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Chapter77
“Hope?”
“My baby! Where’s my baby?” Tears started streaming down my cheeks, the worst outcome scenarios filled my mind. No, no, no… Not Hope…
“Calm dow, love, our baby is just fine.” he said rubbing my back. “In fact, she is right here.”
“Where?” i started looking around in panic, and that’s when I saw Shirley, she was sitting in a large armchair by the window, holding a bundle of blankets to her chest. The smile on her face was blinding, she slowly stood up and walked towards us.
“So her name is Hope, huh?” she asked in a soft voice. “We kind of got used to calling her our little Munchkin” And then she lowered my baby to my lap. Thankfully Nick understood that my hands were too week to hold the baby, so he wrapped his arms around mine, taking all the weight of Hope. I looked at the sleeping baby, my baby, for the first time. She was perfect. Her peachy skin was soft and clean, her soft baby hear was the same colour as mine, dark brown, her nose was like a little button, she was chewing something in her sleep and I finally felt whole. She was alive, healthy, breathing. I was alive. Nick and Shirley were alive. Everything was fine. Tears were still streaming
down my face, but this time it were a happy ones. I was happy. Finally.
***
Turned out that I have been unconscious for almost a week. Nick told me in detail everything that
happened, and I felt sad for all of those people, who’s ambitions lead them to death. And my parents… The betrayal stung but surprisingly I didn’t feel as devastated as I thought I would. Yes, I was sad that they were gone, but they turned out to be the bad ones. They never loved me as parents
should have, I saw that in the way Shirley and Jonathan treated their children. My parents felt no
love for me, and only the fact that I spent over 20 years in their company showed that we had some
relations, but there were no warm feeling between us, so I decided not to dwell on the past and
move on.
Doc Evans got attacked on the way from the pack, luckily no one got hurt, but it made him arrive to
the council the same time the fight was over. Nick said that when Jonathan called him from the
hospital, doc rushed back before talking to the wise men, which naturally made the members mad,
but Nathan managed to smooth out the conflict and invited the members of the council for a visit, a
gesture of respect. Nobody blamed doc for it though, because they understood the bond he felt
towards me and it was literally ripping him apart being so far and unable to help, although truth to
be told, he couldn’t do more than just hold my hand while I was out of it.
I also found out that I have missed not only the birth of my child, but also the marking. I was sad, the marking was supposed to be substitute a wedding, since were’s didn’t do that. And I have missed the moment me and Nick would be bound for life… I sulked for a couple of days, but all my bad mood has vanished when one evening when I was putting Hope to sleep Nick took me by the hand and led me outside to the swing set we used to cuddle in. He sat me down and right there, in
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the back yard of B&B I stumbled upon those months ago he lowered himself to one knee and proposed. And I cried. Happy tears of–course. The ring wasn’t huge, but it was perfect, elegant and very traditional (human wise), with a small single diamond surrounded by delicate golden twigs reminding me of a flower in a forest. The very next day me, Nick, doc Evans, Shirley and Jonathan, Hannah, Lena, the twins and Nathan with his mate drove to a nearby town and we got married. There was no church, no white dress, brides mates or anything I dreamt of as a girl, but it was perfect. In the end I didn’t need all this flashy things to be happy, all I needed was a family who loved me, and they did.
Oh, and Angela… Angela was devastated that she had missed everything and didn’t step a foot out of the safe room to help me or Shirley, and during or celebratory dinner she broke down in tears. Instantly she received quite a talk from Shirley about that… She was protecting a child in there and opening the door of the safe room would endanger the young innocent baby, so no one felt bad for her staying on the sidelines. Especially me, I understood her reasons more that she thought, I had my own child to protect, so I gave her a tight hug and reassured that no riff would come between us because of her choices. Some would argue, that a Luna should have stepped in, but in truth – she was a young mother, not just a Luna, her job is to protect the new generation, the heir of the pack, so that’s that. After the whole ordeal and a long talk I found myself with indeed another friend, she complemented my tandem with Lena perfectly and we started spending a lot of quality girl time together from that moment on.
Another week later we decided to do the hard thing and take a trip to my hometown. I needed to sort through my parents‘ things and I decided to sell the house. We didn’t have any other relatives, so the house was now my property, but I didn’t need it. I had no intentions of staying there, the only things I wanted to find were the books, I was now certain, that my mother had those, and I intended to learn as much as I could from them. Since it was on a neutral territory, we didn’t need any permissions from other packs, and nothing stood in our way, so we packed a light suitcase, everything that the baby could need and took that trip. Lena tagged along, and I was thankful to her, she helped with the baby and then with the packing and sorting. Finding a realtor was a peace of cake, since I knew every single person in this town, so that part of my life was over relatively soon. Lying to the police wasn’t that easy. I don’t know exactly how but doc Evans got a coroners report saying that both my parents were attacked by some wild animal in the woods and died. They were cremated with no ceremony and we let their ashes free in the woods were everything happened to me. At the same spot I decided to forgive them for everything, because they were just mislead by the Mayor. They made a mistake. A grave one. But keeping it all inside and holding on to the hate would eat me alive, so I let it go.
