Chapter 3
1618 Words
"Alpha!”
Philip sits up quickly, disoriented by still being on the couch. He shakes his head and responds to Gregory.
“What? What's wrong!”
“Aren’t you coming to get me today?”
He looks at his phone, its seven o’clock in the morning.
“Why are you waking me up at seven? Don’t you get released around nine?”
“I need you to go to my place and grab me some sweats, this cast won’t fit into my jeans.”
“Oh, right.” He rubs his hand down his face, gabbing his knuckles into his eyes, trying to think. “That’s going to take me two hours?”
“I don’t know, possibly. Plus I need help getting dressed.”
“Isn’t Sam right there?”
“Yes, Sam is right here but she had nightmares last night. I'm letting her sleep. I had to tell Fenrir to visit her and stop the dream. I can’t move because of this damn contraption. Plus, you really think she could hold me up by herself?”
“You have a point. You are kinda hefty.”
“Thanks, small fry.”
“Hey, you’re my best warrior, why would I want you tiny? That was a compliment.”
“Sorry man, this whole thing has got me on edge, especially now that Sam was involved.”
“I get it. Okay, I’ll get up and get moving. I’ll see you soon.”
Philip uses the keys he took from Gregory last night to let himself into his apartment. Okay, sweatpants. He heads to the laundry room, nothing. His laundry’s already done? He must have a dirty hamper somewhere. Wait, should I have gone to Sam’s instead?
He about turns to go back out the door but remembers he needs Sam in order to get into Sam’s place. Alright, he should have more than one pair.
Walking into Gregory’s bedroom he just stands there for a minute. I forgot what a neat freak he is. Right, this should be easy then. Everything should have a place and everything in its place.
He starts at the dirty hamper, not much in there just boxers, a few shirts and shorts. Workout clothes, okay, no. He heads to his closet. Five designer suits are lined up, the dress shirts color coordinated on the opposite side. A few t-shirts are hanging at the end. Dress pants are hung up, so shouldn’t all the pants be hung up? He riffles through the hangers, sliding everything this way and that. Nope. Dresser? Where is his dresser? He takes a spin around the room. The nightstands maybe?
He begins opening drawers willy-nilly. He snorts at the box of condoms, it isn’t even open. In the next drawer there are boxers, in the bottom are socks. He shuffles through them, he’ll need a change of underwear and socks for shoes right? A wicked gleam hits his eyes as he digs to the bottom pulling out the most hideous and oldest pair of boxers Gregory owns. Wake me up at freaking six am when I was at the hospital with you until one!
He strikes gold in the other nightstand. He pulls out the sweats that Gregory reveres the most and smirks. Just for the hell of it he throws a few other things around the room.
Now scissors. If I were Mr. Tidy-whitey where would I keep my scissors? In the junk drawer! Everyone’s scissors are in the junk drawer!
Heading in to the kitchen he pulls open the junk drawer. Same place, every house he’s ever lived in. He can’t see them right away so he pulls the drawer completely out and places it on the kitchen table. Maybe they’re under something? He shuffles, removes and scatters everything in frustration. Where the HELL are his scissors! He looks at his watch, it’s approaching seven thirty, if he doesn’t hurry and get to the hospital by eight, he knows Greg is going to start bugging him again.
He searches on top of the fridge, in every drawer, in every cabinet, he even looked in the fridge with no luck. Philip is well past frustrated and annoyed so he purposefully leaves everything open and heads back to the bedroom. I already demolished the nightstands and closet, so what’s left? He turns to his left. The bathroom?
Entering the bathroom, there is no medicine cabinet which leaves only under the sink. Opening the doors he finds a disposable set of plastic drawers. In the very top drawer, scissors. Out of spite he cuts the leg of the sweatpants right there, replaces the scissors and leaves the apartment.
***
Arriving at the hospital he sees Sam sound asleep in a reclining bed next to Gregory’s hospital bed. The side railing has been lowered and Greg’s arm is hanging over, barely touching Sam. He looks uncomfortable and awkward and you can see the concern on his face for her. Okay, okay I’m a douchebag. Drake answers him this time. “You think?”
He helps get Greg back into a normal position before the doctor comes in to check on him and release him. Once the doctor has made his rounds, he helps him into a wheelchair and rolls Greg into the bathroom to get dressed. It’s awkward as hell and he now understands why Greg didn’t want Sam to help him. The big lug would have fallen over on top of her and crushed her.
After three attempts to get Greg’s boxers on he says forget it and with his claws, rips them apart.
“Hey!”
“You hated that pair anyway. I got them for you five years ago and you’ve never worn them.”
“And how would you know? Do you secretly watch me change every day?”
“No, I’m smart! They were shoved to the very bottom of the drawer I found them in!”
Greg couldn’t argue with that so he didn’t.
He brings the sweats out and Greg cringes. “You didn’t.”
“Didn’t what?” Philip asks, trying to act innocent. “You said you needed sweatpants, these were at the top of the drawer!”
Greg purses his lips and glares at Philip. “You dug to the bottom of my drawer for my ugliest pair of boxers…”
“I KNEW IT!” Philip shouts but Greg isn’t deterred.
“And yet just grab my favorite pair of sweats off the top? Then you deliberately disfigured them?”
Philip stands there a minute with no defense. He knows he did it on purpose but he isn’t about to give in an inch.
He kneels down in front of the wheelchair and starts pulling the sweats up over the cast. Just like the boxers they get stuck right above the knee. Using his claws again, he rips the side and inseam. Shoving Greg's healthy leg into the other side he promptly pulls them up. He can hear Greg moaning as if in pain but simply stands him up. Sweatpants secure, he pushes Greg back down into the wheelchair.
“Suck it up, you’re a four hundred and twenty five year old man, they are a pair of sweatpants!”
“You did this on purpose, I know you did. I’ll get my revenge, just wait.”
“Don’t you disrespect me; I may be your best friend but I am also your Alpha.”
Gregory throws his head backwards and rolls his eyes, “Seriously? Every time you do something wrong you throw the Alpha card. Dude, you are also four hundred and twenty five; take responsibility for more than the pack.”
Philip ignores Greg’s outburst and simply opens the bathroom door, and pushes the grumpy wolf back out into his room. Greg is still bemoaning his beloved sweatpants.
“I don’t see why you couldn’t just bring me an old pair of sweats or just buy me a new pair.”
Sam is awake and staring at the two of you from across the room. She looks confused until she sees Gregory’s sweatpants. “Oh, your favorite sweats!”
“Right?!?!” Greg points at Sam but is staring at Philip. “See my mate gets it.”
I no longer feel guilty, I am vindicated in my actions against him. Philip tells himself.
***
Down at the car Philip suddenly realizes that fitting Gregory into it is going to be a major Tetrus experiment. He was never any good at Tetrus and Greg isn’t helping.
After the twelfth attempt, Greg is not just criticizing but complaining about his leg getting rebroken. Dude, it’s in a cast. That’s the whole POINT of the freaking cast in the first place and the reason I can't get your big body into this car!
Sam steps forward and takes over. Philip does as instructed and heaves a sigh of relief as Gregory is finally squished into the car interior. Goddess I miss Sandra. She deserves her time off but still. Thank the heavens we now have Sam. Women are a gift, for more than just their bodies…some days.
And thinking about women, Sam points behind him and he turns. He had totally forgotten that Tabitha was even there. Damn it! I hate that I can’t feel her! She could have totally just stabbed me in the back and I’d be dead!
Philip introduces his new assistant to Sam and sends them off. Please don’t let Tabitha be a spy and I just handed my best friends mate over to her. He prays as he gets in his car and faces the said big grumpy best friend.
- Writer
