You know I can see and feel what’s in your heart too.
I didn’t go into the cabin when I arrived, but wandered through the woods, noting a rabbit’s burrow and the squirrels leaping along the branches. Birds twittered, and I hated how happy they sounded and wished they’d shut their beaks.
Let me take my fur and you’ll feel better.
My bear wanted to head to the lake and grab a few fish.
With no urgent tasks, I removed my clothes and shifted. My beast was right in that not being in my human head made me less irritable, but it also gave me more time to think.
My mind went to Asher who’d mated a human scientist. They’d almost come to blows because of their different agenda, but they were fated and now had a baby. Asher was a polar bear shifter as I was. Perhaps I wasn’t destined to be with a shifter.
A human?My bear interrupted his fishing expedition.Why?
It’d worked out well for Asher despite their differences. The problem with humans was we had to alter their world view and not all of them could cope with what they deemed a fantasy world. If I fell in love with someone and they rejected me because I could get furry, I doubted I’d recover.
With enough fish in my beast’s belly, I took my skin and returned to the cabin. As I opened the door, I tried to see it from a potential mate’s point of view. There were two bedrooms and only one bathroom. From reading blogs and social media posts, I’d discovered many city-dwelling humans and shifters preferred a bathroom to themselves. I didn’t understand why because it wasn’t as though mates would be using it at the same time, unless they were showering together.
The main room was well-worn, with threadbare rugs and faded curtains, but those were easy fixes. The sofa springs sagged and there was a dip in the middle, but I could pick up another secondhand one easily.
I’d built the fireplace myself from local stone, something I was proud of. I was a builder by trade and working with my hands took my mind off how lonely I was.
The kitchen had no hot water which didn’t bother me. Even when I wasn’t in my fur, I could tolerate much colder temperatures than other shifters and humans.
I’d need a new mattress because that was in a worse state than the sofa. But new bedding to pretty up the bed and maybe a second lamp on the other nightstand would improve the esthetics.
I kept the place clean and I wasn’t a fan of clutter, so no potential mate could label me a hoarder. But as I slipped onto the old sofa, I knew I was kidding myself, imagining bringing a mate here. Who would want to live out here with me gone to work most days? A shifter could keep themselves busy exploring the woods, but a human? I didn’t see it happening.
My fate was to live out my life here and die alone.
I refuse to allow that to happen, my beast told me.
But if my bear thought he could wrest control and find me a mate, he was living not just in my head but in la-la land.
2
FORD
Today was the day. I was doing this, leaving the flight that didn’t want me and not looking back.
I walked through my small apartment, checking the cabinets, the closet, and the medicine cabinet, making sure I didn’t leave anything important behind. The furniture was either staying with the new tenant or had already been sold, and I was down to the boxes in my vehicle and the suitcase by my side.
I expected to wake up this morning excited, happy, and thrilled that I was going to have a fresh start in a new town with a new job. No one would be looking down on me because I wasn’t “dragon enough” because of my omega father being human. And I was. But also, my nerves were taking over.
As harsh as this place had been to me, it was what I knew. Who knew what Bramble Woods would be like? Maybe it would be worse there. Maybe the humans would find me not human enough. Maybe they’d think I talked funny. Maybe the job would suck. But I knew one thing, I didn’t belong here. And for the one year of my contract, I could do anything.
I finished the rest of my coffee, washed the mug, and put it in the final unsealed box. It was instant coffee which made me chuckle. The mug had originally belonged to my human omega father, and he would’ve given me a lecture on how instant coffee wasn’t real coffee. A lecture I’d have earned. The stuff wasn’t good, but I didn’t want to deal with packing the coffee maker. I had a packet of the stuff that came in a work gift a very long time ago. I couldn’t remember how old it was, but it was freeze-dried, so did it really matter?
I was about to leave when my phone started ringing. My gut was to just leave it alone and ignore it. This was my day to leave, to start again. Nothing could be more important than that. But when I pulled it out, it was Jared, a flight mate and the closest thing I had to a friend.
He looked down on me but pretended not to. In some ways, that was worse, but at least I had someone to sit beside in classes and most recently at my job.
“Yes, Jared?”
“I wanted to say goodbye.”
“Oh, well… goodbye.” This was awkward. We didn’t have the kind of relationship that would last past me driving out of the city, and that somehow made it weird.
But then he asked me a question about work, and I realized it had nothing to do with him missing me. The call was just his way to get the answers he needed. Which was fine, but honestly, I’d rather have had him lead with that.
