“Where are you now

Was it all in my fantasy

Where are you now

Were you only imaginary

Where are you now

Atlantis

Under the sea

Where are you now

Another dream

The monsters running wild inside of me.”

--

-

“How is it that I'm excited and nervous at the same time?” Alissa asked me, as she sat on my bed with us finalising her travel bag.

“You'll be okay,” I said, chuckling at her excitement.

“No but you don't understand! I haven't been there in ages!” She said, “I'm looking forward to going to school again, and meeting new people, but I'm afraid of the kind of looks I'll get from the ones who know me and have seen me before. Also, I don't know what they'll think or if they'll pity me. I don't want them to pity me, Olivia. I'm tired of seeing sympathetic eyes everywhere and people treating me like I'm made up of a glass that can shatter anytime.”

Her eyes saddened and I completely understood what she meant and how she felt.

“You don't have to worry about anyone,” I told her. “If you think about others, you stop thinking about yourself. And that's the last thing you want right now.”

She looked at me for a moment before nodded slowly. “Yeah but I don't want to turn cold. I want to be happy on the inside and not feel like I'm numb. I just don't know. Sometimes I feel like I don't need anyone to be happy, and on other days I feel like what's a life without people in it? It's like I'm in this state of confusion on whether I want to interact with a lot of people or not.”

Her words initially were like a jab in my heart. Simply because I realised that I was rubbing my indifferent and cold attitude on her. I realised that I was being toxic and instead of sharing joy with her, I was sharing my demons, my disdain and the distrust in society with her.

I shouldn't do that. She doesn't need to become what I've become and I should be glad that even after what all happened to her, she's still willing to give this world another chance and she was still willing to give HERSELF another shot at life.

“Don’t think too much,” I said, smiling as we zipped her bag up. “You'll be fine. Don't go with a plan, just go with the flow and do things that you think are right and things that make you and your parents feel proud. And most important of all, please take care of yourself and be safe.”

She smiled at me too. “I'll be, I promise.”

We went downstairs and took a hearty breakfast before it was time for Alissa to leave with her family back to her original pack which was quite far from here.

<><><>

We we came back from the war, I realised 4 interesting things-

1.My parents were back now and the Alpha had already made sure that they knew nothing regarding my kidnap. And no, it was not a kind move by him, instead it was quite selfish. He didn't want my father to find out that no pack member was ready to help his daughter when she was basically dying because then, my father would have been angry and would have left the pack. And the Alpha can't have his best pack doctor leave, can he?

2. Reece was going to act like nothing had happened and like he wasn't exposed in front of everybody. And being the bastard that he is, he continued to act like he was perfect Alpha when he welcomed us and asked about our health and lied to everyone, saying that he had to stay back to look after the pack. Seriously I sometimes pity the people of this pack because they have such Alphas. But then I remember that how they themselves are and I am not pitiful anymore.

I didn't have anything to complain for though because the way Reece behaved actually suited my future plans.

3. While I was gone, school was suspended for an entire month because the alpha declared that it wasn't safe for the children to leave their houses as the pack is undergoing a 'crisis’.

Well, that really makes me want to question everything. Did he do this so that the pack members get more panicked than before and so that even less people willingly help me or because he was genuinely concerned? And if it was the prior, then why did he in the end help Chance and the others by giving his army? A lot of unanswered questions was all I had.

4. Ryder and I realised that we'll have to keep. Alissa's powers a secret from these leeches because if our greedy, selfish and manipulating alphas find out about her powers, then they'll try to keep her here. And she was willing to go back to her pack— she had said. So we made sure that she goes back where she wanted to. To the pack, to everyone else except for me and Ryder, Alissa was just a regular damsels in distress and my pack members were therefore not hesitant to let go of her.

Technically it's a wolves choice as of where they want to stay and where they don't, but my pack could have pressurized Alissa into staying her because they had “saved” her in case they knew.

But now that Alissa has already left and is free from the clutches of this pack, I feel quite relieved.

Had she been stuck here, I would have felt very guilty.

It was even more lonely here now though, I was alone again.

Mom and dad had went out for work and there was no one in the house. It was eerily quiet. Eerily normal.

I was so used to something or the other happening in my life at the moment that any kind of stillness or stability in my life irked me.

Irk might not be the right word. It more of like bothered me because I wasn't used to it.

I wasn't completely okay though, there was some restlessness inside me and perhaps that was the reason why I couldn't fall asleep.

On the first day when I came back, I was weird to lie down on my bed. After more than a month of sleeping on floor, bed felt awfully comfortable and too soft to fall asleep. I had slept on ground that day. Then, as days passed, I developed the habit on sleeping on beds again.

That experience taught me how adjustive our body is and yet how un-adjustive our thinking becomes.

<><><>

Remember what I said about it being lonely? Yeah, it still persists except for those moments in which this annoying creature named Ryder cames to nag me.

“Come on, Livy. It will be fun.” He said, tugging on the fabric of my elbow as I arranged my cupboard and he sat on my bed.

“Nope. I am not interested in eating out at all.”

Ryder huffed like a kid and whined. “But Livy! It's a new restaurant and it's so nice. Plus there's a party in the pack house today so we have no chances of running into one of those hooligans. We can easily just enjoy ourselves and bless our stomachs with good, divine food.”

The food part sounded too good to me and pursed my lips to stop myself from agreeing. He knew that food is my weakness and he's trying to use it against me.

“Yeah, but we have school tomorrow.” I said, trying to reason out. School was finally starting over tomorrow after the apparent 'crisis’ on the pack is over.

Cue a snort.

“Once a nerd, always a nerd.” Ryder mumbled, loud enough for me to listen.

“Hey!” I complained, hitting the back of his head.

“Stop being violent woman! You are probably the only one who prepares like this for their first day of school.” He said, pointing at the bag, snacks and new notebooks I had laid on the bed.

My cheeks turned red in embarrassment and I refrained myself from hitting him again.

“Whatever,” I mumbled, pretending to go back to arranging my cupboard.

Ryder sighed behind me and stood up.

“Fine then…” he said dramatically, dragging his words. “I'll go alone and enjoy the cheesy lasagna all by myself. I mean, it is too much to eat for a single person, but I'll manage. I also wanted to order some garlic bread but maybe—”

“Alright fine, I'm coming!” I said, giving into the holy Goddess of food and lasagna. Let's be honest, nothing is worth sacrificing good food over.

Ryder grinned triumphantly at me even when I hit him again and I rolled my eyes at his childishness.

“Hurry up hurry up! I am hungry!” He said, almost jumping up and down as I went to change into decent clothes.

Just when I thought he couldn't get more annoying.

<><><>

“This place is nice, isn't it?” Said Ryder, looking at the surrounding in awe.

I nodded and did the same.

The ambience of this restaurant was absolutely remarkable and I could only hope that the food tasted similarly good.

I was paying attention to where I was walking as I stated at the walls and ceiling of the place when I slammed into someone. The person must have been very strong for the force of hitting him/her hurt my arms quite a lot.

“Are you okay?” Said a male voice and a looked up to see an unknown person with a worried expression on his face.

He looked exotic and not someone I had seen in this pack before. I was so busy trying to figure out whether I had seen him or not that I didn't answer him and he asked me again.

“I'm sorry, but are you okay?” He asked again, this time he almost touched my arm in comfort when I flinched away.

“Y-yeah I’m okay.” I said, stepping a couple of steps away from him, with my arms subtly in front of me in defence.

I was stuttering not because I was caught off guard, but because he had almost touched me. I am not sure why but this is a common occurrence with me now. If anyone, sometimes even Ryder, try to touch me in any way, I just flinch away and go all defensive. I can't handle anyone standing near to me for long, I start feeling as if I've been cornered and that produces a sense of insecurity in me.

Everytime I am with someone, I involuntarily start looking around for escape routes and weapons in case the person attacks me. It's horrible and absolutely ridiculous, but that's me now. And I can't help it.

So when this little encounter happened, I didn't even wait for his reply and I walked away with shaky legs.

My body was still recovering from the shock and fear. It was the fear of being outpowered and hurt again that made me like this.

<><><>

“I am coming to the pack house from tomorrow.” I said, surprisingly Ryder when he was looking at the menu.

“Why?” He asked, with a wary expression, probably curious too.

“Well, as I had mentioned before, I want to start training.” I said, taking a sip of water. “And you will train me, no excuses.”

“Definitely. No problem.” He said. “But you haven't healed completely yet,” he added, referring to the wounds in my wrist due to the silver chain and several other cuts and bruises on my body that were yet to heal. In the absence of Aurora, I was healing almost at human rate only.

“I don't care, I can't have them hold me back anymore.” I argued, making him sigh.

“You're being stubborn, Livy. If you could just wait a few more weeks—”

“Ryder, please. I need this. I am tired of feeling like I'm out powered and insecure all the time. I really want to be like Katherine and all the other strong women out there who have trained and invested on themselves.”

“Fine.” He said, grumbling, “but we'll start with exercises that do not involved too much work and no arguments there.”

I nodded like an obedient student and we went back to selecting our dishes.

<><><>

“It was amazing!” I gushed as we walked back home after eating a hearty, delicious meal at the restaurant.

Ryder nodded happily, “Yup! I'm definitely coming back tomorrow.”

“For someone who has such a toned body, you eat a lot. I'm jealous.” I grumbled, pouting as I crossed my arms over my chest.

He grinned at me, his eyes shining in narcissism and I rolled my eyes.

He said something which I didn't quite catch because now my eyes fell on a girl and her dog who were walking down the same street as us, just in an opposite direction.

The girl was someone I had seen before in school, but it didn't matter. What mattered was how happy she looked with her dog.

They were playing and walking, sometimes the dog would run and the girl would run behind him and the other times it was the opposite. She won't stop laughing and smiling and the dog won't stop barking happily.

It was the most pure form of friendship ever. And I guess that's how animals are. They love you unconditionally and remember and appreciate every bit you do for them, expecting nothing in return. They love you and look after you no matter what and keep you above all.

Their love is pure and the most anyone can ask for.

In a weird way, they both reminded me of my Aurora.

Aurora. Her name always made me heart pain and I gulped in remorse. I really miss her and I wish she was here. Despite the fact that I shift only once and had known her for a little bit of time, I was so attached to her. She was and is, a part of me that I felt like I have lost.

The hope of finding her again was in me but it was sometimes shadowed by the remorse of having lost her.

I envied the girl so much right now, simply because she looked so carefree and happy that I wish I was in her place and I was smiling like that. I can't even remember the last time I laughed like that or was so happy.

“Ryder?” I said, making a decision in a second.

“Yeah?” He asked, turning around.

“I want to get a pet dog.”