Reasons

Everything is still the same in the house. The walls were recently re-painted the same cerulean blue that my mother loves. There are a couple of new frames on the photo wall, but I don't stop to look at them. The couches are new, too.

Lucinda walks us to my old room where absolutely everything is still the same, so much so that I gasp when I walk in and my brain plays an awful trick on me because it makes me smell Daniel’s scent.

It's been years, his scent can't still be here. But everything else is.

His football, the tennis shoes he left here the last time he slept over… and all of the pictures of us that I pathetically decorated my room with because I was so fücking in love.

Oh, god.

I don't know if what I feel most right now is pain, embarrassment or just plain hate towards Daniel for making everything in my life revolve around him, but all of those emotions are fighting inside of me to win.

“Mom didn't want to change anything. She's been waiting for you to come back any minute, ever since you left," Lucinda explains. I can clearly smell her annoyance and frustration with me, just as she can smell my nostalgia. My sister points to my desk with Daniel's things and to our pictures. “Now that I know the missing piece of the puzzle, this whole... altar makes more sense.”

“Ha, ha, ha.” I fake laugh, without an ounce of amusement. Felix walks around observing everything without paying much attention to us because he's carefully studying this part of me that I never talked about.

“It’s such a teen girl room," he teases and bends down to inspect the photos, "Who is this guy?”

The Devil.

“Daniel. He was my best friend... and now he's Clara's husband. Clara, my sister," I explain with an extremely fake smile that I've been practicing since I knew I was coming back here. “I was eighteen when I left.”

Pregnant and confused. Sad. Heartbroken. Cheated on, betrayed. Hating my sister and my lover, my so-called best friend. My so-called fated mate.

“Felix, how about you make yourself comfortable while I talk to Oli about our father.”

“Yes, please. Talk about whatever you need to talk about," he says, settling in my bed, "I need to send some emails.”

“Okay, baby. I'll be right back," I say and give him a deep kiss before I leave this blast from the past that won't let me breathe. I walk next to my sister until we get to my father's office and only when I'm locked with her, I manage to release all the air I had stuck, “Fück, Lucinda. This is so hard.”

“I know," she mutters, putting a hand on my back as I try to pull myself together, but I just get worse and worse as it all comes crashing down on me.

I'm not here just to suffer for Daniel and my mess of a life, I'm here because someone attacked my father.

“How's dad?”

“In a coma. Mom is in the hospital with him. The doctors are doing their best, but they told us there was very little chance of him coming back to us," Lucinda informs me, still stroking my back as I cry silently, "Do you want to go see him?”

“Please.”

Rosie stays to take care of Laurie and I beg Felix to wait for me in my room and not go out until I return.

The hospital is small and full of familiar faces, but Lucinda and I don't stop to make conversation with anyone. We walk straight to my dad's room and when the nurse opens the door, my mom rises from the couch with an expression of complete surprise, covering her mouth with one hand.

I guess Lucinda hadn't told her I was on my way.

“My baby," she whispers in disbelief as she slowly approaches me. My tears come out again, "Mother Nature heard my prayers.”

My poor mother shouldn't be praying to see me when I only live four hours away from her. I'm such a bad person.

“I'm sorry, mommy,” I cry on her shoulder, hugging her like she's my lifeline, “I'm so sorry, I didn't know what to do. I made a mess and I didn't know how to fix it, so I ran away. I'm sorry.”

My mom doesn't say anything, she just holds me and tries to calm me down. I can smell her relief at having me here and it makes me feel worse.

“That doesn't matter at this second, Oli. What matters is that you're here when we need you the most," she says in a low, broken voice, pulling away to take my face in her hands, "Your daddy needs you. He'll know you're here, even if he doesn't come back to us.”

I nod and turn away from her to walk to the gurney where my father lies. I stifle a sob in my throat and drop onto the couch next to him to grab his hand and squeeze it.

His neck is bandaged so I venture to imagine he was attacked by a wolf in battle, right in the throat. A lethal injury.

Usually one bleeds out and dies within minutes, so the fact that he's here, fighting for his life, gives me a little hope.

“Keep fighting, Dad," I whisper, squeezing his hand, "You're going to be fine and you're going to come back, I really believe it. You have to come back so you can give me the scolding I deserve for being a shïtty fücking daughter.”

“Hey," my mother complains from the doorway where she's leaning, frowning despite her tears, "I think he'll be fine too. He's a strong alpha, like an oak. He just needs his body to rest for a couple of days and he'll be back.”

Lucinda nods, but looks down and says nothing because she doesn't share our positivity genes. Not just because she's an alpha but because she's the oldest daughter and therefore the number one killjoy, the one in charge of ruining all our fun.

So I won’t let her negativity consume me, I seriously think our father is not going to die.

“When did this happen?”

“Yesterday morning," my mom answers and I turn to Lucinda.

“You called me as soon as it happened? How did you get my new number so easily?”

“It wasn't easy at all. Robbie found your social media a year ago and from them he found your number," she explains. Robbie is her husband, the best IT guy in the clan, “But since I know you didn't want to be contacted, I didn't do it until this shït happened. If you weren't here and the old man died, I was never going to be able to forgive you.”

“Lucinda, please," my mother pleads, "There's plenty of time for complaining, but not now. I couldn't bear to see my children fight while I lose my mate.”

“You're right, mother. I'm so sorry... but there's something incredibly important Olivia has to tell you," she starts and then burns me with her damn psycho alpha eyes, "Tell her the whole truth. She has to know.”

I stammer and shake my head, but my mother narrows her eyes at me and Lucinda crosses her arms.

“Come on, Olivia.”

“Uh... well, uhm,” I take a breath and look around, searching for the words, “Do you remember how Daniel and I were close for a long time?”

“Aha...” my mother answers, confused, “He was your best friend.”

I thought so too.

“Yeah, well. Uhm,” I swallow and dry my wet hands on my pants, “When I turned eighteen and presented as an omega.... Daniel and I realized we were compatible.”

Lucinda closes her eyes with stress. My mom breaks away from the wall, her eyes wide as saucers. She's in shock and I haven't even started the story yet.

“For months we had an intimate relationship," I mumble through my teeth, not wanting to talk about this with my mom, but if I'm going to explain myself I have to do it right. My mom is about to explode, “We were together every day, in every sense of the word and suddenly... one day we woke up together in my bed, went about our business like any other day, except that Friday was my dad's birthday. We had a big party at the chapel, remember?”

My mom and Lucinda know exactly where I'm going, they're both in shock now. This is a piece of the "puzzle" that Lucinda didn't know yet.

“As you may well remember, that day Daniel got down on one knee and asked Clara to marry him,” I continue, feeling the damn knife stuck in my back like every time I remember the situation. Both women are still dumbfounded by my story, “At that moment while everyone was celebrating, I slipped into the house, grabbed a backpack with my stuff and left.”