Breathing Room

POV: Trishelle

Trishelle dragged herself down the basement stairs, bone tired in the way that came from days that never let up. James had backed off, at least. No more shadows in the garden, no more footsteps outside the shed. Whatever twisted thing had crawled into him seemed to have burned itself out, and she sure as hell wasn't going to poke at it and find out why. She'd learned a long time ago that peace in this house came in scraps, little windows that slammed shut as fast as they cracked open. The only smart move was to climb through while she still could.

She shook out her thin blanket, and the old irritation came roaring back anyway. The fabric smelled like the basement, damp stone and dust, and she wrinkled her nose before spreading it over the mattress.

Bark at me to bake cookies in a rush, vanish for a day, then strut back in reeking of sex and God knows how many she-wolves, and have the balls to demand a fresh batch like I've got an endless supply hiding up my sleeve.

Good thing she'd stashed the first batch somewhere he'd never think to look. She'd given it to the pups instead, and they'd inhaled it without asking a single question about where it came from, which was more than she could say for most people under this roof. Their small hands and easy laughter almost made the whole mess worth it. Almost.

Something's wrong with him. I don't know what, and honestly, I don't want to know.

She sank onto her mattress and let her eyes fall shut, grateful for the quiet, at least. Sleep took its time, her mind circling James's strange mood like a moth drawn to a flame it knew better than to touch, but exhaustion won in the end.

The next day turned out better than she'd let herself hope. Breakfast was simple, just eggs and toast, and Alpha James announced he wouldn't be around to eat it, which meant she didn't have to serve him. She took the small mercy without asking questions, soaking up the rare stretch of morning where nobody's eyes tracked her every move.

Later, while she scrubbed pans, Tiffany wandered into the kitchen. Out of all the Omegas, Tiffany was one of the few who didn't treat her like something to scrape off a boot. Today she held out a little bag with something that looked suspiciously like bath soap. Trishelle set down the pan she'd been drying and wiped her hands on her apron before she dared reach for it.

"Pack got a shipment of samples," Tiffany said, shrugging like it meant nothing. "Most everybody already has their own brand, so they're passing the extra to us."

Trishelle turned the little bar over in her hands, half convinced it would disappear if she looked away too long. The soap smelled of lavender, faint and clean, nothing like the harsh bar she usually rationed for herself. "Everyone's getting some?"

"Yep. You're not being singled out, if that's what's got you twisted up."

That's exactly what had me twisted up. She thanked Tiffany twice before the woman waved her off and left. Trishelle tucked the soap away like it was made of gold, already picturing the quiet luxury of using it just once before it vanished like everything good in her life eventually did.

Later that afternoon, elbow deep in prepping dinner, the Delta's daughter marched into the kitchen and shoved a bag into her hands without so much as a hello. Trishelle nearly dropped it, caught off guard by the sharpness of the movement, her heart lurching the way it always did when someone approached her with purpose in their stride.

Confused, she peeked inside and found clothing, a dress, folded neat and clearly unworn. The fabric felt soft under her fingers, a pale blue that reminded her of skies she rarely had time to look up and admire. "Do you need this washed? Repaired?"

"Ordered it online," the woman huffed, arms crossed, standing nearly eye level with her, which put her taller than most in this pack. "Wrong size showed up. Can't return it since it was on sale, and my father convinced me donating it beats tossing it out." Her tone made it painfully clear which option she would've preferred. "You came to mind."

Heat rushed to Trishelle's face, a strange mix of humiliation and something warmer underneath that she didn't know what to do with. She liked wearing Rosie's old clothes. They made her feel like the old woman was still close by, still watching out for her the way she used to. But it had been years since anything she owned had been new, truly hers and nobody else's first. The thought sat strange in her chest, foreign and fragile, like something she wasn't allowed to keep for long.

She bowed her head before she spoke, careful with her words the way she'd trained herself to be. "I wouldn't get in trouble for wearing this, would I?"

A low growl rumbled out of the woman's chest before Trishelle even finished the sentence. "I mean no disrespect," she rushed to add. "I'm grateful, truly. I just want to know I'm allowed to actually think of it as mine."

The Delta's daughter huffed again, muttered something under her breath that Trishelle didn't catch, and confirmed there'd be no trouble before storming back out the way she'd come, leaving nothing behind but the echo of her irritation and a faint trace of perfume.

Well. That went about as well as it could have.

Trishelle stood there for a moment, soap in one hand and a bag of someone else's rejected dress in the other, and something in her chest twisted in a way she couldn't quite name. Not joy, not grief, but some tangled knot of both, pulling tight enough to ache.

Is it my birthday? Do I even have one?

She'd never actually known. When they found her wandering the woods as a toddler, the pack doctor had guessed her age off her size alone, the way you'd guess the age of a stray dog. She didn't know her real birthday, didn't know how old she really was, didn't even have a wolf to help her figure it out the way most shifters could. Sometimes, late at night, she tried to imagine what her life might have looked like if someone had bothered to keep better records, if some passing stranger had thought to write down a date, a name, anything to anchor her to the world the way everyone else seemed anchored.

Stop it. Doesn't matter. Not today.

She shook the thought loose, carried her small treasures up to her room, and got back to her chores before anyone noticed she'd stopped moving. The soap and the dress sat tucked beneath her thin blanket like secrets, small proof that maybe, just maybe, someone in this house saw her as more than furniture.

Whatever the reason behind the sudden kindness, she wasn't going to question it too hard. She'd take what she could get, and for tonight, that would have to be enough.