Hey friends! Poor Hakeem. I feel bad, but you kinda saw it coming at the same time. Leave me some love and let me know what you think. See you soon!
5 months later… I’m walking into my room after my night shift, looking forward to my call with Gael. Tonight, we’ll be able to video chat on the computer that I set up in my room. We’re finally able to have some private time and see each other. I have five more months left of my enlistment period and this last stretch is going to be the most brutal. I won’t be allowed to go home and because of all of his alpha commitments, Gael won’t be able to come here. So, I got a video camera and hooked it up to the computer in my room. I need to see my mate. Even if I can’t be with him, now I’m able to see and hear him, and, with the benefit of a shirt that he sent to me, I’ll have his scent as well. It’s almost as good…right? Yeah, it isn’t, but it’s better than we’ve had, so I’ll take what I can get. Checking the time, I see that I can grab a quick shower and a snack before we’re scheduled to talk. The serg came in early and in a good mood. He sent me home and I wasn’t asking quest
5 months later… Today is the day. ¡POR FIN! (FINALLY!) Today is the day that Hakeem comes home. Goddess, these last five months have been absolute hell. I have missed him with every fiber of my being. My wolf whines in my head at night and I have to sleep with a pillow wearing his shirt while playing a tape of his voice to get to sleep. I sound like a lovesick pup, but it’s the only way that my wolf will relax enough to sleep. Hakeem has to do the same thing. It’s a bit pathetic. But needs must. I’m standing at the terminal gate with all of Hakeem’s family waiting for him to come walking down the hall. I had wanted to pick him up in California, which is where he had been shipped back to so he could finish his last month of his enlistment stateside, but his parents, Sha-Tira and Rahim, had insisted on seeing him first. I can’t go pissing off the in-laws, so here we are. His plane had just landed and we are waiting for him to get off. His younger brother and sister, Ra
10 months later… “So, what you’re telling me is that despite repeated warning about how much this could hurt our entire pack, how this put not only my life, but both of my mates’ lives at risk, you still thought that it would be a good idea for you to be in contact with your nephew, the former delta of a pack that we don’t have an alliance with? ¿Es eso cierto? (Is that right?)” I’m livid, though my casual tone and demeanor don’t let on. No, I think that the only people that can tell exactly how angry I am are my mate and the members of my leadership. I don’t think that I’ve ever been this upset with a pack member in my entire life. Xavier Frontída, one of the fiercest and most loyal pack members, is standing before me telling me that he defied the order that I set down at the beginning of my alpha rule not to have interactions with other packs. Well, I had thought that he was loyal. Now I find out that he’s been talking about what’s been going on with our pack to his old
Gael and I have to leave extremely early in the morning in order to make it to the Artemis pack by a halfway decent time. Ugh, I hate early mornings. “Come on, Tesoro. We have to get up. We have things to do. People to see. And…I think that nuestra compañera (our mate) may be there,” Gael whispers in my ear as I lay on the bed. I open my eyes, shooting up in the bed, barely missing headbutting Gael in the face. He chuckles as he moves swiftly out of the way. “How do you know?” I ask, my heart pounding in my chest as I look at him. He shrugs, casual, like this is something that happens every day. “No lo sé. Es sólo algo que siento. Toma. (Don’t know. It’s just something I feel. Here.)” Gael places his hand over his heart and an excited smile comes to his face. I stare at him for a second before throwing off the covers and climbing out of bed. “Then what the fuck are we waiting for? Let me hop in the shower. We can grab breakfast on the way.” I’m heading to
5 years old… “Forty-eight…Forty-nine…Fifty. Ready or not, here I come!” I call out to my friends, Devin, Zak, and Brandon. We’re in the woods behind the packhouse, a place that we go all the time to play, especially when our mommies are having their weekly picnic lunch at the edge of the forest. Mommy, and Luna Clara, and Auntie Lauren, and Auntie Christine get together every Tuesday at lunch to discuss pack business. They are important she-wolves in our pack because they are mated to our daddies, who are in charge of the pack. I think that it’s really cool that the she-wolves have important things to do, too. But, I don’t really want my mommy’s job. She works with the younger wolves, the ones that are getting ready to turn or have just gotten their wolves. I want to be like Daddy. He’s a warrior, the best one in our pack. Nobody can beat Daddy, not even Alpha Jared. That’s what I want to do when I grow up. That’s why I’m glad that Alpha Jared said that I would take Dad
Age 7… “That’s it! Good job, Charlie! Keep your arm up, Devin. Just a little higher, Zak! Just like that, good! Brandon, I could drive a car through the hole you’ve got in your defense. You’re using that arm to block your face, not just cause it looks pretty!” Delta Alistar calls to us. I have to call him Delta when he’s on the training field. Not allowed to call him Uncle Allie out here. He’s running us through our defensive poses. We have to hold them up so that our muscles remember the pose. We have to build up the lactic acid in our muscles. “That’ll help your muscles know what to do when you really need them!” Delta Alistar always says. “You don’t want to have to pause to remember where to put your hands when a rogue is attacking the pack.” I mean, I guess that he’s not wrong, but come on! We do this for the first 30 minutes of training. EVERY DAY! I’d rather be working on hitting something. I’d rather be running laps. Hell, I’d rather be doing burpees. An
Age 13… “Dude, did you hear that fart that Rosetti let out when he went to the board? I thought that he was gonna float off of the floor?” I say, laughing my ass off as Brandon and I walk through the woods, headed towards our favorite spot, the waterfall. We’re going to meet Dev and Charlie after Dev finishes up with his group for a project and Charlie finishes with cheerleading. “I know, right?! And he just acted like it didn’t happen. Like he wasn’t in a room of teenage werewolves that would have heard it. I almost pissed myself trying not to laugh!” Brandon guffaws, having to stop and lean against a tree as he tries to catch his breath. “I think that Dev did!” That just sends Brandon into another bout of laughter which takes several minutes for him to get himself together long enough for us to keep walking. We finally get walking again, talking about random shit: the math test we had on Monday, our group project that he and I were paired for and had already finished, and
Age 13… “Race you to the orchard post!” I call over my shoulder to Dev. “You’re on!” he cries and we take off. It’s an off day for Dev and I, a rare Saturday for us to hang out while our father’s are on a trip to an allied pack. Brandon and Zak actually went with them and Alpha Jared while Beta Carl is in charge of the pack. They’ll be back by tomorrow morning, so it’s not like it’s going to last long. Still, it’s nice to have some time with Dev not training. Our dads still gave us a list of things that they wanted us to complete though, so I guess it’s not quite a day completely off. Nothing huge. We were supposed to run the 10 mile track that goes through the woods for stamina training and spend an hour in the gym doing some strength training. But honestly, that’s so little compared to what we normally do that we’ll have it done before lunch and then can just chill for the rest of the day. That, and we finished all of our homework for the weekend, so we can literall