Howling to the Heart || Isaac Lahey

42.

Tears continued to stream down my face as I slammed my car door shut behind me, walking toward Scott's house. He tried calling me multiple times with Allison since the moment I left them in the woods, but I didn't want to talk to them. They would just tell me Stiles was overreacting or I was in the wrong, and I just couldn't find it in me to care anymore.

I pushed opened the front door, closing it behind me as I slid my back down it, dropping my head into my hands. I was exhausted. Utterly and completely tired. It was always one thing after another, and I couldn't keep up with it anymore.

I lost my enter family to a fire that still gave me nightmares when I slept and when I lifted my shirt up to reveal the burn on my ribs. Every time I got too close to the house, the screams echoed in my ears, smoke filled my lungs, and the burning smell of flesh filled my nose.

Scott got bit and in order to protect and help him, I had to tell him and Stiles what I was after keeping it from them. I still couldn't forget the way Stiles looked at me the first time he saw my eyes. He was scared of me.

Then my father died, with my help. I loved him for years. I visited him for years, waiting for the day he would come out of his coma to be my dad. I just wanted a dad and he left me. He chose revenge over me. His own flesh and blood. I wasn't enough for him to love me and to be a father.

I was never enough for anyone.

Stiles told me he loved me and in the same sentence, he said he loved Lydia. How could he ever love me when he clearly loved someone else? And now—now he hated me. I could see it, feel it, smell it. Stiles hated me and it was all my fault.

I was unlovable.

I'm broken like a mirror with pieces forever missing, unable to make me whole again.

"Riah? Honey, what's wrong?" I heard Melissa and then felt a hand on my back. I had no idea she was home; I didn't even check for her car. I just assumed she was at work like usual.

"Neriah, can you talk to me?" she asked me softly, her voice full of concern and worry.

I wondered what my mother would be like if she was still alive now. Would she abandon me too, just like my father? Would she be unable to love me?

"It hurts," I cried, lifting my head up to look at her kneeling beside me. "Everything hurts," I sobbed, shaking my head. "Please, make it stop."

"Oh my," she whispered, sitting on the ground before pulling me into her arms. "What hurts? What is it?"

I cried harder, holding onto her arms tightly wrapped around me. "I miss my mom and dad," I sobbed, squeezing my eyes closed. "Why did they leave me? I needed them. I still need them."

She held me tighter, pressing her head against mine and I didn't know if she was crying with me, or if I was crying that much, that both or bodies shook.

"I ruined everything with Stiles," I confessed between cries. "I ruin everything I touch."

"No you don't," she croaked, telling me she was indeed crying. "You bring life to everything you touch, Riah. You have since the day I met you."

"Then why-y does e-everyone leave me?" I said between hiccups.

She pulled away, cradling my face between her hands as I looked up at her, seeing the tears on her face. "I may not be your mom, but you will always be my daughter, Neriah. I will never leave you, even if you beg me too. I will always be here for you, no matter what."

I nodded, my lips wobbling. Yeah, she may not be my birth mother, but she was the longest mother I ever had in my life. She showed me how to braid, taught me how to cook and bake, took me shopping, helped me learn how to drive, sat outside the bathroom door talking me through what to do when I got my first period. Melissa McCall had always been there, since I could remember.