Liam:
There was never a wolf born who didn't have a sleepless night the day before his 16th birthday. I was no exception. My father had found my mother the day he turned 16. They have been together from that day on. Every wolf wants that, to not have to pine for his mate even for a day.
As the first night of my 16th year went by, I knew I wasn't as lucky as my father. But I was still hopeful; hopeful the next day, the next month, the next year and the years that followed.
I watched people move in unison with their mates as if they were one being. I watched them watch me with pity and move away, lest they upset their future alpha with their happiness.
I knew what they thought of me 'the uptight loner who thinks he is above everyone else'. They were not wrong. My social skills were never worth the first page of my CV and I liked routines. I don't like chaos. That's the way I am; why is it so hard for people to accept that?
It's not like I didn't have friends, I did. But that didn't mean I had to spend every walking seconds of my life with them. My friends did do a lot of silly teenage things that I had no interest in. So I separated myself at those times and did productive stuffs.
Reading gave me a perspective of what the world beyond the pack was, how humans were no less of a mystery, and how I could run my pack in the changing equations with the outside world. I was going to be a doctor, healing was an important part of our everyday lives since we had immense speed and were reckless. I wasn't as cold as my people thought; it's just that I had more sensible ways of showing my concern.
It did however occur to me once in a while that maybe I was not doing the right thing by only focusing on the bigger goal, maybe I was missing out on the smaller prized moments.
*****
It was the first day of my med school, the day I met Maya, my soon-to-be wife. She took the seat next to me when no one else dared to sit by the 'beefed up dude with a permanent scowl'.
She smiled at me every time I glared, dragged me along when I refused to attend the stupid welcome party. She talked to me about the world that I learned from my books. So I closed my books and started looking at her instead, she was my book now.
She soon turned from being a bother to someone I enjoyed being with and then to someone I couldn't do without.
I was thinking less and less about my mate and more and more about her. Her honey brown eyes complementing her dark tresses, her smile lighting up her face as she showered random stranger with her kindness, wasn't that my idea of an ideal mate?
I was standing in the sidelines watching her one day; she was making faces at a baby as the baby giggled away. My heart warmed up and a sense of peace settled in me. That was when I realized that I felt more than I should feel for her.
I tried keeping my distance. My wolf had by then realized my intensions; he burned me from within every time I went close to her. He wasn't happy to say the least.
I was confused at the intense emotions I felt every time I looked at her. This wasn't how I was supposed to feel for someone who wasn't my mate, yet I couldn't look away.
She made me do the first stupid thing in my life, she made me territorial. I kissed her in front of the entire college when she tried to flirt with a senior. I had taken a step forward and I couldn't take it back.
My wolf had gone silent, I felt the emptiness more and more but when she was around I was truly happy. So I made it a point to keep her with me as much as I could. She was the medicine for my loneliness.
She was everything I ever wanted so how could she not be mine? Was it my fault that she wasn't my wolf's mate when she was my mate in every sense?
*****
"I met someone" I had told my father that morning at the breakfast table. I was never a coward; once I decide do something, I don't hide it. I couldn't insult Maya by keeping her a secret; I wasn't ashamed of falling in love with her.
To say that my father wasn't pleased at that would be an understatement. He wanted me to leave Maya and go looking for my mate.
We were both on the brink of shifting when he claimed that he would consider giving Evan the position of alpha. My wolf took that as a challenge and I could barely hold it back.
The front door opened at that moment and in walked Evan and Eva. She was holding onto Evan in fear, my wolf growled at that. I couldn't look away. I didn't know what it was about her that day, was it because she resembled Maya so much that I couldn't bear her holding onto Evan. My wolf turned restless.
"What are you going to do when these two don't end up being mates?" I said with hatred so evident that I couldn't recognize my own voice.
"We are not together bro" yeah right! Like I hadn't seen the way they look at each other. How could he not want her when she was everything and everywhere in his life?
*****
I felt her before I saw her. I knew I should've refrained from going out. I knew she was there, the woman who could've appeared in front of me anytime in the past decade but chose that day to come. My heartbeat stopped but my feet continued to drag me towards her. I could see Maya smiling in my arms but my brain registered nothing. The only sound I could here was that of 'her' heartbeat resonating mine.
I could feel my wolf after years, we haven't been in the same space all these years but this time we were both in attention.
She was beautiful, her charcoal black eyes opened wide in curiosity, lips parted in confusion; she looked like the purest little pup I had ever seen. The moment my eyes landed on her, my wolf growled. This was the woman we were supposed to protect, to love. Mine.
I felt a tug and my world came crashing down. Eva.
*****
I took off for a run as soon as I got out of the event. I shifted and ran towards my mountain.
The engagement, the day I was so eager to make a fairytale of, was left behind like a hazy memory. I couldn't remember putting a ring on the woman I loved. But the ring was there, shining on my finger, when the claps broke my daze.
She fainted. My wolf let out a howl.
My mate was so repulsed by the idea of me being her mate that she fainted.
Eva.
Eva, the girl I wanted from the moment I laid my eyes on her was my mate. A hollow chuckle escaped my throat. This has got to be funniest joke the moon goddess made out of anyone's life.
What did she want me to do? Be grateful? Who the fu*k takes a 5-year old seriously?
I just ruined the life of one kid who couldn't harm a fly to save her life.
I had wanted to mark Maya the moment she showed me her pregnancy report. I have lived in fear of my mate showing up for over five years now. I wanted to start afresh with Maya and our child, leaving the fear behind. But the goddess has her own plans. They won't let me mark her until the pup was out and safe.
Over the five years, I had thought of multiple scenarios where I meet my mate. I had imagined her to be a beautiful stranger, a stranger my wolf loved. But I never imagined it to hit so close to home. I never knew that it could be someone who was somehow a part of most of my life. She wasn't a stranger I could give up without emotions. It would not leave just my wolf broken, it would break me too.
She doesn't deserve this.
*****
She was there, standing behind me unaware of the storm she threw at me the moment she came in view.
I decided that I wouldn't run away from confrontation.
No amount of apology made my heart feel any lighter. Every time I looked at her face, my wolf broke from within.
I knew she was lively, I knew she was kind but I didn't know of the amount of mental strength she possessed. I, the alpha blood, was breaking right before her but there was not one weak emotion I could see in her eyes. The only proof that she even felt something was the tears that made their way out of her emotionless eyes.
Her wolf was as beautiful as her. It was the first time I saw her. She had a dull shade of grey fur that shone in the moonlight, her eyes so powerful that I could see my soul in them. She was the perfect mate, as strong as an alpha female should be.
Their union was heartbreaking, it made me want to go back five years and change things. It made me want to forget the woman I loved.
It also made me realize how inferior I was to my mate. I have always thought that only the most powerful could control their wolf. Me and my wolf, we fought for domination all the time. Yet here she was controlling her wolf without any effort. The two of them felt so much like a single being, their eyes and their stance, danced in rhythm.
*****
She was leaving.
For a moment when I followed her into my father's cabin, I thought she was going to claim her rights. I couldn't have been more wrong.
My wolf broke free off my control and took off. He hated me.
Maya was sick, my pup was not well but all my wolf cared about was the loss of his mate. I was the one torn between my duty and my wolf's desire.
But I deserved it. This was what I signed up for and I was going to see this through. I'll not leave the woman I love for the woman the moon goddess thinks I should love.
I'll let her go no matter how much it hurt my wolf. She deserved a future full of happiness. I'll release her off my bond and the pain once I mark Maya.
*****
I ran away. That was the one thing I never wanted to do in my life, running away from consequences. I did it, that too to my mate.
Waking up with her in my arms was the one situation I was never prepared for. I was ashamed. My mind wasn't working. So I did the one thing cowards do, I hid behind my wolf and took off towards the forest.
She was drunk, I wasn't. I did that to her, I ruined her, in full consciousness. I knew what I was doing yet the desire within me overpowered my sanity.
I didn't deserve her. I didn't deserve Maya.
I was too weak to be an Alpha.
*****
I had to talk to her. Beg her. Take responsibility for what I did.
My time in hiding was over. I had to let everyone know and then let them decide for me. I didn't deserve to be their alpha anyways
There were howls and cries erupting from her home when I made my way to her that afternoon.
.
.
.
She was gone.
*****************