He Chose the Sunset, I Chose Goodbye

On the day of our graduation trip, my Alpha boyfriend and his Beta best friend left me behind at an interstate rest stop. Sienna was traveling with us too. She was a wolf Cedar Ridge Pack had only found and brought home six months earlier. They had been gone for nearly half an hour before they realized I was no longer in the car. When Adrian Cross finally called, there was no panic in his voice. Only irritation. “Nora, why didn’t you get back in the car? Don’t turn this into a big deal. We have to arrive before sunset, and we can’t turn around now.” His childhood friend, Evan Brooks, was also the pack’s future Beta. His voice came through the phone next. “There are taxis at the rest stop, and you can call a rideshare. Get to the next exit. We’ll meet you there.” Then Sienna’s clear, bright voice cut in. “She isn’t a pup. Do you two really have to handle everything for her?” In the past, my eyes would already have been burning with tears. I would have apologized first, then dragged my suitcase behind me and done everything I could to catch up with them. But this time, I stood outside the rest stop and looked up at the blue-gray sky. A sense of relief unlike anything I had ever felt suddenly spread through me. I did not want to chase them anymore. I canceled every remaining hotel and photography reservation for the trip. Then I changed my flight and booked a ticket to the coastal town I had always wanted to visit. They had all said it was too quiet and too boring, the kind of place no young wolf would enjoy. But in that moment, I understood one thing with perfect clarity. I was tired of living by someone else’s map.