Omega Cabin

The full moon was close. It was around a week away, and I was pretty sure that everyone in Arcadia was feeling it. Not me They were about to go into the initiation into the pack and were already picking mates. Me, I wasn't. I was always looking around without any hope, wishing to be found. But year after year, I was skipped. Year after year I ...

You know what, let's forget it.

As the sun approached the horizon, I walked to the window and looked outside into the compound. Two campfires were lit. One for the elders, the fire for storytelling, and just good old innocent fun. Then there was the other campfire, the one where the youth came to have fun, spread rumors, and everything. A few yards from it was the lake. There, everyone with a mate once chilled. Without a mate, you can't touch its waters, unless you are old enough to swim alone. Like me.

Then eerily looking at it all was the Omega house on its left. The house I am supposed to be living in, but there was no way in hell I was going to. On the right was the complete polar opposite of the Omega house, the Beta house. Full of life and inviting, not like the Omega house, that spooked. But I would admit, the Omega house held its own mysterious pull. But not enough to attract, it spooked.

The pack was crowded around both fires and I honestly knew that stories were being told. Once in a while, I could hear laughter and I felt my heart churn with desire at the sound of it all. I wanted to join them. Felt like joining them, but the knowledge that I might not be like them was disheartening.

I wanted to hear the pack stories, but as the prodigal Omega, I couldn't. Plus, I wasn't just an omega, I was truly a lone wolf. Maybe I wasn't one, which I why I couldn't hear any of them. I mean, this was the pack I was born into. True. But I was almost twenty-four, which meant by this time I should be able to turn at will. But I couldn't. I haven't even had my first transformation yet. Thanks to somebody!

I stared at them. But even as I tried to listen my ears couldn't pick even a single word from the nearest fire. I skipped around the room took a hoodie and walked downstairs to the campfires. At first, I know I joined the elders and tried to listen to their stories from the old times, but I quickly felt out of place. Especially with eyes trained on me, and being the only one in their twenties around thirteen-year-olds and well hundred-year-olds?

I walked to the other campfire to maybe hear what was new and maybe or not keep my eyes on Kevin, phew! man, that guy is hot! He was eye candy. But he was taken, by Mitchell. Which made me feel rather sad. But hey... she is a catch, for Michael's twin sister.

But I definitely don't know how I ended up here. In front of the most forbidden cabin of all in the pack compound. The spookiest cabin in the entire pack compound. The cabin of the last Omega here. The Omega house.

From what I heard, the omega, his wife, and kid, all died a few months after I was born, and the house was put on total lockdown, never to be opened again.

But here I was, desiring to go in there. To search for something. But the fear of the omega's blood that stained it was repelling.

"Wanna go in?" Carey said appearing next to me.

"No," I said quickly and turned to move away. She pulled my hand and held it. Her hand felt warm, reassuring. She smiled sadly and pulled me close, preventing me from going away.

"You know," She said looking at the cabin with the saddest eyes I've ever seen her with ever since she walked me out of that closet five years ago. "They were a lovely bunch. The kindest people in this pack. They were helpful and... if you ever needed a thing. Or felt afraid of anything, they were the ones you could turn to."

She smiled sadly and I felt her sadness ripping right through me. Her smile in itself couldn't conceal the pain she felt at losing the Omegas.

Something inside of me urged me to know more. To know why the cabin had white flowers all year round all around it. I finally knew the answer to why everyone six years older than me, shed tears when they came to this place. But why some ran with fear upon coming to close proximity to this place was still unanswered. Or why I occasionally came upset-minded to this place. I wanted to know but I was afraid.

She turned to face me and I quickly bowed my head. I was an Omega, looking at the future lunar and the present-day top huntress wasn't something I could do. She chuckled and held me even closer to her. Hugged me if all is well.

"You know, I'm not gonna eat you." She said looking rather amused amiss the sadness she felt. "you can say what is on your mind. they wouldn't like it if you just kept it to yourself. Neither do I like it, I just want you to feel at home. the same way they made everyone home."

"where they..." the question I had on my head vanished. maybe I was just afraid to ask it.

"That kind?" she filled in my question though I'm sure that it wasn't the question I wanted to ask. "Yeah, when your mom gave birth to you, they used to fight over who was to babysit you. Most things you had when you were young were from them. There was a time when you thought of them as your parents instead of your actual parents. Maybe it's why even now you use the name, Allison, instead of Ramsey."

Ramsey? Thoughts started spinning. I've heard of that name. My mother in her sleep used to cry out that name. Used to beg for that Ramsey to be saved in her dreams. I hated that name. Always jealous of it. It always felt like whoever Ramsey was, had my mother's heart. Not me. I still remembered my mother's last prayer, not to the moon goddess but to the Guardian God, whoever he was to protect Ramsey, not me. But it was me all along?

It was me? I felt a sob form at the back of my throat and swallowed it. I wiped the tears I had in my eyes already and looked at Carey.

She smiled at some memory and stole a look at me once more before chuckling. "Allison. Noble one. That's what they named you. Or was it honest, or some glorified word in the odd language they spoke sometimes in? Was it 'light'? I kind of forgot but I know that they took one look at you and that is what they agreed on. Mine was Carty."

My face had moved from warm to hot and tears had built on my face once more as I heard her voice crack. It hurt me to see her in pain. Even though I had my own pain, hers was everything to me.

I mean I loved her. Respected her and I was eternally grateful for her saving me. And to see her hurt, hurt me way more, especially with her pretending not to be hurt. I can pretend, she can't.

I hugged her and buried my face in her hair. "I'm sorry, i..." My voice almost cracked.

'It's okay,' I whispered back. She held me tighter and for the first time in weeks, I felt a bit safer. The nudging in my chest grew easier. I remembered my mother, as weak as she got after my dad passed away, each day withering but holding herself on just to see me grow a little bit old. I remembered the nights she cried holding my father's photos. I tried to comfort her but she was inconsolable. I remembered her and Ruby hiding me inside the closet just to protect me and seeing her torn apart through the cracks of the closet by that black thing.

And I missed them. Terribly. Missed them so much it hurt.

"Carey," I whispered, "thank you for being there for me."

"I... " She locked eyes with me and even in the twilight, I saw concealed pain beneath her teary eyes and love too. The pain I've seen way too many times in her eyes. The pain looked deeper than she was letting on. "It's what a lunar does." She said confidently, trying to make her eyes gleam.

"It's okay." It's what you are supposed to say, maybe, 'it's no sweat.' Or something along those lines." I said without breaking the hug.

"Oh, look at you learning how to speak," she said caressing my hair before breaking the hug and walking off.

Sometimes, I wondered what she would be like if she wasn't a tomboy and always trying to be cool no matter the situation. How beautiful she would look if she wore her hair long, not two inches like an American marine? Or when she actually wore a dress and makeup. Not khaki shorts and T-shirts, or hoods like she did. Or wearing jeans that weren't oversize.

True, I loved her freckles. Her brown hazel eyes and cute dimples showed every time she smiled, but I felt like she could try to be even more beautiful to her mate, Nate; the future Alpha.

So says the person without a mate.

I started to follow her but I felt my heart tug, and my eyes trained on me. I turned in the direction I felt the eyes from, but I couldn't see a thing, except for trees. Must be the border watchers. I thought.

I turned to go but my heart felt uneasy. I wasn't scared, or afraid. I knew those emotions way too well. It was tugging and like it had wings, it wanted to fly off in the direction of whoever was staring at me.

I took a breath and I caught it. The scent of moist earth. The smell of garden soil. Black garden soil. I think. At a whiff of it, my heart leaped. Even though the scent was but a pinch in the air, the faintest of all traces, it drove me nuts. It made me feel oddly warm within and safe, angry, and mad and it made my heart dance. It made my heartache. It made me think of Mr. Ruffy. My favorite pale brown stuffed rabbit I had when I was young that I never washed.

It made me miss him. It smelled like him, even though it was only a flyspeck before somebody washed him and he started smelling like washing powder.

I wanted to walk toward the source of the scent. I died to have that scent right on my face. I died to be shrouded by that scent.

Slowly I walked towards the forest. The scent was still a flyspeck. But as I got a step closer and closer to the edge of the forest, my stomach screamed. I grew worried, not for me but for him. My anger grew searingly hot and I knew whether he was hurt or not, I was going to kill him. Whether I missed and loved him, I was going to tear him apart like a loincloth. I knew if I was going to catch him, I was going to punish him for all the pain I have felt.

I felt my body become hot. Like something inside of me was boiling. I felt a hot wave form over my back and my spine ached along its length.

The wind changed direction and I lost the scent. The only thing I could pick up was green plants. I stopped as my heart broke. The warmth I had within me, dissipated. The funny, yet nice and rejuvenating feeling in my stomach dissipated too. My heart that was racing became calm again, and besides feeling abandoned and let go, became nothing but empty. Sad.

"Hey, ain't you coming?"

"What?"

"Aren't you coming?"

"Oh, I'll be there."