Hidden Fox

One

"Hey!" I protested as flecks of cool water hit my shin. I sat up to glare at whoever splashed me.

"Come in!" My little sister begged, her arms folded on the concrete to keep her head and shoulders out of the water. Her hair—normally blonde and wavy—was plastered to her scalp, appearing dark brown when soaking wet. She kicked her foot out behind her and water sprayed up again, sprinkling across the concrete to my chair.

"I'm good." I told her, lowering myself back down to rest on my elbows. She rolled her eyes and muttered something before pushing away from the wall and swimming away. She made an extra effort to kick more water at me as she did so.

May was nine, so getting in the pool with her was a sentence to playing some sort of dolphin or mermaid or other sea-creature game. Which I would normally be okay with, but it wasn't just any regular day at the pool. Today was our brother's fifteenth birthday, and that meant it was a pack celebration. In Utah, August was hot, even up north out of the valley and into the mountains. So, naturally it was a pool party and a barbecue. . . with the entire pack.

I wasn't big on social gatherings. Interacting with big groups of people just wasn't something I enjoyed. But he's my brother, so I knew there was no way I would be getting out of this one. Though, usually I was dragged to pack parties anyway, no matter the occasion. Being one of the alpha's daughters really didn't give me much of a choice. Besides, Mom was convinced that if she brought me to social events, sooner or later I would make a friend. She couldn't seem to wrap her mind around the fact that it just wasn't going to happen.

I had grown up around all the other girls my age in the pack. But I never clicked with any of them. All those years of being in the same classes at school, attending pack events, and even just seeing them around the Packhouse was never enough. They had their little cliques and I was always on the outside. By the time I reached my teenage years, I gave up and stopped trying. Mom was still adamant I mingled, but I supposed being the alpha's oldest child essentially made me untouchable. At least, that's what I told myself to feel better about being left out.

Now, sitting on the side of the pool, I could see the other she-wolves close to my age. The ones that weren't already mated and/or with a pup were all laying out on the opposite side of the pool together,  sunbathing and gossiping in their skimpy little bikinis. I don't need them anyway. I reminded myself.

Usually, I had my siblings to hang out with. Now that my brother had gotten older, he had been more cool to be around, and obviously I adored my little sister. But at things like this, they had their own friends. Especially today. I spotted August—all three of us are named after our birth months—wrestling with his friends towards the center of the pool. It looked like they were taking turns trying to dunk each other under. In the shallow end, May and her friends were attempting an underwater handstand contest.

With a sigh, I lied back down on the chair, flipping an arm over my forehead to shield my eyes from the sun. Beyond the pool, and all the people mingling around the yard eating and talking and laughing, I could see the tall pine forest that stretched for miles around the skirts of Vernal. The trees climbed up the mountains that seemed to box us in from every direction. While the peaks were absolutely gorgeous—even in the middle of summer the very tips were still capped with snow—sometimes I couldn't help but wonder what was beyond them. What places in the country, or even world, were like without them.

Recently, my thoughts had tended to drift towards that a lot, ever since I graduated High School last year. My entire life I had been told what was expected of me. Unless my mate ended up being an alpha, I was next in line to take over the Glowing Moon Pack. But I hadn't met my mate yet. Being deep in the mountains, we didn't get a lot of other packs over to visit, and we didn't go other places very often either. So sometimes, I really felt stuck, like the rocks of the mountains were walls caging me in.