Howdy! Hopefully I get the imprint couples correct. Please feel free to correct me :)
Chapter 9.
You know how there is a name for each grouping of animals? A herd of buffalo, a flock of sheep, a pack of wolves. Is there a group name for women? I wonder about that as I pick through my salad at lunch. Several conversations go on around me. Since I'm sitting with a bunch of "Wolf Girls," I'm going to consider us a pack.
The term Wolf Girls was originally coined when I was a little girl. You were considered a Wolf Girl if you were involved, in any way, with a member of the pack. You could be married, a girlfriend, or just hang out with the boys on a regular basis…like me.
Leah Clearwater-Hirsch, the one and only female shape-shifting wolf, is visiting from out of town so the official Wolf Girls considered it a great excuse to all get together to eat and shop. Leah decided to stop phasing as a wolf to lead a normal life outside of the reservation with her husband Allen. She likes to visit a few times a year.
The girls that make up the pack of Wolf Girls is Emily (my mom's sister and wife of Sam, the Alpha male), Tala (my cousin Seth's wife), Kim (Jared's wife), Rachel (Paul's wife), Ashley (Collin's wife), Abby (Embry's wife), and me. Nobody's wife. I'm considered a Wolf Girl because of my friendship with Quil.
The pack of women circled a corner booth at our favorite diner in Port Angeles. Unfortunately, La Push was in the middle of nowhere so if anyone wanted to do anything special they needed to drive an hour and a half to Port Angeles. "PA" had just about everything a smaller town didn't.
The conversation on the drive into town…we all crammed into Tala's minivan, intended for only seven people…continued into the diner. I was ignorant to believe the topic of my date with Jason wouldn't come up. The ladies waited until my mouth was full of leafy greens before pouncing me with questions.
"Claire, your mom tells me you had a date on Friday?" Aunt Emily was the first to pounce. I stopped mid-chew and glanced up at her. Every other face at the table was staring at me expectantly.
"Yup," I responded and kept chewing while poking through the leaves for more chunks of chicken.
"You had a date?" Leah asked. It sounded like she was the only one who wasn't informed. "Did he finally tell you?"
I stopped in mid-chew again and gave Leah a confused look. "Huh?" I asked at the same time several grumbles and coughs came from the other ladies.
"Ow." It looked like Tala elbowed Leah.
"His name is Jason and he goes to school with Claire," Emily answered Leah as I stared at Leah trying to decipher her question. Before I was able to ask Leah what she meant, Emily cut me off.
"Ah, how did Quil take it?" Leah asked.
"Oh you know, he gave Jason the stink-eye, almost crushed his hand shaking it, growled at him, and followed us around town," I replied with a shrugged. "The usual."
"He followed you?" Tala asked. Ashley and Kim rolled their eyes and shook their heads in disbelief.
"You know how he is. I can't do anything without a lecture on safety. I couldn't go out with Jason unless we double-dated with my sister and her date." A few of the ladies nodded their heads in understanding. They knew how Quil was with me.
"Jan got some great pictures of her and Jason. Katie went out with that cute boy from the shop, Rob." Emily continued.
"Oh, he is a cutie," Ashley replied. "And so nice!" Kim added. Kim and Ashley filled the others in on Rob since they both worked part time at the shop.
"Mom got the pictures already?" I asked to no one in particular. It had only been two days.
"Ok, so back to this Jason guy," Tala drew the conversation back to me. I internally groaned.
"Yeah, what about him?" I asked nicely, trying to be polite.
"Do you like him?" Tala asked.
"Yeah, he's really nice," I replied and tried to keep the grin from spreading across my face. It didn't work too well. There were several 'awes' and cooing that came from the ladies.
"I heard he kissed you," Aunt Emily said. More girlie squeals and excitement came from the crew.
"God! My mom tells you everything doesn't she?" I groaned.
"Oh, oh, oh…was he a good kisser?" Kim asked. I knew she wasn't trying to embarrass me. She was always genuinely happy for that lovey-dovey stuff.
"It was…ok," I answered into my salad. I have always been more comfortable speaking with the Wolf Girls than my own sister and mother about personal stuff, but with every one of them scrutinizing me it was hard to spill my guts.
"Just ok?" Kim asked, actually looking disappointed.
"Well, I've never kissed anyone before so at first it was…awkward," I shrugged.
"Did it get better?" Abby asked.
"Like all sorts of warmth and electricity was running from your mouth all throughout your body?" Kim asked with a dreamy look in her eye.
"Well, no, not rea…" I tried to answer but kept getting interrupted.
"Did you constantly want to touch him during your date and feel so much better when you did?" Ashley asked.
"I held his hand a little, but…"
"Did the feeling in your chest become stronger once you finally kissed him for the first time?" Tala asked. "And then you knew he was the one and only for you?"
Feeling in my chest? Did everyone get that?
"Actually no, I didn't feel anything in my chest with Jason," I mumbled as everyone compared their kisses with their significant others. I glanced over to Leah. She was the only person not going on and on about making out. Leah rolled her eyes and stuck her finger down her throat, pretending to gag. I laughed and rolled my eyes too.
"Is that something I should be feeling?" I whispered to Leah. She smirked in reply and shrugged one shoulder. She didn't seem to know what the rest of the girls were talking about.
I certainly didn't feel that way about Jason. I liked kissing him and hoped to again, but I didn't know if that was my crazy hormones kicking in and enjoying the experience or if it had to do with Jason. I have experienced all those feeling, but the kissing part, with Quil. Just thinking about kissing Quil gave me all those warm, dreamy feelings everyone was talking about.
"Is that…um, does that mean you're in love with someone? If you feel all that?" I asked timidly. When I looked up I noticed everyone had a small smile on their face. All eyes darted around to each other, avoiding contact with mine.
I looked at my Aunt Emily and she answered me, nodding slightly. "Yeah, and a lot more. Are you in love…with Jason?"
The table suddenly seemed quieter as everyone waited for my answer. I shook my head slightly and looked down at my food again.
"No. It's too early to tell how I feel," I answered.
"What about Quil?" Leah asked. My head snapped up and I could feel my cheeks blush. A couple of the ladies snickered. "If he was following you did he see Jason kiss you?"
"Oh, um, yeah he did." I laughed a little. "Actually I think the whole sex thing freaks him out."
"You're having sex with Jason?" Kim squawked. Several shocked faces looked my way.
"No! God! I'm not having sex with Jason. You can all relax," I said. I could actually see everyone relax. "Quil was all concerned about Jason taking advantage of me so he wanted to have the talk. Can we please steer the conversation on to something else?" I could feel my face burning from embarrassment.
The conversation moved away from me, but stayed on the subject of sex. I wanted to die. I didn't want to hear what everyone at the table did and enjoyed. And I certainly didn't want to hear what particular skill their significant others were good at. Apparently they were all comfortable talking about it because they were getting pretty intimate.
"Hey, they all have access to each other's minds so why shouldn't we?" Kim explained to me.
"You get the best of the best," Abby wiggled her eyebrows at me.
"Yeah, we learn new things this way," Aunt Emily added.
"Yeah, but it's one thing to hear what Jared does to Kim, but it's totally different hearing what my Uncle does to you," I said to Emily and shivered. "Gross."
"Imagine being a girl and listening to a bunch of teenage boys' minds. Talk about gross," Leah shuddered. "That shit will mess you up, thinking about girls in a certain way and me being straight. I had a girl-crush on Kim for several months."
"Ha! Yeah, sorry about that Leah," Kim laughed. "Jared was pretty intense."
I couldn't help but laugh with the rest of the ladies. Our little pack family was way too close.
"Aren't any of you worried about what the other guys are seeing in their heads? Like your naked body and being all pervy about it?" I asked.
"Nah, they are all pretty good about blocking out that sort of thing while in wolf form," Abby answered. "It's the ones who aren't imp…" Emily's cough interrupted Abby's sentence. "It's the ones who aren't in relationships that you have to worry about."
"Like Brady. That boy needs his own relationship so he can focus on her," Kim added with air quotes emphasizing the word 'relationship.'
"He's getting much better," Ashley giggled. "Collin pretty much rips Brady's eyeballs out if he looks at me longer than he should."
"Still, that would just be embarrassing to me. I'm glad I don't have to deal with that," I smiled.
When I got home from the interesting girls day out, Quil was waiting for me. Mom and Katie were gone.
"Your boyfriend called," Quil sneered as he held up a small note with Jason's phone number on it between his fingers.
"He's not my boyfriend," I replied and tried to grab the piece of paper. Quil kept snapping it out of my reach. "Just give it to me!" He finally surrendered the note.
"You sit with him at lunch every day, right?" Quil teased.
"So, I eat lots of meals with you too." I argued. "And I go to the movies with you and hang out with you a lot. You're not my boyfriend. So what's the difference?" I glanced down at Quil's scribbles on the note.
"You kiss him." Quil answered quietly, all teasing ceased.
Does Quil know how bad I want to kiss him? How much I want him to be my boyfriend? The conversations with the ladies earlier were still on my brain and definitely had me thinking what it would be like to be with Quil in that way. I thought about it a lot on the ride home from PA.
I could feel my cheeks warming up so I cleared my throat and changed the subject.
"Were you nice to him?" I asked Quil, holding up the note.
"Sure," Quil answered.
"He's really nice Quil and he's never done anything inappropriate to me," I whined. "Can you just be nice to him? I think you'd like him if you gave him a chance."
Quil gave a non-committal shrug.
"So, what did you ladies do today?" Quil asked with his head sticking in the fridge.
"Shopped, ate, and talked about sex," I replied. The last part slipped out before I could stop myself. Apparently my brain still wanted to discuss it.
Quil's head quickly appeared around the refrigerator door. "What?"
"I heard a lot more about those ladies and your pack brothers than I really wanted to know."
"They talk about that stuff? In front of you?" Quil looked disgusted.
"Oh please. I'm almost seventeen – in twenty-two days – and it's not like I don't know what all goes on," I answered and made sure to remind him of my upcoming birthday.
"It's down to twenty-two days now, is it?" Quil continued to frown.
"It was a bit TMI, but it didn't seem to faze any of them," I ignored his frown. "They must talk about it all the time. They say that it's a good thing because you guys share and get the best from the best…as Abby called it."
"Not voluntarily," Quil grimaced.
I wondered if Quil ever used any ideas or techniques that he picked out of the pack's mind on a woman. But I was too afraid to ask. I wasn't sure I wanted to know the answer. Instead I asked a more innocent question. One I never really thought of before either.
"Quil?"
"Yeah?" His back was towards me as he looked in the pantry. Apparently I needed to make him dinner.
"Have you ever had a girlfriend?"
"Claire-Bear, I think you would know if I've ever had a girlfriend."
"Why not?" I saw Quil's body pause slightly in his search for food.
"I dunno," he answered with a shrug and continued to scour the shelves.
"Are you gay?"
"No, I'm not gay!" Quil glanced back at me and gave me a look like it was a crazy idea.
"You seem to be overly defensive about not being gay."
"Claire-Bear, you know I'm not gay," he smiled slightly. His body turned to face me.
"Well, you don't have a girlfriend and you haven't ever had one that I know of. Other than me you hang out with a bunch of guys who are naked half of the time," I teased.
"We are not naked half of the time."
"Wouldn't you rather be looking at a naked girl half the time, instead?"
"If I had the choice, yes, I would prefer to look at a naked girl than my pack brothers," he answered with an amused grin.
"So then, why don't you have a girlfriend that you can look at…naked?" I started to get a little braver with my questions.
"Claire," Quil sighed. He leaned with his back against the countertop.
"Quil," I mimicked his tone and continued to look at him until he answered.
Quil was quiet for a few seconds and stared right back. I finally caved first.
"Don't you…want one?" I mumbled. Of course his wolf ears heard me.
"Of course. Someday," he responded. His foot started to knock against the cupboard. His leg always had a way of fidgeting when he was nervous.
"What are you waiting for?" I stared at him and asked.
"I'm not ready." Quil stared back; his leg still continued to twitch.
"When will you be ready?"
There was an awkward, quiet lapse of time where the two of us just stood there and watched each other. I challenged him by not looking away.
"I don't know. Maybe…twenty-two days."
Twenty-two days?
"My birthday? What does my birthday have to do with whether you are ready for a girlfriend or not?"
My my my Quil...he's driving me crazy. Isn't he getting on your nerves? I agree with some of my reviewers who say Claire is kind of whiney and immature. Yes, yes she is and she's supposed to be. When I think of Claire, I think of someone who gets her way most of the time from the person who has always been there...Quil. Plus, she's only sixteen! (hopefully I don't offend any teens out there) It's been along time since I've been sixteen, but I can remember most of my friends (and probably myself as well) who were so immature, clueless, and they worried about their body image all the time. That was a big one for me.
I know not all girls are like that, but my version of Claire is. Don't worry, she'll grow up and finally get a clue eventually. You would think this little conversation with the other wolf girls would spark more questions, but she gets side-tracked easily.
If you agree or disagree, let me know! I love to hear your opinions and your thoughts on the story so far. Thanks!
