Little Wolf

Paislee Paislee Garrett paces back and forth in the waiting room at Willow Glen Hospital. Her long fiery red hair is shoved haphazardly into a black Boston Bruins cap, with a ponytail swinging out the back. Her emerald green eyes are red rimmed from crying. It’s 3:15 in the morning, and the hospital is relatively quiet. Every single time a door opens, Paislee’s head snaps up to see if it’s someone coming to update her on her parents’ condition. At long last, a stout man with bushy grey eyebrows emerges from the double doors. He’s wearing green hospital scrubs with the little green booties over his shoes, and he can’t be much taller than her at five foot five. “Paislee Anne Garrett?”, he asks her. Paislee bites her trembling lower lip and nods ever so slightly. “Hello, I’m Doctor Alvarez. Miss Garrett, I’m so sorry to tell you that your mother and father have succumbed to their injuries”. Doctor Alvarez is still speaking, but Paislee is no longer listening. Your mother and father have succumbed to their injuries. The room begins to tilt, and Paislee stumbles towards a line of chairs against the wall, one arm outstretched. “Miss Garrett? Is there someone you can call? Nurse!”, Paislee hears the Doctor’s voice somewhere in the distance. Stumbling, Paislee feels Doctor Alvarez grip her by the elbow tightly as he guides her into a chair. Bolting upright in her bed, Paislee gasps for air and searches her bedroom frantically, squinting into the darkness. Realizing her parents are really dead, she covers her face with both hands and sobs. It’s been seven months since a drunk driver killed Charlotte and Bill Garrett in a head on collision, but Paislee feels it like it was only yesterday. Two days ago, Paislee turned eighteen and she was able to return to her childhood home. After the crash, child services ordered that Paislee stay with her maternal grandmother Eunice in Utah until her eighteenth birthday. Grandma Eunice is a nice enough woman, but Paislee hardly knew her since she and Charlotte never really got along. Paislee checks her phone to find that it’s only 5:40 in the morning. Throwing her legs over the side of the bed, she shuffles to the bathroom for a glass of water. The hallway is littered with stacks of boxes from the last two days of packing up her parents’ things, and she stubs her toe on one of them as she makes her way back to bed. Drifting off, she dreams that a female voice is telling her to return home. The dream has been recurring ever since her parents passed away. Luke Twenty six year old Luke LeBlanc awakens covered in sweat. He doesn’t remember what he was dreaming about, he almost never does. It’s the same result every time, though. Blinking into the darkness, he sees his alarm clock reads 5:40am. His alarm will go off in twenty minutes for warrior training, and he might as well get out of bed. Beside him lies his flavour of the week, Melody Crane. Her chest rises and falls as she sleeps, her black hair is splayed out on the pillow. She’s an omega from Blue Moon pack, he met her in Fisherville at a pub last week when he and the guys were blowing off some steam. Already, he finds her annoying. It’s the same thing every time, they want to be his chosen mate; his future Luna. It’s rare to not have found a mate yet, especially for an Alpha. Luke’s father Michael isn’t willing to hand over the Alpha title of Harvest Moon pack until Luke tames his playboy ways, and settles down with his mate. Luke snorts just thinking about it. He’s a werewolf after all, and they’re very s****l beings. He can’t deny his very nature, and Michael should know that. Stepping into a cold shower, Luke washes his chestnut coloured shoulder length hair. The cold stings his head and cascades down his bulging tattooed pecs before splaying across his eight pack. Looking at himself in the mirror, his chocolate brown eyes stare back as he massages some beard oil into his facial hair that’s styled in friendly mutton chops. Ever since his younger sister Lucy told him that he looks like Hugh Jackman, he’s run with it, taking on a Wolverine look. Luke smirks at himself as he ties his hair into a man bun at the back of his head. Jogging onto the field, Luke spots his best friend and future Beta, Trevor Black warming up with his younger brother Tyler. Trevor has always reminded Luke of a young Robert Redford with his sandy blond hair and light blue eyes. Trevor is also covered in tattoos, both of them having their pack crest covering their backs. “Hey guy! How’s Melanie?”, Trevor asks. Luke doesn’t even bother to correct him, “She needs to go home, man”, Luke shakes his head and rolls his eyes, causing Trevor and Tyler to howl with laughter. “Let’s go out to the pub tonight”, Luke suggests to them, his eyebrow raised. “If your sister will let me”, Trevor laughs and rolls his eyes. Lucy is fed up with Luke’s playboy ways, and even more fed up with him dragging Trevor, her mate, along. “I dare her to argue with her Alpha”, Luke chuckles. “Future Alpha”, Lucy says, coming up behind them and punching his arm before wrapping her arms around Trevor’s waist. Lucy is dressed in a tight baby blue tank top and black adidas shorts, ready for warrior training. Her chestnut coloured hair is in a high ponytail on top of her head, her brown eyes are glaring at Luke. There’s no denying that the two of them are siblings. The only difference is that Luke is six foot three and Lucy is five foot nine. She and Trevor discovered they’re mates on the day she turned eighteen - she is four years younger than Luke and Trevor. “Why can’t just you and Tyler go?”, Lucy pouts. Trevor’s younger brother Tyler is a quiet guy with red hair and emerald green eyes like his father, Sam. He’s only a year younger than Trevor, but he’s two inches taller at six foot five. It takes a lot because he’s a werewolf, but if you can get him drunk he switches to being the life of the party. “We’ll all go. But if you cockblock me again, so help me…”, Luke growls playfully. Paislee Paislee is excited to finally see her best friend Ivy Harrison today after seven months. She was finishing her exams and couldn’t afford any distractions when Paislee arrived back in town. Flitting around the kitchen, Paislee puts on coffee and then slides a pan of bacon into the oven as she sings along with the country music blaring from the speaker. “Knock knock!”, Ivy practically shouts over the music. “Ivy!”, Paislee cries out as the girls rush to each other and hug tightly. Paislee reaches to turn down the music before returning her attention back to Ivy’s five foot six frame. Taking her in, Ivy looks like she’s grown into a woman since Paislee has been away. Her platinum blonde hair is cut into a lob, and her striking blue eyes are glistening with unshed tears. “I’ve missed you”, Paislee chokes out. “I’ve missed you so much!”, Ivy wails before throwing her arms around Paislee again. Ivy has been her best friend since second grade when the Harrison family moved to Fisherville from Florida for Ivy’s father Kyle’s job as a baseball player. Kyle and his wife Gretchen tried to keep Paislee from having to move to Utah with Grandma Eunice, pleading with the judge to let her finish school in Fisherville. Unfortunately because Kyle is on the road for work so much, the courts turned them down. “How are your parents?”, Paislee asks as she pours a cup of coffee for Ivy. “So good! Mom has her bakery to keep her busy while dad is on the road. What I want to know is, how are you doing?”, Ivy asks, c*****g a perfectly waxed eyebrow at her. “I’m not too bad, just trying to get mom and dads stuff packed up to make it easier to be here”, Paislee sighs. The girls catch up over breakfast before they move into Bill’s office to do some more packing. Bill was a paediatrician with a practice in the city. His partner Amos bought out the practice when he passed, with the money held in trust for Paislee when she turned eighteen. “Anything work related, pack it up for Amos”, Paislee mumbles as they rifle through the row of filing cabinets. Paislee tosses files on to the desk to review later, the deed to the house, the vehicle ownerships, stocks, life insurance paperwork and the like. “Hey, you have a file!”, Ivy calls, her head is nearly buried in one of the cabinets. Since Bill was a paediatrician, it kind of makes sense that Paislee would have a file. “Let me see that!”, she races across the room to Ivy who is unabashedly thumbing through her file. The file is thick with logs of paperwork. Everything from when she had the chicken pox at three years old, to when she broke her arm falling off a horse at age eight. Paislee pulls out the record of the break, and furrows her brow. “It says my arm healed in a week? That can’t be right. I wore a cast for six weeks. He must mean seven weeks instead of seven days”, Paislee ponders out loud. “Well that is weird”, Ivy murmurs, standing over Paislee’s shoulder as she reads. “What’s that!”, Ivy stops her from flipping past a page. “Looks like my adoption paperwork”, Paislee’s breath catching in her chest. Paislee slams the file shut and drops it on the floor. “Don’t you want to know?”, Ivy asks softly. “Why? My birth parents didn’t want me, they gave me up for adoption. Mom and dad loved me so much, they gave me an awesome life. It would be disrespectful to their memory to try to find my birth parents”, Paislee huffs as she fights back tears. “You don’t know that they didn’t want you, Lee. People give babies up for adoption for all sorts of reasons”, Ivy argues. “That file will tell you the legalities of it all, but it won’t say why, Ivy”, Paislee tells her as she stands, “I’m going for some air”. Out on the front porch, Paislee sits in a white wicker chair overlooking the lake while her tears roll down her cheeks. The summer air is warm, but not too hot. The lake is still, like glass, and the surrounding trees hardly make a rustle. She always knew that she was adopted as an infant, but she tried to never really let it bother her. Stepping quietly on to the porch, Ivy takes a seat in the wicker chair on the other side of the little end table. “I’m sorry”, she finally whispers. “It’s alright”, Paislee says in earnest as she wipes away her tears. “Let me take you out for dinner tonight. We need a break before we get back at it. What do you say?”, Ivy asks her. Paislee can’t help but smile just a bit. She never stays mad at Ivy for very long, if at all. “Okay”, she sniffles.