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Chapter 2 - Odd Feelings

The sun was shining through the windows, hitting me right in the face. I didn’t open my eyes. Instead, I just let the sun warm me, trying to shake the shivery feeling from the dream i just had. I need to call my mom, need to hear her voice, her annoying but lively chatter about what happened in the past week.

I reach for my nightstand and find my phone, pressing the home button, “Call mom,” I say and soon I hear the soothing voice on the other side.

“ Morning sweetie! You’re up early today!”

I can feel the lump in my throat and try to swallow it down.

“ Hun, is everything ok?” my mother asks when I say nothing.

I take a deep, kind of shaky breath and answer her.

“ Yeah mom, im fine, just needed to hear your voice”

“ Bad dreams again?” she wondered

“ Kind of, it was a weird one, made no sense,” I say, finally open my eyes and start shoveling out of my bed.

“Dreams seldom do at first. Do you want to tell me about it?” she asks.

Do I? What will I say? “We lived in a cave and this gorgeous hunk killed you. With his teeth, drank you dry actually”

“Nah, it’s ok, it’s fading anyway, can’t really remember much,” I answer, knowing my mother can spend hours interpreting dreams if I tell her the smallest detail.

It started when I was a child, maybe at the age of three. I had these periods of nightmares, not the usual ones about monsters under the bed or killingclowns at the tivoli. No, mine were of a mutch more bloody nature, people being ripped apart, limb by limb, beasts in the dark and nature itself turning on our human race. Sometimes i couldn’t tell where the dream ended and my real life began. My mother often took time of from work to stay home when I had a bad night, convincing me it was all just a dream.

For four years, my mother was trying to get me help and I could se how it ate at her. For every doctor that wanted to give me a new type of drug, or talk to me more about my father leaving us, she got more defeated. She bought all the books on dream interpretation she could get her hands on, with a mission to fix me. So I started to hide or lie about my dreams. Telling her bits and pieces and always kept quiet about the worst until one day I said they were gone, replaced with dreams of cute boys and love stories. And soon, they really were.

“Thats good sweetie..But Hope, you would tell me, right? If the nightmares came back?” The worried voice of my mother sent a ping to my heart.

“ Of course mom, but dont worry, it wasn’t a nightmare, just a weird one” I lied.

“ I really got to go, haven’t had my morning pee yet,” I chuckled, knowing that would end the conversation.

“Ok, you better get to it then. See you on Sunday?” she asked.

“Ill be there!” I said ending the call before i rushed into the bathroom. It wasn’t a lie, my bladder was really about to burst.

Today was my day of from work. After dosing off for a couple of hours, my first idea was to stay at home, in bed, watching Netflix and stuffing my face with strong coffee, sandwiches, chips, and ice cream. But the lingering feeling of being trapped in a cave made me crave fresh air. I was considering sending Maya a text. Maybe we could hang out, but I crossed it out, even thou Maya was a breath of fresh air most of the time, she takes a lot of energy and I was feeling, right now, I needed that energy for myself.

I opened my closet, and sigh as I looked at the piles of clothes. Maybe I should spend the day organizing this mess? I postponed..again..

I put on a black tank top , a pair of jeans and my white converse. I grabbed my jeans jacket and my shoulder bag and left my apartment.

The air outside felt clean after the heavy rain the night before. The sun was warm but not hot. I took a few deep breaths and decided it was indeed a beautiful day.

After a short walk, I ended up at the Town Zoo. I love it here. I actually prefer animals to people because there is no need to talk.

My stroll took me past the seals and dolphins, thru the reptile house. I stopped at the children’s pettingzoo to cuddle with the bunnies. I love the smell of bunnies! Then there was the area with the big cats, don’t care much for them, I admit. I find them lazy and arrogant and if I was an animal, I wouldn’t trust them. Lots of backstabbings vibes going on there. I ended up in the same spot as always. At the far end of the park, at the wolves. They are a solid pack of 8 wolves and they are the only therapy I need. I lock eyes with the Alpha female and I feel a smile form on my face. “Go on, call them,” I whisper to her as if I really believe she can hear and understand me. She tilts her head back and a low howl erupts from her throat and I let out a giggle. It doesn’t take long before the rest of the pack comes running. The Alpha male stops at his female, snuggling his nose in the fur of her neck before coming forward to me. The Alpha female stays at her spot, watching.

I slide down on the grass in front of them, just separated by the fence in their enclosure, and I put my hand in my bag. Seven pairs of ears perked up, seven pairs of eyes follow my every move and seven wet tongues licking their snouts.

“I know what you want, you goofy dogs,” I laugh while I pull up a bag of dried meat from my bag. I turn to the Alpha first.

“Now you know the deal, you go give your lady first.” I say and give him the piece of meat between the tight bars of the fence. I watch as he jogs over and puts the meat in front of her before coming back to me. “Good boy! You are such a gentleman” I praise him and give him his own piece of delicacy. I then pay my attention to each of the six remaining wolves before I lean to the fence and just relaxed for a while. The furry seven on the other side did the same.

“I really wish you could understand me. It would be nice to have someone that I could talk to. I dont care much about talking to people, never been good at it” I turned to the Alpha male. He was resting his head on his big paws, looking back at me. “Oh well, maybe we can train on that next time, huh?” I chuckled before standing up.

The Alpha female mirrored me before again tilting her head and calling her pack.

They all ran off, following her, but before he disappeared, the Alpha male turned around and gave me a strong howl that went right into my soul and then he was gone. My legs shook, and I grabbed the fence to steady myself. What was that? It wasn’t a threat, or an act of dominance. It felt more like a pat on the back. More like; “You go girl” “I feel you” “Hang in there”.

“God Hope, it must be really bad if you hope for encouragement from a wolf.” I whisper’d to myself, shaking my head and a silent chuckle left my lips.

Instead of going back home, my legs took me to the parkour park a few blocks from my apartment. It’s an extensive park, not only for parkour, there is a coffee stand with a few tables and chairs, areas for picnics, frisbee games, a small dog park and of course George the ice cream man with his waggon of cold, heavenly treats. Usually I come here from time to time to train myself, but today I am only a spectator. I ordered a medium caffe mocha and sat down at a table facing the park. The teenagers who normally invaded this part were probably in school, but it was a few, maybe in my age, training their skills. I sipped on the bittersweet liquid as I watched the jumps, swings and slides before me. I could feel my muscles twitch a little, yearning to join in.

“Skipping training today”? I hear a male voice coming up behind me.

Jesse took a seat in the chair beside me. Red hair, blue eyes and freckles cover his skin. He smiled his white, charming smile.

“Nope, its my day off so I just came for the coffee” I answered smiling back.

“Keep telling yourself that” Jesse winked at me while pulling his shirt of, flexing his muscles. “I’m pretty sure you came for the view,” he continued, wiggling his eyebrows.

“Yeah, you wish!” I answer, feeling a little blush on my face and a little warmer than normal.

He laughed out loud before he stood up, ruffled my hair and took off.

I smiled to myself and took another sip from my cup.

He’s not wrong though, I like watching him train. Not like a smitten girl impressed with his good..no exceptional bodily physiques, but his speed, flexibility and strength often blew me away. It’s like he’s not human. Like he stepped out from an avengers or gladiator movie. When I saw him in the air sometimes, it was like he defied the law of gravity. Today was one of those days. His body, shining with sweat was twisting, turning, landing, leaving and flying like it was ment for nothing else. From balancing on slim surfaces to landing on another, way to far away, it was like a dance with nature and

I felt my breathing getting faster, my skin warmer and I licked my lips, a bit out of focus..what the fuck?…I never react to Jesse this way..

“Are you sure you dont want to join?” He called after a while. I just shook my head and waved for him to continue, glad he war to far away to se my flustred face.

I train with him sometimes, and maybe if he sent me a text telling me he would be here, I could have worn better clothes and joined him.

I check my phone.

One new message…

From Jesse: Training today, wanna join?.

Oups, totally missed that one.

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