Chapter One Hatred

Chapter One

Hatred

 

 

I was moving to Jasper, Texas, a small town where racism is still an issue, a  part of peoples daily lives and people were often killed because of it. I hadn’t wanted to move in the first place, but to Jasper? Not in a million years! What was my mother thinking? Did she want me to be killed? If I had to move, I wanted to move out to the country, where it was beautiful, quiet, peaceful, not some frightening town where people were killed almost daily.

Packing was always my least favorite part of moving. Trying to decide what should go in which box and what to leave behind. Clothes were one of the worst things to pack. I was moving from New York City to Texas in the dead of winter. What the heck was I supposed to take? It was warmer in Texas, I knew that much.

I researched and decided to take my summer clothes and some of my winter stuff. Some jeans, long sleeved T-shirts, a couple of sweaters. That should be sufficient for my winter wardrobe.

Now for the worst part. Books. I didn’t want to leave any of my books behind, but I had too many to be able to take them all. I would have to pick and choose. All of my vampire and werewolf books and most of the classics would be packed. Maybe some of my favorite mysteries and romances could be packed too. I hated when we moved.

“Aly,” my mom called.

“Yeah?” I called back. What did she want this time? For the last week, since she’d decided to move, I hadn’t been able to hardly move without hearing her yell my name.

“Are you done packing?”

“No, I’m deciding which books to pack and which ones to get rid of,” I answered, rolling my eyes at her in irritation. Yes, of course I’d finished packing in two hours. Easy. “Stupid question,” I muttered.

“Don’t take too many! We only have room for you to take fifteen books.” 

Perfect! Limit my choices even more. Now I have to be even choosier. I figured I’d pick my top favorites of each category and hope to find the rest again at some used book store or online cheap. I hated how she always seemed to make everything ten times as difficult as was absolutely necessary.

“Ok,” I called. Now, to pick the fifteen books I was allowed. I wondered how many books she was taking. Probably at least fifty. Maybe even a hundred and fifty.

The task of sorting through my hundred and fifty odd books and picking only fifteen to take took me hours in and of itself.  I still had to pack my clothes. I couldn’t pack enough summer clothes, so I would have to go shopping once we got there.

After that, my mom left me alone. Until dinner.

“Aly! It’s time to eat.”

“Ok, I’m coming,” I called back. Ugh, couldn’t she ever time things better than that? I could never finish one task before she wanted me to do something else. It was hard to do anything she wanted. Impossible might be the better word.

 

Dinner was the usual quiet affair; mom didn’t talk because she hated talking to me unless it was absolutely necessary or she was yelling orders at me, and I didn’t count that as talking, and I didn’t talk because she didn’t want me to. It worked, I guess. There weren’t any arguments, but it wasn’t much of a life. I was seriously considering moving out as soon as I turned eighteen. Make a life for myself without always having to be extra careful what I did and said. I couldn’t even let her know about my writing. All I had ever wanted to do was write, but she hated the idea, she had told me when I wasn’t but ten that if she ever caught me writing a story she would burn the paper or delete it from the computer, whichever it needed to be. I had been so mad, but I continued writing in spite of her. I decided in that instant that I would not allow her to crush my dreams and destroy everything I was working for.  Nothing would ever stop me.

I pulled my notebooks and pens out from underneath my mattress, where I had hidden them, and shoved them into my overnight bag, knowing she would never look there. She couldn’t care less what I put in that bag, she only checked everything else I packed. After all, my writing a book simply could not be allowed. She had tried once to write a book, she had even tried to have it published, but they had rejected it. They told her it was good, but needed a lot of work, she even had someone showing her where it should be fixed but she wouldn’t listen, she always said ‘that’s just the way I write,’ so people stopped helping her. She never got anything published and didn’t want me too do something she couldn’t. She didn’t know it, but I had been fortunate enough to meet someone who really had books published, five of them. She had been helping me improve my work. She said that she had been worried at first that I would get frustrated and give up or refuse to listen to her advice but I’ve been trying to learn. I want to get better at this. Rose Barnett, my friend, seemed pleased with the edits I had made to the stories. We would edit them like five times before we were satisfied with them.

Once I had everything packed, I went downstairs. Nobody was there.

“Hello?” I called. “Anyone home?”

Silence was the only answer I received. I figured she’d decided to go out and ‘forgotten’ to tell me. That wouldn’t be unusual. Oh well, there was still the kitchen stuff to be packed before midnight tomorrow, I had two hours to work on that before I needed to get to bed so I headed in there to pack dishes. I couldn’t have been more surprised when I rounded the corner to find my mom standing there, packing plates into a box. She just didn’t do stuff like that. Not that I was aware, anyway. I’d been told she used to be very good at packing. I wouldn’t know, though, as I was always the one packing.

“Hey, mom,” I said, the surprise clear in my voice.

“Hi,” she answered. “Surprised to see me packing?”

“Um....” I wasn’t sure how to answer that one. Should I tell her the truth; that I had thought she’d gone out and left me to do all the packing? Or should I lie and tell her I wasn’t the least bit surprised to see her packing? “Yeah,” I answered honestly. “I am surprised. I thought you’d gone out for the night. I was going to work in here for a couple of hours.”

She shrugged. “You still can, unless you’d rather not work with me.”

It was hard to decide then what I wanted to do. I didn’t want to spend any more time around her than was absolutely necessary, but I did like the idea of bonding time between us, we hadn’t had that in years. Maybe something good could come of this move. Maybe my mother and I could be closer, the way we used to be.

“Sure,” I replied.

She handed me a box and I started wrapping glasses in newspaper and packing them carefully into the box.

“How was school?” she asked.

“Fine,” I answered.

“Any cute guys?”

“Same old, same old. Besides, we’re moving tomorrow,”

She nodded. I guess she figured I did have a valid point. Why get attracted to someone if you’re about to move away?

“How was work?” I asked, I didn’t really care much; all she did was bus tables at McDonalds, but whatever.

“I didn’t go in, they let me leave a day early.”

“Oh,”

“Careful with that glass! Your grandmother gave that to me.”

I rolled my eyes. I knew grandma had given it to her just days before she died, did my mom really think I would be careless with something that meant that much to her? Nice. So I was the careless idiot that would break it.

“Don’t roll your eyes at me,” she snapped.

“Sure, sure,” I replied, turning away and continuing on with what I was doing. Probably not the best idea, but it did serve my secondary purpose. If you can’t get along with her, get rid of her. Besides, I could pack better than she could any day.

She glared at me for a minute then stormed angrily out of the kitchen.

Oh, well, I sighed. So much for mother/daughter bonding time.

The phone rang.

“Get that,” mom ordered from the living room.

I frowned and grabbed the phone.

“Hello?” I asked.

“Hey, sweetheart,” my dad answered.

“Hi, dad.” I was excited he’d called. I rarely got to talk to him anymore.

“Who is it?” mom called.

“It’s dad,” I answered. Normally I would have told her to butt out, but I knew how much it bugged her when I talked to my dad. She couldn’t stand him.

“Oh, never mind.” She turned to walk back to the living room.

“How’s your writing?” dad asked me. I didn’t have to keep it a secret from him. He supported me one hundred percent in this. He even supplied the notebooks, pens, pencils, and everything else I needed. Including the expensive laptop, which he’d given me for Christmas a couple of years earlier.

“Not bad, I have a friend who’s helping me with it. She’s actually got some stuff published.”

“Nice.”

“Yeah, Rose Barnett. Her work is really good.”

“What kind of books does she write?” he asked curiously.

“Werewolves.”

There was a long pause before he responded.

“Cool,” he said hesitantly. He seemed suddenly uncomfortable. What was with that?

“You ok, dad?” I asked anxiously.

“Yeah, I’m fine.”

“You sure? You sound displeased.” Why the crazy reaction to werewolves?

“You’re into werewolves now, huh?” He almost sounded like he was afraid of something.

“And vampires, witches and wizards, mysteries, thrillers, horrors.  Pretty much anything. But vampires and werewolves are my favorites.”

“How much research have you done on them?”

“An unbelievably huge amount. I’ve read everything I could find on them. And I’m still looking.” My research was one of the things I was most proud of. I spent almost as much time researching the things I wrote about as I did actually writing the story.

“Did you find anything interesting?” I wasn’t sure why, but I had the feeling he was trying to get information out of me, and not just because he was curious, he had an ulterior motive on this one.

“Sure,” I answered cautiously. “Lots of interesting stuff. They’re fascinating.”

“Not as much as you might think,” dad said with a bitter laugh.

“What do you mean?” I demanded.

“It doesn’t matter,” he told me.

“I’m curious though, what do you mean ‘not as much as you might think?”

“It really doesn’t matter,” he insisted.

“Ok....” I hated when he answered any question that way. One day he was going to have to explain this to me.

“I have something I need to do now,” he said suddenly.

I sighed. I had already known as soon as I started asking questions he would hang up. It was his routine.

“Sure,” I replied.

He hung up.

I shrugged and got back to packing the glasses.

I wasn’t at all surprised to hear the front door close. Mom had left again, gee, big shocker there. I’d just have to finish the packing myself. The kitchen, the rest of the things in the living room, everything.

Five hours later I had finally finished the packing and just gone to bed when my cell rang.

“Hello?” I asked. This had better not be my mom.

“Aly Donavan?” a male voice asked.

“Yes, who is this?”

“Mark Night, from Jasper, Texas.”

“How did you get my number?”

“Your father gave it to me. He said I should warn you.”

“Warn me about what? When did he give it to you? Why didn’t he warn me himself?”

“I can’t answer that, I don’t know everything. He didn’t tell me. He only said that I should warn you.”

I was dead curious now. What was he supposed to warn me about?

“Alright....” I said hesitantly. “What are you supposed to warn me about?”

“My family, we’ve become the ruling family of the Wolflords. You must know that your family will not be allowed to take that from us, we will fight.”

“What are Wolflords?” I asked in confusion. It almost sounded like he was talking about some lame horror movie or something.

“You don’t know? your grandfather was the last alpha, the last ruler, before my father took over when they left.”

“Wait, back up a second. Werewolves? What are you talking about?”

“Your parents never told you?”

“I guess not. What are you talking about?”

“I’ll explain more when you get here, just remember what I said,” he answered.

“Ok,” I agreed.

He hung up.

“Weird,” I muttered.

I put the phone back on the nightstand and went to bed.

 

 

♠♠♠

 

 

Two days later I was unpacking in our new house, one third the size of the old one, thank goodness, when the doorbell rang.

“Aly, answer the door!” mom called from the kitchen. She was right next to the door and I had to go downstairs to answer it.

I pulled the door open to see a cute guy there. His denim cutoffs and fitted t-shirt showed off his musculature to great advantage.

“Hi,” he smiled. “I’m Mark Night.”

I nodded. “Here to explain that mysterious phone call the other night?” I asked, giving him a cool smile.

“Yes, I am.”

“Alright, explain then.”

His emerald eyes sparkled with amusement. “Right to the point.”

I nodded. I had things to do, if he didn’t start explaining soon, I’d chase him off.

“Alright,” he sighed. “You come from a long line of werewolves, our particular pack is called the Wolflords, we rule over all werewolves, no matter who or where they are. If our alpha passes a law, all must follow it. Your family used to be the alpha family, but your father didn’t want it, so he moved away. Your mother moved away years ago because she wanted nothing to do with it. She didn’t want you exposed to this life, so she took you with her. Your father turned over the alpha position to his beta, my father. My family doesn’t want yours to try and take it back from us, a discussion about it would be one thing, perhaps an agreement could even be reached. But if you demand it, or try to force us to give it back to you, we will fight..”

“If my family wants it back, we can take it. It was ours to begin with,” I snapped.

He glared and ran a hand through his rich, chocolate brown hair in annoyance. “It belongs to my family now, your father turned it over to mine. He didn’t want it.  You have no right.”

“Right,” I laughed harshly. “How many people do you think would go with that?”

“Most, I would guess,” he answered confidently. “My father is far more popular among the pack than yours ever was. He’s a better ruler, too. At least there are decent rules now. Things were crazy when your father ruled.”

I suddenly found myself furious with him. Nobody could insult my dad and get away with it.

“Really? Then I suppose the news I’ve been hearing isn’t true then? All the murders because of racism? If your father is so much better than mine, why are the murders still happening?”

That hit a nerve.

“You don’t know anything, pup,” he growled. “The people being murdered are the wolves! Occasionally a wolf will kill, but only in self defense. Most of the time.”

“Of course,” I said sweetly. I knew I was tempting fate here, his temper wouldn’t hold out forever.

His form started to change slightly and I saw pain flash in his eyes and I knew I’d gone to far. Oh, well, too late now.

He glared at me. “You’ll pay for that!” he hissed.

I just rolled my eyes. “Sure, sure,” I muttered.

He growled, turned and sprinted toward the street.

how anyone have so much hatred for someone they had only just met? I wondered as I slammed the door behind him. I couldn’t answer that, but I knew that I hated him, I would always hate him. I wanted to hurt him somehow. And I vowed that I would. He would not insult my father and tell me not to dare try and take back what should be mine.

“Who was that?” mom asked, coming around the corner.

“Some guy, Mark Night,” I answered.

She froze in her tracks. “Wh... what did he want?” Obviously she knew who he was.

“Nothing really. He said something about my being a werewolf...” I trailed off, letting it sink in.

“You know about that?” The horror in her eyes at that thought amused me.

“I didn’t know until he called me last night,” I told her. “Why didn’t you tell me? Didn’t you think I had a right to know?”

“I didn’t want that life for you. It’s not normal.”

I glared at her. “You didn’t want it for me, don’t I get a say in anything?”

“Not in this! Do you know what they’ll do to you now that you know?”

“They won’t hurt us as long as we don’t try and take back leadership,” I informed her.

“How do you know that?”

“Because Mark promised we would be safe unless we tried to force them out. Of course, that was before he got mad...”

“What did you do?”

“Perfect! He got mad, so I automatically did something to him. Why don’t you just tell me what I did?” Ok, so I went overboard, I really had done something to make him mad, but she always assumed that I did something wrong. A picture could fall off the wall because it wasn’t hanging quite right and it was my fault.

“What did you do?” she asked again.

“I got angry with him for insulting dad, that’s all. He took it too personally.” Of course, I had taken it too personally as well. No need to tell her that, though.

“What else did you do?”

“Whatever you say I did.” I rolled my eyes and walked upstairs to unpack. She could assume whatever she wanted to, that didn’t make it true. It only made me mad.

I unpacked all the clothes I had brought with me and hung them in the closet or put them in the dresser, I would have to rearrange the furniture later, or find someone who would do that for me. I didn’t have the strength to move it all by myself and there was no way my mom would help me. The books had to stay in their box; I didn’t have a bookshelf to put them on yet. I’d get one first opportunity and put it together.

I plugged in my CD player and put in one of my favorite CD’s to help calm myself down. There was too much hatred in my heart right now, I hated Mark Night for the way he had insulted my father and practically ordered me not to try and take back what should be mine anyway. And I hated my mother for always assuming I had done something wrong. I had to get over this, I had to push the hatred out of my heart to allow the love to return full force and music helped me do that.