Chapter 8: The Lines of Expectation and Reality Blur
Once more Jamie found herself in bed at 11:00AM, smothering herself with her pillows. Only, with her broken collarbone and arm sling she couldn’t lay on her stomach and had instead thrown a pillow over her face.
It wasn’t as effective, but she’d take what she could get.
She’d woken up in the cabin. After Valerie had brought her back last night neither were in the mood for talking and had gone to sleep. Now the other was avoiding her.
Jamie didn’t blame her. It’s not like she’d done herself any favors attacking the alpha, insulting him, disrespecting him, and a whole lot of other things that would usually be grounds for being tossed out.
In her father’s pack, people were friendly with him and joked around, but they knew not to go too far, knew that some topics were off limits, and deferred to him properly.
She was way past too far after last night.
Jamie groaned, almost rolling onto her side before she grimaced, the left side of her body twinging in pain. That was the other reason she hadn’t gotten out of bed yet. Everything hurt.
That was mostly due to the fact that she hadn’t taken a single prescribed pill from what Andy had given her last night.
There weren’t a lot of medics to territories, but Jamie was rather confident in knowing when someone was full of sh*t and something like ‘standard procedure’ was absolute bull.
Screw getting medical readings for himself. He had her medical records and physicals were a yearly thing. She could understand three vials for the more obscure diseases to test for, maybe five, but ten?
No, something was fishy about that, about Andy and his strange non-deference to his friend let alone the pack alpha.
Jamie had seen a lot of packs with different dynamics, stern and stiff, proper and traditional, even laid back. Whatever this was, it wasn’t any of those because it was lacking a proper pack structure and dynamic.
Oh, to be fair, Logan was the leader and alpha everyone deferred to. Even if some, like Andy, were far removed from proper dynamics.
He just didn’t know what the hell he was doing, and it affected the pack and everyone in it.
She was still upset at how he treated her, how he acted when he was supposed to be the Alpha.
Jamie knew her standards were high. Her dad had been the alpha. She’d been a shoo-in for next in line—there was just a decorum to it all that ALL packs followed and Logan…didn’t.
Andy said to ‘not be too hard on him’ but at this point in time Jamie didn’t really trust anything that came out of Andy’s mouth.
“If you’re trying to suffocate, that’s not the way to do it.”
Jamie raised the pillow from her face only to see Valerie at the doorway, holding a bowl of something.
“And how would you suggest I do it?”
“Overdose on pain meds then drown in the tub.”
Jamie snorted at that suggestion.
“But then I drowned instead of suffocated.”
“Bah, semantics. The water suffocates you…I brought you some oatmeal. Sucky peace offering, I know but it’s the only food I can make in the microwave without starting a fire. Lucille still hasn’t forgiven me for that potato I set on fire.”
Startled laughter left Jamie before she hissed, curling up slightly, clutching her ribs.
“You should take a heavier dose if your ribs are still bothering you.”
“I’m just waiting for it to kick in.” Jamie lied through her teeth, sitting up. “Thanks, but…I didn’t think you or anyone else wanted to be around me yesterday.”
Valerie handed her the bowl before taking a seat on her own bunk, facing Jamie, snickering as the other struggled to balance the bowl on her slinged arm.
“To be fair, I had to talk myself into it. It was like you were halfway to feral—I mean come ON! You punched Logan in the throat when he was in his shifted form!” Flailed Valerie.
“Because he cheated,” hissed Jamie. “What, did you expect me to bite him when he was a coward?”
“See, that’s the part I don’t get. Logan’s a lot of things, but a coward isn’t one of them.”
“He shifted in the middle of a fight!”
“You’ll have to run me through that. How is that cheating?”
“What—that’s like fighting 101!”
“Jamie, look, do we look like a regular pack to you? A lot of us don’t have your background. Your father was the alpha, right? Logan’s mother was too, but he lost both his parents rather young, and he wasn’t gonna be the alpha. Someone had to step up and, well, he’s a good guy, and god are we thankful he stepped up, but he doesn’t know all that stuff like you do. We don’t either.”
‘So…Andy was telling the truth,’ thought Jamie, looking away and shoving a spoonful of oatmeal into her mouth before grimacing at the taste. Valerie was definitely no cook.
“When you start a fight, even if you start it poorly like I did, it’s still an official challenge,” she explained, waving her spoon at Valerie. “No cheap shots, no pre-emptive killing, and no shifting forms mid battle. That means no tossing sand into someone’s eyes, no forgoing a demand for surrender or submission, and no shifting mid-fight to gain the upper hand.”
“Why would that matter? We’re shifters, we do that in spars.”
“Those are spars though—like I said, we were doing an official challenge even if I instigated it poorly. With spars we train to be able to manage rogue shifters or even humans. Official challenges only ever happen between shifters and there’s etiquette to it—especially if the alpha’s fighting. You’re held to a higher standard.”
“So, when Logan shifted…”
“He cheated. The fight becomes too skewed when it’s wolf against human or vice versa. As humans, a wolf has natural weapons, speed, and strength. They can easily tear out your throat before you can fight. As wolves, the human can hold a gun or knife. There’s just no merit in a fight like that. You don’t win cause of skill or strength—something an alpha’s supposed to show he has.”
“So, he went against the proper shifter decorum of fights,” concluded Valerie. “But I can bet you anything that Logan didn’t know that. And THAT is why none of the pack is mad at you—though Logan is a bit salty, but he’ll get over it.”
“That doesn’t make sense though. I not only improperly challenged their alpha, but I ruined the run.”
“Everyone still ran. You didn’t ruin anything. Sure, it wasn’t quite the welcoming we wanted to give, but let’s be fair. Logan didn’t really give the one he should’ve either. And don’t forget,“ she tacked on, “we’re not a standard pack. You said it last night that we didn’t really go about any of this properly, and that’s on us, ‘cause we really, honestly don’t know how to. We’ve been in your shoes though. What? You think you’re the only one who started something when they first got here? Maybe we weren’t as…explosive as you, but we started crap, practically tradition at this point.”
Jamie stared at Valerie before setting the oatmeal bowl aside and facing her properly.
“I’m sorry,” she told her. “You don’t know. I’ve been treating you all like a typical pack, but this pack exists because it’s not so typical. You’re right, you’ve been in my shoes, but since you have you gotta understand that for me, coming here wasn’t some weight off my shoulders of leaving a toxic pack for somewhere safe and accepting or a place of belonging. I left because I didn’t have a choice, and if I had one, I wouldn’t have come here because f*ck it! That was home! That was my pack!”
“I know, you didn’t leave because you wanted to. You had to.” Valerie blinked her wet eyes, looking up for a moment, not letting her own tears fall. “But my daddy always said ‘better alive somewhere else than dead in your own house.’”
“I…I’m sorry.”
“Not your fault. None of us asked to get Canis Syndrome, but what can you do?” she sniffed, carefully wiping the corners of her eyes so she didn’t smudge her makeup. “We’re not mad and we won’t—we’re not gonna treat you poorly because you’re going through a lot, so how about we go get lunch and talk to some of the others?”
“Yeah—I—yeah, sure,” agreed Jamie, setting the bowl aside. “I should probably apologize anyways…and talk to your alpha about all this.”
She owed Logan an apology, and while Jamie had her pride, she knew when she was in the wrong. The question was would Logan see it that way?