"Sometimes life seems too quiet, into paralyzing silence.
Like the moonless dark, meant to make
me strong.
Familiar breath of my old lies, changed the color in my eyes.
Soon he will perforate the fabric of the peaceful by and by.
Sorrow lasts through this night. I'll take this piece of you and hold for all eternity.
For just one second I felt whole... as you flew right through me.
Left alone with only reflections of the memory, to face the ugly girl that's smothering me."
– Song: Sorrow / Artist: Flyleaf
~()~
Samantha sat up on the side of her bed and shut the alarm on her cellphone off.
Morning had come far too soon, it felt like she'd only just fallen asleep.
Groggily, she she stumbled across the room to gather her school clothes for the day and disappeared into the small bathroom attached to her bedroom.
Thirty minutes later she emerged, wearing a pair of jeans and a black hoodie her long dark, golden blonde hair was still damp from the early morning shower,
She rarely ever bothered with make-up.
She was far too tired in the mornings and between running around at school all day and then being on her feet for hours after that for her job, she'd probably end up smearing and sweating it off anyway.
Making her morning rounds in the upstairs of her family's house, she popped into her mom's room first.
"Mom?" Samantha called out as she opened the bedroom door.
When her mom, Amanda, didn't respond Sam walked farther into the room and shut the loud, buzzing alarm clock off.
"Mom, wake up!" She called loudly as she shook her.
Finally her mom sat up with a loud gasp.
"You slept through your alarm again." Sam frowned as she looked at the bottles of anxiety and sleeping medication on her mom's bed side table.
"Damn it." Amanda muttered in a hoarse voice. She rubbed her eyes and tried to wake up more.
As she turned to leave the room her mom called after her, "Thanks Sam."
Choosing to give her brother a couple extra minutes of shut eye before dragging him out of bed, she stopped back at her own room.
When she opened her closet, she dropped her head back in frustration.
She'd been too tired when she got home from work the night before to wash any laundry.
Leaning down she dug through her dirty cloths hamper and found a pair of her black work pants and the red polo shirt with the logo of the restaurant she worked at.
Frowning at the small grease stain on the front of it, she spritzed the outfit with perfume and tucked it into her book bag before heading into her little brother's room.
"Jake." She shook her younger sleeping brother.
He stopped snoring but didn't open his eyes.
"Jacob! Come on, we're running late." She said louder as she ripped the blankets off of him and opened the blinds.
He let out a loud groan and sat up narrowing his eyes at her.
"Aw, come on Sam... ten more minutes." He pleaded with a rather dramatic yawn.
"Sorry little bro." She apologized, leaving his room.
She wished she could let him sleep a little longer but she needed to get breakfast started and wouldn't have time to go wake him up again.
Plus, he'd been taking an extra long time to pick out his clothes for the schooldays lately. She suspected he might have a crush on a classmate, but if he did he wasn't talking about it.
Taking some frozen biscuits from the freezer she put them on a tray in the oven, then headed down to the basement to get her brothers jacket out of the dryer from the last time she'd done laundry.
Even if she was to exhausted to bother with her own laundry most days, she always made sure Jake and her mom had clean clothes ready to go.
Returning upstairs to the kitchen she made a pot of coffee.
Soon her mother walked in the room, dressed in her nursing scrubs and with a black turtle neck shirt under them to hide the scar on her neck.
Crossing the kitchen she got some tap water in a glass before she took her pill case from her purse and took her morning dose of her medication.
Grabbing her mom's insulated coffee cup from the cabinet, Samantha filled it with coffee and a little cream, before snapping the lid back on and handed it to her.
"Do I smell biscuits?" Amanda questioned.
"Yeah, I overslept and didn't have time to cook anything else." She apologized as she pulled the tray from the oven and sat it on the stove top, then dropped the dish cloth she'd used to pick the hot tray up from the counter.
"Do you want them to go?" Samantha glanced over her shoulder.
Checking the time on her phone Amanda said, "I should have time before I leave for work."
Nodding, she put a few of them on a plate and slid them to her mom as she sat down at the island in the kitchen.
Her mom nodded thanks and Sam yelled for her brother when she saw the time.
"What's for breakfast?" He asked as he walked into the kitchen.
"Juice and biscuits." Sam answered as she laid out two biscuits on some paper towel and pulled a small bottle of juice out of the refrigerator.
"Jelly." He said as he pulled on his jacket that his older sister had laid out for him.
"Sorry, I had a doctor's appointment after work yesterday and forgot to the go to the store." Amanda apologized to her children as she hung her head.
"It's okay, mom. We've got... peanut butter." Sam exclaimed as she went through the cabinets.
"You're joking right? Peanut butter on biscuits?" Jacob asked her as he crossed his arms over his chest and his button nose wrinkled.
Looking at her brother who was in the fifth grade she tried to convince him, "Yes, lots of people eat theirs like that."
"Nobody I know does that." He mumbled, as Samantha cut the biscuit in half and slathered some peanut butter between the halves.
Folding more paper towel around them she said, "You're eating on the run today. Go, before you miss the bus."
He took it from her and picked his bottle of juice up before rushing out of the house.
The bit of relief she felt at her brother not sticking around to argue further quickly faded when she checked the time on her phone and saw it was getting late.
She had a chemistry for the the first class of the day and they had a test that morning.
Putting some peanut butter on her own biscuit, she also grabbed a can of soda.
"Coke, this early in the morning?" Amanda asked her 16 year old daughter.
"I need the caffeine and I can't drink my coffee without sugar." She replied.
Her mom nodded, knowing that there wasn't any sugar because she didn't go to the store.
"You need anything before I go?" Sam asked.
"No I'm heading out too." Amanda replied as she stood and grabbed her purse.
The door opened and Jacob looked between them with an apologetic expression.
"I missed the bus."
"Can you take him today?" She asked her mom.
"I really can't. I'm already running late." Amanda said with an empathetic expression as she turned and left for work, leaving the task up to Sam to take care of.
"I... could walk." Jacob offered, seeing how stressed his sister was getting.
"It's okay, I've got time to drop you off." Samantha said as she grabbed her biscuit and soda and nodded for him to follow her out to her car.
After dropping him off she drove to her school but hadn't even gotten out of the car when her brother called to say he must have left his permission slip for the field trip in the car.
Leaning over she saw a folded up piece of paper in the passenger side floorboard.
Knowing if she didn't bring it back to him, he'd have to stay at school instead of going on the trip she backed out of the parking spot she'd just pulled into and headed back to her brother.
A ball of nerves was growing inside of her stomach when she made it back to the high school and knew she'd be late getting to class.
She hated having all eyes on her and dreaded knowing the scene it would make when she walked in, considering who her teacher was.
Pulling in a deep breath, she did her best to steady herself before pulling open the door to the classroom and walking in.
Mr. Harris stood and walked over to her, "Miss Evans, how nice of you to finally grace us with your presence."
"I'm so sorry. My little brother missed the bus and then I had to go back to his school cause he forgot something." She blurted out nervously as the entire class watched her.
"You've got 15 minutes until class ends. Let's hope you can get enough answers scribbled down to pass. We both know you're barely maintaining a C in this class." He said as he pushed the test into her hand.
She could feel her cheeks darken as she surveyed the classroom before she headed to the back and took her seat.
The rest of the day passed just like any other day of high school for her.
She sat by herself at lunch and kept her head down in the hallway in between classes.
When school let out she headed to her job as a waitress at a local restaurant and stopped by the store after work.
Another day of monotony.
An endless cycle of taking care of everyone around her at the expense of her own well-being and mental health.
Rinse. Repeat.
Sometimes the only thing that kept her going was the very same thing that made her want to run away; all of the responsibility carried on her shoulders.
She was tired. Her feet hurt from her cheap work shoes.
Shoulders weighed down with a level of perpetual exhaustion that sleeping for a week wouldn't be enough to cure
Her shopping at the small convenience store was done on autopilot, with thoughts racing over everything that still needed done when she got home and how badly she just wanted to crawl into bed and shut the rest of the world out.
As low as she felt inside, she still mustered enough strength to offer a smile and thank you to the cashier at the store.
A gesture and effort that wasn't returned as the guy working the check-out lane stared down to his cellphone the second he'd handed her the receipt for the purchase.
The cool night air was a welcome relief from the stuffy, stale air of the store when she made it outside.
She stopped just past the doors and closed her eyes, craned her neck back and tried to take a moment to herself just to breathe.
That was about the only thing she had time to do for herself.
When she opened her eyes again and scanned the nearly empty parking lot, an uneasy feeling passed through her.
Even though she couldn't see anyone... she wasn't able to shake the feeling that someone was watching her.
It was almost eleven by the time she got home.
She carried in the groceries and grabbed the mail from that day.
After putting the groceries away, she checked to make sure her brother was in bed. She knew her mother was already in bed sound asleep from her sleeping pills.
Sam went through the mail, threw the advertisements away and put the bills in the middle of the kitchen table for her mom to look at the next day.
When she came to the last envelope her heart started to race.
It was from her dad, who was currently serving time in prison for the attempted murder of his wife.
Amanda always wore her turtle neck shirts to cover up the scar on her neck from where her husband had tried to slit her throat, but hadn't cut deep enough.
Swallowing hard, Sam hands shook as she tore open the letter but couldn't bring herself to read even a word of it.
What could he possibly have to say to the family?
She took the letter to her room and laid it to the side as she tried to focus on finishing up her homework for the next school day.
Eyes darting over to the torn open envelope every few minutes,
It took almost an hour for her to decide that she wasn't going to read the letter or even tell her mom about it.
Her mom had trouble trying to function from day to day with all the mental anguish after the attack.
Grabbing a lighter off the top of her dresser by some candles she went into the bathroom and burnt the letter in the sink.
Once she put everything back in her book bag for the next day she laid down and pulled the covers up to her chin, pinning her eyes shut as tears started to run from her face onto her pale orange pillow case.
It had been years since the night her dad had tried to kill her mom, but it only took the one night for her life to change forever.
She was going into the 5th grade when her father's trail began. She had to testify about the times her dad had been abusive to her mother, herself and her little brother.
The friends that she'd had all stopped talking to her.
Either because they chose to, or their parents had seen media coverage of the case and didn't want their children associating with her.
What few friends she had left, all quit talking to her by the 8th grade when she couldn't ever hang out with them or go do anything because she was too busy trying to take care of herself and her younger brother.
~(The next night)~
After getting off work late again, she got in her car and saw she had a text from her brother Jacob asking her to stop and get the supplies he was supposed to bring to school the next day for a in class project.
Sam parked her car outside of the same store she'd just been to the night before.
She closed her eyes and rested her forehead against the steering wheel, she was completely exhausted from the last two days and when she thought about the essay she had to write when she got home; she just wanted to cry.
But knowing tears wouldn't solve anything, she took a deep breath and unfastened her seat-belt, pushing her car door open.
Another rinse and repeat of the same interaction as the night before with the cashier.
Despite how she felt, she still did her best to be pleasant and it was ignored again.
Again, when she left the store she had the same feeling like someone was watching her.
As she neared her car she saw two guys approaching her, considering the rowdy state she figured they'd came from the bar across the street.
"Helloooo beautiful." One of them called, his words slurred as he took a drink from the bottle in his hand.
She swallowed hard and stared down at the ground, growing more uncomfortable by the second. Sam sped up her pace, hoping to just get to the safety of her car, lock the doors and get out of there,
"What's a pretty young thing like yourself doing out this late alone?" The other guy questioned.
She slowed to a stop when she realized that she wasn't going to make it to her car before they would,
Her eyes cut from the approaching threat, to her car and then over her shoulder back to the store.
She could try to run back inside but wasn't sure it would even do her any good.
The cashier would probably just stare right through her and not offer any help.
...That was if he'd even look up from his phone long enough to acknowledge her.
Her legs tensed; body responding to the threat and choosing flight over fight.
But while her body was going into survival mode to get her out of peril, another part of her was too emotionally and physically exhausted to do anything.
Slowly, she moved a few steps closer to her car.
Maybe if she ignored them they'd just leave her alone?
"How old are you?" One of them asked her as they paused by her car.
Suddenly a strange sensation flowed over her.
Apathy like she'd never felt before.
All she'd known was misery day after day for over 5 years and she'd been so ground down from playing caretaker to her family and keeping things together for everyone else that somewhere along the way something broke in her and she didn't realize it until now.
Staring danger and fear right in the face and not giving a shit what the outcome of it was.
Continuing her plan to ignore them, she walked up to her car and started to unlock the door when one of the guys knocked the keys from her hand.
"Oops." He said with raised eyebrows as he looked at her.
She looked over to the other one as he said, "What's wrong sweet thing... cat got your tongue?"
A booming laugh accompanied his words.
He reached out and tried to stoke the side of her face but she recoiled from his touch and backed away, her back colliding with the side of her car.
She was trapped.
The one with a bottle in his hand took a step closer to fully box her in but then stopped as he glanced behind her.
A look of fear washed over his face, eyes wide and he slowly started to back away.
It was only a few moments later that both men retreated back across the street in hurried pace, neither of them saying a word for the first time all night.
Samantha turned around to see another man she didn't recognize approaching her.
She opened her mouth to thank him but no words came out.
He might have scared to the two drunks off, but there was something that felt even more threatening about the loner.
An air of danger seemed to encircle him and the closer he walked to her, the stronger it felt.
She diverted her eyes away him and back down to where her car keys had landed on the pavement.
Following her line of the sight, the man paused for a moment before he leaned down and picked up the keys -but didn't hand them over.
He offered her a smile -which somehow didn't make him feel any less threatening.
"Who are you?" She finally found her voice.
He looked down at the car keys in his hand and then back to her from under his dark brows,
"I'm Derek." He answered.
Derek.
For some reason she felt like she knew that already.
Derek Hale!
Light-bulb moment.
She did know that, she recognized him from the wanted posters around town the previous year.
She wasn't one to watch news reports -but when a murder happens in your school, news tends to get around even if you don't follow current events.
Sam also remembered news that he'd been acquitted and cleared of all charges.
"Sam." She motioned to herself with a very delayed counter introduction.
Shifting her stance awkwardly, she looked around them again.
One some primal level, she knew he was dangerous- but she didn't feel like she was in danger.
"Can I have my keys please?"
She slowly raised her hand with an open palm.
"You didn't go back inside when you saw those guys." Derek nodded across the street to the bar they'd fled to safety in.
Thinking maybe wanted acknowledgment of how he'd stepped in to save her from whatever those men had planned, Sam said, "Thanks for chasing them off."
The way he stared at her was intense, she felt like he was able to read her mind or something.
Clearing her throat and feeling the spotlight on her growing brighter, she repeated in a quieter tone, "Keys?"
Her arm bounced slightly in anticipation.
"Why didn't you run from them?" He pushed.
"Oh... uh... I-I don't know." She was stumbling over simple words now.
"Yes, you do." He seemed so sure of it.
"I'm just tired?" Sam shrugged. Her response was more a question than a direct answer.
"C'mon," Derek took another step closer with, "It's a little more than just that, isn't it, Sam?"
"I..." Her mouth turned to cotton.
"You didn't run. You weren't even going to fight back. You don't care if you live or die." Derek said and Sam's eyes widened, maybe he could read her mind after all?
Giving up on the hope of him giving her the car keys back, her arm dropped back to her side.
"And that, is no way to live, Sam." His head titled to side to keep her line of sight as she stopped making eye contact with him.
She bit down on the inside of her cheek.
Too fatigued to even deny what he was saying was the truth.
She nervously ran her tongue over her dry lips, struggling to come up with a response to him.
Struggling to understand how he seemed to know her so well even though they'd only just met.
Struggling in general -as was the theme of her life up until this point.
"I can smell the misery -the hopelessness on you." Derek said.
Smell?
Sam's eyebrows lowered.
He took another step closer as if he had no concept of personal space whatsoever.
"You don't have to keep feeling like this."
"Yeah?" The word came out with a strangled breath, "In what world?"
"In this one."
She scoffed.
"Where you feel nothing but weakness, you could have strength. Power. Never get sick. Be more beautiful, even age slower."
He gave his sales pitch.
And Sam eyed him suspiciously.
Perhaps he was a drug dealer?
Though, at this point, she wouldn't completely rule out taking something that would make her feel better -even if only for a short time.
But she was also running short on cash from all the stops at the store this week to pick up things for the house and then tonight to buy more for her brother.
"How?" She questioned, entirely drawn in by both what he was saying and his general presence.
Derek blinked -only when eyes opened they were glowing bright red.
Hair prickled on the back of her neck and even though she knew she was looking at something inhuman, she didn't back away.
But a small gasp did inadvertently slip out.
She didn't look away, didn't divert her gaze from the red glow.
In an odd way she wasn't entirely shocked.
Strange occurrences had started to become common place in their small town and there had been an alarming number of animal attacks happening.
"What... what are you?" Sam whispered.
He blinked once more and his eyes looked human again.
Derek glanced behind her to see a car drive slowly down the road.
Knowing the Argents' were looking for him, it wasn't smart to stay in once place visible for too long.
"Come on," He nodded for her to follow him.
"Where are we going?" Sam asked as she walked with him to where a sleek dark Camaro was parked around the corner.
He smiled at both her words and her willingness to follow him, he dropped her keys into his jacket pocked as he said, "Somewhere we can talk. I'll explain everything."
The car ride was silent and she checked the time on her phone seeing it was going on midnight.
Sam wasn't sure where she expected him to take her, but an abandoned underground space with a rusting subway car wasn't it.
Cleared of murder charges or not, he was still clearly hiding from something -or someone.
Derek watched as Sam turned in a slow circle to get a good view of the makeshift accommodations.
He waited for her to speak first.
Expecting her to ask any number of questions.
"Who are you hiding from?" Was the first thing she said.
Catching him a little off guard, the question wasn't what he expected but in some ways it was a pleasant surprise.
She was smart, observant and thought things through before she acted or spoke.
All things that would be a benefit to the pack he was trying to build.
"Hunters."
Derek chose to answer her with honesty.
"Hunters?" She repeated back. Paused then added, "You're being hunted because you're...?"
A werewolf. The word was ticking the tip of her tongue but she couldn't get it out.
He stared at her. Waited on her to either put the pieces together or get the courage to voice it.
"You're not human." Sam's voice lowered to a whisper, as if anyone else would be there to hear her.
"No, I'm not." A smile pulled at the corner of his mouth as he watched her trying to solve the puzzle in front of her.
"And you want to make me not human too?"
"That is entirely your decision, Sam." Derek said.
He reached into his pocket and she heard the jungle of her keys as he held them for her to take.
"I can take you back to your car, you can walk away and you'll never see me again." Derek released his grip on the keyring and let the keys fall into her awaiting hand, "If that's what you want."
"Or, you can turn me into... a werewolf?"
The cold metal of her keys felt sticky against her clammy palms as she stared at him wide eyed.
He felt another tug at the corner of his mouth.
She was also quick to catch on,
He nodded.
"It's a gift."
"Aside from the being hunted part?" Sam's posture relaxed some, feeling more comfortable around him by the second.
He was probably the first person in a long as she could remember to give her a choice about anything and care about what her decision would be.
She'd caught the ghost of a smile on his lips.
"It's a gift, but it comes at a cost. Until I can train you to control it, you'll turn on full moons. I'll have to chain you up so that you don't kill anyone." He began to explain the down side.
She nodded in understanding, a part of her in disbelief that she was actually having this conversation.
"And there are hunters in town who'll try to kill you. But you won't have to fight alone, you'll have a pack." He explained.
She stood silently and listened to what he told her as he briefly explained all the ups and down of getting the bite.
Her dad had gotten sentenced to 15 years in prison for the attempted murder of her mom and she was scared to death he'd try to kill them all once he was released.
If what he was saying was true then it would give the ability to protect her family.
"Where's the rest of your pack?" She asked him, her light blue eyes scanning the surroundings.
It took him a few moments to answer, "I don't have one yet."
He saw the doubt in her eyes as she weighed her options.
"But I will, and the more members a pack has the stronger we all are." He said, trying to persuade her.
She nodded and looked over to the side where she could hear some water dripping down from an exposed pipe in the ceiling.
"If I agree to this... what exactly will happen?" She asked him.
"Your strength and senses will be heightened and will increase until your first full moon, which is when you'll shift the for first time." He said as he looked over to the dripping pipe she kept staring at.
"But that's if I survive?" She remembered what he'd been explaining.
"I told you it was dangerous." Derek said to her.
Letting out a small dry laugh she said, "So... it'll either the best thing to happen to me, or the worst?"
He nodded in agreement with her words.
"It's not just me I have to think about though. If something happens to me, I don't know what my mom and brother will do." She opened up.
He stood silently as he watched her staring down to the floor, trying to make the decision that would change the rest of her life.
She knew she couldn't keep going on the way she'd been living.
Every day she hated life more and more, she felt completely alone.
As Derek worked on trying to build his pack, she'd gain friends.
A family. A pack.
If everything he was telling her was true, then her life would be better. But that was if she survived.
Remembering back to the incident in the parking lot she shook her head at herself. A part of her didn't want to live through the night, she'd tried to stay strong for so long. But the past 5 years had been hell.
Then it occurred to her that if she was told to pick one word to describe herself, the word she'd choose would be dead.
Even though she was still breathing, she felt dead inside. She wasn't really living, she felt like she was just a waste of space and breath.
"I'll do it... I want in." She finally decided and said it out loud before she had a chance to change her mind.
~(Later that night)~
Samantha quietly pushed open the door to her brothers dark room, and walked inside setting the bag with his school supplies down by his book bag.
Once in her room she pulled off her work shirt and pants, leaving her in just her bra and underwear.
Crossing her room she stopped in front of the mirror and turned to the side and looking at the bite mark on her flesh, she lightly ran her fingers over the sore skin.
She hoped everything Derek had told her was true and that the bite was truly a gift.
Even wasn't all he'd cracked it up to be, she didn't see how it could be worse than the life she was leading now.