chapter 8
By Sunday afternoon, the building had finally calmed down from the morning chaos. A whole week since she was booked off and allowed to reciver at home. A first for someone in their district.
The Alpha’s inspection team had swept through the district like a cold wind—fast, disruptive, and leaving everyone shaken even after they were gone.
But once the enforcers disappeared down the street and the last wolf vanished into a vehicle, the humans did what humans always did: they tried to pretend life was normal again.
Ferial stood at the small kitchen counter, stirring the pot of rice with absentminded motions. Her body was still on edge from everything that had happened, but routine was grounding. The steam fogged her face, warm and comforting, the complete opposite of how her insides felt.
“Your rice is burning,” Abdie said from the doorway with the flat tone of someone who had warned her five times already.
“It’s not burning,” she muttered.
He pointed. “Ferial, my sister in burnt-offerings, it is literally sticking to the pot. You’re scraping it like you’re digging for treasure. Just admit defeat.”
She rolled her eyes and switched off the stove. “Fine. Slightly burnt.”
“Slightly?” He leaned over the pot, sniffed dramatically, then coughed. “Girl, this rice has seen the gates of hell and turned back.”
She threw the wooden spoon at him with terrible aim. He dodged and continued laughing.
The easy teasing softened the leftover tension from the morning. Abdie always did that—dragged her away from whatever storm was brewing in her head and forced her to look at something ridiculous instead.
She scooped the not-so-perfect rice into a bowl. “You know, you could cook sometimes.”
“I am a man of talent,” he declared. “Just not in kitchens.”
“You can’t fry an egg without burning water.”
He paused. “…that only happened once.”
“It happened twice.”
“Okay, but the second time doesn’t count. The stove was faulty.”
“You blamed the egg,” she reminded him.
“Because the egg had a suspicious attitude.”
They both snorted. This—this banter, this silliness—kept them sane in a world that didn’t care if humans cracked under pressure.
Before they could sit down to eat, a sudden crash echoed from the hallway.
Ferial froze. Abdie looked at her with raised eyebrows.
Another noise followed—a loud bang and then muffled shouting.
Ferial set her bowl down slowly. “What now?”
Abdie peeked through the peephole. His eyebrows shot up. “It’s the Mokoena couple.”
Ferial groaned. “Not again.”
“They’re at it like they’re auditioning for a telenovela,” Abdie whispered.
"You don't even know what a telenovela is. You mention things that wolf's speak about,"she laughed and walked over to him.
A scream cut through the hallway, followed by the sound of something hitting the wall.
Ferial’s eyes widened. “Okay, that didn’t sound like the normal fighting.”
Abdie nodded. “We should check.”
Reluctantly but instinctively, they both stepped outside.
The hallway smelled like old paint and detergent, the overhead light flickering at its own unpredictable rhythm.
A small crowd of residents had already gathered—humans in mismatched clothes, slippers, blankets wrapped around shoulders, babies on hips.
Everyone looked exhausted, annoyed, but unsurprised.
Drama was as constant as electricity outages in the district.
Mrs. Mokoena stood in the middle of the hallway, her finger shoved in her husband’s face, screaming at a level that made Ferial wince. Mr. Mokoena looked equally ready to combust. A broken vase lay on the floor, flowers flattened and water dripping between tiles.
“I told you,” Mrs. Mokoena shrieked, “if you speak to that woman again—”
“I WAS ASKING FOR DIRECTIONS!” Mr. Mokoena thundered back.
“Directions to HER HOUSE!”
Abdie whispered, “This man’s funeral is tomorrow.”
Ferial elbowed him, but she couldn’t help the laugh that escaped. Not loud enough to be heard, but loud enough that her body loosened a bit.
One of the neighbors—a tired-looking father with a toddler clinging to his leg—rubbed his forehead. “Can you two please keep it down? Some of us are trying to put kids to sleep.”
Mrs. Mokoena wheeled on him. “Tell HIM that!”
Mr. Mokoena raised his hands. “Why am I being blamed for her paranoia?”
“Because you married me!” she snapped.
The entire hallway went silent for a second.
Then more yelling erupted.
Ferial sighed. “Should we… do something?”
“What do you want us to do?” Abdie asked. “Hold up cue cards? ‘Argue softly.’ ‘Throw fewer objects.’ ‘Consider therapy.’”
Ferial bit her lip to keep from laughing. “You’re impossible.”
“And I’m also correct.”
Still, something in her chest stirred—not fear, exactly, but unease. Ever since the Alpha heir had passed by her—ever since his eyes had landed on her for that fraction of a second—her world had felt slightly skewed, like something had shifted without permission.
She didn’t want anything else drawing attention to this building. Not today. Not after the wolves had swept through it on their visit in this district.
Before she could speak, heavy footsteps echoed from the stairwell.
Everyone turned.
The building manager—Mr. Patel—stood there with his clipboard.
His face was stern, the kind of stern that came from years of dealing with humans who had nowhere else to take their frustrations.
Behind him were two district guards—not werewolves, just armed human men in brown uniforms who barely mattered but were still enough to intimidate struggling residents.
Human guards that we called the traitors to our people and the ones to lick these werewolves asses.
“Enough!” Mr. Patel barked.
The Mokoenas froze mid-argument.
“You want to scream? Do it inside your apartment. You want to throw things? Do it inside your apartment. You disturb the hallway again, I report this unit as disruptive, and guess what? The wolves do not like disruptions.”
A quiet ripple of fear passed through the crowd.
The Mokoenas nodded quickly, scurrying back inside, still muttering under their breath but quieter this time.
The moment their door slammed shut, Mr. Patel sighed heavily and rubbed his temples. “Everyone else—back inside. No more gatherings in the passage. Last thing we need is patrols thinking we’re forming a crowd.”
Slowly, people dispersed.
Ferial and Abdie slipped back into her apartment.
Abdie collapsed onto the couch dramatically. “This district is wild. You can’t tell me life is boring here.”
She shot him a flat look. “You enjoy chaos too much.”
“I enjoy entertainment. And chaos is free.”
Ferial shook her head and picked up her bowl of rice again. It had cooled a little, but she didn’t mind. Her mind felt busy—too busy—and food was grounding.
Abdie watched her with a softer expression now. “You okay?”
She nodded once. “Yeah.”
He didn’t believe her. She could tell by the way his eyebrows dipped, but he didn’t press.
Instead he stretched, groaned dramatically, and reached for his own bowl. “One day, when we’re rich, we’re moving out of this building.”
She snorted. “Rich where? Working what? We’re humans.”
“We’ll open a store somewhere,” he insisted. “Sell something. Anything.”
“What are you going to sell? You can’t even cook rice.”
“I’ll sell dreams.”
She laughed again—real, this time.
Outside, somewhere in the distance, a wolf howled. The sound carried faintly through the window, crawling under the skin, a reminder of the world beyond their walls.
Of the power above them.
Of the Alpha heir whose eyes had lingered on her longer than they should have earlier that day.
She swallowed.
She didn’t know it yet, but that moment—the way he had stopped, the way something flickered across his face before he turned away—was already the start of something.
Something she couldn’t outrun.
Not in this district.
Not anywhere.
But for now, inside this tiny apartment, with burnt rice and her best friends nonsense humor filling the space, she allowed herself to breathe.
Because tomorrow?
Tomorrow would be different.
And she could already feel fate stirring at the edges of her quiet life.