4. Freak

Today promises to be a beautiful day. This morning is unlike any other I've woken up to see in the past eighteen years. I open my eyes to the sound of my alarm at 5 a.m and I couldn't stop my usually grim face from splitting into a huge grin. Gone are the days I would sleep and wish I never wake up

Even though my room is a windowless small space under the stairwell that I shared with the brooms, mops, and buckets. Right on my foldable and narrow cot bed, I imagine myself looking out of my imaginary window, inhaling the air to smell the neighbor's blooming flowers while listening to the birds sings their joyful song. I can't wait to tell Martha my good news when I get to work.

It's less than a week to my eighteenth birthday and I finally, finally shifted after waiting for so long. Yeah, I'm still happy and optimistic even though I shifted to something that looks more like a monster than a wolf. It was lurking in a corner somewhere inside of me, waiting for the perfect opportunity to let loose. No, not the perfect opportunity! I think the right words to use are 'My breaking point.' Yeah! Being tied to a tree and almost raped by five werewolves will make a monster out of anyone

I sit up in bed and switch on the single light bulb hanging from the side of the wall and the room lit up. I take a deep breath in and let it out slowly... I'm not surprised that I feel no pain.

I check my sides and I find the bruises the Gamma chief gave me have completely disappeared. I look down at my hands with their long graceful fingers. When I shifted, they were large and hairy with long thick claws, I remembered them looking like they belonged to a huge beast.

But I don't understand why everything about me has to be different. I've seen people shift to their wolf form and it was a beautiful thing to behold but my own wolf walk on two legs instead of all fours? It looks like a half-human, half-wolf monster! Does that mean I will be a freak for the rest of my life!? I wonder to myself. I badly need someone to confide in about this but who? I've never seen any shifter shift into a half-human, half-wolf in my eighteen years on Earth.

As I stand up from the bed, my thoughts shift to the werewolves that tried to rape me. Who are they? Why do they smell familiar? Are we in the same pack? What happened to them after I shifted? Did they see my monster? So many questions that begged for urgent answers run through my mind.

Well, I better start preparing for work, rather than considering questions I currently don't have answers for. I thought as I pick my towel, underwear, and the clothes I'll be wearing for the day and headed for the guest bathroom down the hall to have my bath. I make sure the bathroom door was securely locked from the inside before I remove my pajamas to have my bath. When I finish bathing, I wear my clothes before coming out of the bathroom

It has been that way since when my twenty-year-old brother mistakenly burst into my room while I was getting dressed. He has ever since made it a habit to always burst into my room, especially in the morning around the time he knew I would be preparing for work. He even went as far as knocking my door down whenever he found it locked. He has kicked my door down so many times the wood is splintered to the extent it couldn't be fixed, except the whole door is changed

I return to my broom closet room. While brushing my hair, my mind drifts to my wolf again. Even though I'm happy that I finally shifted to something. I wonder why my wolf is different from the others in my pack. Why would they have real wolves while mine looks like a cross between a human and a wolf?

Then the ever-so-familiar crash of my bedroom door hitting the wall hard startled me out of my thoughts. I rolled my eyes in exasperation, not moving from where I'm standing. My sicko excuse for a brother kicked the door off its hinges this time.

"Hey, duck face!'' He says and laughs like the idiot that he is, walking into my room like he owned the place.

He thought I would get angry and scream at him as usual but I just look at him with disinterest. I no longer care. I don't give a damn about the door he kicked off its hinges. I don't give a damn about him and I don't give a damn about my so-called parents anymore.

I used to care. I used to wonder about a lot of things about this family...

Why my mom, dad, and brother can sleep in a nice comfy bed while I was made to sleep on a foldable cot inside the broom closet?

Why my own mother would raise her hands against me, call me ugly and a freak on several occasions, made me drop out of school, and got me a maid's job at a place where I'm constantly being abused.?

Why my father, even though has never abused me in any way, but would still watch from the sideline and do nothing while I was being maltreated?

And why my elder brother has perverted thoughts about me?

I wondered with frustration so many times and I blamed myself for all they did to me. Maybe if I had been a normal child? Maybe if I was not such a freak... my parents wouldn't have hated me and wouldn't have been ashamed of me. I swore to make it up to them. I did everything they wanted, everything in my power to make sure they loved

me but the more I try to please them, the more I was hated.

I wonder why they've not kicked me out when they hate me that much. Well whether they kick me out or not, I'm bound to them and the pack by law until when I turn eighteen. It's just a matter of some days then I would be free from them. What is six more days?... I can wait.

"What do you want!?" I ask coldly. It's annoying how he's been looking at me knowingly for some seconds without saying anything.

He smirk. "You're such a whore, Ash, you know that right?" He says lasciviously without losing the smirk that seems to me he was born with.

"As you're a pervert, you sick fuck!" I replied hatefully. The smirk on his face made me cringe and I feel disgusted by him. How could I think of this animal as my brother!?

He throw his head back and guffawed. The disgusting sound of his laughter grated on my nerves

"You're a fine one to talk, considering what you did, and to think you could still go about your normal duties? Damn, girl! You're unbelievable!"

'What I did?... What did I do?' I wonder to myself. I know what he's trying to do. He wants me to engage him in some kind of conversation but I won't be drawn into his game.

"Listen asshole, if you have something in mind to say to me, I'm sorry, I don't care to hear it. Whatever I do with my time is none of your business and whatever you think I did that you're privy to, and you think I shouldn't have done is your business, I don't care! I just want you out of my presence because merely looking at you makes me sick to my stomach.

He laughs again

"No sis. You make me sick to my stomach. Hell, the whole pack is sick to their stomach at the mere sight of you but strangely that doesn't stop them and I'm not ashamed to say, me too, from wanting a piece of that ass..." He says as his eyes travel down my body

I am lost for words when he finally says what he wanted without mincing words.

"I'm supposed to be your sister, douchebag!" I shockingly say

"Uhmm... So?... And we're not blood-related Sooo?..." His words trailed off when he realized what he has done.

"Oopsie!... I'm not supposed to let you know but now you know!" He lightly shrugs

"Oh..." I say but the news doesn't surprise me, considering how I've been treated by them, I've severally thought of that possibility.

"Please leave!" I said in a low but threatening voice

"Okay," he said with a shrug, shoving his hands deep into his pockets.

Even though what he told me didn't come as a surprise, the news was still disheartening. But I can't afford to fall apart right now. I will be late for work if I don't get moving.

I grab whatever I need to grab and rush out. I'm almost at the door when Celine, my bitter mother's voice stops me

"You're not leaving without preparing breakfast or are you?" She asks

I look at the woman that has maltreated me all these years just because she didn't pop me out of her vagina and I feel hate! I want to ask her who my real parents are but I know it isn't the right time, I need to get to work if I don't want to attract punishment to myself today. I took a deep breath in to calm myself

"Yeah, I am... I don't see why I should continue to cook food that I'm not allowed to eat from. Besides I'm already running late, I can't make the time" I say and turn around to leave but Kent's words stop me in my tracks