The Ides Of March

Consternation

Part 1 : Love Bites

"I love thee, I love but thee

With a love that shall not die

Till the sun grows cold, And the stars grow old..."

- Bayard Taylor

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Chapter 1 : Consternation

Have you ever gotten this feeling in your stomach, that told you something bad was going to happen?

You don't know what, but you just have this gut feeling and you know that something is going to happen.

This was the feeling Esmeralda Saunders experienced now. Deep within her, she could feel that something bad was about to happen.

Perhaps sometimes she worried over things she shouldn't, over things that didn't need to be stressed over, maybe she was called a "worry-wart" for a good reason, she constantly worried about many things. But right now, this moment, wasn't just some irrational fear. Something just wasn't right. 

Why should she ignore the feeling and act like it was foolish? Because this time it wasn't.

Sure sometimes she worried for nothing, but other times, when she got this heavy sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach, something always went wrong. It's the same feeling she felt the day her grandma passed away. It's the feeling she felt when a riot broke out in town between the humans and the supernatural in her town when she was nine years old. It's the same feeling she got the day her sister died. She had had horrible, disturbing dreams filled with death and violence and blood the night before, nightmares so horrible she had woken her family from her screams. 

She hadn't had a nightmare last night, in fact, she couldn't remember dreaming at all last night.  

Digging through her bag frantically in search of her keys, Esmeralda hummed quietly to herself, fighting to stay calm.

All calm feelings were lost completely as a twig snapped from the right.

Whipping her head around to face the trees, she silently cursed the long driveway they had, making her family's house basically right smack in the middle of the forest.

Squinting her eyes, she noticed a pair of hypnotizing golden eyes hidden between the trees.

Oh. Dear. God.

Doing a silent prayer in her head, she slowly turned around to face the driveway. Counting to three and making sure the beautiful, creepy eyes were in the same position, she bolted down the steps and down the driveway, running the fastest she had ever ran in her entire life. She started calling her friends name, who had dropped her off mere moments ago, maybe if she ran fast enough she could get to the road and her friend would still be at the end of her drive way. Maybe if she yelled loud enough her voice would carry and her friend would her panic stricken screams through the crack in her car window. 

Maybe she was just stupid. 

Esmeralda she was halfway down the driveway  when her coordination skills kicked in and she tripped. Ignoring the pain in her hands and legs, she lifted her herself up.

Her breathing stopped as she stared at the furry paws that were planted right in front of her face. Pushing herself up, she gasped and fell backwards in shock from the large glowing eyes that stared right back at her.

Wolf.

No. Not at a wolf. It was much too large for that.

Werewolf.