Bitter Silence
It was too much.
She couldn't deal with it.
Upon seeing her darling father lying in his coffin, upon seeing the ghastliness of his visage, his pallid eyelids, his lack of expression and liveliness, she started to shake; she trembled and then convulsed violently before plunging to the ground and closing her eyes. While gritting her teeth, she withered against the hands that snatched her from the ground, swept her away from her deceased father, and laid her on the ground, where she tossed and turned.
With her spine cracking and elongating, with her jaw clenching and widening, with her muscles constricting and finally loosening, she exploded into a beast. Into a monster. She howled with confusion, with fury, with anguish.
"Leah, calm down."
It was Sam.
Unwillingly, images of their beautiful encounters, of their beautiful past, flowed through her head before entering through his head. He stood still, spine still, paws still with sorrow. Vengefully, she summoned memories of his instinctive betrayal, of his wandering eyes, of his admiration toward her cousin and finally his ultimate action: his ultimate decision to dump her, to throw her away like trash and claim her cousin as his eternal lover.
He flinched.
And she reveled in his discomfort.
"You're a protector. It's our duty to help the people of La Push," Sam revealed.
"And it's also our duty to betray others? To destroy them emotionally? Some protector you are," she muttered, making him recoil.
She grew stronger, fiercer, but sadder, especially when he stared at her with pity.
"I'm sorry, Leah, but I'm hoping that someday you will understand and accept what has happened. I imprinted on your cousin, Emily, and it's our fate to be together," Sam exposed. Her heart clenched. Her eyes narrowed. Her body shook.
It was too much.
She couldn't deal with it.
And she didn't.
She ran away, leaving him behind.
She sought her father—his warm, welcoming hands, which rubbed and patted her back and stabilized her, his understanding gaze, his reassuring murmurations which always, always tranquilized her.
But he was gone.
She stood in bitter silence, watching and waiting.
Watching her father get lowered down into the ground.
Waiting for his guests to leave.
But when they left, it was too late; he was gone, buried six feet under.
She stood in bitter silence, crying, sobbing, howling.
Goodbye, daddy.