The Last Female Alphas

THE HAPPY DAYS 2

Ray POV:

Alpha Simon made it his life's mission to punish me after that incident. They say he lost it and went berserk after losing his Luna. But I know, he is just a monster. I can’t even imagine he was anything else but a monster before he lost her. The only thing I remember about my childhood is someone trying to help me, but not much about that someone. But that help also stopped a long time ago. When I turned 9 years old, I was punished because I burned the toast, a single toast that was meant for the Alpha’s breakfast. As a punishment, I received lashing. During the lashing, someone stood up to the Alpha. I don’t have any memory of what happened after that, as I woke up in my dirty cupboard after a week. That’s how badly he punished me. After that day, I somehow felt lonelier. It felt as if I lost something dear to me.

Even with all the bad memories that keep dragging me down, today is just peaceful. The beautiful summer breeze has the smell of wildflowers, especially forget-me-not flowers. It gives me warmth and a feeling of safety in my personal hell. It’s weird, but I keep smelling them around here. And lately, the smell has been around more often. However, I do not see the beautiful small blue flowers anywhere around here. I even went looking for it a couple of times knowing that they would kill me if they found out I was lazing around.

While I did the laundry in the basement, I dreamed of the day when I would turn 19 and get my wolf. I will run away and live anywhere but here. In the beautiful wild Sawtooth Wilderness of Idaho, I will run away and never return to this hell. A lot can be hidden in this wilderness, and I will become that hidden mystery, and no one will ever find me. If only I survive till then. As the punishments have become quite cruel lately, for the first time I am afraid that I won’t make it. Last time I was late in making breakfast because the eggs went bad, and I had to go to the coop to collect fresh eggs for breakfast. They lashed me and starved me for a week. While I kept slaving away, doing all the work from dusk to dawn.

However, I have a secret that they don’t know. A secret is that every time they try to starve me, mysteriously, I get some food here and there. I just scarf it down so no one can know, or they will beat me more claiming that I stole the food.

On my last birthday, the 1st of May, Luna, the model of honesty and purity around here, said I burned her mouth because her coffee was too hot. She hung me to the tree and made the Alpha beat me till I passed out. They locked me in the basement broom cupboard, which is my home sweet home for about a week. I had not eaten anything for 5 days at that time because of my ongoing punishment, and I was barely surviving. However, at midnight I smelled the beautiful smell of forget-me-not flowers again, and a small packet of warm fluffy croissants and the best chocolate muffins I ever had just appeared on my window. It is basically a small ventilator with a grill, so I cannot escape this hell and run away. As if I ever have enough strength to run fast enough to lose the border patrol. The smell stayed till the early hours of the morning, giving me warmth and comfort. I had the best sleep in forever that night even though I was tired, starving, and hurting.

I am almost done with all the chores for today. I just have to make all the food that is required for tonight’s welcome home dinner party for Blaze. It’s surprising that even though I have spent all my life in the pack house, I have never seen him around. At around 10 years of age, he was sent away, and he never returned. Some even say he disobeyed Alpha Simon and was sent away. No one knows for sure though. I don’t remember much about him, but I think he was kind. He gave me his food when they tried starving me. He even saved me a few times from the big kids who were doing what all the adults do, hit me and hurt me. When he went to boarding school, he just never came back, and no one knows what he looks like now.

Well, let’s see if he comes back today. I am actually excited about meeting him, which is odd and rare for me. I am never excited about meeting anyone from Alpha’s house. Somehow, I think he will be different. Not anything like his father, he would have kind eyes. Time will tell how much my excitement is going to hurt me. I made deer meat, as we had a lot of game meat from the last hunt in the walking freezer. I made grilled vegetables, butter potatoes, and garlic bread. Some varieties of bird meats too, such as quail and chicken just in case. I roasted the garlic butter salmon too, as I remember the lead omega saying Blaze loved salmon as a kid. I am just putting the fairy lights on the welcome home sign as requested by the ever-loving Luna, and then I am done here. Then my second job of the day will begin, which I truly love in all honestly, being invisible, so nobody sees me during the dinner party.

I walked back downstairs to finish drying the laundry I did in the afternoon. And folding 15 bucket loads of clothes I have washed and dried during the day. I love doing laundry. First, it gives me company with the humming noise of the dryer and, secondly, it makes the whole room warm. Hence, I always do it at the end of the day so at least I have some sort of heat while I try to sleep for a few hours before dawn. All I have for sleeping is a thin mattress which I found lying near the junkyard. It’s where everyone throws their used broken things and it’s my secret treasure. I find all the things I need in the junkyard.

I also have a pale blue blanket that showed up magically near my window one day when I was little. Every couple of months it’s like I find stuff that I really need. It’s like my personal guardian angel leaves those things for me. I would totally believe it if everything else didn’t suck so badly.

We are in the middle of nowhere in the Sawtooth Wilderness, but we have electricity and running water. We are not like those forgotten people who lived in the Stone Age. We even have a garage full of cars for the rank pack members. We are the Red Claw wolf pack, the biggest pack in these mountain ranges of Sawtooth Valley. We are very well hidden. I might say that only if you have seen the pack, can you find it. The thick and tricky old growth of the forest is like a maze, a very deadly maze. Specifically, during winter months when there is thick snow everywhere. It covers everything like thick layers of molten lava but only colder.

All the pack members whom I have seen shift are gray-whitish wolves with beautiful caramel undercoats. I haven’t seen many but those warriors who patrol when I work in the vegetable garden and the alpha’s followers, are the same, with slightly different sizes. It helps us hide in these dangerous woods, no matter the weather. Alpha himself has dark gray fur with black patches. He is bigger than the others though.

It was almost midnight when I heard the commotion upstairs and made myself as small as possible. I can hear shouting, but nothing is heard clearly. Everything is hazy. I ignore my instinct to run, knowing this has nothing to do with me. I finish folding and separating the laundry for the day. I saw a small packet sitting by the window. Which makes me smile, my angel has left something for me. It’s the most delicious carrot cake I have ever tasted. It has resins in it. It is just so soft that it melted in my mouth.

I finish everything on time and try to sleep on my thin mattress as tomorrow will be another dreadful day in the misery that is my life. I have an awfully long list of chores to do, but the peace from today will be lost forever. Everyone will be present to make my life a living hell.