From the Outside Looking In

She started speed walking down the hallway, took a left, and then took a left again. I had to jog to keep up. Obviously, she was very eager to see me getting yelled at.

       Finally, we came to a sudden stop. Room 183. She knocked loudly.

“What is it?” a gruff voice answered.

“You have a visitor,” the secretary said, looking at me slyly. The door swung open to reveal a tall hairy man, looking down on me. I felt intimidated, wanting to crawl into a hole. His whole body tensed. “What are you doing here?”, he asked rather harshly.

“I need to tell you something regarding my daughter, sir.”

       Waving off the secretary, he beckoned me into the room and sat down on the swiveling chair behind his desk. I remained standing, fidgeting with the end of my shirt.

“Are you going to sit anytime soon?” he asked, aggravated.

“Y-yes sir.”

He looked at me expectantly, waiting for me to go on. I took a deep breath, and started.

“Sir, my daughter Halyn was recently diagnosed with autism. She will most likely never be able to talk. I have left Dave because he was unwilling to help care for my daughter. I had to let you know because of the rules.” Then I waited for the shouting to start.

I looked up, flinching. He simply sat there, staring at me with his steely gaze.

“She will never be able to talk?”

“No.”

“You deserve this. This is what you get for marrying a human. Your daughter is of mixed blood. She is not one of our pack and never will be. Do you realize what a mistake you made? Because of you, your daughter will be unwanted amongst us forever,”he snarled. “Get out.”.

       It’s the last thing he said to me that hurt the most. Was it really my fault? How could I live with myself knowing that because of me, Halyn would forever be an outcast? I had brought this upon her. She will never have the protection an elder pack member has for the children. Most importantly, she would never truly belong to a pack.  

       I stood up shakily and walked out. I scolded myself, You knew this was what would happen. Why are you so upset then?

Of course I knew why I was upset. I knew this would happen, but somewhere, I had a sliver of hope, that maybe, maybe, he would pity my situation and decide to help out. Apparently not.  

~~~~~

We pulled into the driveway. I got out of the car, while Rylee prompted Halyn, “Take off your seatbelt and get out of the car, please. I’m freezing over here. I’m all wet.”. Halyn climbed out slowly, taking her sweet time. Sometimes I wonder if that is just when she is being a normal annoying sister, or she just always moves slowly. Right after she got down, she sprinted to the house, leaving the door wide open. Rylee and I followed, smiling to ourselves at her enthusiasm. We entered, seeing the scene we’ve seen countless times. Halyn was sitting at her little desk in the corner of the living room, her hands wrapped around a spring green colored pencil. Her back was hunched over, her eyes staring hard at the piece of paper as her hand made swift strokes at the bottom.  I leaned over her shoulder, watching an outline of a face start to appear. Ever since her second grade art class, she had fallen in love with drawing. She had filled up countless notebooks of her work, all carefully stored on a bookshelf in her room. All her drawings were so beautiful. Each and everyone was perfect, filled with just the right shade of blue or green. How she learned to draw so well was beyond me. Neither Dave nor I had ever been talented in that area.