Ayn's Healing

Chapter 16 - Ayn

Before entering the living room, I vouched to do some impeccable adulting and straightened my imaginary crown.

Unfortunately all those efforts had been for naught, because the first thing that caught my eye was Kari's body.  His dress pants hung loose on his hips, betraying all the weight he had lost in the last week.

My core painfully tightened with the need to feed him from my hand, until the bulk of his muscles would stretch again that white shirt across his chest.

I sensed he was not fully healed from the fight with his father and the desire to make his residual injuries and scars disappear was overwhelming. Realizing that, if I gawk much longer I won't be able to fight the temptation to offer him the healing touch and I would probably face another refusal. This time with a much larger audience. I avoided his exhaustion-dulled eyes and joined the Beta couple's gossip corner on the couch.

Hearing Mia and Timo's bets on how the matching event would go, while they were involuntarily giving me a play-by-play of Kari's interaction with the voluptuous shifter lady, I considered going back to my room. I could not stand the thought of another female smiling at him or even worse, touching him. I thought I would lose control and turn her into a frog on the spot.

But then I remembered I cannot really turn people into frogs or into any other creatures unfortunately, there is no spell for that. Which is a pity because I would use that frequently as an elegant solution to all my problems. 

Thanks to my outstanding peripheral vision - a mildly useful post-traumatic blessing - I noticed all the smiles exchanged between Astrid and Kari at the dinner table, as well as the attentive way in which he filled her glass.

I only caught glimpses of their conversation about training programs and trips they have taken and the situation was barely sufferable. But when she put her amazingly long fingers on his scarred cheek, I desperately wished I had wings to fly the hell out of there, out of the sadness that was slowly freezing my inner tree and turning its leaves black one by one.

***

I walk now up to my room, beyond relieved that the whole ordeal is over and that nobody asked questions about why I did not want to partake in their wolf race. Looking out of  the window, to check the colors of the mountain peaks stretching along the horizon, I notice much to my dismay that they are still in front of the house.

And it is not over.

Seeing her presenting her naked body to him has me grip the windowsill.

Seeing him touching her bare flesh, as her full breast brushes his chest makes my nails sink in the wooden frame.

Watching them shifting quickly and disappearing into the night with bushy tails force my bloodied fingers to go limp, much like the rest of my body.

I crouch on the floor and let some tears drop freely on my black dress. I wish I could offer myself the healing touch and get rid of the claw that's stuck in my chest and the stabbing pain in my belly.

But the healing touch only works for true physical damage. So I just roll over on my side, raking the floor in search of the brick-sized phone.

"Hi, future Firestarter."

"Hi, Healer. Burning the shifters' midnight oil?"

"Yes, I just wanted to check if you are causing enough chaos and mayhem to compensate for my absence."

"At this hour?"

I can still abort my plan. I can still say yes, at this time, and then exchange a couple of witty jokes, maybe describing to her my first experience with healing Xander's warriors and all their esthetically pleasing shapes and sizes.