Hope
It was about a week of testing before I was allowed to leave the fancy panic room. Somehow, despite eleven years of almost nonstop anxiety surrounding my kids, knowing they were in Aegis’s care was... freeing.
That, and I got to video call them every day till my eventual release.
Lucy took the best to this, excitedly asking me everything she could think of about my new transformation.
“Do you look like Collin?”
“No, sweetheart, you can see that I don’t.”
“So you can go werewolf whenever you want?”
“Uh... sort of. It takes a lot of effort. Like... a lot.”
“But you won’t turn in surprise?”
“No, so far, I don’t surprise turn.”
“How do you kiss Aegis when you’re a werewolf?”
I pinched the bridge of my nose. “Who told you I was kissing Aegis?”
“Annie said so.”
“I haven’t even seen Annie, yet!”
“She said she heard her mom talking about how you and Aegis were gonna be a ‘thing’ now, and when I asked what that meant, she said it meant you guys kiss a lot.”
“That’s... sort of correct?”
“Does that mean you’re gonna marry him?”
I heard Aegis chuckling in the background, and my face burned. “Maybe? We’re trying to be sort of normal about it.”
“But Collin says you’re fated mates, and Annie says that all fated mates get married, because that’s what happens.”
“Y-yes, that’s correct, but I don’t want to upend your lives that much! I want to go slowly, get you used to it!”
“But he’s already here all the time. If you get married, he can move in, and I can tell everyone my dad’s the Alpha! We have Rudy, and he’s like a Grandpa, and I always wanted a Grandpa, and Ms. Leanne’s gonna be our Grandma- she said so- and Jade will be my AUNT! Ivy said she’s not related to Aegis, but she can be my Aunt, too, and-”
“Sweetheart, is Dylan around?” I said, trying not to groan. In the background, I heard the obvious laughter of both Jade and her brother.
“Well, he was,” Lucy said, looking over her shoulder and peering around the room, “but I think he left.”
My heart sunk. Dylan had been avoiding me since this entire thing had gone down, and Aegis had told me that apart from doing his homework, he hadn’t really spoken to anyone.
It was with relief, therefore, when I left Jade’s house and bid a final farewell to the panic room.
The world felt entirely more crisp when I stepped out into it. Just as well, because I’d been in a sort of pseudo-coma for three weeks, and spent a fourth locked up in a small room trying to prove I wasn’t a danger to society. It was the vacation from hell; nowhere to go, and no one could stay with me all the time, and there were only so many books one could read or shows one could watch from sunup to sundown, seven days straight.
The sun on my skin felt warmer; the air carried with it a thousand and one new pieces of information, things I’d never noticed. In just my human form, I could tell there was a variety of animals all around us, though the information all jumbled together. I needed practice actually sorting it all into useful information.
“You’ll get used to it,” Aegis chuckled, holding my hand as I stepped out into the blinding sunlight. “It’s a lot, I’ve been told.”
“It’s like someone turned a filter on permanently,” I said, looking around me. The colors were brighter, more beautiful, more real. “I can’t imagine not being like this.”
“Remember not to gush too loudly in front of Dylan.”
I winced. “Right. We still don’t know if he’ll be a werewolf.”
We drove back to my home, and for some reason, the closer we got, the more tense I became. I wanted so badly to see my family, to get back a sense of normalcy… but everything was changed. Everything and nothing.
There was that feeling of completeness when Aegis was around. Even if I was in a room full of friends that I loved, somehow, I always knew where he was. Being too far away from him induced anxiety, like I was treading water in a cave, slowly running out of oxygen. When I saw him, everything clicked back into place. It was like everything I’d ever felt for him amplified by a million, and on a genetic level. It was almost embarrassing how my body reacted to his presence.
We walked in the door, and I was shocked by the amount of information my new senses picked up. I knew Lucy was about to smash into me before I ever saw or heard her; she burst into tears upon contact with my legs, and I held her, rocking her back and forth and surprised when I started to sniffle, too.
“Mama,” she wailed, “I’m so sorry.”
“You already told me that, honey,” I said softly.
“I know. I know- but it’s our fault you got hurt.”
“No one is at fault,” I said, for perhaps the thousandth time. “You’re children. You couldn’t have known the danger out there; it’s my job, as your mama, to keep you safe.”
Collin came up to me when Lucy finally released me and gave me an awkward, one-armed hug. I could smell that he was different from Lucy; could smell the werewolf gene in him. I realized, too, that I could somehow smell that I shared blood with both Collin and Lucy, and how it differed slightly between the two of them.
“Dylan’s outside,” Collin said quietly. He glanced toward the back door. “I don’t know how to help him, Mom.”
Dylan was seated on the back porch, alone, looking off over the fence. When I dropped beside him, he didn’t seem surprised, though he didn’t look at me.
“Hey, honey,” I said, clasping my hands together.
“Mom.”
“How’s school?”
He sniffed. “Same as I’ve been telling you on the phone.”
I snorted. “Considering that’s usually just been ‘it’s fine’, I’d like a little more than that.”
He shrugged. “It’s… okay.”
“That is not any better,” I said, reaching over to tickle him. He flinched away from me, and I frowned, tilting my head. “Honey, what’s going on?”
It was a long moment before he said anything, and I saw him struggling for words, his hands twisting in his lap. “I almost got you killed,” he said finally.
“No-“
“I know. It’s not my fault,” he said, and there was a surprising amount of bitterness in his voice. “It was, though. It was so stupid. So freaking stupid, it’s not even funny. I look back on that whole thing, and I can’t believe how stupid I was, sneaking out and going into the woods with Lucy.”
“You do know you’re not the only kid in the world to do something stupid, right?” I asked.
“Yeah, but going out and getting lost in some woods I barely know with my five year old sister while a rogue werewolf is on the loose?” He looked so angry, it surprised me. It was such a strangely mature level of emotion from an eleven-year old.
“Dylan,” I said softly. “Why don’t you tell me what’s really bothering you?”
“Everything!” He threw up his hands, and tears started to fall- angry tears. “Everything’s different, Mom. First it was just Collin. He and I- we’re different now. If I don’t shift, he and I are going to split apart. I can already tell. He’s different- and not just because he’s a werewolf, but because he’s special.” Bitterness flooded his tone. “I know he’s got that Alpha gene, or whatever. I’ve heard Aegis and his mom talking about it at night, when they think we’re asleep. Collin’s not just a werewolf, he’s a special werewolf. What does that make me?”
“It makes you Dylan,” I said, but he shook his head.
“I’m getting left behind by everyone,” he said. “And even if I did shift, then what? What would I be? Not an Alpha. Even if I did shift, we still wouldn’t be the same anymore. I’m losing my brother, my best friend, and there’s nothing I can do about it.”
“Honey-“
“And now,” he added, “everything’s even worse, and it’s all my fault. You’re a werewolf now, too, and now Lucy and I are the only humans, and I…”
“Dylan. Look at me.”
He didn’t for a long moment, but finally lifted his eyes up to my face. “What?”
“You are my son,” I said. “You and Collin both. Lucy is my daughter. Nothing in the entire world has changed that, not from the day you were born, to the day my ex left us, to the day Collin shifted. If you shift tomorrow, I will love you to the world and back, Alpha gene or no… and if you don’t shift, then I will love you to the world and back, werewolf or no.” I grabbed his shoulders. “You are my son. I have given up everything to keep you guys, and I would do it again, and again, and again. If someone told me they could make it so I could go back and make this choice all over again, I’d still take you both in, I’d just… probably do a better job of it.”
He sniffled, the corner of his mouth twitching slightly.
“I love you,” I said softly, squeezing his shoulders. “I realize the last few weeks have been hard because Collin is different. I won’t deny that. Things are complicated for him in a way even I can’t understand.”
“But you’re-“
“Yes, but I’m not like him,” I said gently. “I never went through two different puberties at the same time.”
Dylan shuddered. “Yeah, I guess I don’t want that.”
“Whether or not you shift,” I continued, “it doesn’t matter. You are my Dylan. Yes, we have changed, but unfortunately, change is a part of this world. Some people drift apart for way less than one being a werewolf and the other being a human; some stay together through even worse situations.”
Dylan looked at me doubtfully. “Do they?”
“Sure. Backstabbing, drugs- I’ll have to have you sit down and watch some true crime documentaries one day. You’ll feel positively normal by the end of them.”
That got a shaky laugh out of him. “I don’t know about that, mom.”
I smoothed his hair out of his eyes. “Here’s the deal, kiddo: I can’t foretell what the future will hold. I can’t tell you that things aren’t going to change. I can’t tell you what life will be like, with Collin having the Alpha gene, or my being a werewolf. All I can do is ask you to talk to me.”
“Talk?”
“Tell me what you’re feeling, and when,” I said. “I’m going to make mistakes, we both know this.”
He snorted. “Yeah, that’s true.”
“Oi.” I teasingly thumped him on the shoulder. “Watch it.” I cupped his face, serious again. “And I’m serious: you are not the first kid in the world to do something stupid.”
“Yeah, but this stupid?” He asked, doubtful again.
“Yeah, this stupid,” I laughed. “Did I ever tell you about the time Ivy and I snuck out, and I fell into the river after a rain in the dead of winter?”
“What?” Dylan looked shocked. “The water must have been freezing.”
“It was. I nearly died. Ivy was afraid to leave me, so she tried howling to see if nearby werewolves would hear us.”
He burst into laughter. “What?”
“It didn’t work the way she intended,” I said. “It did get someone to call the cops out on a noise complaint, though, so I did get the help I wanted.”
“Yeah, but you didn’t endanger anyone else’s life.”
“I did,” Ivy said, dropping down on the other side of him. I looked up to see that the others had come to stand behind us at some point, listening in. “Why do you think your mom fell into the river? She was trying to save my stupid butt.”
“Oh,” Dylan said, blinking.
“In fact,” Ivy added, a little wryly, “nearly every scrape we ever got ourselves into was on account of me.”
“Is this something the Sheriff of Werewolf Hollow should be telling the youths?” Leanne asked, bemused. Beside her, Rudy was watching us warmly, and it seemed as though a few of the lines in his face had vanished.
“Better they see that they can grow out of it,” Ivy said. The three enormous scars stretched tight as she laughed, and she winced. “Well, sort of.”
“I think you look pretty cool,” Lucy said promptly, coming to scoot in between her and I. “It gives you an air of mystique.”
“Where in the heck did you hear that?” I asked, laughing.
“Ms. Leanne was watching a show on TV in black and white.”
“We skipped the bits she shouldn’t see,” Leanne said, embarrassed.
“So does this mean we’re officially part of the pack?” Collin asked, coming to sit next to Dylan.
“Not quite,” Aegis said, crossing his arms and grinning. “There’s a big thing we do, kind of like the bonfire. The whole pack comes out, and I swear you in; it’s a big deal.”
“Can I be part of the pack, too?” Lucy asked, pouting. “I wanna be a werewolf, too.”
“Nah,” Dylan said, reaching over to hug her shoulders, a sudden twinkle in his eye, “we gotta hold the line on the normal folks in this household, Lu. Can’t let all the monsters take over.”
“Guh!” I said, pretending to be shot in the heart. “The nerve! After everything I’ve done for this family!”
“Could probably still eat him, if you shift now,” Ivy snickered.
“I want to hear more stories about all the stuff you got into,” Lucy declared, jumping onto Ivy’s lap, her eyes sparkling. “You gotta tell me!”
“You have to call me ‘Aunt Ivy’, first!” Ivy said, before tickling Lucy so hard, she squealed with laughter.
I smiled, watching this whole scene unfold in front of me, and for a moment, it felt as if the future was finally stretching out before me. The world was filled with potential.
We still wouldn’t really know if Dylan was a werewolf or not, but it didn’t matter. He would always be my son, regardless of who or what he was. Collin had a future ahead of him of training and learning to control whatever powerful aura his Alpha gene gave him. Whether he would take over the Black Lake pack remained to be seen.
There was hope in Rudy’s eyes; tired, but it was there. He stood shoulder to shoulder with Leanne, and I saw this sort of tired acceptance in her own face. They would never lose their grief, but friendship- or perhaps more, even if it wasn’t fated- could help them traverse that well of loss.
Lucy was probably the most stable out of all of us, if I was honest. Ecstatic to suddenly have quadrupled in family members, she hopped from lap to lap, pure joy on that little face… and there was no greater feeling a mom could experience.
Lawrence and Brittani weren't exactly friendly, but things were mending. There was hope. At the very least, we would be forced into each other's company a lot more, because Annie, Dylan, and Collin were inseparable.
Ivy had matured beyond what I could've ever guessed. Brave, defiant, strong, and beautiful, she was fawned over by nearly everyone. If there was one person who could unite the three packs at this point, it was Ivy. Much to all our surprise, her little stunt had seemed to spark something in Paul; the pack Beta hadn't taken his eyes off her since the whole thing had gone down. I could only imagine how that would go.
Dylan saw what I saw: a future ahead of him, undefined and uncertain. It scared him more than it scared Collin, because he realized what Collin didn’t: nothing was promised. Even so, I hoped he could also see that in spite of the uncertainty of reality, there would always be hope. Hope… and love.
And Aegis…
I looked at him, and I saw the world stretched out before me. I knew that no matter what we might face, what tragedy could strike our family… I had him. Aegis. Fate had brought us back together, and only Fate could tear us apart, now… but he had given me the strength I needed to look up, to look forward, to find hope.
Whatever happened… I would be okay.
I would be his.