Chapter 12

"Hey, Clearwater!" I could hear him talking but he sounded so far away. It felt so good, here in bed. So soft. So warm. "Hey, Leah!" he shoved my arm and it annoyed me.

"Not now, honey, I have a headache." What could he possibly want when I was lying here so comfy? Mm, so soft.

"Now's not the time to fake it. You, me, patrol. now."

Oh! Patrol. I remembered but it didn't mean I cared. Those allergy pills were awesome. I should make note to buy them next time I'm in town. They give you that nice floating feeling. And that nice floating feeling disappeared the moment he yanked the covers off of me.

"Fine! You want me to phase and patrol? I'll phase and patrol, oh supreme Alpha. Now stand back." It actually took some determination to keep my eyes open. Maybe if I phased and toppled over, he'd leave me alone. Then again, the whole point was that I didn't want to phase in the first place. "Eh, nope. Not working. It seems I'm having trouble caring or phasing, Jakey-poo." Whoa, his arm is bigger than my thigh! I went to touch it but totally missed it and went for the shoulder instead.

"Are you drunk? Are you friggin' high?" Was he sniffing me? I swear he just sniffed me. And holy crap did I just not have a sense of balance. Maybe I WAS drunk. Or maybe it was high? I couldn't make up my mind.

"I don't know, maybe?" I replied

"Well, which one!"

Hmm, now that was going to take some thinking. The cough syrup's active ingredient couldn't have affected me seeing as it was expired but the pills on the other hand could have interacted with the high fructose corn syrup, wait, "What was the question again?" I eyed him up and down. He had come from patrol because he wasn't wearing a shirt. If he was here, then who was there? Oh well, I didn't really care, he'd left the room and now I could go back to sleep on my so soft, so warm, delicious be-

"How much of these did you take?"

Oh god, too good to be true. I knew it. What did he want now? How much I took? There hadn't been much in the syrup bottle and practically all the pills had been taken from their foil packet by the time I got to them. I didn't feel like having a whole conversation and so I gave him the shortest possible answer. "Whatever was left and three?"

"What the hell is going on through you head?"

"I don't want to patrol, and I don't want to phase and I don't want to see you with mini-leech." Oh, oh. Where did my brain-to-mouth filter go? I was sure I had one. I'd used it plenty of times before when I'd been at Emily and Sam's house. These pills weren't so good after all. That floating feeling was all nice and stuff but I needed that brain-to-mouth filter in order to function.

"Leah, you have to phase sooner or later. Protecting people from vampires, it's what we do. It's what we were made for."

And when did he become all happy and complacent with this responsibility that had been forced on us? Next thing out of his mouth would be that he couldn't wait to imprint. Right? I might have been high or drunk or whatever I was, but I still wasn't going to accept this crap and let it control me. I hadn't been made to chase vampires. I'd been made so that I could be whatever in hell I wanted to be, even if what I wanted to be was a drunk bum on the side of a road in Seattle. "NO! I don't want to play werewolf anymore. I'm done."

"How long ago did you take these?"

God! Was he going to keep this up? How long was he going to stand there and prod me? Couldn't he tell that I was desperate to go to sleep? What time was it anyway? Whatever, I'll just throw a ball park figure at him and hope he leaves. "Hours."

"Leah?"

Maybe if I just ignored him.

"Leah?"

Damn, that wasn't working. "What!" I groaned.

"You can't harm yourself anymore." and he left my room closing the door behind himself. Whatever, as long as I got to go back to sleep. Sweet Succe- My thoughts came to a screeching halt and I suddenly felt sick to my stomach. That double timbre in his voice. I'd heard that before. HE USED AN ALPHA COMMAND ON ME!

I felt instantly betrayed. Deceived. I wanted to jump out of bed and shout E TU BRUTE! I wanted to grab random objects and fling them across the room and punch my fist through the window. I was too high to do anything and I just laid there with a tornado of emotions tearing up all my insides. Once again I began to stir the endless pot of emotions and go around in circles until it struck me, he cares. He really does care about me.

It wasn't in the romantic sense, but he did indeed hold some sort of regard for me. He had cared enough to search for me in the waters and to bring me back. He'd stayed at the hospital and tonight he came looking for me, right? He didn't send somebody else to do the job like Sam had done in the past, there had been no middle man. He came here himself and then he left to continue with his duties. That's why he had been fuming at the party, right, because he cared? Jacob Black actually cared about ME!

I suddenly wasn't nearly as mad about the alpha command as I knew I should have been, and that bothered me. A lot. I slapped my face with both hands as I drifted off to sleep.

I must be high as a kite.


A tiny chapter but at least now Leah finally gets it. Sorta.

Holy shit! I have over 200 reviews! I'm so excited that I have to stop myself from using thirty or so exclamation points after each sentence. You can't even begin to imagine. And to think that I almost didn't write that first chapter. I grew some balls, wrote the chapter and posted it hoping to get at least two reviews. Then I said to myself, "Maybe I'll even get five! And just maybe they won't say to go fuck myself!" Now I have over two hundred reviews, countless story alerts, been favorited and to make things even more 'crap in my pants' exciting, some of the authors who's stories I've enjoyed so much are now reading mine. How amazing is that!? Wish I had confetti to throw around.

Next chapter is currently in the works. I plan on it being from two different people's point of view. It will begin with one person's thoughts then I'll make a division where the other person picks up the narrative and ends the chapter. As usual, you'll have to figure out who's who but don't worry. It will be easy.