Traumatised Tim

Chapter Eight

”They won’t accept me back easily Eveliina. You cannot be with me when I go back.”

“Why not? They are your family, they will love to see you again!”

“I betrayed them!” He said. Finally. “I betrayed their trust. I left them.”

                He didn’t expect the tender brush of her fingers but he relished it none the less. She brushed back his hair and wiped away the sweat that coated his forehead.

“Tell me Tim, tell me what haunts you. Why are you trembling?”

“They… they were, everything to me. But… they didn’t know me. They only knew from what I had come from.”

                Her small form suddenly sat down on the floor infront of him. He looked down at her from his position on the edge of the makeshift bed. Her legs folded were under her and she looked up at him waiting patiently. This was his chance to tell her everything so she knew what she was getting involved with. She deserved to know the horrible truth about her mate.

“My father beat me. Tendra was my sister and she stopped him, she took so many beating for me that her body is scarred. She used to tell me to hide because I was so young. I used to hear her screaming. I could hear when she bit down on her fist to stop her cries from being heard. But I always heard them. I used to dream of them. I can still hear them.”

                It was like he was back in that house. The house that only looked colourful and bright when it was him and Tendra. When his father was in it seemed dark, grey and dismal. It became a cage, a prison when their father was there. When their father was gone it was a run down but cosy home. He was back in the darkened house now, “I was seven when Tendra found Ray. He was alpha and her mate and he found her being beaten and he saved her and me. Ashton pulled me from under the bed. That was where I used to hide with my teddy bear. I was pathetic Eveliina! I coward in the dark! I let my sister take the pain that was meant for me. And if it wasn’t meant for me I still made no effort to save her as she did me! I am a terrible person. I am… unworthy.”

                He was grateful his mate stayed silent. Nothing she said would have made this any better, any easier. Her silence was blessing as he relived his curse. “But there was a pack that was killing others and had followed us. It ended up killing some of Ray’s pack. Ashton never left me. He and Ray became like fathers to me. In the end Ray had connections, when I was captured with Tendra Ray came to save us with three other packs.”

                He paused, breathing deep. “Tendra was crying, Ray and his men were outnumbered. Ashton looked to be dying. I had had enough. I was seven years old and I wanted nothing more than to cower under my bed again. But I couldn’t and suddenly I was angry. Not at the enemy, at myself. I was done with being so little and weak and silly. I wanted to be someone. I heard Tendra sob and it broke me. I felt it make my insides tear and it hurt me. I felt actual pain when I heard her. When I knew we were all going to die all I could think about was that I had never even tried to save Tendra. Then I noticed that I was getting bigger. I stretching and it felt good. It felt like a relief and I enjoyed the feeling even though it was weird. I changed into a wolf that day Eveliina, I was seven years old and I changed into a wolf, took part in the fight and in the end took a knife for Lebon, one of the alpha’s Ray merged packs with. We survived and I was carried back. I was a lost cause for a few days but I lived. Lived to tell the tale.”

                And that was where things started to suffocate him.

“But after that is was different. I had to go back to a happy family life. I was enrolled into school and I was shown how real families lived. I enjoyed being loved. But I was an adult; I had the mind of an adult, I couldn’t play the games of my school piers I was too analytical. I needed to win, I saw it as a challenge whereas they saw it as fun. I was stronger, faster, bigger than everyone else for I already had the wolf with me. So I made no friends. I had only Lewis. Tendra had a baby, Christopher and I swore to my nephew that I would never leave him. That I would protect him. So I trained every day, every night, I learnt languages, I learnt academics years in advance of my own year group. I lifted weights, I went on runs. I did everything to become a powerful warrior wolf and every year I asked Ray to let me be in his guards. I was ready. But they shunned me. They did not see me for the wolf I was.”