Chapter 10: Ceremonial Plumerias

Background color
Font
Font size
Line height

This is the longest chapter I've EVER written at 7,667 words and 16 pages on Word. I would appreciate a lot of comments and votes. It would mean so much because I worked soo hard on it. Thank you! Mahalia's eyes. SHARE SHARE SHARE! Leave inlines too!

My doctor say you're no good

But people say what they wanna say

And you should know if I could

I'd breathe you in every single day-Selena Gomez, Hands To Myself

Korali's Pov.(Not edited)

I decided to snoop in the room a little until I could go to sleep. Because why not? I was going to be stuck in here till tomorrow anyway. I would go to my ceremony, become part of the pack, lock myself in my room for the rest of the day-well to Jordan's knowledge I would be. I planned on sneaking out as soon as he let me go into my room. It was the perfect planning and timing on fates behalf because the Luau is at night and so is my ceremony. I already called Kaliko and told her where to meet me by in the forest to take me back home. It was only about a 45-minute drive.

Getting past Max and the guards would be the hard part. But I would tell them that Jordan is meeting me at the border to visit my parents and I'll tell Max that he'd either let me do this or make me cry. He was one of those guys. While Jordan didn't mind making me cry, Max couldn't bare to see it. He says "No one deserves to be that unhappy, while I'm around."

I looked around the dark gray room looking for anything that seemed different than a regular extra room. When I couldn't, I looked into the closet. It appeared to be mostly empty except for one box. It was a shoe box-old obviously, because the marking to tell what kind of shoe was in it was long faded.

I reached, getting on my tippy toes to bring the box down onto the ground. I sat crisscross and opened the box slowly blowing the dust off dramatically. Because why not? Once the top was off I picked up a handful of papers.

They were old drawing and beautiful pictures of wolves and people, of a pond that I'm sure I passed in the forest before. There was one that stuck out the most. It was of a little girl. She looked so cute and young. She looked about 4, with lengthy brown hair that touched her elbow-but was braided into little pigtails. He round eyes were what stuck out the most. One was brown and the other was green.

But werewolves don't get their wolves until they are 15, so it was a natural case of hetero-chromia iridium. She didn't necessarily look like Jordan or anything. So I'm not sure who she is to him. She was a very beautiful little girl.

It struck my heart of how many pictures were drawn and they were so good. They were so realistic and they made me feel like I was actually seeing the person in flesh. After I got past all the art, I got actual pictures; photographs.

There were multiple of the little girl, then I saw one that made me pause. It was of Jordan. I knew it was him, I could tell. His handsome face was much younger although he didn't seem much happier. But he did look a little less defensive, not by much.

I flipped to the next and a breath caught in my throat again. These were photos that I'm sure if I weren't snooping I would have never saw. It was of Jordan at about roughly 10 years old and holding a baby.

His expression was fixed into one of weariness and that worried me that a child could have so early. I couldn't help but admire his adorable, chunky cheeks, his thick dark hair, vibrant forest green eyes, his thick eyebrows, with his no so cheerful disposition. He was a bit gangly, and although his cheeks were plump, his body was skinny as if he was hitting early puberty-I'm sure an alpha trait.

I thought he was adorable and if I managed to convince him into giving me a baby, I was sure they'd be beautiful; especially if they looked like him. Rummaging deeper through the box there was a picture of Max, Jordan, Cailo, and some boy I've never seen before. I may not have seen enough of the pack to truly know if he was from here.

Then my hand felt something cool. My fingers dug at it a little to realize it was a chain; a necklace of some sort. It had a circle jeweled pendant with what looked to be flowers inside. There was a balled up piece of paper lastly, in the box. I grabbed the last paper unfurling it and reading it over. The handwriting was neat, it looked like some type of beautiful font. Jordan's handwriting was like that of calligraphy.

"For my mate, if I am to have one I have this charm I found in the forest. Each day the hope for one loosens. I've been told that being such an impurity; an incubus, that I wouldn't be gifted with one. And if I did that I should save her the agony and end her life-because rejection is out of the question. But that wouldn't make me a good alpha to deny the pack a Luna. But to curse her wouldn't make me a good mate. I'm conflicted. With Mahalia lamented, I knew that the only good things in my life would be either killed or I would destroy. There were no in-betweens. If I meet her then it should happen on my 20th birthday, as they did. If not, then she doesn't exist. As the days go on, my fate-less existence ceases to offer any opportunities of serenity. I've been commanded on the fact that losing my life would be for the weak. That a strong ruthless Alpha I am to be should have no so soft spots, and if I did, to prod and slice the fragile skin until it puckered, scarred, hardened. Emotion was for the feeble. As I slowly lose touch with any pulp that I still contain, I feel myself slipping off the edge of the precipice."

How old was Jordan anyway? I knew he wasn't much older than me though. That I knew. This note was dated, so he probably was around 10, 11 or maybe even 12 when he wrote it. An ache of sadness rolled through me. I hurriedly pushed the items back into the box. If he caught me with this, then I'd be dead meat for sure. But I wanted to cry. Cry, because I felt partly to blame. If Jordan still remembered the existence of this note, then on his 20th birthday is when he gave up on hope to find me. Me not being normal and going to look for him like everyone else when they were 18 was stupid.

That note was incredibly sad. About a boy who was losing his sanity. I wanted to know how much of the rumors were true. How bad was his dad? Did his mom run away? And who was Mahalia?

I clutch the pendant to my chest not wanting to put it back. It gave me hope. It was hope. Even slight. Although that note made me feel an incredible amount of grief for Jordan-I couldn't be completely compliant with being treated like trash. I mattered. I wanted to matter to him, but if his damage was irreversible, I couldn't force him to have feelings for me. It would be unfair for us both for me to push for entirely too long.

I knew he was about a year or two older than me; he deserved a little of my patience from those years he waited and lost aspiration.

I was going to try for as long as I could till my heart broke completely. Then and only then would I give up on Jordan. I wasn't sure when my resolve would break-no one could be sure. But I was falling in love with him anyway no matter how much of a nut case he was. But once I gave enough tries and I can't see any amount of hope that he'd love me, my heart would break but I'd let him go. Because love is give and take-and sometimes you give more than you can take from the person.

I never known myself to be a giver. I was the type of girl who never had a range of wild emotions. I didn't depend on emotions, I took what was given to me and I went with it. I never really had to try, in the sense of something that came to me. If someone threw me a ball, then they threw it to me because they wanted to, I didn't have to wave my hands and ask them to give the ball to me.

The next morning, I skipped into the kitchen, noticing Jordan eating a bowl of cereal. I couldn't hold it in my heart to be angry at him for last night, that note hurt things in my heart at the moment rather than fueled my anger.

"Why are you looking at me like that?" Jordan's eyebrows were furrowed tightly and his lips were pulled into a tight line. The look seemed quite endearing in this moment. Maybe my Luna abilities were shining through or most likely, seeing those pictures made me want to understand him better. Knowing that I wasn't the only reason why he was such a bitter cynic, made me feel better. That sounded selfish, but he was content in how he was living. I was the one forced into a change that became more negative then its positive.

That note showed something different. Maybe he did have disdain for me. But I don't think it was me personally. It could vary with its reasons. It could be the fact that I didn't look for him and I didn't come when he needed me, it could be what he was told, it could even be a fact that my mind can't even conjure up. All I know is that this note was a little, slight, a piece of him.

"No reason." I mused slightly understanding his questioning. I was probably staring at him like relatives around a newborn. I had so much empathy in my heart at the moment. I just wanted to hug him; although I knew it was out of the question. "How old are you?"

He raised an eyebrow still eating at his cereal he swallowed before answering "22."

"Oh good, I knew you weren't that much older than me. I'm going to be 21 soon." I don't know why I decided to add that. I knew he would say he didn't care. I braced myself for it, but it never came. I looked up at him to see him looking at me questioningly still.

His brows were still furrowed, "Are you ill? Second thoughts about becoming a member of the pack?" I think he was hoping that I was scared out of doing it because he's always irritated but I wasn't.

"Nope. I'm 100 percent sure on that," I rolled my eyes. "You wont be able to change my mind."

"Fine. There's something I must show you. I have to take you on a tour of the Alpha room." I could tell he didn't want to. He didn't seem to even want to talk about it. But I was glad that he was.

"You're actually showing me something? Oh wow!" I squealed sarcastically, but I didn't get a response. He just got up from the table leaving his bowl there and I had to run to catch up with him. I watched his back muscles flex in his thin gray shirt. I could picture waking up in that shirt and having my thighs out showing, while getting out of the bed and doing a strip tease for him. I almost laughed out loud at my thoughts. As if that would ever happen.

I stopped paying attention obviously, because he stopped and I ran into his back. The tingles shot from me into him and vice versa. He craned his neck and looked at me and I couldn't do anything but look back up to him. He closed his eyes for a minute before opening the door and walking inside. I shook my head and followed him.

There were rows and rows of portraits. They were paintings, even the most recent ones, of Alphas and Betas that this pack has had. Weird room to have, but who was I to say that? Maybe all Alphas have this and I just didn't know.

"We should just get our portrait over with now," he gestured to the camera at the end of the room.

I shrugged, it was one of my better hair days so I didn't mind. I noticed the picture that was directly in front of us was from an olden time like the early 1900's, based on the styles. The Alpha and Luna were beaming smiles, their children, all 10 of them happily beside them.

"You've been a bad dog," I said suddenly hoping that it would make Jordan laugh or something. A smirk, a quirk up, anything to show that he wasn't just a robot.

"Don't taunt me," he growled glaring at me. His hair was getting a bit long and from how much he tugged at it I knew that he was going to cut it soon. If I told him that I liked it long, he'd probably cut it quicker than anything. He was looking a little pale, but I thought nothing of it.

"I thought it'd make you laugh. This whole picture thing is weird." I gestured around, then I decided to actually look a little harder, we could take the picture in a minute.

"Every Alpha and beta family has a portrait here." He explained while I observed. I quickly looked for more recent portraits. I was surprised that he even had this much patience with me. When I got to his grandparents I stopped for a minute. It was when they were younger, around 30 with a young boy beaming next them. I knew that was Jordan's dad because he had the same hair and body type. "Did you meet your grandparents?"

"No. They were murdered before I was born." His response was so deadpan that I didn't even want to question how or why. I'm sure he'd cut off about it. When I got to his family portrait the one with his parents. I stopped.

His mom was a definite beauty. She had long bronze hair like that of a penny, it was elegantly braided to one side, a thick branch of golden hair tied as a crown around her head. She had deep set features that were very prominent. Her green eyes were piercing and she didn't look like a particularly pleasant person. But who was I to judge? She could just have resting mean face. She didn't look evil or anything either. She just looked like high class type of person.

Jordan's dad was handsome in a different way. His dark chocolate brown hair that Jordan inherited was cut short, but slicked back with a pomade or gel or something. He was tall, towering over his pixie of a mate. His color looked to be a hazelnut brown. His arm was wrapped around her waist in a way that showed proud, love, devotion of some sort. He wasn't smiling either. But I could see a slight tilt of his lips and his eyes weren't staring straight ahead like everyone else's. His eyes were on his mate.

Jordan's dad had a baby in his other arm, because of the rosy pink blanket, so I assume it was a girl. Then I looked at Jordan. He was around 10 or so, around the same age as the note, his face was solemn, his mouth tightened as if speaking was out of the question. He was oddly spaced from his family. I could see fatigue in his young troubled green eyes even though it was a painting. This was the only photo from the bunch of what I've seen so far, that didn't smile. The only one to seem to have a semblance of emotion on his face was Jordan's dad, the dark haired baby's not one that was really seen.

"But that's just it. These are all portraits after they've decided they were done having children-oh. Of course. I forgot." I didn't forget. I wanted to guilt-trip him. He avoided my eye contact. The self starter camera was set for 15 seconds and we stood there next to each other stiffly. It was for the painter to have something to go off of.

I tried to smile. But there was nothing to smile about. I looked at the picture. Jordan's face a statue and mine looked like a force smile. Like I was prisoner and trying to say help through my eyes. I hated that it looked like that. I wanted to be like Jordan's grandparents. Like my parents. I wanted Jordan to feel better.

"You look like your mom." I noticed Jordan was staring at the picture of his parents for an uncomfortable amount of time.

He looked towards the floor; his face was paling and his breathing turned rapid. His stomach was so loud that I could hear rumbling. I don't think he liked this room in general. Maybe it was too much to try to live up to the reputations. Or maybe it was something inside him.

"We need to leave this room." I could see his eyes unfocused and he slightly gagged.

"Jordan," I yelled while I chased him to the nearest bathroom. He threw up into the toilet, his body releasing all the cereal he ate this morning.

"Leave Korali," he threw a hand out in my direction to direct to move. But I stayed, crouching over to rub his back while his head was still bent over the toilet.

"I'm not going to leave when you're sick Jordan. You may not like me, but I care about you."

Then he threw up again. I didn't know how to take that. But it wasn't a positive.

***

I shouldn't have eaten that taco before the ceremony.

I was so nervous that I would stumble and mess up and end up over the toilet puking my guts out like Jordan was earlier. I marked it up as an attack of some sort. I doubt the cereal made him sick. It seemed more like an anxiety attack or something.

I was in a dark black gown to act as a camouflage in the night. It was very simple dress that swooped a bit at the bosom. It had a cut out at the side of my stomach but it was a lengthy maxi styled dress. I didn't wear any shoes, but I did wear shorts underneath so when I needed to get out of the house later it would be easy. And it would save me time to not have to change.

About 100 members of the pack surrounded me in two rows and I walked in-between them. Children danced around me frolicking along and throwing Plumeria in the air around me. They signified new beginnings, birth, new life, and in some cultures devotion; some even considered it a symbol of love. I thought it was beautiful that they'd think about a thing as small as that for their ceremonies.

The children scampered in front of me making a flower circle in front of where Jordan stood staring at me with a stoic expression. I was hoping for something-even small. But it was no use. The people's faces around me were of awe or in anticipation even the young ones were watching quietly.

When I finally reached Jordan-who was shirtless and trust me the sight was for sore eyes. His body was like getting water thrown on you. The slight but not overly done sculpture of his pectorals, everything was defined but to the point where you knew he was fit; but you knew he wasn't a gym head.

The moon illuminated his form casting a slight glow that was harsh on his features in a good way and a bad way. In a good way because it made him look hard, viral, tough. In a bad way because he looked evil, like a villain, ominous.

Jordan walked up to me in the circle of flowers a little before nodding at me slightly. I gave a slight smile. He glanced at me before looking at the full moon and then back to me. I nodded telling him that I was truly ready, plus I definitely wouldn't back out in front of some of the pack members that would be rude and they'd hate me more than they do now.

Max walked up and nodded at me beaming an open mouth white smile at me. "You have my blessing as well as Jordan's, Flower." I could hear Jordan's stifled growl but we all ignored it and I nodded back at Max a smile lifting onto my face.

Jordan held up a small blade and his other hand. His sliced it quickly and silently his face not showing an ounce of pain or any emotion at all. He handed me the knife and his eyes twitched. I grabbed the knife trying to slice as quickly as he did but not as deep. It hurt like a bitch and I wanted to cry. My face tilted downwards as I tried to hold back tears. I looked back up to Jordan to see his eyes fading in and out of focus and when the focused back in they were at my hand. He let out a breath and held his hand out for me to shake. I grasped his hand in mine trying to ignore the feelings he ignited in my skin and body. I'm sure there was a chemical response from our body's because of our blood mixing that accelerated the feeling of our sparks.

Max walked up next to him with mashed berries on what looked to be some type of painter's tray. He took some of the red fruit and tapped my nose and straight down my lips. He

You are reading the story above: TeenFic.Net