Chapter 5 - Tommy

Faces.  Everywhere where I look, there are faces. 

My heartbeat quickens.  They are too close…. 

They glare at me with the familiar look of hatred, while they scream nonstop with words laced in venom….

My mouth dries and my body trembles as fear washes over me. 

The crowd leans in around me and sneers while they hiss. 

“Freak!”

“Just die!”

“Disgusting!”

They hurl their insults at me from every direction.  Unfortunately, no matter what I do, I can’t get away.  They have me surrounded. 

As I coward down in the middle, I silently pray.  Someone, please, make them stop.

BAM! 

Before I know what is happening, pain shoots through my whole body as punches and kicks land from every direction randomly land across my body.  Besides the pain, a wave of panic slams hard into me, too. 

Instinctively, I cover my head with my arms, which leaves my body wide open.  The angry crowd immediately takes advantage of my mistake, and their attacks quickly move to my torso as another series of punches and kicks land on me. 

With pain rifling through my entire body, darkness soon closes in on me.

NO!  Please make them stop!  I don’t want to die! 

I bolt up in bed.  “NO!  NOT AGAIN!”

I can’t catch my breath, while a cold sweat explodes across my body.  Where am I?

I frantically look around, while trying to figure out what is happening.  I quickly turn to the nightstand and turn on the lamp.  However, the light doesn’t ease my mind.  It only proves I’m alone in my bedroom. 

My ears perk as the sound of movement from outside the room circles around me.   My breath instantly hitches. 

They are coming to get me again.  NO!

As the footsteps draw closer, I pull my blank up tight against my chin and curl into a ball.  My body trembles as fear shoots through me.  I quickly scan the room to see if there is any place where I can hide, but there is nothing.  My eyes land on the nearby closet, but there isn’t much room in there. 

My heart drums harder with each footstep.

I scurry backwards on the bed and pull the sheets up to my chin again.  I only stop when my back hits the headboard. 

My eyes snap to the door.  Stay away! 

The room begins to spin while the drumming of my heartbeat drowns out everything else and echoes in my ears.  The footsteps draw nearer and then stop right outside the door. 

My breath hitches again. 

This is it.  They are coming to get me.

The door inches open.

I gasp and nearly scream when Finn pops through. 

The instance our eyes meet, Finn’s smile fades, and he darts right beside me.  “It is all right, Tommy.  I’m right here, now.  I’m sorry.  I got hungry and went to get a snack, but I’m back now.  I won’t let anything hurt you.”

I barely hear his voice over the pounding of my heart and the angry voices still swimming in my head. 

The moment his arms wrap around my trembling body, a sense of calm washes over me.  The images, which scared me moments ago, slowly fade away.  At the same time, my heart rate slows back down to normal.

Relieved, I cling onto him.  He is my life preserver.  I can’t live without him. 

***

My nightmares last night are the same ones that I’ve had before, but they have made me extremely clingy to Finn now. 

It has been at least a year, if not longer, since I’ve had a nightmare like that.  Back then, I would wait outside the bathroom for Finn to take his bath.  At least, it is better than when we first met.  At sixteen, I couldn’t bring myself to be separated from him for anything, and we often took baths together.  We were with each other 24/7 in the beginning. 

As Finn and I walk through the apartment, Kane steps in front of us.  “Are you all right, Tommy?  I woke up last night to your screaming.”

What?  I thought our rooms were soundproof.

Wyatt stops beside Kane and wraps his arm around his mate’s waist as he softly says, “I left the bedroom door open when I went to give Connor a bottle.  I don’t think you had completely shut your door either, because I heard your screams easily.”

I lower my head slightly and glance at Kane through my eyelashes as my gut twists and shame consumes me.  Finn doesn’t wait for my distress signal.  He immediately grabs my hand and holds it. 

I slowly nod my head.  “Yes.  I’m fine now thanks to Finn.”

Kane’s eyes fill with concern as he reaches up and gently rubs my arm.  “Don’t worry, Tommy.  You will learn to get over your past.  You may never be able to forget it, but you and your wolf will learn to live with what happened.  I want to say you will learn to accept it, but that isn’t the right word.  No matter what I do to help, you will always have those scenes in the back of your mind, just waiting for an opportunity to invade your thoughts again.  However, over time, you will learn to keep those images and sounds at bay and not let them take control of you.”

I hope so.  I’m not that confident with me learning to take control of those things, instead of having the memories controlling me. 

The Supreme Elder’s words buzz around in my mind.  I have to conquer my demons, which this is one of them, before I can find my mate.  Even though I would love to continue to hide from all of this, I can’t.  If I don’t face these problems, I can never have my mate.

***

I set my food down on the table right beside Finn while my eyes dart around the area, looking for anything out of the ordinary.

I breathe a small sigh of relief when I find nothing.    

As I sit down next to my friend, Shane waves his finger at me.  “Hey, did something happen?  You are being kind of clingy with Finn today.”

I frowned and glanced next to me at Finn as I mumble, “Sort of.”

My friend glances back at me and then turns towards Shane and Dee, who are sitting across the table.  “Tommy had a bad dream last night.  He feels safe when he is around me.”

It is times like this when I really want to confess to Shane and Dee that we are werewolves, and that my friend uses his ability to calm me down and keep me stable. 

I’m sure at some point we will tell them, but not right now. 

Guilt nibbles away at me as I look across the table at the two. 

Both Kane and Ben have said it is all right to tell Shane and Dee, but Finn and I are waiting.  I’m not really sure why, but we are.

Dee looks at me and then scans me up and down before she sighs.  “I guess us going out and celebrating the start of our second year of college is out of the question then.  Man, I was hoping we could finally let off some steam.”

The corners of my mouth curl downward as I stare at her.  That isn’t what I thought she was going to say.

Finn looks up from his food and stares at her.  “We can still celebrate, but you already know that bars are out.  We don’t do the bar scene and never will.”

She shoves some food into her mouth and groans. 

As she slams her spoon down into her food, she huffs, “I was hoping this year would be different.  I don’t mind not going to the bar.  Dang, most of the time, I’m very happy we don’t go, but I heard there is this new bar opening up across town.  I was hoping we could go there.”

I wish we could go too.  I hate being the fun blocker all the time. 

Under normal circumstances, I may have braved it, but not right now.  A dark cloud hovers over me as my fears have taken over my mind.  I need to stay calm, which means I need to stay home in my safe zone right now.

Finn turns his attention to Dee.  “You can always go with some of your other friends.  Just because we don’t want to go, it doesn’t mean you can’t go at all.”

“But you guys are my best friends.  How can I go with others when I want to go there for the first time with my best friends?”

Finn glances at me, but he doesn’t even have to ask.  He knows I can’t right now. 

He then turns back towards Dee.  “Well, if you really want to go there for the first time with us, then you are going to have to wait a bit.  When Tommy has calmed down from the nightmare, then we will think about it.  I’m not promising anything, but we will think about it after Tommy has eased his mind and his fears.”

I quickly add, “If we actually do go, we can’t stay there that late either.  It will just be a feat to go inside a crowded bar, and I won’t be able to last long.  Okay.”

A smile slowly forms on her face.  “Not a problem.  We won’t stay for too long, but please don’t make us wait for months before we go.  Okay.  I really want to see the place.”

Shane nods his head.  “I promise too.”

He then turns and looks at me.  A small frown forms.  “I just wish you would tell us what happened to you that has traumatized you so much.  You know you can trust us, and we won’t make fun of you.  We will try to help you as much as we can.”

Guilt nibbles away at me again. 

I know they will try to help, but I’m just not ready yet.  For the first time since I’ve met Shane and Dee, I wish they were part of my pack, so they could just read my mind without me having to tell them anything.