5
July 2, 2021
D ear Nana,
your favorite granddaughter is trying to be smarter this month.
I’ll try to write a little bit every weekend, not only to make sure I don’t leave anything out in my letter but also because I think it will help me process the events of the week better.
You already know that I saw Father when he came to visit Isaac at school last month, and I want to thank you for sending me the cookies and the new dress. I’m not ashamed to admit that I cried that night when I opened the box, because your lingering smell on the dress combined with the almond cookie smell felt like a hug from you and these days I often find myself in need of those. I miss you a lot.
I’d hated every second of Father’s visit.
“ Where is your mate?” was the first thing out of his mouth. This was the first time he had seen me in almost two months.
“ Dominic just got back from a work trip last night and has a lot of work to catch up on. He sends his apologies.”
Dominic sent nothing of the sort. When I told him I was going to see my father, in the hopes that he’d offer to come with me, he’d told me to have fun. I could have asked instead of hoped, but I was afraid he’d say no.
I was in this vulnerable mindset where him saying “no” to lunch would have felt like him saying “no” to spending time with me. I didn't really care about him and Father hanging out, although having a buffer between me and Alpha John Hansen wouldn’t have been bad.
“ Isaac here was just telling me that he drove up to visit you last weekend. It’s very fortunate that you live close by. That way he can have a home-cooked meal whenever he feels homesick. I remember what it was like when I was at school,” Father droned on, not noticing the tightness in Isaac’s face or the sorrow on mine.
“ Yes, it’s nice that Penelope lives close to me because I love her, and I love being around her,” Isaac drawled as if hoping he’d actually be heard for once, but Father just continued updating him on everything that had happened in the pack in our absence, on how Evie’s studies were going, on the bull he was preparing for the breeding season, and more.
I just sat there and pushed my food around as the decision settled inside me – I would never drive up here for Father again. If he wanted to see me, he was free to come to my pack. I was a fool for having come today, but I did it for Isaac. Judging by the apologetic looks he kept shooting me, he knew that as well as I did.
On the drive back, Hank talked about his newborn grandpup, but not even that could break through my gloomy mood.
◆◆◆
I was surprised to read that you didn’t enjoy Mr. Whitman’s writing. After how you raved about Thoreau, I’d thought that you’d be enamored by Leaves of Grass. A lot of it is philosophically similar, and I know you usually like poetry. I, on the other hand, enjoyed it very much.
You know that I never liked poetry that rhymes, so maybe that is why I enjoyed Mr. Whitman’s style. I wish I was better at remembering the exact things Prof. Bell said during class, but all that sticks with me are the passages that particularly touched me, and I have no rational explanation to offer you as to the “why” of it all.
Stop this day and night with me and you shall possess the origin of all poems,
You shall possess the good of the earth and sun,
(there are millions of suns left,)
I swear I’ve come back to this part at least five times. Something about it feels deep and romantic and like he’s about to combust. I don’t know.
I never dare say these things in class because I’m worried I’ll be laughed at or, worse, made fun of behind my back. I know what you’re going to say: Those who matter don’t mind, and those who mind don’t matter . I know it’s true but it doesn’t change the way I feel. A wolf can know that something is true and still behave like they don’t.
You should hear some of these wolves, Nana. They discuss things in such complicated terms and even argue with Professor Bell, who doesn’t mind it! On the contrary, he seems to enjoy it when Lynn starts contradicting him. Sometimes I think he defends a view he isn’t even that passionate about, just to see one of us fighting him on it. It’s never me, though.
◆◆◆
I’ve been working at the office more and it’s been incredibly rewarding. I normally walk over there in the morning since it’s not far from Dominic’s house, and it helps me settle my thoughts before I start work. It’s going better than I thought it would, so that’s been my incentive to learn and apply myself even more.
More than ever, I appreciate the support of Florence’s friend group, who regularly include me in their lunches and mentor me in a way. Everyone who works at the pack’s administrative building (which is huge, by the way, I almost got lost a few times) is really nice and accommodating.
Everyone but Heather. Every time she saw me, she made a face that reminded me of Isaac’s when he bit into that greengage from the fruit basket gifted to us by one of the foreign delegations. She was nothing but respectful whenever we spoke, so I had no concrete reason to dislike her.
Only the fact that your mate is chauffeuring her around, the ugly voice whispered. I chose to ignore it.
The best part of life in this pack is still my classmates. At the beginning of the month, we organized a picnic and a run, so our wolves could spend time with each other. We mostly packed snacks and fruit because we wanted to hunt and eat together later, so it wasn’t like the pack picnics back home, where all the work and preparations took the fun out of the actual outing.
What surprised me were the varying levels of modesty, depending on where someone’s from. Some of them just disrobed right there, in front of everyone. I would have felt better if I’d had Dominic with me, but he had a charity obligation in the pack that he just couldn’t postpone.
There, not a lie. When Heather showed up at our door the morning of the picnic, it took all the strength I had not to show my surprise or annoyance.
Dominic explained that, because of the accident, she needed a lot of physical therapy for her leg, and the rehab clinic that had the hot pool she needed was near campus.
“Poor” Heather was too scared to drive after her traumatic accident, but she was also afraid to be driven by others. Due to Dominic having been there for her in the immediate aftermath of the tragedy and him being her Alpha now, she only felt safe with him.
The hatred I felt for her in that moment made me want to vomit. But I also felt like the most horrible she-wolf in the world. What did I know about what she had gone through?
Now that Dominic had mentioned it, I remembered how something about her gait had seemed off the few times that she’d passed me by in the pack offices.
Had she also ingested wolfsbane that night? Is that why the injury never healed properly? I couldn’t exactly ask Dominic about it since I wasn’t sure if the gossip about Cassandra’s death was true.
So the two of them drove off together, whereas Hank and I would leave and come back on our own schedule. I was informed this would be happening every two months.
In the evening, I was still so wound up about the whole thing that I went for a long run, and when I came back, Dominic was in the kitchen, wearing his workout gear as well. He must have just returned from the gym. I watched the way his hair kept getting in his eyes, and I thought he needed a haircut. I could envision him sitting in a chair in front of me, the back of his head digging into my lower stomach, my fingers gently combing through his wet strands as I cut them...
As my shoulder brushed against him on my way to get some water from the fridge, his erect appendage emerged from the waistband of his shorts. I couldn’t stop staring at it. Did he get excited just from that touch? A drop of clear liquid glistened at the tip. I licked my lips unconsciously and he stepped towards me.
Without words, we devoured each other on the kitchen floor, salty and hot, until neither of us could move. After we showered in separate bathrooms, I didn’t feel like putting on “real” clothes, and it was too early for my nightgown. I still needed that water, so I just slid on his sleep shirt that was on our bed and a pair of clean underwear to go get it. I heard Dominic jogging down the stairs and I was about to offer him a glass as well, but I noticed how angry he looked, so I didn’t. He squeezed his eyes shut and took a few deep breaths.
“ Why are you walking around like that? Put some clothes on,” he said between clenched teeth.
It didn’t even hurt. It was what I imagined frostbite was like. A cold feeling that spread until you were numb. And then the affected tissue died.
I just nodded, like the mute he was turning me into, picked up the sweaty and torn clothes from the kitchen floor, and went upstairs to change. I put on my nightgown and went to do a load of laundry, and didn’t go back upstairs until I was sure he was asleep.
◆◆◆
Since I know how much you loved hearing about my trip to Concord, this time I decided to have some of Anthony’s photos developed and I’m including those with my letter. Of course, Orchard House is among them, as is the replica of Thoreau’s cabin at Walden Pond. However, most of them are photos from our second trip to Montague, MA.
You will particularly enjoy the photo of me with my friends at the Bookmill, the most amazing bookshop I have ever been to. You can easily deduce that the only male in the photo has to be Anthony; I will tell you that the tall black female is your fellow Georgian, Lynn, which leaves the curvy brunette to be Charlotte.
The bookstore nearly bankrupted us, but we still had some money left over for lunch at the café that it houses. It was such a unique experience for me since I'd never spent much time among humans, but we sat there for two hours, just observing (and smelling) all the humans who came through the place. We wondered what life was like for them, but I don’t think our imagination did it justice.
“ Do you think we’re better off with our fated mates, or are they with their freedom of choice?” Charlotte asked, her mood unreadable.
“ I think having a fated mate beats just picking someone you like,” Lynn said and Anthony groaned.
“ Of course you’d say that, you’re mated already.”
I didn’t say anything. I was mated too, and yet here I was, unable to claim it was undoubtedly better than sifting through dozens of humans to find one you’d want or like.
“ I can’t even imagine what the process would be like,” I said honestly. “The possibilities are endless. Do you choose based on sight or smell? Do you approach someone on the street? Do families choose for their pups? If you can grow to love a person, does it also mean you can grow to unlove them? It is just all so different from our ways.”
“ True,” Lynn replied. “I feel like human mating and our mating are two different languages, and we simply don’t speak theirs. It would be like telling a blind person to imagine what letters look like based on how they sound.”
“ Exactly,” Anthony said and pointedly looked at Charlotte, “so there’s no use in thinking about it.”
“ I’ve read a lot of their romance books, and choice seems wonderful,” Charlotte continued, ignoring him completely.
“ I think that is because they’re books,” I pointed out. “I don’t know that real life always works out like that.”
“ Don’t mind me, I’m just in a mood today. I started next month’s reading already, so it got me thinking about things.”
“ The Age of Innocence? Is it any good?” Lynn asked, seeming relieved at the change in topic.
“ It’s wonderful; I can’t wait to discuss it in class and see which woman everyone will side with.”
“ I’ll support whichever of them is the prettier one,” Anthony deadpanned and Charlotte guffawed, which caused the rest of us to break out into laughter as well.
As wonderful as the trip was, it wasn’t the highlight of my month. When Dominic left for Colorado in the middle of the month, I used that time to plan and host a sleepover for Charlotte, Lynn, Grace, Mira Judd (who is a nurse that Florence introduced me to), and – you’ll never believe this – Margaret!
When I read in your letter that you’re enjoying the way she’s handling the advice column, I just couldn’t contain my excitement at the thought of telling you that she’ll be attending my sleepover. As juvenile as it sounds, it made me insanely happy.
You know that I never had many friends back in Uinta, and I am just starting to see how poor that made me in certain ways. How deprived. Almost emotionally illiterate about some things.
Anyway, I worried that Mira wouldn’t have fun since she is older than most of us (she’s 30) and new to the group, but Florence wasn’t wrong when she suggested that I include her. She fit in perfectly with the rest of us and we already made plans to repeat the experience next time Dominic is out of town.
We stayed in the whole weekend – we talked, played board games, cooked, baked, and just spent time together. Thanks to the new couch, I had enough space for everyone. Mira and Margaret slept on the couch, Lynn and Charlotte in the guest room, and Grace shared a bed with me. It was like what I always imagined the all-female boarding school from A Little Princess was like.
But it was also eye-opening. Five minutes into the sleepover, after I’d asked everyone to please remove their shoes, Charlotte had wistfully said: “My late father would always forget to take his off and would track mud all over our house. I can still hear my mother yelling at him for it, and see him shoot me a wink.”
“ Your mother was yelling at her mate?” I asked, incredulous.
It was their turn to be incredulous. Thus began the first of the many deep conversations we’d have in the course of the next two days.
I’d explained my strict upbringing, my widowed father and his quiet chosen mate, and they’d shared stories of growing up witnessing many different kinds of relationships among the mated couples around them. Margaret mostly remained silent, but I figured that was a habit she'd acquired through her work as a mating counselor.
I smiled at her as I removed a piece of lint from her leggings, which made her look at me.
“ How come you decided to move to this pack?” I asked her something I’d been wondering about.
Her bio in the magazine said she was originally from Pennsylvania.
“ Dr. Jackson is an old friend. When I complained to her about feeling restless and needing a change, she suggested moving here,” she shrugged.
“ I hope you’ll like living here,” I said and she smiled warmly. Something about her pear smell reminded me of my late mother and the way she used to hug me.
I told them my first heat was coming up, and the mated females gave me some good advice, but they also kind of scared me. Grace has no pups, despite having been mated for five years, and Mira has a 4-year-old she conceived during her sixth heat. I guess the fuss about our family history made me believe I’d conceive on my first try, but now that I think about it, I shouldn’t get my hopes up in advance.
It’s times like these that I miss Mother the most. Don’t get me wrong, I love you and appreciate you and I know I always have your support, but it's just... I don’t know. It’s hard to explain.
I hope you don’t mind my thinking out loud in a way as I’m writing. I rarely feel comfortable enough to say whatever comes to mind these days. But I feel like I’m getting there with the females from the sleepover.
Mention your mate, I reminded myself.
And as you know, Dominic already knows everything that I’m thinking.
And I hate it.
I couldn’t stop thinking about some of the conversations that happened during the sleepover weekend. Charlotte was asking Margaret about her job, and whether she had many clients.
“ More couples are in counseling than ever before, I believe,” had been Margaret’s response.
“ Why do you think that is?” Mira asked. “My grandfather always talks about how females nowadays are more high maintenance, but I don’t necessarily see that in my friends.”
“ No,” Margaret agreed. “It was different for our grandmothers and their mothers, wasn’t it? What’s a good mate for you, Lynn?”
“ Someone kind, good, attentive, loving, protective, supportive,” Lynn slowly listed things until Charlotte interrupted her, saying, “You should appreciate how hard she’s trying to be vague and not to describe her mate right now,” and we all laughed.
“ See, most of those are somewhat emotional and soft attributes, no?” Margaret looked around at us. “Can you tell us about a normal day for you and your mate, Mira?”
Mira frowned as she thought about it.
“Let’s say I worked the night shift. I come home around 8 am, we have breakfast, and then,”
“ Wait. Who makes the breakfast that you eat?” Margaret interrupted.
“ Er, he does. Why?”
“ Just asking, no reason,” Margaret smiled. “Please, go on.”
“ Then I go to bed and he takes our pup to school before going to work. He owns the hardware store in town,” she explained. “I wake up around 1 pm, do some things around the house, pick up Ben, then my mate comes home around six and sometimes he brings takeout, sometimes I cook dinner, depending on what we agreed on in the morning. Then, after Ben's bedtime, we hang out a bit and go to bed. That’s it.”
Margaret leaned forward, putting her elbows on her knees, her hands animated while she talked, “Shifters used to live in more isolated, more rudimentary, hidden packs. Some of them were half-feral once upon a time. A good mate was strong, protective, possessive, fertile, a good hunter, and a good provider. He provided shelter. He was steadfast. There were no presents outside of mating customs. No one took their mate out for a date,” she huffed a little laugh at the ludicrous idea. I kept thinking about Eden for some reason. “Tasks were split along gender lines even more than they are now. Wolves traveled less and interacted with humans less. We live in historic times for our kind, and that is why I have so many clients.”
“ What changed?” I asked, breathless from thinking about everything that she was saying.
“ Well,” she took a sip of her tea, Marley’s latest find. “Females now want to like their mate, as well as love him. And whereas the idea of not liking your mate or being unhappy with him is by no means a new concept, it is the first time that females have the freedom to voice it. The old school attitude is that it doesn’t matter how your mate treats you, the bond overrides it all and takes precedence over everything. I know many packs still think like that,” she said, and she seemed hurt by it. “I don’t think that’s true. It’s possible to want your mate, even to love your mate because the bond is forcing you to, but still not to like him.”
It felt like the room was spinning. What she was saying was akin to heresy in the eyes of my family.
I was scared to think about whether I liked my mate.
Since my heat will be starting next week, and then we’ll slowly step into August after that, not mailing this letter today would push me into promise-breaking territory, so I better stop here.
If I’m correct in my assumptions, you’re already reading The Age of Innocence and I can’t wait to hear your thoughts on it. Charlotte loved it. I still haven’t started it, but I plan to start soon. It’s bittersweet, because it’s the last book of the course. Anyways! I have to go!
I can’t wait for your next letter.
Love,
Penelope
I sighed and sat back in my chair. Why did writing to Nana always feel like lying? I made very sure never to write a direct lie, yet the very optimistic, hopeful tone that I made sure to use made me feel deceitful.
My upcoming heat was probably wreaking havoc in my mind as well. I already felt more needy, and I wanted to be around Dominic all the time. I could see it affecting him as well. His gaze was threatening to ignite me every time we were in a room together. His wolf was running around the property, marking his territory. The other day I found him in my walk-in closet, rubbing his scent all over my clothes.
When I realized my canines had extended at the thought, another line from Whitman came to mind:
Urge and urge and urge,
Always the procreant urge of the world.
Out of the dimness opposite equals advance, always substance and increase, always sex,
Always a knit of identity, always distinction, always a breed of life.