Raised by Wolves

I was running. Running as quick as my legs would allow me to. Perhaps the quickest that I had gone in my entire life. My heart felt like it was about to burst in flames from the mix of being upset and losing my breath.

Finally I could see a wolf in my view. He was bleeding on his stomach. Since I had nothing to say, tears took its place as I kneeled down next to the werewolf. I pet it and tried to make sure it was still alive.

“Stay away from it! It’s a dangerous animal. Not some Jacob Black shit. This is a real wolf.” A man who appeared to be a cowboy was standing there with a black gun in his hands and pointing it at the animal. “Get away! It’s still alive!”

I wiped the tears off my face and showed just how pissed off I was. “Who are you? Who are you to say that this creature is dangerous?” With anger, I pointed at the guy with my pointer finger. “From the looks of it, you’re the one with a damn gun in your hands. Look into his eyes and then run from the shame you have put on yourself.”

Slowly, he put the gun down, speechless. “Have you no shame to have sex in the woods? You’re naked.”

Remembering this, I covered my hands around my chest. “I don’t believe that my life is any of your business.” A tear dropped from my eye.

It appeared to be that the young hunter felt sympathy for me when he took off his hunting coat and the jacket under it so he could give it to me. He threw it at me as he put his hunting coat back on.

It wasn’t much, but it covered all my body parts that were handing out that shouldn’t be. “Look into his eyes and tell him that you didn’t mean it.”

He was clearly scared to do it, but he was intrigued by the speech.

He looked into the brown eyes of the wolf as the wolf looked back. There was an innocence to the creature. It seemed like for once in his life, the hunter understood the pain I was going through.

His hand rested upon the coat of the werewolf and he began to pat it and looked down at the blood. It didn’t seem to be all that bad, but it still had to be treated right away. “I’m sorry wolf. If I could, I would wish to take it back. I’d take your pain away.”

“Wishing won’t take anything back. You hurt him and he could potentially die now. You don’t think his pack will be vengeful?”

The guy stood up immediately. “You go get help and I’ll stay with him in case he pulls anything on me.”

Still, he infuriated me. “I told you to run, right now!”

“I’m not leaving you with him.”

“I’ll be fine. It’s yourself who you should be worrying about.”

Without another word, he looked at me once and walked out of the woods being cautious of the idea of something happening to me.

Once he was gone, I knelt back down with the wolf. Taking out the hand sanitizer I always have with me, I put it on my hands and took the bullet out of him. Quickly before he could bleed out anymore, I ripped a strand of the jacket where I could find a rip and wrapped it around his body.

It was clear he was in pain when he began to growl and move around. In case he was about to lash out, I ran but it wasn’t enough when he got up and stood like a human, howling.

With me being scared that he would make himself known to the world and maybe killed, I ran up to him and put my hands in the air in surrender. “Stop! You need to calm down. You know me, right? It’s me, Sam.”

The werewolf looked at the light and ran under a fallen tree branch. Soon after, he fell asleep and minutes later, I witnessed for the first time ever, a werewolf transforming into a human.

It was my brother who was laying under the tree now. He was shivering and holding onto his wound. He was doing something that I had never seen him do before, cry.

I shook him awake. “Chad, I’m here.”

He looked at me and held on for dear life. “What happened to me?”

It took me a few tries before I was able to tell him the truth about what happened. After all, it’s not every day that you get shot.

I helped him stand up as he covered his junk and we slowly made it out of the woods.

He looked at me. “That’s not your jacket. Where are your clothes?”

“I gave them to another werewolf.”

“Mom or Dad?”

“No, I haven’t seen them. Turns out there have been four of you guys running around.” I had to choke back my tears to show that I didn’t have any emotion for Ryan. I didn’t even know much about him.

“Does anyone else know about this?”

I did the best that I could to lie to him. It just wasn’t something that I could explain. I especially didn’t have to relive that point in my life when I couldn’t stop thinking about him when I was just a little girl. “No, I actually just found out about it this morning when I went for a walk.”

“How’d you get the jacket?” Chad was asking too many questions and it was annoying me but perhaps it was to take his mind off the pain.

I looked him deep in the eyes. “The hunter.” Chad just glared at me for taking something that belonged to the man who had tried to kill him. “Hey, I’m the reason why you’re not dead. He had a change of heart.”

“They’re all the same and they never change. That hunter will be back to his ways tonight and there is absolutely nothing you can do.”

I slicked back my brother’s chocolaty brown hair. “I won’t let him get you next full moon. That’s a promise.”

“Whatever, let’s get out of here.”

Once we were back in the safety of our home we found that it was more dangerous than a full moon. Mom was pacing back and forth across the kitchen and dad’s head was resting on the table as his legs were tapping against the ground.

Mom thanked the lord that we were safe until she saw the blood running on Chad. “What happened to you?” Tears were slowly forming in her jewel like eyes.

“Don’t worry mom. It’s just a little wound.” I could tell that Chad didn’t even believe that. His voice was low and pathetic, sounding like any moment he could die.

Dad was so speechless that he just walked out of the room and came back seconds later with the first aid kit in his hands.

Mom was tapping her foot on the floor and folded her legs. “You, you stayed out last night. Where were you? Were you at a boyfriend’s house? That his jacket?”

How would I be able to tell her that I was doing something worse? I could have been killed out in the woods last night by a pack of werewolves. The thing is that I was too aware of that. I just didn’t care at this point. The only word that came out of my mouth was, no.

Clearly she was waiting for an explanation. Not sure of what I was about to say, I opened my mouth but Chad got the first word in. “Don’t blame Sammie. I’d be dead if it wasn’t for her.”

A smile should have appeared on my face to see that my brother was standing up for me, but I felt regret instead.

“Are you going to tell me what happened or are we going to wait here all day?”

Chad and I just looked at each other. I could tell in his eyes that he wanted me to tell the truth, but he didn’t realize the truth is what would kill me. I looked at him for a long moment before keeping calm and looking at mom. “And what if you knew that the truth would break your heart? Would you still want to know?”

Because there were no more words for me nor my mom, I just wrapped my arms around her and gave her a hug. I pet her hair to know it would be ok. She didn’t say anything as I walked over to the men of the family and rubbed Chad’s hair with seconds later, giving a kiss to my dad’s forehead.

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I walked out of the house and didn’t say another word. It was getting a little dark outside already, so I walked to a venue where I could hear music beaming from the inside. The kind of music that I loved so much. The kind of music that brought me to feel like a normal kid.

As I walked through, the room was dark, even the stage. Fans were screaming loudly, trying to find the lead singer that they all loved and adored. Suddenly, a raspy voice came on the speaker. “This is Falling in Reverse! I’m Ronnie fucking Radke! Bow down to your king of the music scene!”

As he said that, a thousand fan girls screamed louder than before and immediately, the lights popped on to the stage. Everyone in the band wore black, even their hair was flaming with darkness.

Just as much as the person next to me, the front, and the back, I rocked harder than I thought was possible. To me, it didn’t matter if you knew who the band was. If you enjoyed it, then you rock out to it like you are one of their fans.

It took me a few songs to pay attention to everyone in the band. It was a group of five rather attractive guys. And that is when all my focus was launched at the boy in the back, the one who was banging and rhythmically rocking out to the sound of his drums.