Chapter 3:

OLIVIA

The next day came so fast, I had to rush whatever I was doing so I wouldn't have to miss the one day that mattered to me. I just stepped out of the bedroom when my mother asked me to help Clara dress up.

"But Mother—" she didn't even let me finish talking.

"No buts, Olivia," she snapped. "Clara is your younger sister and she needs your assistance."

I don't understand. Other times, Clara was not my younger sister because it had nothing to do with my help. Now she is my younger sister?

I frowned. "Mom, Clara is eighteen, which means she's an adult and can take care of herself without me. Besides, who still wears a grown-up her clothes?"

She got provoked by my words, her expression twisting into a deep frown.

"Now you listen to me, young lady," she said, pointing at me. "You don't talk back to me when I talk to you. Clara needs to appear nice, and you don't expect her to make herself up and fix her hair without a helping hand."

"Then what about me?" I asked. "Don't I need someone to help me with that?"

She looked me up and down like I was disgusting to her. "Who cares about you?" she blurted. "Not like there is someone ready to choose you. Even the moon goddess wouldn't be foolish enough to pair you with anyone."

I felt my heart shatter at those words. Every confidence I had coated myself in for the past few days broke in a second. I reminded myself that someone was waiting patiently, hoping to see me, but the damage had been done.

"What are you still standing there for?" she yelled. "Get going!"

Slowly, I headed for Clara's room, where she was still muttering to herself which dress and color was better. The moment I stepped in, she pointed the dress at me and asked which was better. I pointed to the wine red dress, and she didn't hesitate to put it on.

"Dress my hair," she demanded, not even caring to say please. "And for the love of heaven, I don't want to lose a strand."

That comment had stirred something inside me. I had wanted to leave her and simply walk out of the room, but seeing my mother standing so fixedly at the door, as if she had known my intentions even before I thought about it, I had to stay back.

I spent nearly thirty minutes on her hair because she kept refusing the hairstyles I made her, saying it didn't make her look as beautiful as she had wanted. I nearly yelled at her, but held myself.

"What exactly do you want, Clara?"

"Don't talk to her that way," my mother snapped. "Do exactly as she said. It won't be funny if Clara has to leave this house looking like a fool."

"I need this style," Clara stated, pointing her phone to me.

I glanced at the picture, I had never seen that style before. It was something that would probably take me another thirty minutes or an hour if I had to make it exactly the way it is in that photo.

Clara wasn't helping either. Every two minutes, she would touch her hair, checking if I gave it the same texture as the one in the photo. She would either complain it didn't, or that I had tied her hair way tighter, and I'll have no choice but to start all over again. Each complaint followed with a barking from my mother.

I got tired at this point, wanting every chance to leave her hair and get the hell out of this place for good. After what felt like eternity, I was done.

Meanwhile, Clara left with her girlfriends while my mother asked me to stay back to help her make night dishes for my stepfather.

"Why am I the only one staying back?" I asked, despite how hard I tried to hold myself. "Clara was there all this while, you didn't say a word. Now she is gone, I have to make the dish with you?"

She simply ignored me, acting like I wasn't even existing to her.

"Mother!"

"Have you already forgotten who is in charge here?" she barked. "I am, and I have every damn right to ask you to stay back."

"But Clara —"

"Clara is too fragile to handle the cooker," she defended. "I wouldn't want her getting hurt by the heat."

"So, I'm the one who deserves to get hurt?" I questioned.

"Of what good are you, whether or not you get hurt?" She looked at me.

I looked at her, really looked at her, and let myself, for a moment, wonder if actually this woman standing before me was really my mother. I was supposed to be at the meeting hall with my mates. Doesn't that ring a bell to her?

"Look, Olivia, let's tell each other the truth," she started, as though what she had just said hadn't cracked a spot in my chest. "You and I both know that going to that hall is as useless as not going at all. Who in this pack would want to have someone as big as you as a mate?"

She waited for an answer. When she saw none, she replied, "None. No one. Absolutely no one would. So my advice is to stay back and save yourself the disappointment."

Not like she cared. She just wanted me to waste yet another opportunity, so she could have the privilege to keep reminding me how old I was becoming, and how much time I had left to share the same roof with her and her perfect family before getting out.

And sometimes I do wonder if this woman had a heart. It was very much okay listening to people outside speak hate words to me, but it has never, not even for the twenty-three years of my life, been okay for me to digest her words. Every time she spat those words at me, it's like a part of my life has been ripped off me.

But regardless, I couldn't let her words be the reason Damien doesn't call me his mate tonight.

She finally let me go, and that is because I had sneaked my way out when she was engrossed on a call. I had barely ten minutes left, which I spent running, not minding how profuse I was sweating. By the time I got there, half my body was soaked with sweat. I didn't mind. My eyes were busy searching for Damien, hoping he hadn't chosen another lady in my place because I had taken longer to show up.

Two minutes later, the bell rang. This was the most exciting moment. Since I didn't have a wolf, my heart did the one thing it knew how to do best: beat.

The door opened in a grand way, Damien stepped in as the pack prince and future Alpha he was. I didn't realise how awkward I was smiling until my cheeks began to hurt, and my hand had somehow, found it's way to the necklace on my neck.

With every happiness in me, I had expected Damien would stop and look at me, that he'd hold my hands as always and tell the crowd "everyone, here is my mate I've been dying to tell you all". That he would prove every single word he had told me for the past eight years. But then, he just walked past me like I wasn't even standing right there. And he kept walking, finally stopping before a young lady.

I blinked, trying to process what just happened, only to discover the young lady — the very one he had stopped right in front of — was my sister, Clara.