What is she?

Chapter 4 Headache

Waking to my alarm blaring, I reach over to shut it off and realize I had slept through it for half an hour. Jumping out of bed in a panic, I race to the bathroom to brush my teeth and wash my face. Pulling my long hair back into a ponytail, I hurry in the bathroom and then went back to my room to throw on some workout clothes. Grabbing my phone, campus map, and my keys off my desk, I head for the front door. Checking the time on my phone, I realize I only have two minutes to get to the soccer field to meet the coach. Sleeping through my alarm had cost me. No time for coffee or a morning snack and with the slight headache I already had, I knew it was going to be a rough morning. Sprinting out of the dorm, I race towards the soccer field hoping I can get there on time. The last thing I needed this morning was to anger the coach for being late, when I should have been early.

Two hours later, I was heading back to my dorm from the recreation center. I had made it to the soccer field with seconds to spare and found the coach hadn’t arrived yet. While waiting for the coach I did some stretching and warm up drills since I wasn’t sure what the coach would want to do. Luckily, the coach only wanted to run a couple of drills on the field. The rest of the time was spent talking about the team and he showed me around the recreation center. Since I had arrived on campus a week ahead of the other students, I wouldn’t get to meet the members of the team till later but it did give me time to get a jumpstart on workouts in the recreation center.

Back in my dorm, I made my way to the kitchen and started a pot of coffee. While that brewed, I ate an apple and banana with a glass of water so I could take some Tylenol. The headache I had woken up with was only getting worse. After taking the Tylenol, I made a cup of coffee and went to the couch to relax only to have my phone start ringing as soon as I sat down. I pulled out my phone to see my mom’s number flashing on the screen. Rolling my eyes, I slid my finger across the screen answering the call.

“Hello mom” I said into the phone.

“HAPPY BIRTHDAY SWEETHEART!” My mom screamed into her phone causing me to move my phone from my ear and my head to ache even more.

“Oh my gosh mom, now I’m deaf in one ear. Thanks.”

Not missing a beat or even noticing I wasn’t pleased about her screaming into the phone she says “You’re welcome sweetheart!” Next thing I hear is dad trying to talk into the phone.

“Honey, how did the meeting with the soccer coach go this morning?”

“Really Brian, it’s her birthday but the first thing you do is ask about her meeting the soccer coach?” Mom retorts.

“Well with you screaming Happy birthday so loudly it covers it for the both of us. Plus I’m right there with Eliza, I’m now deaf in one ear too.” Dad says sarcastically to mom.

Relaxing back into the couch and sipping my coffee, I listened to them affectionately bicker with each other.

“I didn’t scream happy birthday and neither of you have gone deaf. Stop overreacting.” Mom said back. Dad’s laughter boomed in the background of the call.

“Okay honey, whatever you say! Anyway, happy birthday Eliza, so how did it go meeting the coach?” Dad asked while mom let out a heavy sigh. While mom has always attended every game I have ever played, she simply didn’t understand why I liked sports so much and found the topic boring. Dad on the other hand had taken the time to learn all about the sports I played so he could discuss my games with me. Something I greatly appreciated about him. I filled dad in on the meeting with my soccer coach and he seemed pleased that the meeting had gone well.

“So you’ll meet your teammates next week then, when practice officially starts?” Dad asked

“Yes. Coach said student’s should start moving onto campus later this week and practice start’s the same day as classes.” I told him.

“I still don’t understand why you couldn’t have moved to campus at the same time as the rest of the student’s. We could be celebrating your birthday together.” Mom said, slightly irritated. I just sighed, we had already had this discussion countless times and even though I had already moved to the campus she was still upset about it. While the reasons I had used to convince my mom to move to campus earlier were legit, they weren’t the driving force that had caused me to fight my mom on this. For weeks prior I had had this overwhelming feeling that if I was home on my 18th birthday something horrible would happen. It had gotten so bad that I was hardly sleeping and I was constantly stressed out about my approaching birthday. The feeling hadn’t subsided till I finally got mom to agree to let me move to campus early. Now that my birthday was here, I still felt anxious and didn’t understand why I had so strongly felt the need to be away from home.

Ignoring mom’s earlier statement I said, “Hey mom, I need to get a shower and finish unpacking. I had just walked in the door when you called.”

“Oh goodness Eliza! Yes, go take a shower. I’ll video call you this evening so you can show me how you set up your room!” Mom said. Great, now I really did have to work on unpacking when I had planned on taking a nap due to my headache only getting worse.

“Okay, mom. I’ll talk to you later.” I said ready to end the call.

“Bye, sweetheart. And happy birthday Eliza!” Both of my parents said in unison.

“Thank you. Bye Mom. Bye Dad.” I quickly ended the call.

Sighing heavily, I pushed myself off the couch, dropped my cup in the kitchen sink, and headed to my room to gather my bathroom necessities for a shower. I stood under the hot water of the shower letting it relax my sore muscles. The shower did nothing for my headache and only seemed to make it worse. It had gone from a nagging headache to a pounding one. It felt like someone was trying to break down a door in my mind and at this point they had gotten very angry that the imaginary door hadn’t just simply opened for them. After my shower I went back to my room putting away my bathroom necessities and started unpacking a few boxes. A few hours later I had unpacked and organized most of my belongings. Fairly satisfied with how I had set up my room, I went to the kitchen to take more Tylenol since my headache was persistent. Checking my phone, it was now 2:30pm, I knew I could nap for a few hours before my mom video called to see how I had set up my room. Making my way back to my room, I closed the curtains and crawled into bed burrowing under the covers, slowly drifting off to sleep.

Sleep did not bring me the peace I hoped it would. I was dreaming of running for my life through the forest with something huge chasing me. I couldn’t figure out what it was but it was growling and gnashing its teeth in desperation to catch me. Suddenly, I woke from my dream screaming in pain. My whole body felt like it was on fire, breathing heavily I tried to take in my surroundings. I was no longer in my dorm room but laying on the ground in the forest. I thought it had only been a dream of running through the forest, before I could think anymore about it, a searing pain shot through my body. I screamed out into the quiet forest only to hear the sound of every bone in my body breaking and realigning. It felt like I laid on the forest floor screaming in pain for hours, until I felt a pop in my mind and just as suddenly as the pain had started it stopped. I continued to lay on the forest floor trying to catch my breath, slowly I stretched out my body and went to stand but it no longer felt the same. Getting to my feet, I looked down at myself in shock. Night had settled over the forest but the full moon cast its light through the trees and reflected off a nearby stream. Moving towards the stream I took in my own reflection. No longer was I the tall green eyed athletic girl I had always known, instead I was a huge white wolf with gold eyes.

“Hello Eliza, I’m Pandi, your wolf counterpart.”