"LEAH MECHELLE CLEARWATER! If you aren't up in the next 30 seconds, I will personally come up there and drag you out of that bed!"
Holy hell, nightmares suck. They always leave me with a cold sweat and my heart racing and generally not knowing what the fuck is actually going on. The only thing worse that a nightmare?
My mother, pissed off at me for yet again missing my alarm. I was in my junior year of high school, but still had to get up early enough to take my younger brother, Seth, to early morning football practice and to drop off my niece, Claire, at daycare. Adulting sucks, but when your father is of ill health, and your mom works double shifts at the local hospital, somebody has to do it.
Sighing, I decided it would be better to avoid a fight and just do as she asked. "I'm coming, I'm coming! Geez...", I yelled back.
"Cut the attitude, Leah. It's not my fault you stayed out so late last night."
"Yea Leah, no need to be such a bitch", my brother Seth called from his room across the hall.
"Shut up, runt! Before you end up walking your ass to school. Why don't you keep your prepubescent, peach fuzz covered ass out of my business."
"Mom! Leah is being...bitchy Leah again!"
"Seth, watch your mouth and quit antagonizing your sister. Leah, stop being so hard on your brother. You know he doesn't mean anything by it."
"Of course he doesn't", I muttered.
"What was that?"
"Nothing mom, just...nothing."
"That's what I thought."
Rolling my eyes, I got up and walked over to my closet. I used to give a shit of what other people thought of me and of the way I dressed, but that was before the Sam fiasco. I looked through the few hangers I had, and decided on a simple black t shirt with the Gas Monkey logo on the front. I paired that with a pair of cutoff jeans and black Nikes, and the look was complete. My long black hair was already straight- perks of my native american heritage- so there wasn't anything left to do.
See? No fucks given about what anybody thinks about my fashion sense. Or lack thereof, actually.
I grabbed my wallet from my dresser and my bag off the hook on the wall and made my way to the kitchen. Seth and my mother were sitting at the bar, discussing the weekend's agenda.
"Where's dad?", I asked.
"Still in bed. He was up late last night again, from what I saw. I didn't finish my shift until 3, and he had just laid down."
Of course, the one person in my family that I could stand to be around for more than 20 seconds, aside from Seth, wasn't awake yet. And it wasn't even that my mother was a bad person: we just didn't get along the best. I was too headstrong, stubborn, and quick to anger, while she was soft spoken and patient.
I grabbed a piece of toast from the bar and glanced at the clock: 7:30. "Come on, dork. we've got to run. Grab your bags and meet me in the car."
"Yea, yea ok. On it, grouchy"
Loved Seth, but I swear he knows just how to push my buttons. He was the most mature 14 year old I knew, and one of the only people that stuck with me, no matter what. He was even there to keep my head up when Same left me.
We got in my old Ford pickup and made our way down the rainy street towards the only school on the La Push reservation. it wasn't that far of a drive, but parking could be a real bitch, so we always tried to leave a little early.
Seth drabbled on about school, his friends, and the latest theories on the La Push "gang". Close to 6 months ago, things started getting strange. First, my boyfriend Sam disappeared for 2 weeks. Non of the tribe elders seemed worried about it, stating that "surely he's fine, he'll show up soon, don't worry about him". The next time I saw him, it looked like he had grown at least 6 inches, cut off all of his hair, and gotten a tattoo. He wouldn't say two words to me, other than to break up with me. The only people he spent time around were the elders, particularly Old Quil Ateara, Billy Black, and my father Harry Clearwater. Even then he didn't ever have much to say.
I was more or less zoned out, thinking about Sam and wondering what the hell I was going to do with my life. Seth's yell broke me out of my thoughts.
"What the hell is that?!" he shouted, pointing down the road in front of the truck.
There, in the middle of a curve in the road stood the biggest wolf I had ever seen, easily standing around 5 feet at its shoulder. It was black as night and looking right at us with piercing golden yellow eyes, seemingly waiting for us to get closer to it. I quickly slammed on the breaks, throwing the truck into neutral, locking the tires us and sending us sliding helplessly towards the wolf.
We finally came to a stop, a mere few feet from the creature. Both Seth and myself were frozen, fear and tension palpable in the cab of my truck. I couldn't tear my eyes away from the wolf. My heart was in my throat, my stomach rolling as I realized a chilling fact. This wolf was so familiar, so similar to the one in my nightmare from the night before...
"What the hell, Leah? Drive, go! Sometime before this thing decides to turn on us!"
Snapping back to reality, I punched the clutch and threw the truck in reverse, tires spinning until they got traction. I finally got the truck turned around and floored it, deciding to take a back road to the school.
"So, that's one hell of a way to start the weekend, huh?"
If only we knew how much weirder our lives were about to get.