she doesn't trust you yet." said Matt as he kicked a rock in his way as it went flying ahead of them.

"But I want her to trust me, I want her to be able to be honest with me, I don't know why she finds it so hard to trust me." said Ollie as he sighed.

"It's not your fault dude, it's just her, she finds it hard to trust people, and given her past circumstances I don't blame her, but at the same time she's also just being really mean to you for no reason, now that I don't understand and have an explanation for." said Matt as he shook his head.

"I agree with you there... she's just really mean, and to me especially." said Ollie as he scoffed, he liked Maddie, she was a good friend and a great person, but really her rudeness and meanness was enough to chase anyone away.

Not everyone could deal with her annoying behaviours and find out that deep down beneath all that roughness and meanness was a person who would do anything to care for those that they loved.

"You know what dude, now that I think about it, Maddie has never been mean to me, not once." said Matt as he suddenly remembered.

"Really dude??" asked Ollie as he looked at him in surprise as Matt nodded.

"Really." he replied.

"I find that really hard to believe, the Maddie I know loves giving people a hard time getting along with her." said Ollie.

"Well that may be true, but she never once was mean to me. I remember the first time we met, she was super nice to me and she gave me directions to the class I was on my way to, and on top of that she even walked me there." said Matt.

"It sounds like we are not talking about the same person here." said Ollie as Matt chuckled.

"Oh but we are, I know it's hard to believe because I felt the exact same way when Annie told me what sort of person Maddie used to be. I honestly didn't know who to believe." said Matt.

"Here Annie was telling me that Maddie was evil and a bully, and on the other hand Maddie was nice to me and she was telling me that Annie is a hypocrite who thinks that she's better than everyone else." said Matt.

"I was conflicted, I wanted to give them both a chance, then suddenly I decided not to believe either of them when I found them both fighting in the girls bathroom using magic." said Matt as he laughed remembering the funny memory of the fight in the girls bathroom even though at the moment he was confused and did not find it funny at all.

"It turned out that they were both lying to me, keeping things away from me." said Matt as Ollie chuckled.

"They fought with each other?" he asked as he found that hard to imagine at the moment.

"Yes they did." replied Matt as he laughed.

"Who won?" asked Ollie out of curiousity.

"Annie did." declared Matt proudly as Ollie laughed.

"Don't get me wrong, but in that situation Annie totally deserved to win. Maddie was trying to make her life miserable to live, luckily Annie was able to stand up to her." said Matt proudly as Ollie continued laughing.

"Wow, I love hearing this story of your friendship, it's really funny, so tell me what happened after that." said Ollie.

"Well I stopped talking to Maddie after that and Annie asked me to come to her house later so she could explain everything to me." said Matt.

"I went to her house, her parents were there and so was Curtis and her dad particularly did not like me. Anyway, Annie explained what happened and she told me about magic, which at the time she was not aware that I already knew all about that, my parents had told me everything about witches, vampires and werewolves a week before." said Matt.

"And you didn't tell her that you already knew?" asked Ollie.

"Well I didn't trust her enough yet to tell her such a huge family secret, judging from the explanation she gave me she didn't even know about the existence of vampires or werewolves. Besides, I didn't want to creep her out by telling her that I wasn't even human." said Matt.

"But you ended up telling her anyway." said Ollie as he smiled and Matt nodded.

"Yes, I had to, she was my friend and I was no better if I continued to hide things from her that way she had to, so I told her the truth and brought her to meet my family." said Matt as he smiled and Ollie smiled.

"Then what happened?" asked Ollie.

"Well things were calm until..." said Matt as he paused.

"Until what?" asked Ollie.

"Until Maddie suddenly came along saying that she wanted to be Annie's friend, first she came to Annie's house and brought her some chocolate chip cookies, which are Annie's favourite and I could not believe that Annie ate cookies from our then enemy." said Matt as Ollie laughed.

"You don't get it dude, back then it wasn't funny. Maddie was pure evil, she could have poisoned those cookies back then or something." said Matt.

"But Annie being the nice person she was decided to accept Maddie's friendship." said Matt.

"What did you think?" asked Ollie.

"I thought that we shouldn't even be giving Maddie the benefit of a doubt, but we did." said Matt.

"It turns out that Azazel was the one who forced her to befriend Annie for his own wicked reasons." said Matt.

"I can imagine, and Maddie had no choice than to obey, I feel so sorry for her." said Ollie as Matt nodded.

"I agree." he said.

"Anyway, Azazel was tired of waiting so he organised a party and asked Maddie to invite Annie and I." said Matt.

"Did you go?" asked Ollie.

"Well I didn't want to, but Annie did, and I decided that she shouldn't be there alone with Maddie on her own, so I went with her." said Matt.

"So what happened?" asked Ollie.

"Maddie came to pick us up from Annie's house, we didn't even get to the party when the car was pushed off the road and we had a minor accident." said Matt.

"Oh my goodness really?" asked Ollie in surprise.

"Really." said Matt.

"It was so bad that the driver got knocked out. It turns out that the rogues had ambushed us." said Matt.

"I think that was the first time we had ever faced rogues." said Matt.

"So what did you do?" asked Ollie.

"They wanted to kill us, so we had to find them, luckily Curtis arrived just in time in his human form and we were able to make it to the party." said Matt.

"But why were the rogues after you in the first place?" asked Ollie.

"We later found out that they were working with Azazel and he wanted to test us or something like that." said Matt.

"That man really was evil... he still is." said Ollie.

"Yes, but that's not it, we finally made it to the party and we didn't even stay for an hour because Maddie figured out that something fishy was going on, so she decided to protect Annie from Azazel." said Matt.

"So when Azazel was on his way to Maddie's room, I had to jump with Annie out her window in order for us to escape." said Matt as he laughed.

"Wow, you guys have really been through a lot of adventures before we met." said Ollie as he laughed, he had never jumped out a window in his life. Thinking about it made the thought seem thrilling, he could only imagine how shocked and scared Annie and Matt where when they had to escape like that.

"I tell you Ollie, jumping out of window was one of the least. Seriously looking back now I wonder why we didn't realize how tiring it was to have to run and hide." said Matt.

"True, but it was also thrilling, I've never jumped out of a window before." said Ollie as Matt laughed.

"I don't think it's something you should want to do, we only did it because we had no choice." said Matt.

"I agree, but you don't know how boring my life can be sometimes, which is why I like hearing of all your adventures, no wonder you three are so close." said Ollie as he smiled.

"Yes... that is true, we've been through a lot together." said Matt as he laughed.

"But we've also been through some adventures with you, so you are part of the group already, don't mind what Maddie says, she knows that it's true." said Matt smiling as Ollie smiled and nodded.

"So I seems that I just have to try harder to get her to accept me." said Ollie with a sigh.

"No, dude, I don't think you should. I think that Maddie has already accepted you, she just doesn't want you to know that she has." said Matt as Ollie scoffed.

"Of course she doesn't... she can be really difficult for no reason at times." he said as he laughed, he did not know if he was laughing at her or himself, it was probably the latter because he did not know why he actually did care a lot.

"Isn't that the truth? But I'm sure that you'll get into her good books very soon, heck I am sure that you are already in her good books." said Matt as Ollie laughed.

"You're just saying that to make me feel better dude." said Ollie as he shook his head.

"Do you really think that I would do that?" asked Matt as Ollie stopped walking and looked at him shaking his head.

"Exactly, so trust me when I say that Maddie does trust you. All her actions do not say otherwise. If she really still hated you she wouldn't have agreed for us all to come spend a week with you here." said Matt.

"Yeah well that may be true, but you forget that she was also very thrilled about learning to convey, in her mind there was no passing up that opportunity.

"That is true, look I would be lying if I said that Maddie isn't complicated, she is very, very, very complicated, you just have to learn to get used to her and understand her." he said as he smiled.

"Alright, I get it, thank you Matt." said Ollie as he smiled.

"Anytime." replied Matt as he smiled.

"Do you want to take a break? We've been walking for a while." said Ollie.

"Sure." replied Matt even though he was not tired but he had a hunch that Ollie was a bit tired.

"Great." said Ollie as he sat down on the ground completely unworried that some bugs or creepy crawlies would bite him or climb on him.

"Aren't you afraid of bugs?" asked Matt.

"Not at all, there are no bugs here." said Ollie.

"Okay then." said Matt as he sat down beside him and they looked up into the trees.

"Are you good at climbing?" asked Ollie out of the blue as Matt chuckled.

"Well yes... I think I am." said Matt.

"What exactly are good at climbing?" asked Ollie out of curiosity.

"Well trees, but I'm not as good as my dad though." said Matt as he laughed.

"Why not?" asked Ollie.

"Because he told us that he and my uncle Jacob literally grew up living in the forest. They used to climb trees and hunt prey, so I cannot compare to his skills." said Matt.

"Ahh I see, so if I was to ask you to climb that tree right now, how fast do you think you will be able to climb it?" asked Ollie as he pointed to a large, tall tree right in front of them.

"I don't know, five seconds or less." said Matt simply as Ollie looked at him surprised.

"Five seconds?" asked Ollie as Matt nodded.

"But that tree is huge dude, I think it would take you at least a minute or more." said Ollie.

"Would you like me to prove you wrong?" asked Matt smugly.

"Be my guest." said Ollie as Matt stood up instantly.

"Get ready to be proved wrong." said Matt as he stretched out lightly and Ollie snapped his finger as a little green bird timer appeared in his hand.

"Alright then, three, two, one, go." said Ollie as the timer began to count down and Matt was already off.

He ran to the base of the tree and before Ollie could realize what was going on Matt had somehow leaped onto the tree as he continued to leap mightily until he reached the top of the tree in a matter of seconds.

"I told you so." he said as he shouted and looked down to Ollie who was snapped out of his shocked stupour when the timer went off.

"Alright, you weren't lying when you said five seconds." said Ollie as he shouted back and laughed.

"I can see the Castle from here." said Matt as he looked ahead. Everywhere looked majestic from way up here, the view was simply breathtaking and the Castle looked like a haven in the midst of all this dense, thick forest.

"It looks breathtaking doesn't it?" asked Ollie as Matt nodded.

"Certainly does." he replied.

"Alright that's enough showing off, come down now." said Ollie as Matt laughed and slid down the bark of the tree with his hands and it did not hurt one bit.

"I still can't believe you were actually right." said Ollie as Matt laughed while walking towards him.

"But how come you can climb so fast?" asked Ollie as he was still surprised.

"I have no idea, I also wonder why I can climb so effortlessly and quickly." said Matt as he chuckled.

"I think I have an idea why. Vampires have claws, although not as long or as sharp as werewolf claws, but they definitely have them, and it enables them to be able to climb well and kill their prey." said Ollie as Matt looked at his hands.

"But I don't have any claws at all, see." said Matt as he showed Ollie his hands and he had normal nails, no claws at all.

"I see, but I guess that since you're part vampire you didn't get features like the claws, or the fangs, but your abilities are clearly still there. Your claws may not be visible, but your hands have the adaptations that vampire hands do." said Ollie as he came up with his own conclusion.

"I believe that since Evie is a pure vampire, she will probably have claws and fangs." said Ollie.

"That explains why my dad is faster than me, he would have climbed up that tree in less than a second." said Matt as he chuckled.

"Now I can believe that." said Ollie.

"We should get going, I am hungry." said Matt as he laughed.

"Alright, come on, I know a shortcut to the Castle." said Ollie with a smile.

...

"Maddie can you get me some more sugar?" asked Annie as she and Maddie were in the kitchen baking some cookies.

"Sure." said Maddie as she handed Annie some more sugar which she added to the batter.

At first when Annie had told Maddie that she wanted to make cookies, Maddie was lazy and she did not want to, but after hearing that if Annie made cookies and she did not help her then she wouldn't be able to eat them, and that quickly changed Maddie's mind.

And to Annie's luck the head chef did not even question her, he just allowed her do whatever she want and even told her to ask him in case she needed anything,

"I wonder how long those two will be out. They have been gone for far too long now." said Maddie as she frowned.

"And I don't see why you are so worried." replied Annie.

"I'm not worried, I just don't want them hanging out together alone." she replied.

"And tell me why that is any of your business in the first place?" asked Annie with a frown.

"Well because I am sure that they talk about me when they are alone." replied Maddie as she frowned.

"I highly doubt that, and even if they do, they are allowed to talk about anyone they want to talk about." replied Annie.

"No, I am very, very sure that they have been talking about me. Why else have I been sneezing since we entered this kitchen?" asked Maddie as Annie put the cookies into the oven and turned to look at Maddie.

"Really? Well maybe you have an allergy to the flour or something." said Annie.

"No, no, no I don't have any allergies, I am sure that I was sneezing because those two were gossiping about me and probably still are." said Maddie in certainty.

"You know what, I am starting to realize that you just love to trouble your little pretty head over things that shouldn't bother you." said Annie as she shook her head.

"Thank you for acknowledging that I have a pretty little head, and yes I agree, but it should bother me because it concerns me, I don't need Matt spilling some secrets with his big mouth, he tells the blondie everything and I mean everything." said Maddie.

"Because they are friends and friends tell each other everything, I tell you everything don't I?" asked Annie seriously as Maddie looked at her.

"But that's different, we are girls and also we are best friends, they are not even best friends." said Maddie in severe annoyance.

"Well now they are, and you should get used to it." said Annie as Maddie looked really far from pleased.