Connection Through Blindness

Chapter 20

   "I'll stay here and catch my family up on everything. I'll go with you but you must change. Not the way you think or talk but the way you handle certain situations. Are you okay with changing?" I asked him.

He gave the tiniest of smiles before shaking his head and leaving without a word said. I nod and go the other way toward my hometown. It was quiet on the way there, well, as much as a forest is in the summer.

A hand slipped into mine and I didn't even have to look up in order to know who it was. I squeezed Zach's hand to his unsaid question. He wanted to know if I needed anything, and I answered back with a "No, but thank you." See, that's how our bond woks. We know things about each other without mind–linking or saying anything. We just know. There hasn't ever been a day in my life that we haven't understood or been there for each other.

We went the remaining way without another word. Before we entered the house I stopped to feel the sun on my face, soaking up the warmth, sighing as we start to clean up the little things that needed to be fixed. Like help set up some furniture or build a fence or pick up trash, etc.

"Dad?" I called out. I just helped Rosie bake some food and cakes for the werewolves as a reward for their hard work.

He spoke up from inside the house. "Yes, Bella?"

I climbed the wooden stairs and found him in Zach and I's old room. The walls were painted a light blue with two cribs next to each other and two rocking chairs next to those cribs. Wolves in the form of clouds were on the walls chasing after each other while the form of a man was sitting with a red-blue wolf and their two little babies.

I lean against the door frame and watched him toss a ball from hand to hand as he lay on the couch my parents put in.

With arms crossed and a thought on my mind. "You know why the rabids keep attacking, don't you?" I asked with no real curiosity. We both knew the answer to that question.

He continued to pass the ball from hand to hand, but as he passed it to his other hand he used his speed to tap the spot right next to him right before he caught it. I accepted his request and sat down right next to his.

My dad's voice has always been deep and strong and full of love for his family. So as he talked I listened to the man who raised me and my twin like it was the last voice I would hear in a very long time.

"The rabids keep attacking because they want to gain power," he answered quietly. "The gifts you and your brother have are very powerful gifts indeed. They believe that if they had power, then they could control the world. Sadly, that's how this world works nowadays. Control. Power. Greed. Money. Not the things that count, like respect, loyalty, trust, love."

Rested my head on his shoulder with a nod. "I have lived in this world for eighteen years," I said slowly, "and all these humans and rabids every learn is that no one is better than them and that power will grant them all the things they've ever wanted. It's sad, really."

"Not sadder than how you look, though," came a snickering remark from the window.

I rolled my eyes and saw Zach squatting on the windowsill, laughing. "Please, I'd rather look horrible than a monkey begging to get his ass kicked," I counter, looking at dad then giving him a kiss on the cheek before I ran away while yelling, "Come get me, little monkey!"

I ran outside where there was more room and watched as Zach ran out of the house with narrowed eyes.

"I'm not a monkey," he said.

"Hey, Anthony?" I yelled.

He looked up from his plate of food. "Yes?"

"Doesn't that little, itty bitty monkey over there" – throwing my hands in his direction – "look like he's going to turn into King Kong any minute?"