Hanuka McCoy was a nervous wreck on her way into the assembly that day.  It was easy too wonder why a girl with her elegent beauty cringed about like a wallflower.  She was tall, but only for a girl, long legged and slender with flared hips and a tapered waist.  Her breasts filled her chest nicely.  Hair black as coal fell too her waist.  Her eyes were such a rich azure as to hint at purple.  Her medium tanned skin was without blemish, and her lips rosy.<br/><br/>Most girls who looked like her had some inkling of what they looked like and met their peers with confidence.  Aye, beauty was only skin deep, but crowds like this were fairly shallow to begin with, so it was easy to keep bellow the surface anxieties in reserve for when confronted directly with them.<br/><br/>Hanuka instinctively started towards the front of the auditorium before she could catch herself, then decided too go with that instinct, remembering that the more rambunctious sort always set themselves in the back.  If someone were going too accidentally brush against the skin beneath her knee length blue skirt, or touch her hand or face, they wouldn't do it on purpose beneath the eyes of the principle.<br/><br/><em>Why a skirt, damn it?  Why couldn't I get jeans like the boys?</em><br/><br/>Hanuka yelped then and jerked her feet back as beckpeddaling student almost stepped on her toes.  The penny loafers on her feet were an illusion, you see, the product of a device clipped to her belt.  Like every inch of visible skin.  The reason for it's perfection was not lucky DNA or makeup, but a hollogram projecting an idealized version of her junior high self aged too seventeen.<br/><br/>Beneath it all was downy fur and elongated fingers and toes, and a simple touch would reveal it.<br/><br/>By some miracle, the stressed out girl made it too a seat on the fourth row, putting her right in front of the stereo and and giving her a front row on Iron Woman's stunt.  She screamed at the top of her lungs along with the rest of the student body.<br/><br/>God, it was good to be in school again!<br/><br/>*  *  *<br/><br/><strong>To Caroline</strong><br/><br/>After the assembly, Hanuka hovered around the edge of the crowd around the frozen yogurt stand when she noticed a girl who looked, from a distance, even taller than herself.  She made her way over, shyly avoiding the noise, then approached carefully, but looked up with a shy smile when she realized that her bangs were on this girl's nose level.<br/><br/>For a moment, she bit her lower lip nervously, then she offered quietly, "If you want, I'll help you duck the basket ball coach.  I'm not sure if they'll be so interested in me anymore, but couldn't stand that I wouldn't join the team back in eight grade."