Half Hearted Captive by Fate

I was supposed to be drifting aimlessly down a river in an inner tube with my friends while wearing the brand new bikini I had just bought for the last summer vacation of my youth. It was our summer of leisure, an endless celebration of togetherness before our senior year. There were no expectations or responsibility, just sunshine and maybe a few sips of whatever liquor we could sneak from our parents' supply or convince someone’s older sibling to buy. This was, in fact, not how I was spending my last days of freedom. Instead, I was awkwardly positioned in the passenger seat of my mom’s SUV, trying to balance out the cast on my right arm and the matching one on my left leg. They went well with the two black eyes that had started to shift to that lovely greenish brown and my shattered nose. Pain throbbed and radiated through me, and I was in a constant state of annoyance. Any belonging of importance was crammed into the backseat and trunk, making it impossible to scoot the seat back or even recline it… even my crutches wouldn’t fit back there. They were wedged into the front seat with me. Every bump in the road prompted a mental explosion where I cursed my very existence. I had never hated being half a werewolf more than I did in that moment. I wasn’t werewolf enough to heal overnight, but I was werewolf enough for my metabolism to burn through any pain medicine at an alarmingly fast pace that basically made it pointless. The coup de grâce was the soundtrack of mostly awkward silence for the duration of our 13-hour road trip. Well, it wasn’t exactly complete quiet. Mom didn’t feel comfortable driving on the big roads. Instead, she took the scenic route, the route that required her to argue with her GPS regularly and then curse herself when she missed her turn, and we were rerouted. I suppose it was easier to talk to the GPS than it was to me. Mom and I, we didn’t have a bad relationship, but we didn’t have a close relationship either. This was the first time I had seen her in person in the last eight years. We talked on the phone on special occasions like we were distant relatives, but we didn’t exactly know each other anymore. She didn’t know how I spent my free time or who I spent it with. To be fair, I didn’t know those things about her either. We still loved each other, we were just from different worlds and needed different things. Every once in a while, she would open her mouth to say something and then close it again before any sounds escaped. She wasn’t exactly happy about the situation, having to drop everything and come get me when the last time we were face to face, I had basically said I would never live with her or be part of her world. Hey, no judgement. I was ten and words and complex emotions were hard…. Especially when everyone around you was special in the same way, and you just weren’t. I was, and would always be, more human than wolf. I was weaker and different and bitter. Kids were mean and didn’t ever give me a chance to forget that while my mom was a wolf, my dad was not. I knew it was hurtful making the choice to live with Dad, but it wasn’t done to hurt her. I would rather be a slightly faster, stronger and more capable being in the human world than weak in the wolf world whose entire hierarchy was based on survival of the fittest. Kids were cruel and adults could be crueler. Living with Dad was also a game of survival, but an entirely different type. I obviously had lost, given my current broken limbs and both parents agreeing it would be better to fend off teenage werewolves than Dad’s drinking problem. Now, don’t jump to the worst conclusions. He wasn’t the type of alcoholic who got angry and violent. No, he was a fun drunk. He always had a smile on his face and was the life of the party. He was charismatic and a natural entertainer. It took a long time to realize that it wasn’t fun, it was sad. Still, I never thought it was dangerous until he lost control on that curve. Mom has every right to be furious, but that didn’t make it any easier. It was like my entire life shifted and was shaped by the whims and choices adults made, and I was just held hostage by circumstance. I guess I was furious too. There were lots of feelings crammed into the SUV with us. I had the odd sense that I wouldn’t fully unpack them for quite some time. Maybe it was the shock, maybe it was the pain, but it just seemed like too much had happened, too fast, and I hadn’t mentally checked in with my new reality. I cast a glance towards Mom in the driver’s seat and felt a little guilty that I was not even trying to engage with her. Despite a supernatural physiology, there were signs of stress and exhaustion. Her back was a little too straight and her fingers a little too tight on the wheel. The mother of my memories was always flawlessly put together. It was as if she strived to be perfectly normal to conceal the fact that she was more animal than human. There was not a hair out of place and her clothes were never less than at least business casual. She was definitely not the mom in leggings and a messy bun at school drop off. Now, her clothes were sloppy and wrinkled. It was evident that when she got the call, she just got in the car and drove. There were a few stray hairs that had escaped the hair tie that had pulled her hair back. Her entire appearance seemed to have dulled over the past day and a half, like someone had turned the saturation way down and sucked any warmth from her image. It was touching in a way. After all this time, the second I needed her, she dropped everything and rushed to my side. Part of me wanted to offer up an apology, to just say sorry for putting her through everything… but I wasn’t about to apologize for a situation which was entirely outside of my control, and I was completely a victim of. I just stayed silent. I knew she would never ask why I wasn’t talking to her and I could make countless excuses. My face hurt when it moved when I spoke. I had barely any sleep and was tired. I was still in shock over everything. But the truth was, I was just a coward and so, instead of opening my mouth, I closed my eyes. Pretending to sleep was the easy way out, and I wasn’t too proud to take it. Eventually, I actually drifted off to some semblance of sleep. It wasn’t the type of sleep that could actually be considered restful. Instead, I was in and out of it for a few minutes at a time. Most of the journey, I was somewhere in between, not quite awake and not quite asleep. I would catch a glimpse of the landscape that sped by through half opened eyes before fading back into haze. The drive was never ending and yet, it didn’t seem quite long enough when the car finally came to a stop and mom said, “Rowan, we’re home.”