CHAPTER 41
Amelia came to accept her reality a few months ago that the small cabin secluded in the woods, had been her refuge as well as her cage. It was as if time was an unbearable burden on her and all she could do was sit by the window staring at the drops of rain which fell against the window. A year. It is understood she had been forced to be separated from her pack, her home, and the man she loved for 12 months.
Amelia’s fingers ran indifferently over the skin around her mate mark, which was no longer a pulsing bond but a throbbing pain. She also tried to remember the feel of Bruce’s arms around her, the sound of his laughter, and the belongings she would get with the pack. And just like photos that are negligently left exposed in the sun, the memories were getting bleached every passing day.
Amelia whispered to herself, a mantra she would hear countless times over the months: ”He will come for me. ” “Elijah told me that this won’t last for long. We are strategizing. I just have to be patient. ”
But, as soon as she said it, doubts arose in her mind and the woman looked utterly cold and sneaking. Honestly speaking, it was a lengthy year. Far too long. What if the pretty Elijah had lied to her? What if this exile was indeed a very simple way of getting rid of her and not a master plan to save the pack?
At once Amelia stands up and starts to pace around the little room of the ship they are in. She did not like to stay idle at home and staying alone had made her inactive for most of the past year and the effect on her was more than visible. Honestly, she was half vampire, half werewolf and she despised the weak, wimpy, whiny vampires that so many loved. She had not come here to spend this half-life of hers in loneliness in the woods.
She glanced at the phone that he handed to her before she left with the instructions never to call from her normal line, a burner phone. It looked this way staring at her with a forlorn expression as if regretting its role as being silent and accusing as it sat on the flimsy table. He would assure her that he would only be calling once a month. For safety. But gradually there had been a tendency to shorten and generalize such calls. The previous one, which was only a week ago, was just a short Hold on to where you are. Have patience.
Patience. Amelia chuckled bitterly. She had patiently forced herself through a year. In this case, she had only conformed to all the policies and procedures that were in place. She had stayed in quarantine out of all human contacts and all she knew for those thirteen days. And for what purpose? To be overlooked? Replaced?
At this at the thought of Bruce being with another woman with Ema, Amelia felt a shooting pain in her chest. She had tried ignoring it, tried holding on to what she knew Bruce was and their relationship for that matter. But it ended up getting harder and harder to rule it out as days turned to weeks and weeks to months.
She looked up for a moment and there caught sight of her in the small mirror above the fireplace that sat Amelia. She hardly recognized herself. She has developed a gloomy look in her eyes and she also developed black eye circles. Elite was an easily exhausted girl with pale skin because of the absence of sunlight and her body was much smaller than it should have been. She appeared. . . defeated.
Amelia shook her head in response and with a BIG, ‘No’, her voice boomed through the cabin with its empty eerie silence. ‘No, this will not break me,’
With all that determination, she walked to the small table by the wall. She went to the last drawer of the dresser, unlocked it, and pulled out a black leather notebook that Bruce had bought as an anniversary gift the last year. Before she couldn’t use it as she thought her writings might be seen by someone increasing and becoming a threat to the ongoing plan.
But now that hope was dying and doubt was growing. Amelia had to tell someone. Should Bruce never come back for her, she had her work cut out in trying to make sense of the mess that was crowning her thoughts.
Amelia held her pen up over the empty page and started to write:Amelia held her pen up over the empty page and started to write:
"A year has passed. I have been living a life of faith with no certain plan for a year now. A year of waiting belief and expectation. Nevertheless, at present, this is uncertain.
What if everything, that she thought was real and true, was only a lie? What if Elijah was merely employing the act of assuring one’s self to get me out of the way? What if, just what if Bruce had forgotten about me and had moved to the next?
This is no longer how I can live; hope that someone, someday, somewhere, will accept this love in me. In this half-living, this in-between place. Me too. Still, I am greater than this. I was an it-girl who was at once powerful, competent, and hybrid. Yes, I have pulled through some fierce problems in the past. Why then am I allowing this circumstance to be on top of me?
Bruce does not come to get me then by force, I have to plow my route if this exile is truly for good. Sometimes I need to be brought back to remembering that I am me and that I am capable. I can not wait for some probable never-come rescue.
Which way do I turn now? My old life is shut away from me in a lock box now and if they still remember me at all, the pack I once considered as family regards me now as an enemy. I will have no resources and no friends. There is only this notebook and the telephone, which rings just as seldom as the shuttle.
Maybe, it is high time I came to terms with the fact that I am an outsider. To claim a path for myself in the middle, and cease striving to belong to one or the other group. Other similar people must be there. Other outsiders, other hybrids. Perhaps I can look for them, and construct something new.
Perhaps I should go back to where I came from, to my parents. Not to ask for permission to speak, but to call for an account. I also have to personally rebut any charges they have to make to prove my loyalty and usefulness. I and Bruce had a great relationship, and because he has moved on and replaced me with Ema I deserve the truth.
Every time I recall the times with Bruce, my heart pains as if I was the one who was cheated on. But is not knowing better than this constant state of not knowing? Then, at least, I could begin to pull myself back together and figure out what the heck it was I was going to do with my life.
But what if I am wrong? What if there is a plan and everything would collapse if I returned? What if Bruce is struggling and fighting for me and all that he has sacrificed for is lost because of my disbelief?
