Eternity

by M.E. Timmons

  Chapter 26

  I had no trouble sneaking into Adrian's room the next night at seven o'clock, as planned. I saw him and a teacher I didn't recognize in the kitchen when I walked by. The teacher wasn't looking in my direction when I passed, but Adrian was, and he winked at me.

  I let myself into his room and hid in the bathroom. I put the bag I'd brought with me down on the floor. I thought it might be nice to actually have some things with me, like a toothbrush. I'd also told Heather that I would be gone so she wouldn't worry, though I didn't tell her where I was going no matter how many times she asked. I would have thought she'd have given up after the tenth time.

  I heard the door open a few minutes later, and Adrian came in. He immediately locked the door and turned on his mp3 player, and I came out of the bathroom and jumped into his arms.

  "Should I feel safe?" I joked after kissing him. "The door is locked and you have music playing loudly. If I was in trouble, I doubt that anyone would hear me scream."

  "Of course you aren't safe," Adrian said, smiling. "You're in here with me."

  We kissed some more before sitting down on the beds. We just sat there and talked for awhile, mostly about the past. Adrian told me what it was like growing up as part of a pack.

  "There wasn't much privacy," he told me. "Everyone knew everything that was happening to everyone else. Relationships and marriage were always a big deal because of breeding, and there were a lot of rules about marrying. We weren't really allowed to marry people who weren't like us, though people did sometimes anyway. Usually when that happened they would be kicked out of the pack and forced to move to a new territory. People were allowed to marry werewolves from other packs, but only if they had permission from both pack leaders. My dad used to always tell me that I would get married some day and have kids like everyone else, but it wasn't really a priority for me. There weren't any girls in my pack I liked, and when I came here I didn't meet any wolves I liked. I found you instead. My dad would have been furious if he was still alive, but my mom stopped caring what I did a long time ago."

  "Could you really get kicked out for loving someone who isn't a werewolf?" I asked.

  "Yes, if they knew about it. There's only one other person here who's from my pack though, and he won't talk. He does far worse things than I do as far as pack law goes."

  "What would you do if you were kicked out?"

  "Probably nothing different. I was never really into pack stuff anyway. They're more like family than anything else, but distant family. I'm not close enough to anyone there to really care about leaving. The only problem would be losing the protection of the pack. If I ever stumbled into the territory of any pack, even the one I belong to now, I would be vulnerable."

  "How many packs are there?"

  "I think there are about fifty in the whole world. Most of them are in Europe, and there are quite a few in the U.S. and Canada, but there aren't many anywhere else. Werewolves originated in Eastern Europe, so most of us are Caucasian, though there have been a few other races that have been bred in. Still, we tend to go where we'll fit in, and to places with plenty of forest."

  Everything he was telling me seemed so different from the way I had grown up, and also the way Jack grew up. He never had a pack, so he never had anyone to support him through the transition and explain what was happening, and he never had the same level of protection that Adrian had. It was probably a good thing he never moved somewhere else because he could have ended up in pack territory, and that wouldn't have been good.

  After I learned all about what it was like growing up in a pack, Adrian wanted to know what it was like growing up in an orphanage.

  "Well, it was weird," I said. "We probably had less privacy than you did because we all lived together. I lived there for most of my life, but it was never really home because I had nothing that actually belonged to me, and there were always people coming and going. There was no peace because there were always people around, and not all of them were good. You get used to it, but it's hard to enjoy it."

  "Why were you never adopted?" Adrian wanted to know.

  "Most of the kids ended up in foster homes before they were ever adopted. People want babies, not grown kids. There were babies there, but they didn't tend to stay long. Jack was an exception, though. He was dropped off there as a baby but he was never even in a foster home. I was never in a foster home either, even though my parents died when I was three. I don't think it was because there was anything wrong with us. We both had a few interviews over the years, but we just weren't what they were looking for. It happens sometimes."

  "Maybe they could tell you were different," Adrian suggested. "Were there any other people with special abilities in the place?"

  "No, there never were. It was just the two of us who were different, although Jack never even knew until we were coming here."

  "Do you remember your parents at all?"

  "Yeah. I remember them well because I have a good memory. I got my hair from my mother and my eyes from my father. They were young, but they loved each other and they cared for me as well as they could. They died in a car accident coming home from a movie, and I was with a babysitter at the time. I still remember when the police came to the door, and when social services took me away. I had no other family, so they put me in Pembrook, thinking it would only be temporary, but of course it wasn't."

  We continued to talk for awhile until the teacher outside knocked to tell Adrian to get to bed, since the music was still playing loudly to drown out the sounds of our conversation. He had to turn it off, and we had to be really quiet. Adrian went into the bathroom to get ready for bed, and when he was finished I did the same.

  Like last week, we decided to share a bed. I liked it better because I felt closer to Adrian, and it was comforting. I liked being in his arms even if we weren't doing anything other than sleeping, though that night neither of us were particularly eager to get to sleep.

  We started out just kissing, but our kisses got deeper, and I lost track of everything else. When Adrian started taking my clothes off, I didn't do anything to stop him. Actually, I helped him, and I helped him get his off as well. I felt shy for only a moment. We had seen enough of each other before anyway, though it was different when we were that close.

  I ended up losing my virginity that night. It hurt for a moment, but that moment passed, and after that it was wonderful. I loved him, and being with him like that felt right to me because I felt more connected with him than ever. When we were lying in each other's arms afterwards, he told me that he loved me for the first time, and he meant it.