The Ancients

35: Rebellious

Well, maybe that hole had been there much earlier.

But Reece and Emmet hadn't come around to fix it lately, and interestingly, I didn't mind. Our house was less than safe anyway. At least now we knew that there was someone out there and that we'd be prepared.

Emmet retreated to his room, soon thereafter, to re-read some of his books. I on the other hand only managed to walk a short distance—to the living room.

My thoughts drifted back to Reece and his refusal of letting me tag along—something I should have done without his consent. But now it was too late.

He thinks because he's our leader that he has to deal with whatever comes his way on his own, I thought to myself, defeated, and let myself plump into the cushioned armchair. 

I stared at the unlit fireplace, three half-burned logs sitting there, dead and motionless. Outside, the sky was darkening. The wind whistling past the walls grew colder.

The only help he accepts is that of his trusted beta. I wish he'd lay off the pride and honour.

Unfortunately, ancient customs are difficult to stray from. 

I tried to distance myself from all the negative feelings and memories resurfacing when my thoughts circled around the past of our family and the circumstances we were thrown into so suddenly. Reece had always been a leader long before he was pronounced alpha.

Everything had begun to spiral out of control. And I hated not being in control of my own body, my emotions. Not even my adolescence-phase had been so turbulent.

I had asked myself so often why I had to be given these abilities. Why emotions? Something that defined our very being?

Why something so fragile, something so raw? I groaned in frustration. Mother always said I got this curse because of the person I was destined to become.

As children, we'd develop our personality and slowly mould into it, like a puzzle piece connecting to the parts it belonged to. We changed and we matured, but when we were still young, our soul formed and created the raw version of who we were supposed to grow into.

We acted the way we did because of the way we were moulded into our personalities.

That didn't happen over time, and it certainly didn't happen when one was out of their adolescence-phase and thought they'd figured themselves out. It happened when one was but a little youngling, getting to know the world, one's surroundings, the people that became an influence.

Maybe I had gotten that gift because since I was young, I'd always been confronted by raw emotions.

I felt my mother break into a million pieces, Reece take on his new responsibilities, and Emmet turn to books and studying.

And because I was being moulded into a little, sensitive girl, that was the gift I was given. To change the emotions of people around me, to control them, but never be able to fully control my own. Because, deep down, I was still part human and emotions were what made a human, human.

I needed to come to terms with the way things were, even if it was hard. But maybe not everything was always supposed to be balanced.

Maybe it was okay to fall into a fit of anger, to cry my eyes out or to laugh as loud as I could, or to feel so awkward I wish I'd be buried in an instant. Maybe it was okay to mirror the fire that had once been aflame within those ashen, grey walls of the tiny fireplace I was still staring into.

As it had once burned, it was okay for me to burn as well. And it was okay for my flames to be reduced to small flickers—as long as they were there.