I squashed the curious child within me, suffocating her very existence, and began to live in this shadow of his. I became the background of the unseen, and that’s how it had to be. How it had to stay for us all to live happily.
Every night mom would come in and brush my hair, when she’d ask how my day had been and I would tell her about Eziah’s day, pretending it was mine when I was actually just the observer of him or the characters in my book.
She would happily listen, and often I saw the relief in her eyes when I told her something Eziah’s friends did or what we did together. I knew that relief was because she was always worried about me. But I’d keep this up, so she would never have to worry about me ever again.
The video clip plays out, and I hear a person’s voice who is not in the frame. My heart skips a beat. That voice feels familiar, oddly familiar, yet louder. I don’t understand it, but I know that voice. That voice would speak to me at night when I was a child. Sometimes, I could hear that voice like a whisper behind my ear, yet softer. When I was down, crying into my pillow, that voice was often my only comfort.
“Whose voice was that?” I ask Jonah.
“His name was Dominic Octavian; he was Kyan’s father,” Jonah tells me before kissing my hair. I nod against his chest, knowing I must be mistaken then, and the clip ends.
He looks down at me, kissing my forehead once again before he begins to go through some old photos. There are loads, one of me, asleep on Kyan’s chest in their living room. He shows me so many pictures, and I was getting older with each one.
“Is that Kyan?” I ask when Jonah suddenly starts scrolling, but I snatch the phone from him.
I go back to the photo that caught my attention. I would have been about seven, and Kyan was on a dirt bike, maybe around sixteen. I recognize the area again. It is the training grounds at Uncle Andrei’s pack. Sitting on the bike in front of him – it’s me, yet I have no memory of this, but I have no doubt it is me.
“Why don’t I remember this?” I know I wouldn’t remember the baby photos, but here in this one, I am old enough to remember this. It’s strange because I remember everything from around this time. When he doesn’t reply, I look up at him sharply.
“Jonah?” Jonah’s teeth are clenched, and his body tense. I realize he’s avoiding looking me in the eye. “Jonah?” I demand, sitting up and staring down at the picture on the phone. “Why do I not remember this?”
Jonah shakes his head, quickly taking the phone from my hand and locking it. “You will have to ask Kyan about that. These are some of the things that I can’t answer. Not because I don’t want to, but because I just can’t. That is something that Kyan will have to tell you. But now you see. Now you see for yourself that he doesn’t hate you, Mara. He loves you, he always has, just as I always have,” Jonah says softly.
His eyes fill with emotion and my heart thuds harder at his words. I’m unable to look away from the intense gaze, he has me locked in. I’m unable to escape the emotions that I too feel for him. “I’ve always loved you Mara,” Jonah whispers.
Marabella
My brain seems to sputter at his words; I must have heard that wrong or understood it wrong. I blink, staring dumbfounded at his words. What do I say to that when I have a mate? Jonah has a mate out there, somewhere.
As much as I want for his words to be true, I know once he finds his mate, I will be tossed aside. Like I always am. The unseen. I feel my emotions become a storm and comb my fingers through my hair, trying not to look directly into his gorgeous eyes.
Suddenly the thought of being invisible to Jonah makes my chest squeeze uncomfortably. I wish that he could be my mate. Things would be so much simpler. Why couldn’t I have one thing go right? Yet what we want and what we get are usually two different things.
Jonah isn’t mine, no matter how much I wish he could be. No matter how many times I prayed to find him as my mate. Despite everything I ever wanted and dreamed of, nothing changes the fact that he isn’t mine. Jonah doesn’t belong to me. And never will.
Being with Jonah would be easy, and natural, but it still screams the same thing in my head. He isn’t mine, and I couldn’t take someone else’s mate, could I?
Because inevitably, he will find his mate one day, and I don’t think I will be able to handle it. Plus, would he really go against his best friend like that? Sure Kyan doesn’t want me, no matter how much he apparently loves me, but I know if I give my all to Jonah, in the end, I will be the one left broken.
“Mara?” Jonah calls, his voice sounds thicker and huskier as he reaches for me, and I can see his uncertainty.
Is that because of me? Is he suddenly regretting his words, realizing he shouldn’t have said them because he can’t possibly have meant them? Yeah, probably. It has to be a mistake.
“I should go,” I whisper, and he reaches for me again, but I climb off the bed quickly, my stomach a mess of knots. I need fresh air.
“Mara, please, you can’t leave. Wait!” I rush out of his room and head for the spare room. As I pass the kitchen counter, I spot my phone and quickly snatch it off the bench before locking myself in the room.
It will never work. I have a mate, and Jonah is yet to find his, but he will, and where will that leave me? With an angry Kyan, well more irate because he already hates me and I don’t need to give him more reason to by betraying him for his best friend.
My life has become my own personal living hell. I lean against the door, closing my eyes as I exhale slowly.
“Mara, open the door,” Jonah pleads. Why does he have to make this so much harder?
“Just leave me alone Jonah, please… Just go…”
For a moment, he doesn’t respond, and I hear him sigh. “I’m sorry Mara, please open the door?” His voice is softer now, and I can tell he is struggling, too.