YOU STEPPED OUT OF A DREAM

17 FEBRUARY, WEDNESDAY, FINALLY DINNER TIME

I followed Savy down to the main family house, and was quite surprised to find my family waiting in the living room. Wow, Dad was serious about not eating till I showed up.

I would be lying if I said I wasn't nervous. If Savy wasn't holding my sweaty hand AND if Savy didn't drag me right into the living room, I'd have chickened out and ran back upstairs. I really wasn't ready for this!

But I panicked for nothing. Mate was no longer there.

Yeah, I know right.

After I let Savy do my hair and all.

I knew the moment I stepped into the living room. His scent was still lingering in the room, but his being was not.

Perhaps I took too long to get ready and he got impatient and left? Perhaps he had to go back to work? Maybe he just changed his mind and decided not to meet me. Maybe.

I didn't really care what the reason was. Really!

Dad came over to me in two secs grabbed me in a bear hug. Mum hugged me from behind. And Sabre, I doubt she knew exactly what was happening, but she managed to insert herself between my legs.

Okay... It really wasn't that big a deal. And definitely not the first time I dealt with a vampire incident, but by now I had learnt that any attempt to reassure them usually backfired.

At any rate, all I could feel was my heart dropping down to my guts like a stone. He was gone.

I almost met my Mate. Almost. But he was gone. He was still nearby, I felt quite sure of it, but he was not here. And my Wolf - yes even Boo, was immediately despondent that he had chosen not to meet me in person.

"Oh, Sam." Mum rubbed my back gently, "It's okay, Mama's here."

Mum was probably thinking I was still upset about the vampire thing. I shook my head, "I'm okay, Mum."

"My poor brave, Sam." Mum was starting to get teary. Uh oh.

Dad finally let go of me and pat my head, his hand still felt warm and large, and then he frowned and pulled off my hood.

Mum gasped.

I needed to stop and breathe, "It's okay. My ears won't shift back is all."

"Madam Principal would be hearing from me tomorrow." Dad growled.

Poor Madam Principal.

Apparently, while he should refrain from barging into the school in king-kong mode to demand and explanation or wring Lord Kosan's neck, it was perfectly acceptable for Dad to pay a visit to my school the day after, during school hours, to discuss the incident calmly.

The key word here was "calmly".

And I must be growing up, because I couldn't explain it, but it made perfect sense to me.

I'm just not grown up enough for a particular DUMBBELL to want to meet in person yet. And he was probably right too. For the first time in my life, I really hated myself for being a kid.

I wished I was 18 NOW.

And that my ears would shift back too. I reached behind me and pulled the hood back on.

"Sam is like little red riding hood!" Sabre decided.

"Wrong. I'm the big bad wolf!" I told her, turning around to make a grab for her.

Sabre squealed.

And just as I made a playful grab at her (with my arms, I didn't go kraken or anything), the dinner bell chimed. My stomach growled appreciatively in response and I immediately gave up chase. Sabre was still playing though. Laughing with gleeful panic, she scrambled to Savy and tried to climb her. Savy hoisted the little girl up on her back and we headed to the dining room.

Ki had gotten one of those fancy dinner bells. You knew it was fancy because it was made of crystal, and when he rang it, it made a really clear but quiet "ling-ling" sound. Like my beta's smart two taps on the door when he knocked, Ki's bell ringing was a quiet and distinguished sound.

This just proved again how no matter what Ki had against the Lorent Pack, he was fully and undoubtedly Lorent. But having him around had taught me a lot about Lorent level poshiness.

For example, anyone with money could buy expensive luxury brand items, but truly posh people would buy luxury brand items with the least obvious logo displayed on it. It's like they will spend a hundred times the price for a sweater that had to look like a very normal sweater to the normal eye. But another truly posh person would know immediately that you were true posh material because your normal looking sweater was made of sustainably sourced angora fur/had a red embellishment embroidered on its inner sleeve/ or a tiny little black ribbon sewn into one side, just at the hem, indicating to anyone who noticed that this was indeed the poshest of posh sweaters the world had to offer.

It was the posers who bought the sweaters that were covered with logos. People who wanted to show that they were posh. Really posh people didn't show off. That would be below them. At any rate, they wouldn't care for normal people's recognition. Really posh people only wanted to be recognized by other really posh people "with a discerning eye."

But ignoring all the pish posh, it meant that I was saved from wearing anything that looked different from what I would usually wear anyway. Like today, my crop joggers was just a light grey thing. It had a very thin white lining up the sides, white drawstrings, two side pockets, and a back pocket. Very normal... the only thing that gave it away was that I recognized the beads at the end of the drawstrings. It was also white, but made of metal, and exactly the same ones as on the hood strings of the rogue-smelling jacket my friends were admiring.

My tshirt was striped. Dark blue and light blue. Very normal. BUT if you examined the hems very carefully, you'd see it has a different type of stitching than normal t-shirts. Also there was no tag sewn on the back, the brand and size was printed in gold cursive lettering on the inside of the back of the t-shirt.

And I also had a matching hooded vest. Like my crop joggers, it was also light grey, the hood was extra large, the hood strings had the same white metal beads at the end. It had side pockets too - side pockets with extra soft inner lining. The hood too had the same soft inner lining. Just like the rogue smelling hood. Ki liked to buy different variations and colors from the same style. I've noticed this in the gym gear and other daily clothes I owned.

I doubt Ki would ever buy the logo or orange colored version of the jacket my friends were eyeing. My wardrobe was largely white (I told you this dude was 100% Lorent at heart), with varying shades of grey and blues, a bit of black, and occasionally pale pinks. He had put out a tan colored jacket before, but after I ignored the option for a few days in favor for the second jacket option, he removed it, and I never saw another brown item on the birdcage rack again.

Anyway, Lorents were weird like that. Okay, I couldn't say for sure if it were a Lorent thing, or just a Ki thing. I just automatically picked up all these little eccentricities my Lorent Beta exhibited and filed them under "Lorent behavior."

Where else would I file these quirks? Like "white wolf behavior"? Which, if I looked at Mum, would not be too far off. Perhaps Mum was secretly a Lorent too, because while she had never bought us branded clothes to the extent that Ki did, she quite appreciated Ki's style, crystal dinner bell and all. She praised Ki very often for his "good taste" and had since increased the household budget in his care, "just a little", because Ki was "so clever with the household budget."

Which explained how Ki procured the crystal dinner bell.

But I guess if he bought a cheaper bell, he would sound like the pack's ice-cream man every dinner.

So there I was, thinking about our pack's ice-cream man, and wondering when he would come out from his winter "hibernation" and ply the streets with his motorbike and ice-cream fridge sidecar, when HE stepped out of the kitchen the exact moment as I stepped into the dining room.

But never mind that we were at home, my fam was around, or that He stepped out of the kitchen with all the kitchen smells, because He ~

Stepped out of a dream ~

You are too wonderful ~

To be what you seem. ~

So this was what love was like.

Mate took the first step forward and then suddenly he was right in front of me, "Mine."

His voice was low and growly and quiet all at the same time. Like the sound of the deep ocean, like the quiet rumbling of distant thunder, or the train's constant bass as it ran through a tunnel, my Mate's voice was the most beautiful sound I had ever heard.

Although it was also the voice that called me stupid, and said a number of other things I had suddenly forgotten, but had made me mad at the time.

And he smelled like salted caramel. I knew this scent - I mean, I had been to his room, I had smuggled his tshirt across a dream travel or two, I had... but this was him, along with all the things about him, the smell of the woods and open road exhaust, and a different laundry detergent in his uniform, gunpowder, metal oil, shoe polish, and other familiar wolves, a mix of Stephan, Theo, Beta Lucas, Dad... whoever he had rubbed shoulders with today, wherever he had been.

"You still have a puppy smell." His deep voice remarked.

Eh? I looked up in shock. Wait what? Did he just call me a puppy? But his eyes were kind, his gaze was warm, and he was smiling his handsome smile when he reached over and touched my hair. The moment he touched me, something zinged out from my heart to him, I'm not sure what, but suddenly my wolf was complete.

"Mine." I didn't realize I was speaking till I heard my voice confirm it.

He brought the lock of hair in his hand to his lips, kissed it almost reverently, and then dropped it back down.

Mine. My mate. I was still reeling internally from the realization.

I mean I knew in my head. Maybe I even knew in my heart. But this, I couldn't quite explain it, this feeling of belonging, completeness, and wth was going on? But I was incredibly happy. Like seriously happy. Like smiling a big goofy stupid grin happy.

Wow, this was my mate, and he was real, and wonderful, and mine.

I had to be the luckiest girl in the world.

Mate pulled out my chair for me, and sat himself next to me after that.

Ki served dinner. Dad started discussing educational policies and Lycan politics with Mate. Mum tried to stop him, but Mate answered something which Dad thought was very a very interesting perspective, so now, not even Mum could steer the conversation out of the boring zone for us girls.

Sabre decided she would indulge us with her rendition of "Pease porridge hot and pease porridge cold," except she said "Please porridge" because we should all be polite, and she ended with "Thank you."

Mum and Savy clapped enthusiastically and asked for an encore from our budding and very polite poet.

In short, everything was just like it usually was.

Except that He was here, really here, and I was so happy. When He reached over for the pepper and accidentally brushed my sleeve with His elbow, my heart flipped. And when He noticed my gaze and offered me some pepper, I actually nodded (even though I didn't like pepper).

I still couldn't believe he was really here. My soulmate. Mine. I found him.

Out of a dream~

Safe into my heart...~

I'd always known I was lucky, but I had to admit, meeting Mate, MY Mate, MINE. I had never felt as lucky as I did today.