Complications in Paws and Love

4

Told as Brittany Brown
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"Well then maybe you're a lesbian too? I don't know it's hard to figure it out for me, how would I be able to figure it out for you?" Clair said, a little impatient but still trying to be nice.

"What girls do you think are pretty anyways? Like girls our age?" Clair asked looking at me.

"Uh I think Jen is really pretty." I said softly trying to hide my blush by looking away. I don't know why I felt so shy about saying that and I didn't expect the weird belly flop my tummy did.

"Aweee how cute, but I think Cupid messed up on that. Jen is definitely straight. She wants to get to marry one of the strong pack soldiers and have tons of babies." Clair said with a giggle.

"Oh. Okay. I didn't say I liked her or anything! Just that she's pretty!!" I said still bright red as we started walking again. We were silent till we got to the hidden dock. It was an absolutely gorgeous summer day. Clair and I both set up our towels just as a young burnet covered in sun kissed freckles and clad in navy blue arrived. I watched as Jen's eyes went from bright excitement to utter disgust as they land on me.

"Hi!!" Clair said smiling happily at Jen. As I took off my shoes and sat down on the dick with my feet above the water.

"Hey... you didn't tell me you were bringing anyone." Jen said with a bit of bitterness gesturing towards me. I know Jen doesn't like me, I felt bad for doing what ever I did to make her feel that way.

"Oh yeah, I brought Brittany!" Clair said not reading the tension filled atmosphere. Clair brought me to everything for the last year and people would guess we're all friends but Jen doesn't like me much. Clair feels bad for me after my father passed and since my mom isn't even from our pack so sometimes people don't exactly like us sometimes. Originally, Jen had tried to be nice to me because my dad died a couple years ago and I sometimes still see that pity in her eyes.

Out of the corner of my eye I watched Clair as she dived into the water. Her one piece bright blue bathing suit making her a blue blur of color in the air. Then Jen quickly laid down my towel and set out her snacks before but I looked away as she took off her dry clothes. I look back over just before she ran fast leaping off the dock, her navy blue and black tankini matching typical color scheme.

The warm sunshine felt nice on my skin, already warm as the summer day heated up around us. I watched the girls I loosely call my friends splash around loudly but I quickly began to space out deep into my thoughts. Sometimes my thoughts feel deeper then the lake, deeper then the old well out by the field where firsts shifts usually happen, and so deep I may drown in them and never come up for air. My mother has a plan for me, she wants me to be at the top in the pack somewhere, obviously not Alpha, so that way she'll have power and a say on the pack. That way they'll accept us as really part of the pack.

My mom was part of a gypsy pack but they were cruel and when she was young, only seventeen, she ran away. She came across my dad by accident while he was in a hunt. My dad was a string sturdy man with kindness in his heart, he welcomed her to stay with him and fiancé. He was older than my mother by a handful of years. My mother moved in with him and tried becoming a member of the pack but was declined by the elders.

My father's fiancé was not his mate and neither was my mother. But he took a liking to my mother, she was not extremely beautiful in her youth though she was smart and pretty. One day his fiancé was hit by a massive illness and died that night. My father turned in grief to my mother, she was 18 then. A month later they were married and my mother was pregnant meaning the pack had to accept her as a member. But they never treated her or me like we truly belonged.

All of a sudden colds hands quickly wrapped around my ankles and yanked me down. I fell downwards into the dark water, or was it my thoughts? I felt a scream leave my lungs before my body was engulfed in cold dark water.

I attempted to go back to the surface, I was definitely not drowning. But I couldn't see in the lake water and started to panic, my pants heavy in the water. Soon a soft set of arms wrapped around me and pulled me up to air, my saving angel pulling me out of hell into heaven. I clang to her wanting to feel safe.

Once to the top of the lake I felt my long wet hair pushed aside uncovering my eyes, Jen's concerned deep brown eyes stared back at me. It was maybe summer but in that moment everything else felt cold and she was the warmth. My hot chocolate after playing in the snow or a warm blanket during a movie. She swam me towards the dock.

"I'm SO sorry! I didn't mean for you to go so deep down! Im really sorry. I shouldn't of done that." Clair grabbed my hands and pulled me up from the water onto the dock. I couldn't help but hug Clair while I shivered dripping water. The hug was nice, they always were they were kind and soft but nothing like what I just felt. Why?

The next few hours were a lot of fun and I felt like a regular teen girl with friends, other then avoiding Jen's eye contact or any physical contact, but she didn't look at me much anyways. While we ate snacks, I watched Jen and Clair take turns leaping off the dock. Clair was recklessly flinging herself into the water but Jen would take her time to dive in. I clapped and laughed watching but Jen mainly watched Clair. It seemed like for Jen she was back to wishing I wasn't here.

Eventually, after endless nagging, I got into the water. I tried to dive in like Jen but ended up falling into the water but once in I could do just fine. Jen seemed surprised making me feel smug, serves her right for judging me so soon. She hardly knows me.

When we all started to walk home to clean up for dinner we were stopped by Clair and Jen's fathers. I despise Clair's father, he was manipulative and my mother told me it's his fault my Dad died. Clair's father, the alpha, is a evil type of man. He looks at everyone as less then which is the worst type of leader, I know he likes me though. My mother made sure of that for our plan. To him, I'm a smart girl with new genes to help our pack the perfect candidate for a wife.

"Clair." The alpha said in an strict voice making my skin crawl.

Author's Note
Hai!! Sorry for the delay, Junior year has been a LOT of work! I've been so busy. Updates will probably be slow to come. Here's a question, how many of you hated Brittany in the last book?