49 Kit
Iwoke alone in my bed. My hand reached out, but I only felt the absence of warmth and flesh.
Souring, my stomach rolled when I opened my eyes to see the blankets had been restored where his body once was.
An overwhelming sense of guilt struck me all at once because I’d been so stupid.
I let Ryatt in last night, but he left me to wake without him, going back to his mates, his pack.
I became someone on the outside of his pack, so I’d never have what they did, only wishing to wake in their mess of tangled limbs.
It would forever be me in this murky swamp of life I waded through.
Closing my eyes, I tried to breathe deeply to abate the tears that sprung up on me.
I had chosen my path to remain unmarked, so this was part of that decision.
Another wave of unadulterated demand readied to crash over me, but I didn’t want it to.
I didn’t want to think about them to get off.
Even if I tried thinking of anyone else, it never stayed on that person by the end of my climax.
Knowing there was only one thing to do in this situation, I thought about the first time I had a heat cycle.
Not many knew this, but I’d been on drugs.
They diluted the world just enough for me to think about anything besides my damning fate.
I wanted that now to hideaway through this one.
But I promised Anika. I told her I wouldn’t do them.
I contemplated my options, chewing my lower lip.
Would it be so bad to fight the drugs next week instead of this one?
It’d only be a few days before the relapse, and I wouldn’t have to wake up to an empty bed.
There wouldn’t be this much sorrow drowning my heart.
All I had to do was use one dose. One measly injection, and I’d sleep through it.
Salivating, my mouth told me how much we craved what idly sat in my cabinet.
My body carried me into the bathroom of its own accord because it wanted this course of action without approval.
Blinded by both needs, I had to. There’d be no fighting the discord within my chest without placing my armor on.
That shield became drugs, and I needed them to carry me through this heartbreaking battle now.
Opening the mirror, I saw the drugs already prepped for me to use.
They’d slip into my vein with ease right below my elbow, joining the track marks I already had.
One day, I planned to get another tattoo over them to hide the new ones better, but they weren’t dark enough for the common eye to catch.
Saul didn’t have me for as long this round to make them awful.
Sadly, I knew I couldn’t think about adding to my elbow piece until I ended my addiction.
Sitting the readied needle against the skin, I paused. My hand traced over the bow without an arrow inked there, I knew the meaning behind it. It was personal, and I never explained it to anyone. A fire sat around the weapon for a few purposes.
The bow without an arrow with the string poised toward me indicated that I wouldn’t shoot myself up again. It represented waving my white flag to myself, surrendering to the urge in order to overcome it. The fire came from being burned by it already, knowing it would only burn me again, and it did.
Saul gave me the fix I never wanted, and now I had the sickening desire to continue.
My hand readjusted the needle to sit at the entry sight, but I couldn’t pierce my skin.
I held it there, yearning for the muddled mind it promised.
It would minimize my heat until it was over.
Closing my eyes, I felt the tear slip because of the promises I’d break to Anika and to myself.
Before I could decide to shoot it into my vein, the door to my room opened.
I didn’t even try hiding what I was doing when I heard Anika call out my name.
The feeling of having eyes on me was enough to know she stood in the doorway of my bathroom, seeing me about to use again. I spoke before she could say anything.
“There’s a promise of safety if I use right now, and I need it for the next week,” I cried. My whole body shook from everything going on.
“Why?” Her eyes began to collect water as well.
“I woke up alone,” I confessed, pinching my eyes shut. I hated how weak I fell with the strongest standing beside me. “It hurts, Anika… so much. I don’t want to feel like this. I don’t want to feel alone when I’m this vulnerable. I don’t want to feel forgotten when I can so easily forget.”
“Kit,” she called me by my real name. “Ryatt came to get me. He was letting me know you were in heat. He didn’t leave you in the way you thought.”
She took a tentative step toward me and raised her muscular arms slightly to appear less threatening.
Shaking my head, I tried to fight through the demons of my mind, but they were too much.
“It hurts. Everything hurts. My body, my mind, my heart. I don’t want to pretend I’m strong anymore.
I don’t want to pretend I’m okay because I’m not, and I don’t want to be.
I’m a fraud because I’d rather numb it all than fight. ”
Heaving for breaths, I heard someone behind Anika suck in a hard breath. That was when I noticed Jericho with her. He had come in to check on me after Ryatt alerted everyone of my condition. He saw the true version of me, and I felt even weaker for it.
“They want you,” Anika argued.
“All of us,” Jericho corrected, coming into the bathroom to join.
Shaking my head, I wept even harder. “I can’t have any of you. I can’t without giving up Damien, and I won’t do that to him. I love him too much to give him up.”
“Do you love him enough to stop using?” Anika finally got close enough to take the needle, but I already planned to hand it over.
“I was trying to stop when you came in, okay? I saw my promise to myself, and it made me stop before you came in.” Showing my tattoo, she knew what it represented as well.
Handing the needle back, her eyes dared me to follow through with what I had said. “Then put it back.”
My heart pounded, begging to hurry and stick it in.
My mind pleaded with it, asking for me to make myself forget.
Squeezing it like a vice, I shakily lifted my hand for it to fit back on the shelf with the others.
I was in position to set it down, but I found it too hard to do.
My grip wouldn’t let it go even though I had done all the previous steps to get here.
“Set. It. Down.” Anika studied how I struggled.
“I-I can’t,” I cried, feeling the suffocation tightening in my chest. “Oh, god…”
“No god can help you now. Only you can help yourself. Omega is stronger than those drugs, and she needs to be strong enough to put it back.”
“Omega,” I whispered my nickname, finding the power within it from everything I had done to earn it. “Omega is strong, but not without Beta.”
“Beta is right here, ready to make another promise to you.” Holding up a bag, she showed me she bought hair dye. “Beta is ready for war.”
Not many would understand what she promised me, but I did. Last time I gave up drugs, Anika dyed her hair in honor of my choice to be a walking reminder of it. She came willing to do it again. “Beta…”
She shrugged her shoulders and smiled. “It’s time for a change anyway.
I’ve been white and blue for too long.” Sitting on top of the toilet seat, she glanced up at me without much height difference between us from how tall she stood.
“So what’s it going to be? Keeping your promise to me or giving in? ”
Damn. When she worded it like that, I knew I only had one option. Plus, I had so many questions about her and Jericho’s new buddying relationship. The ache in my chest never subsided, but Anika tried to give me a happy memory during the hard ones. She was trying to remind me what I had to live for.
Nothing else had been figured out, but I knew I appreciated that.
Pulling out a brighter red color, I knew her natural curls would look fierce.
Her hair curled above her shoulders when not in the box braids, so I couldn’t wait to see her natural afro again.
Relenting, I set down the drugs and turned my back to them.
Moving to her side, I began helping her undo the braids that were in.
It wasn’t a complete fix, and I’d have more heat waves and cravings to come, but I had Anika. I had my best friend.