The Resilient Mate

Chapter Twelve.

“Eve?”

“What?” I snapped, turning my head to see Jenna, my parents and Griffin standing behind them. My feet pounded against the treadmill as I continued running, breathing heavily as I stared at them with impatience. “I don’t have tim-,”

“You don’t have time for our concern; you don’t have time to talk to your friends and family?” Jenna demanded as Griff pushed forward and slammed the emergency stop on the treadmill.

I grabbed the towel and wiped down my face, ignoring Jenna’s outburst. The truth was that I hadn’t wanted to talk to anyone for the past week; so I hadn’t. It probably wasn’t the best way to deal with things but I never had been good with talking about my feelings.

“No you don’t walk away; not this time!” Jenna’s voice echoed angrily around the gym as I was pulled into Griffin’s arms. They carried me out of the gym kicking and screaming and up the stairs into Jenna’s office. Griff dumped me on one of her couches before Jenna locked the door and they all sat opposite me.

“You’ve been sour since you got here and it’s only gotten worse this past week; tell us what’s wrong.”  

I rested my head on my hands as I stared at the floor. “I’m fine, just… tired.” I said with a shrug. So many words ran through my head as the outright lie passed my lips. I wasn’t fine; I was broken. Have you ever felt so broken, so bruised that you just feel… numb and dead? True pain wasn’t the torture I’d suffered, a broken bone or a gunshot; true pain was having to hold back the tears, the memories and emotions. True pain was smiling and laughing, hiding your true thoughts and feelings even though inside you’re screaming.

“You’re not fine though! You don’t think that we don’t notice the fact that you rarely sleep, you’re jumpy if someone surprises you, you’re always on the defensive, you have a compulsive need to exercise, and to top it all off you carry a knife and a gun everywhere you go!” Jenna yelled, standing and pointing a finger at me. “So stop feeding us the bullshit you give everyone else; you’re not ‘fine’!”

None of them understood what it was like to be so broken, so tormented that the only thing you could really do was push everyone away. Everything that had happened in my life; the bullying, the rejection, the pain, torture and torment had just broken me; I felt like I was drowning and there was no way out. I guess that the cysts and pregnancy had been the tip of the iceberg.

At her yelling the damn finally broke; so many months of locking it up, holding it in and pushing it back. Tears rolled down my face as I stared at the floor. There was total silence as I reached my hand up to wipe away the tears and shrugged. I wanted to say that I was fine but every single person in the room knew better.

“What happened Eve? You used to be so happy; what happened?”

I shook my head at dad’s question and took a deep breath. “I was never happy.” I looked up at them with misty eyes and shook my head with a sneer on my face. “I was never happy here. Did you ever wonder why I locked myself up in my room? Why I never spoke to anyone but you? Why I hated school? I was treated as less than trash, like dirt under their shoes; they bullied me for years and sometimes I honestly wanted to kill myself. You say that I’m lucky you found me as a child; well I’m not! You should’ve left me to die; it would have been a far kinder fate than to bring me into a pack full of werewolves that hated me for simply being human!” I shouted at my parents. Their eyes widened in shock as I exploded. “I hated everything here and leaving was the best thing I ever did; I shouldn’t have come back, I should have let you think I was dead.”

There was total silence as they all stared at me in shock until Ace spoke up. “Speaking of which, why were we told you were dead?” It was like my words sailed right over his head; he didn’t want to acknowledge what I’d said and instead focused on something else. He’d always done this; in a way I was very much like him.