The Other Alpha {Teen Wolf}

Chapter 20:

Nope. This definitely was not going to work. Sage stared at her trembling hands and moaned.

It had been exactly four days since she'd been trapped within her own self-conscious for a couple hours and she'd barely slept since then. Sage would just lay awake in bed, staring at the ceiling, unwilling to close her eyes. If she did, the slideshow of horrid memories would pass by and she'd feel the need to scare herself awake again.

Needless to say, Sage was a sleep-deprived, grumpy mess.

Sage scooted herself out of bed and checked the clock. It was exactly 1:43:12 AM.

There are things you pay more attention to when you haven't slept for three days.

She smoothed her rumpled extra big shirt and sat down at the tiny desk and wrung her necklace. She picked up the phone attached to the desk and realized that she was missing the phone number.

Sage rubbed her temples when she saw a tiny sticky note attached to the lamp.

Just in case. It wrote, with the number she was looking for under it.

She dialed, trying not to shake from the lack of sleep.

"Sage?" Someone asked groggily over the phone. Sage tried to take a strong breath, but it came out ragged and raw.

"Isaac." She said softly. "I was hoping I could talk to you."

"But it's almost two in the morning."

It was actually 1:44:03.

"I'm sorry, I just really needed to talk and I don't want to bother Fernando. It's not like I was going to ever fall asleep anyway-" She started rambling.

"Hey, hey. I'll be right over, okay?" Isaac said, his voice seemed to put an ease to her edgy nerves.

Sage put down the phone and brought her knees to her chest. Her mind was trying to race like it normally did, but it seemed to be slowing drastically. It slowed down so much that she barely heard the knock on the door. Her fingers shook as she undid the clasp.

Isaac stood at the door, staring down at her, a touch of worry in his gaze. Sage stifled a yawn as she sat delicately on the foot of her bed, trying not to fall over.

"Hey, are you okay? You look like you haven't slept in a year." Isaac said.

"I haven't."

"Do you want to tell me what happened?" Isaac asked, sitting next to her. Sage found a certain comfort in his warmth. With a deep ragged breath, she tried to not ramble as she told Isaac everything that happened after the rave.

"I haven't slept a wink since. My anchor completely backfired." Sage whispered. "I don't want to tell Fernando because he purposefully moved here to escape madness and I don't want to bring that on him."

Isaac took her hand, holding her fingers.

"Are you sure that you can't try to sleep?" He asked.

"It'll make me feel like I've been trapped again, and I'll think of everything that makes me scared and upset, and then I'll wake up screaming and crying."

"So this is it?"

"What?"

"Your breaking point." He said. "In all the books, the main character always breaks down into nothing and then they build themselves back up into pure awesomeness."

Sage laughed horsely.

"Sure, I'm a great main character for a book." She muttered sarcastically, her eyelids sealing shut. She pried them back open.

"Hey, you should definitely get some sleep. The full moon is tomorrow night and I'm going to need someone to restrain me when I go completely insane." Isaac whispered in her ear. The thought made Sage smile a tiny bit, but she didn't know why. She was too tired to fight as Isaac took her hand as she laid on top of the covers.

"This might sound weird, but can you stay? I might need to be pulled out of the memories." Sage said. Isaac nodded numbly and sat next to her, putting his arm around his shoulders. Sage rested her head in the crook of his shoulder and was surprisingly comfortable.

"How come you always call for me to talk to and not Derek?" Isaac asked curiously.

Sage muttered a laugh.

"Can you imagine me talking to Derek about my past? You're just easier to talk to. You seem to get me." Sage muttered sleepily. Isaac said something, but his safe comfort was starting to drag her under into unknown territory.

Someone was shaking her. Sage woke up sleepily, glancing at the clock. Who would be waking her up at 1:50 in the morning? She was met by a steely grey expression. Sage's father stared at her, his nose dripping with blood. He flipped the light switch, and Sage realized that the blood wasn't red. It was an unnatural black.

"What's going on?" She asked. Her father grabbed her arm and literally dragged her out of bed. She hit the floor with a thump.

"What did you do to me?" He yelled. Sage stared at him in shock. "The bite isn't working!"

"Sage?" Someone called. Sage forced herself to pull out of the memory. Sunlight was streaming through the windows. Her face was cupped in Isaac's hands and his face was panicky. "Are you okay? You just talking in your sleep and hyperventilating.

Sage didn't acknowledge it at all. The only though bounced around her brain. I slept the night. The thought was so outrageous that it made her let out a long sigh of relief, but then stopped as the dream came back to her.

It was a horrible memory of when her father died, only a day after her birthday. The memory bounced around and a deep knot started folding over and over in her stomach.

Isaac gently shook her, tossing her out of her memory.

"Um, yeah. I'm fine." She said softly.

"I don't believe you." Isaac said, his eyes gazing into hers. "Was it your dad?" He asked.

"How can you tell?"

"I've had nightmare too. I'd wake up just like you did, pretending everything was okay. Even on my birthday, I'd wake up thinking that it'll be okay when it wasn't." He said somberly.

Birthday?

Birthday.

"Isaac?" Sage asked in a small voice. "What day is it?"

"Um, the fourteen I think." He stated. The knot tightened in Sage's gut.

No!

"Sage? Sage what is it!" Isaac asked.

"Isaac. It's my birthday." Sage murmured. Isaac's face fell. "Today, three years ago, I became and Alpha and killed my dad."