Chapter 4 - Welcome
It was a feeling of superiority as I gazed out from the airplane window and watched as the world below me got smaller. For a moment I imagined how I could have saved the money by swimming the ocean in my wolf form. It couldn't be that far to Hawaii.
But, I thought, this would be going against what I was aiming at by this trip.
Seth had been home in time to escort me to the airport together with mum. Maybe she needed the support more than I did, what with her daughter leaving the house and flying off one fell swoop. It had come like a rush, truly.
I fell asleep after a while and missed a great deal of the flight. It was after dark when the plane landed. I stared out the window again. It was exciting and still kind of frightening to be here and to face this unknown task.
I stepped out onto solid ground and went through the whole post-landing-procedure in a daze.
When Rebecca came to pick me up, I all but fell into her arms with exhaustion.
She tugged me along with all my luggage. I must have dropped to sleep in her car, because I couldn't remember where I was when she shook me gently.
"Oh, Lee, let's get you to bed. I think you'll be better tomorrow." I perceived only a very small part of how she guided me out of the car and into the house. The next and last thing I felt before I crashed was being layed onto a soft mattress. For once, I slept dreamless.
I woke to the sound of children squealing and laughing, obviously running around all over the house. I still had my clothes on except for my shoes. I stood up and looked around me. The room was small, but in a tasteful design. Probably, this was where I would be staying, but I'd have to ask Rebecca for confirmation before I settled here. I turned to look out the window. It was on first floor and I could see forest as far as I could see. Well, that was perfect, in case...
I shuddered as it dawned upon me that in this society, failing to control my temper meant scaring people to death, maybe hurting them, and exposing our secret. Oh, great. That was the flaw I hadn't thought through. Now, I could only hope that this fear would be strong enough to avoid any tantrums.
The door creaked and I whirled around a bit too fast. Rebecca took an involuntary step back. "I didn't want to scare you, sorry.", she mumbled, being startled herself. I needed to control my human moves, too.
"This will be your room.", Becky explained. The restroom is down the hall, over there." She pointed to a place I couldn't see, being at the other side of the room. I walked over to her in a slow human pace.
"Okay." "I'll give you time to take a shower and all that. If you want, you can use our phone to call your mum and tell her you're alright. You can come for breakfast when you're ready. Just follow the scent of coffee, alright?" I nodded. Following scents was surely no problem.
The hot shower vitalized me and chased my worries out of my conscious mind. I figured I would have time later to unpack and ensconce myself in my new room.
I embraced Becky's offering and gave my mother a call. I'm here, I'm fine, I'll call you again. I miss you, too.
I found the kitchen easily, what with my wonderfully distinct werewolf senses.
As soon as I entered, two children leaped forward to greet me. One was a toddler girl, the other a boy of maybe five or six years. I hugged them in a friendly way and let them tow me toward the kitchen table, where Rebecca had taken a seat with a big mug of coffee. She smiled at me.
"I'm really glad you're here, Leah."
"Yes, me too.", I replied honestly and yawned.
"Jet Lag?", she asked.
"Maybe."
The boy tugged at my sleeve and hopped up and down impatiently.
Rebecca raised an eybrow at him. "Pili."
The boy stopped bouncing, but still looked at me in expectation.
"Leah's just arrived here. She's tired." It was true, but I shrugged anyway. I was used to being tired and still function.
The toddler girl had given up and crawled over to play in another corner of the room.
"I think I'd better lead you around the house so you'll get familiar with everything." I nodded. "First... let me introduce my kids to you – Pili-", she gestured toward the boy, "is the hawaiian transcription of 'Billy'." She smiled. And my little girl is Kaili."
The girl looked up at the sound of her name and smiled a dimpled grin at me. I smiled back. It seemed I'd been won over to her charme. "You will get to know my husband in the evening. He had to leave early this morning."
Rebecca rose from her chair and swiftly set the table. I tried to memorize where to find what in the kitchen as I watched her. "You ought to be hungry."
"I had breakfast already!", Pili exclaimed. "I've been up soo early, but you weren't awake yet and Mommy said I couldn't wake you, so I had to wait and wait until you finally woke up...", he babbled. Rebecca ruffled his hair playfully.
"Leah's gonna be here for a while. You don't have to use up your whole supply all for today."
He shrugged, unconcerned. "It's the weekend and I want to do so much today. Keni will come over tomorrow and we'll go to the forest and..."
"Hey, hey, hold it a second.", I smiled. "How about you wait and play for a while and when I'm done here, I'll come with you if you like?"
He nodded with a bright glint in his dark brown eyes. I sat down and had breakfast. I had a feeling I'd never be bored here with two children keeping me on my toes.
After breakfast, Rebecca took me on a tour through the house. Every room was furnished individually tasteful. I liked the open friendliness the rooms radiated and the big windows that let the sun lighten the room. It was quite a difference to the ever-rainy climate in La Push.
When Becky was through showing me the house, she started asking questions. How was it going, how was her father and her siblings, what was new?
I answered carefully, always minding the La Push secrets I was bound to keep. Billy and Jacob were fine, Rachel was at home at the moment to spend time with her newly found boyfriend. Rebecca had already heard of my father's death and of Sam's and Emily's wedding as well, which she brought up for some reason.
"So... Sam got married to Emily this summer?" She voiced the words hesitantly, eyeing me to see my reaction, hoping it would not upset me. I hoped the same.
"Yes.", I said and tried to repress the shaking. "Oh, Lee." She must have guessed by my expression that this was still chewing at me, ripping at my insides. She took me in her arms and I sobbed. At least, she seemed oblivious to my body temperature, or she just didn't comment on it.
I'd been bottling everything up for years, making my pack and my family suffer from the bitterness I emanated. I'd tried to make others suffer with me to ease my own pain, as Jacob had pointed it out.
It all broke free at this moment when I cried in Rebecca's embrace. I wasn't free to tell her everything, but enough of this was human drama that I could tell.
"It's still the same!", I cried. "I love him still, Becky. He's in my dreams, sometimes with Emily, sometimes he is mine... but when I wake, I know he ain't. He... doesn't love me anymore, but... even if I know there's no point, I...I just can't let him go."
She patted my back and stayed silent, waiting for me to choke out more of it. "Seeing him hurts so much... seeing him with Emily and knowing he doesn't belong to me... how all we had lost its value when he... saw her. I... I know he's happy and I wish he is, but it just hurts to know he's happy without me."
"My poor Lee... I can empathize how that hurts." I wasn't sure if she really could, if anyone could, but I didn't argue. Years ago, Jacob had had the same situation – "he – or she, in his case – is everything you want and everything you can't have", I'd told him.
For him, the scene had changed completely. But for me, it remained the same. I couldn't let go of Sam. And I very much doubted it had the same reason why he couldn't stay away from Bella when she was pregnant with the monster he'd imprinted on.
Wow. My head was private. I could insult vampires without being growled at. What an improvement.
That didn't change anything about the way I felt about Sam. He was still everything I wanted. The only other thing I wanted – since I knew, in theory, that I couldn't have him – was to forget about him and get rid of all this hurt.
Fresh tears came to my eyes and it was such a relief to have someone outside the mess who comforted me. She just kept rubbing my back and whispering almost unintelligible things to me – I suspected they were in Hawaiian language, that explained why even my good ears couldn't make out the words.
The flood of tears ebbed, eventually, and I wiped my eyes dry. "Sorry.", I mumbled. "You're welcome...", Becky whispered back. "I hope being here helps you get a new perspective on things. Maybe..." She trailed off and I was unsure whether I should ask her to go on, but then decided to drop it. "Yes. I hope so."
She changed the subject and told me about her work as a landscape designer. "That means a lot of travelling, you know. The accounting and all that I can do at home, but there's some practical work to do at the sites."
Landscape Designer. That explained the taste that was expressed in this house.
"My husband travels a lot, too. He's working at a Transportation Services Company." She sighed.
"I know it's bad for the kids to lack our company for so much time. But at the moment there's no other option. I'm really glad you'll be here for them." For a moment, she stared out the window as if she searched for something there. Then she turned back to me and smiled.
"Your hair is so short! Didn't you wear it much longer back when I've seen you the last time?"
Absently, she ran her fingers through my short hairstyle. "Oh. Well, it's just more convenient."
"Sure." With that, she turned and walked down the stairs. I wondered briefly if there was some sign I had missed in her suddenly hasty behaviour, but shoved the thought aside. Too much mythical stuff made me paranoid.