. . . Sweet Dreams -By Yo-yo

Disclaimer: I don't own Wolf Lake, wow, I heard the biggest step was to admit your problem, but after that admittance, I'm not sure I want to be cured! Give me back Wolf Lake you bastards!!!!!!!! It was good and you cheapened it!!!!!!!! BRING WOLF LAKE BACK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! ULTIMATE ROWING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

. . . Sweet Dreams XX:

The darkness wrapped around her naked form like a baby blanket, caressing her curves. A soft trickle of wind slowly danced over her skin, making her spine tingle in ecstasy.

The sky was a burst of black velvet, with a splash of silver glitter. The Moon was an open face, craters and lines creasing her visage as she smiled upon their bodies.

The soft tinkling of children's laughter bounced off the trees and reverberated in her ears, along with the pounding of paws on the earth and the lone cries of wolves in the distance blended to form the cradle of peacefulness that surrounded them. She could feel the lush bed of grass beneath her, the tiny points, gently stabbing her back, giving her a sense of contentedness as if acupunctured. His hands rubbed her side from hip to thigh, leaving a pleasant heat in their wake. She could still taste him on her tongue, the softness of his kisses, combined with his soft caress on her skin sent a pleasing moan through her throat.

"We should start heading in, the children have school in the morning," she whispered as a firefly flew above her body, leaving a small speckle of light on her skin.

"Mmmhmm," he moaned placing a kiss on her shoulder, but making no movement to actually stand.

They stayed tangled together for many long moments, wrapped in the beautiful silence as the breeze cooled the air around them.

The person lying beside her grew cold.

"Do you want to go in now? Are you cold?" she whispered softly, finally noticing that his hand had stopped its path down her side a while ago.

No response came.

"Would you like to go home now?" she asked, placing her hand on his.

She realized, she couldn't feel his breath caressing her skin, or feel his heartbeat thumping against her back, or hear his rhythmic breathing in the soundtrack of the night.

Turning slowly, her eyes grew wide at the sight of his eyes closed peacefully as if asleep. His skin was ghostly pale and cold, his joints stiff as she lifted his arm from her. Looking at the grass beneath him, she realized the earth was drenched in liquid. Touching it cautiously with her fingers, she sniffed it and gasped.

He was dead.

-

"Aaahhh!" she jolting upright.

Her eyes flew open and revealed her surroundings. When she found four walls, a desk, dresser, easel and her bed, she fell backwards, groaning at the vividness of the dream.

"Shit," she groaned throwing her coverlet from her body and stepping out of the bed.

Her first two finals, Algebra and Chemistry, were happening in six hours, and she couldn't sleep. The experts said it was imperative to get at least eight hours of sleep before a major exam, and she hadn't had ONE since the night she'd Changed.

Ever since that night, she'd woken up to dreams of a different sort. Instead of waking up from a horrible nightmare where she was dying, she kept dreaming that Luke was.

Pulling on a pair of scuffed trainers and her WLSD hoodie, she pulled her hair into a ponytail and climbed out the already opened window. The only way she was going to get any sleep was if she made herself physically exhausted, and the only way to accomplish that was by going out for a run.

Taking off into the Wolf Lake woods, her senses awoken, introducing a whole new world to her. It was a tapestry of colors: greens, browns, purples, blues, blacks, golds and silvers. It surrounded her like a blanket, filling her nostrils with the familiar and comforting scent of rain and earth. If she only could live in one place for the rest of her life, she'd never leave the security and beauty of the canopy of trees in The Cove.

Halting when she finally reached her destination, an old, fallen, rotting tree trunk, she let her mind drift into oblivion. When she began to free herself from the confines of her clothes, she could feel her body tingling with that familiar want. It boiled in her blood, seared her veins and relaxed her muscles. The warmth in her belly rose throughout her whole being as she felt the familiar popping of her joints transforming and the bittersweet pain of her back breaking as she keeled over onto the ground. In moments the pain receded as quickly as it had come, leaving a pleasing warmth in its wake.

She pawed at the earth beneath her; her human instincts had crumbled with her human body, leaving only her animalistic impulses. Suddenly, she dashed away, skirting between trees, dancing in the moonlight and chasing small animals.

This was when she was alive.

When she was just a normal girl, she never understood the lure of the forest or the temptation of the wolf. She never knew how the night revealed such an attractive world that only a select few are ever granted entrance. And now, these were the times that she relished. She savored the sweetness of each night, bathed in the glow of Moon's kind face and danced in the inviting lake.

"Aaaaaahhhhhwwwwhhhhoooooooo!" she barked to Moon, paying her respects. And in a moment, she was off again, reveling in the feel of the night.

~***~

"Sophia, time to get up," a voice called through her door.

Almost simultaneously, her alarm jolted awake to Nine Inch Nail's "Closer."

"I'm up, I'm up," she groaned. For the second time this morning she threw the coverlet from her body and climbed out of bed.

While stumbling almost drunkenly into the lavatory, she grinned to herself. A couple of nights before Luke had danced with her to that song, his voice resonating throughout his being as he stood close to her, his voice emphasizing the words, "I wanna' fuck you like an animal, / I wanna' feel you from the inside!"

Sure, his words were graphic, but strangely gratifying at the same time. And with the way his hands splayed across her body, gently touching and caressing her scorching skin, she couldn't help but admit that she too wasn't far from that thinking.

Turning off the taps of the shower, she ambled into her room in a towel. As she dried herself off in front of the mirror, she couldn't help stare at her naked frame.

Ever since the night that she'd Changed, she couldn't help stare at herself. She knew she'd be different, she knew she'd somehow change too, but she didn't expect what she got- so fast.

The night after, when she finally slept in her own bed, she'd awoken to a dream juxtaposed of the dream she'd experienced while she was Changing. When she woke up, she went to her full length mirror and was shocked at what she discovered. The young woman who'd led her through the dream wasn't some unknown stranger; she was Sophia herself, after the Change.

Her eyes had transformed into an intense color of hazel, with flecks of blue, gold and green lingering around the pupil. Her skin had lost its unhealthy color and was now honey brown and glowing. Her body was now enveloped in lean muscle, rippling beneath the thin layer of skin, giving her the appearance of a dancer.

She was beautiful.

And everyone had noticed. Luke couldn't keep his hands off of her, not that he didn't have that problem before she flipped. And all the male Skinwalkers were more aware of her. They watched her as she walked down the halls and smiled at her as she passed by. They were definitely emitting pheromones that she couldn't say she didn't sense.

Everyone in the school noticed the change in her attitude. She was more confident, less intimidated and less distracted what everyone thought of her. They had noticed the change in her appearance also. They marveled at the way she held her head now, high. She didn't hold her head like Prestley did, daring anyone to challenge her and making them feel inferior, instead, she stood as a Queen; beautiful and proud.

"Sophia, you're going to be late!" Donner called through the door.

"I'm coming out," she called, snapping back to reality.

Quickly drying off, she pulled on a pair of blue flannel pajama bottoms and a baby blue tank top. On her feet she slipped on some flip- flops and pulled her wet hair into a messy bun atop her head. She may have been Miss Popular now, but that wasn't going to distract her from her grades. The next three days were going to be the most stressful days of her junior year, and she was going to make sure that she could at least dress as comfortable as possible for them.

Grabbing her bag, she stuffed some pre-sharpened pencils into her bun and headed towards the kitchen.

"Hey Dad," she smiled making a beeline straight for the fridge.

"Are you going to work after finals today?"

With her head buried deep within the fridge, her words came back a bit muffled, "Yeah, later. I'm going to come back, study and then head off to the diner."

"Would you like me to pick you up after work?"

"Uh, no thanks. . ." she answered emerging from the cool appliance, a bowl of strawberries in her arms.

"How's Luke?" he asked turning to look at her.

"Dad," she asked taking a bite of a huge strawberry, "do you remember a couple of months ago you asked me if I wanted to stay at the diner all summer?"

"Yeah," he answered, accepting the change of subject.

"Well, you said something about a day camp in Worthington," she began, pushing a strand of wet hair from her eyes. "I was wondering, does that offer still stand?"

"Uh, I'm not sure. I'll call them today and tell you when you come home."

"Thanks," she smiled going to the table.

"Sophia," he asked, coming beside her, "what happened?"

"What are you talking about?"

"Luke, for some reason you don't want to talk about him. What happened?"

She turned her eyes from his. "Dad, we're going to be late."

"Sophia?"

She let out a sigh, "Dad, I don't want to talk about it. I just- I need some time to think. Now can we go? I really don't want to be late for Algebra. Ms. Avery won't let me into the class if I'm late."

"Sure," he replied lifting himself from his seat and grabbing his keys.

~***~

Entering the courtyard, she could feel everyone's eyes on her. In a short span of two weeks, her social status at Wolf Lake High had escalated from a recluse lame-o to their Queen. She was stared at in the halls, worshipped in the classes and slandered in the lavatories. She was everything every teenage girl wanted to be, and yet every moment made her cringe.

He was sitting at his usual table, where all the Skinwalkers usually assembled during their lunch hours. Amongst him sat the most powerful beings of the pack, their heads together as they discussed classified Skinwalker business.

Making her way across the square, she ignored the looks of awe, spite and uncertainty. Instead, she stared into the most beautiful pair of green eyes she'd ever seen. She let their beauty hypnotize her, sending her on a beautiful wave of bliss as she gazed into the eyes of her beloved.

"Hey," he breathed as she stood before him, her eyes locked in his.

"Hey," she replied, reveling in the feeling of being so close to him and knowing that he was hers.

Untangling his limbs, he lifted himself from the picnic table, therefore bringing himself still closer to her.

Her eyes closed in his proximity. Whenever she was so close to him, she found herself drowning in a sea of Nirvana; one so deep that she was afraid she'd never get out, but one so beautiful that she begged the gods she'd never leave. She breathed in the clean scent of him, cinnamon, cologne and earth- the scent she'd just recently discovered- and felt herself being drawn back into the plethora of emotions that she found herself, as of lately, being consumed in.

Then, his lips were on hers, gently brushing against the soft skin, coaxing her for a response. It didn't take long for her body to awaken to the sensation, and take control. Within moments her lips had pressed against his, and she could feel his hands snake around her waist and pull her against him. Soon her hands had traveled up his arms, past his shoulders and circled around his neck with one lost in the folds of his hair and the other dancing across the muscles on his back. The kiss had deepened so quickly that she soon felt herself loosing control and when he bit her shoulder sharply, she couldn't contain the moan that escaped her lips and fueled their passion.

His lips traveled up and down her neck, making her emit guttural sounds as he played her aroused flesh like an expensive instrument. Every move that he made was calculated, every touch that he gave was created to give her pleasure, as if made exclusively for her; as if he was born just to fulfill her.

His lips traveled back to hers, and soon he had her backed against a tree, for both of their legs had gone weak and there was no other way that the other would remain standing without the support.

When breathing became imperative, their lips broke apart and their foreheads rested against one another's. Her eyes opened, loving the feel of him pressed against her so intimately.

When he'd decided that he'd had enough breath, he leaned in again, never once opening his eyes, and began to playfully nip at her lips.

Then, a glimpse of her dream flashed before her and she pulled away as if being burned.

"Wait," she breathed.

"What?" he whispered, not bothering to stop his endeavor.

"We need to stop," she replied, her voice calm.

"Why?" he groaned, finally opening his eyes to look at her.

"This wasn't why I came?"

"Came where?" he groaned, with his blood still in southern regions, thinking was like trying to teach Brittany Spears to count.

"Here, to see you."

He didn't say anything for a while, trying to get his bearings and understand what was she talking about. For many long moments he watched her, she looked anxious as she stared back into his eyes.

"Why did you come to see me?"

"We need to talk."

"What about?" he whispered tucking a strand of her hair behind her ear.

She closed her eyes for a moment, letting the cool touch of his fingers on her flaming skin take over her thoughts. When she opened her eyes again, she wasn't surprised by the huge smirk on his face as he noticed her reaction to his touch.

"About us . . ." then she looked up and noticed all the inquisitive stares, "but not here."

"What about us needs to be discussed?" he asked, not liking her response to his last question. When a girl said she needed to talk, that was usually bad. But when she decided they needed a discussion on their relationship, there was definitely no good to come out of that.

"Somewhere else," she hissed, her eyes opened widely as if he'd just revealed the secret of the century.

"Why?" he asked, his lips playfully nipping at her neck.

A sigh escaped her lips as she felt his hot breath on her skin, wishing that he would just take her their and their inevitable conference would be delayed until a much later time. But of course he didn't kiss her, and she forced herself to answer.

"Because," she groaned, "everyone's looking at us. I need to talk to you alone."

"Where?"

"My room; my Dad's at work." She proffered, never once thinking of the way his mind worked.

"Ok." He grinned, taking one of her hands in his.

~***~

"So," he grinned, leaning towards her from his seat on the bed, "what did you want to talk about?"

"Well," she sighed, turning away from him. Ruffling back her hair, she looked down at her pajama pants and tried to recollect the speech she'd recited in her head that morning.

"Well," she began again, "I like you . . ."

A nervous giggle escaped her lips involuntarily as she strained to control herself, ". . . but you know that. Of course you know that," she repeated ruffling back her hair again, "You've known that since I was twelve and gave you a black eye for telling Sean that I was your girlfriend . . ."

He watched her as she realized the anxious way she'd began ruffling her hair and instead, she resorted to gesticulating wildly with her hands.

"Ok, what I'm trying to say is that I love you . . ." she smiled brightly, "yeah, I love you. And that you also know. I told you the night your father died, and you told me you reciprocated those feelings the night I Changed . . ."

She looked at him now, seeing the way that he calmly observed her jumpy gestures and quietly let her talk.

"I guess," she began, but was stopped by Luke rather than her this time.

"Honey, calm down. There's nothing that you can say that could make you so scared right now. I'm not going to hurt you; you know that- so what the hell is wrong?"

He'd grabbed a hold of her hands, so she wouldn't wave them nervously.

Taking a deep breath, she looked him in the eyes. After a few moments, she began, much calmer and firmly.

"I guess it began the night that I Changed. Ever since we started high school, I was forbidden to hang out with you and we couldn't be friends and we just couldn't . . . BE with one another. But then the night of the Change, everything just fell into place. I was the white wolf, you loved me, my Dad approved, everyone was happy . . . and then I started to get the dreams."

He looked at her, confusion tainting features as he watched her watching him. She looked scared. She looked scared and guilty; as if she'd done something really wrong.

"What dreams?"

"Bad dreams. Like the one's before I was Changing, except . . ." she paused for a moment collecting her thoughts, "except they had nothing to do with the wolf . . . they were about . . . are about us." She concluded.

"What do you mean, about us?"

"Every night, since the night I'd Changed, I've woken up to dreams . . . nightmares about us. It always starts out innocent enough . . . us together and all- but it never ends that way . . ."

"How does it end?" he whispered, noticing the tears that welled up in her eyes as she looked away from him, reliving the horrible dreams.

"With you . . . with you lying . . ." she mumbled inaudibly as she took her hands from his grasp and fiercely wiped away the tears.

"Me lying?" he whispered. "Honey, I would never lie to you," he whispered, misinterpreting her words, "I know I'm experienced, but wolves . . . we mate for life. I could never leave you, I love you."

"I know," she groaned, her head on his shoulder, but her eyes turned away from him. "I know you'd never cheat on me . . . but . . . my dreams . . . my nightmares aren't about you cheating on me."

"Then what are they about?"

"They're about me waking up one day to find you dead." She stated.

He stared at her, their eyes collided and he saw the way hers opened in fear. Tears shimmered in her eyes.

"Can you repeat that again?" he asked after ten minutes silence.

"They're about me . . . waking up one day to find you dead," she repeated.

"Why?" he breathed.

"I don't know . . . but it haunts me every night. I can't go back to sleep afterwards . . ." she sighed.

"Is this-?"

"I can't do this!" she blurted.

"What?"

"I can't do this, I can't be like this!"

"What are you talking about?"

"I can't wake up every night thinking that you might be in mortal danger. I can't have that fear pulsing right beneath my skin everyday. I can't keep praying that today you'll come back to me in one piece. I can't keep thinking that someday our pups won't have a father. I can't do this."

"Sophie, I could die tomorrow-"

"Not helping," she sang.

"I mean, I could die of natural causes at any time. Life doesn't guarantee me any amount of time on this earth-"

"And you have a greater chance of an early grave because you're going to be the future Alpha! I don't know how your mom dealt with it, and I don't know how my dad did, but I can't do it. I'm not like them, and I . . . I just can't."

"Sophie, what are you saying?"

"I'm saying . . . I'm saying that I love you . . . but I can't . . . I can't do this."

"Can't do what?"

"I can't be with you. I can't be with you and feel these things, and love you and I can't keep waking up to your dead face on the ground. I told you once, I don't think I could ever recover if you broke my heart again . . . and I know I can't."

"I don't get it . . . you're breaking up with me for something I didn't do . . ."

"Luke, don't get mad-"

"Why shouldn't I get mad? My girlfriend is leaving me because someday I might die! Well guess what? You're going to die too! And I'm not freaking out about that!" he yelled, jumping from his seat.

"I'm not leaving you or breaking up with you . . . I'm just putting us on a break. I need us not to be together for awhile."

"What?"

Pushing her hair from her face, she looked away.

"I need to think. We can't be together until I know what I want . . ."

"But Sophie, I love you . . ."

"I love you too, but I'm confused, and I think its best if we just called it quits for awhile. I don't know if I can be with you . . . and I need to know what's causing these dreams."

"Sophie . . ."

"Luke, can you leave now? I've got to study before my shift at the diner tonight. Tomorrow is Art and English and I'm really having a rough time remembering the days in which Picasso cheated on all his girlfriends and the names of his like fifty-six children. But I'm having no problem remembering what year he got prostate cancer and had to get his little pee- pee cut off," she smirked thoughtfully.

"Yeah, I'll see you whenever," he sighed pushing his hair back, "bye." He groaned leaving.

~***~

"Sophia, see ya' later . . ." a little blonde girl smiled, waving her goodbye.

"Bye Brooke," she waved back, watching the little girl climb into her parents' car.

That was the last of them. It had been a month since the talk she had with Luke and hadn't seen hide nor hair of the guy. And here she sat on a deserted bus bench waiting for her chariot to carry her back home to Wolf Lake.

Ruffling around in her bag, she produced her CD player, complete with her Avril Lavigne CD. When Jamie had first bought it, she didn't want to listen to it, sure that all the news surrounding the girl was all hype. But after she'd listened to the CD a couple of hundred times, she realized that some things that this Canadian said was cool.

Turning on the player, she immediately skipped to her favorite song, Anything but Ordinary.

"Sometimes I get so weird, / I even freak myself out, / I laugh myself to sleep / It's my lullaby. / Sometimes I drive so fast, / Just to feel the danger, / I wanna' scream it makes me feel alive.

"Is it enough to love, / Is it enough to breathe, / Somebody rip my heart out, / And leave me here to bleed. / Is it enough to die, / Somebody save my life, / I'd rather be anything but ordinary please. . ."

Suddenly a loud honking noise disrupted her revere.

Looking up, she found herself face to face with none other than Sean. He was driving a large, cherry red corvette with chrome bumpers.

"Yo', Sophia."

"Yo' Sean," she countered, pushing her hair from her eyes.

"Need a ride?"

"No thanks, my knight in shining armor is scheduled to come in another, ten minutes."

"Well, the way you've been treating him, I don't think he's gunna' come back."

"Who are we talking about? Sam the bus driver or Luke?"

"Guess?" Sean asked, raising a brow.

"Sean, I really don't feel like getting into it with you. I get that you're his best friend, but it's my choice, and I don't need your help." She groaned.

"Turn off that damn Avril and get in."

"Wow, with an offer like that, how will I ever turn you down?" she replied sarcastically.

"Well, unless you want to stay here an extra hour, I'd get in. It seems your knight in shining armor needs a new transmission and the wait is an hour, so if you want to stay . . . "

"I think I'll stay," she answered, hoping he was lying.

"Sophia, get in the damn car," he demanded, finally loosing his cool.

"Why?"

"Because I actually want to talk to you. And you're making it really hard for me to stay civil."

"Why do you want to talk to me?"

"Because once upon a time, we could actually be civil to one another without withering stares. I feel nostalgic and I want to revert to that time."

"Ok," she groaned opening the front door and settling into her seat.

He shifted the car into drive and sped away.

"So, our civilized conversation . . ?"

"He misses you."

"I miss him back." She replied.

"Why did you break up with him?"

"I don't know," she groaned pushing her hair behind her ear.

"So you just broke up with him on a whim?"

"No, I broke up with him after freaking out. I kept dreaming about him dying, and I couldn't handle the fact that, hey, someday, he might just be. I freaked out. I was scared, am I not allowed to have human emotions now, either?"

"No, you're allowed to feel, in fact, our race strives most on instincts. But you could use more logic. Luke never wants to hurt you . . . so why in the hell would you hurt him?"

"God Sean, it's not like I was trying to hurt him. I love him with all my heart, but you know that sometimes, you aren't meant to be with the guy you fall in love with . . . and maybe I just need time to dwell over that statement. I love him, but I don't know if I can be with him."

"Sophia, do you have any idea how much he loves you?"

"I have an idea . . ." she drawled.

"Do you know that when you are in the process of Changing, there are ways to speed it up?"

"No?" she asked, looking up at his profile, just as they passed the Welcome to Wolf Lake sign.

"Well, there's a prophesy that says when you're Changing, you can do something in order to speed it up."

"Do what?"

"Well, the prophesy says, 'In the heat of passion, bones shall be crushed, hide shall be torn, body will shatter, and life will begin.'"

"I don't get it."

"Just ponder it," he smiled stopping at her house.

"Thanks for the ride," she whispered, her brows knit in concentration.

"Whatever," he answered.

TBC . . .

A/N: hey guys, I know this has taken some time, but I was on a roll today and last night and finally finished this, although I really don't think this is one of my better chapters. I hoped you guys liked it at least, seeing as it's you who have to read it. Please e-mail me and tell me what you think. I'd be very pleased to know.

ONE MORE CHAPPIE LEFT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

W/ luv, Yo-yo