Little Mate

Your Shadow

Dzhan

By the time I am back home in my old room, the walls stripped of all my posters and drawings, my optimism is crushed to pieces. My fingers play mindlessly with the button of my jacket, my gaze locked straight ahead, and my jaw is clenched. I don’t know how to unclench it.

Mom asks me questions, trying to be helpful and supportive, her voice going a little squeaky with how awkward I made the entire drive home, but I couldn’t help it. I still can’t. My heart is beating faster then slower, then fast again and my breathing is coming rugged and strained. All the while my thoughts race with doubts and hope, and so much anger I can’t channel, not with Mom hanging at the door, looking all kinds of devastated.

“Okay, let me know if you need anything, alright?” She finally says, a small, unsure smile on her lips. I hate it, I hate that I am the reason for the sadness hidden behind her eyes, and I don’t know how to undo it. I never know when I get all worked up like this. Just like I was at the day of the accident. I just… sometimes it’s hard to think about anything else but the one thing in front of me, forgetting everything else until it’s too late.

“Sure,” I finally manage to say and turn my back on her.

She stays at the door for a few moments more, hesitating. Geneva Aslan is not a person who hesitates and the fact that my behaviour is making her fidget like this speaks volumes.

“If… uhm,” Mom clears her throat, her voice heavy with frustration, “if you need to talk, you know I am just a call away, right? We all are. If you don’t want to talk to me, you can talk to someone else. We are here for you.”

God, I feel like s*hit. She doesn’t deserve this, she doesn’t deserve my moods. I wish I could tell her what’s bothering me, but it’s the one thing I can’t share with her. Not when she’s made it more than clear she won’t ever accept my feelings for Roxanne. Not only is Roxanne older than me, she’s also somehow connected to Mom’s troubled past, and in a bad way. No one ever talks about it in front of me, but I am not stupid. I’ve caught bits and pieces, my ears strained every time Roxanne’s name has been mentioned, no matter how rare it has happened.

“I know…” I reply and turn to give Mom an apologetic smile, hoping like hell she’ll forgive me. “I am.. okay. Really. It’s fine.”

It’s not fine. Nothing’s fine, but I can’t tell her that. She doesn’t know who Roxanne is for me or why I got so frustrated all of a sudden on the way home. I remain silent until my silence makes Mom uncomfortable enough and just drop it and when she nods and finally, finally, leaves, I let out a sigh of relief.

My relief is only momentary though. I am always a ball of nerves, but now that ball has transformed into a ticking bomb and there are just seconds left before it detonates. I don’t know what to do with myself. I am not sure which is worse - the stale air, filled with the scent of lonely childhood nights and broken dreams, or that I have no choice but accept the truth and find a way not to freak everyone in the house out with my meltdown. Because I was wrong. Roxanne doesn’t want to be found. That’s not why she’s here. She’s not back in the valley for me and it kills me to admit it, but what other choice do I have?

On our way home I looked her up online. A quick check on the college website pulled up Roxanne’s official, professional, picture. I open the page again and her smile - perfect full lips, plush and dark pink, stretched into a polite smile to reveal a row of pearly white teeth - mocks me from my phone screen. D-r Delaney Richards, ethnology lecturer. A short introduction tells me all her achievements, specialisations, what she’s currently working on and what her aspirations are. Neat, impressive, intimidating. She’s smart and by the cocky smirk on her face, she knows it and isn’t afraid to show it.

A related article under her introduction makes my chest swell with emotions I can’t recognise yet. Pride. Jealousy. Anger? 'This year the world renounced PhD Delaney Richards will hold a series of lectures on the history of witchcraft, where she will dig deeper than ever in the origins of the occult, the social impact of superstitious beliefs in various modern societies and the shaping of world’s culture from the ancient world to modern times.’

A PhD. A f*ucking professor. She’s moved on, forgotten about me, about what happened. I was just a random kid she met on the worst day of her life, why would she remember me anyway? Yet, it’s all wrong. Her name’s not right. The sassy look in her deep green eyes is not right, the way she seems like she’s looking down on the entire world making my c*ock twitch in my pants, which is annoying as hell because… My Roxanne is soft and kind, and this one is… I huff in frustration, throwing my phone on the bed behind me. Is it possible it’s not even her? Breathing heavily, rage filling my chest, I reach back for my phone and stare again.

The woman in the picture looks like she’s in her mid thirties, too beautiful for her own good, the same exotic beauty Roxanne has greets me from the screen, but it’s filled with confidence and elegance I don’t recall from my childhood memories. The girl from my past was fragile, broken, in desperate need of someone’s protection. My protection. Does my c*ock get harder to full mast the longer I stare at her? Yes, it does. But only because that woman, Delaney, Del, looks like my mate. Some new, distorted version of the woman I have kept holly in my mind for so long, deep down I’d started to believe she was actually sacred.

It’s no secret I jerk off to the memory of her most of the time. I almost feel guilty now that I am hard also because of this strange, distorted version of hers.

Not doing anything about it, because even I am not that sick, I go to the desk and switch on my old computer. It takes some time to boot. When it does, I pull out the pictures I drew and digitalised before moving to campus in fear someone might find them. My obsession with Roxanne has always been a secret one and I am possessive over it to the point I don’t want other people’s eyes on her. She’s only mine, no one else’s, why would they even need to look at her? Maybe when I finally hunt her down I should grab her and lock her away so she stays mine forever. She’s got a lot of years of loneliness to pay for anyway.

A new wave of anger washes over me when my old sketches only prove what I don’t want to admit. I am not good at drawing, far from it, but I’ve managed to capture her image to perfection at this point, plus drawing her calms me down when I haven’t seen her for years. My sketches might not be the best, but they tell me the truth. There’s no mistake. The girl from my memories and the woman from the news article are one and the same. The only difference is that the real woman has grown, just like me. It’s been fifteen years. She goes by another name now. Delaney. It sounds weird to my lips and I don’t even try to say it. For me she’ll forever be Roxanne. I don’t know why she changed it, but when I go to her I will make sure she goes back to being Roxanne.

Searching her new name up brings a few too many hits. It’s not hard to dig up her social media and when I do… god, when I do… my heart skips a beat and I find myself struggling to breathe again, because it can’t be true, this can’t be happening. She can’t do this to me, not when I’ve stayed loyal to her my entire life, not letting anyone else to touch me, waiting for the one I’m destined to. Am I horny all the time? Of course I am. But do I go stick my d*ick in every random p*ussy that throws itself at me, which is a lot? No. I’m not a monster. I can’t even imagine someone else’s hands on me. And somehow, the romantic id*iot that I am, I made myself believe it was the same for her. But no. No, no, no… Nope. Delaney Richards is engaged to be married in a few months to a man named Xander Ellis, CEO and founder of Ellis Incorporated, which so happens to be the largest construction holding in the area. So, that’s why she’s back. Not because of me, her mate, her rightful man, but because her fiancé, her f*ucking human rich as s*hit fiancé, is local. What the f*uck, Roxanne?

I kick my chair back and jump to my feet, not caring when it falls back with a bang, the sound rattling through the now empty walls of my room. My vision is blurred and my heart is going into overdrive. The wolf in me howls with pain and rage, needing like hell to be let free to find and steal our mate and never let her see the light of day again. It’s a struggle to contain him and a part of me wonders why I even bother. Isn’t that what she wants? She found herself a rich and powerful human with a pretty face and muscles for days. I am rich and powerful and people say I am not particularly ugly. I possess things that measly human will never have. Like my wolf, like my alpha blood which makes even my aunt and uncles look at me warily every time I am around.

God, Roxanne, how could you do this to me? I can’t breathe, I am f*ucking suffocating. Memories of the day I met her, of the way she defended me and the things that man almost did to her, come crushing down on me with new force, one I haven’t faced before. It makes me fall to my knees, my chest heaving as I struggle to keep my mind on the surface, my body in control. I can’t though. I fail like I fail at everything… I close my eyes, squeezing them shut actually. Come on, Dzhan, you stupid f*ucker, keep it together! Don’t let your crazy out! Get back up, you little s*hit! You can fix it!

My inner voice somehow manages to make me get back to my feet. It’s a fight to unclench my fists from my midsection, but I have to do it. Calm down. Breathe. I’ve got this. Maybe she didn’t know. My sweet Roxanne, she couldn’t know we were fated mates. I was only seven when she met me and even I didn’t know who she was for me until I turned eighteen and my wolf spirit awoke. If she knew she’d never go to that human. Maybe she changed her name so that the people who kidnapped us wouldn’t find her because… maybe she doesn’t know they are all dead now? Yeah. That’s it. See? I am not crazy and she just didn’t know. Next week, when I am back to campus, I will find her. No, why wait for next week? I can find her even now, right? It’s easy to track down her address. I just have to keep my hands tied and not let myself strangle her human because then I will go in a whole lot of trouble with the shifter king, who so happens to be the town’s mayor as well as my uncle, so that’s a no to the big mess it all might create.

Instead, I text my buddy Coda, asking for that favour he owes me for saving his a*ss from some bullies ages ago. Roxanne’s new address and the debt is paid, a fair deal. Coda’s a witch, who also happens to be really good with hacking, so it’s no big deal for him to do it, and god knows he doesn’t have the morals to stop him. It actually takes him less than a minute to do it, and Roxanne’s address pops up on my screen.

A large, smile, one that might be just a little crazy, stretches my lips. Tonight, the hunt for my mate officially begins.