Page 25 of His Sunshine Baby

Sometimes, I wonder if Reagan only comes back to Silver City because she feels some responsibility toward me. Since the day she brought me here, whenever she comes back, she never looks for me, but we always see each other at least once somehow. I know she used to see my parents a lot when I was young. After that, she sorts of became my mentor, teaching me how to fight, hunt, and become one with my inner wolf. She never acted nice or gentle towards me. There was always this distance between us, so I never considered her as family. Only as my mentor, my teacher.

“Why did you teach me?”

She looks at me, surprised by my question.

“What do you mean?”

“Why did you become my teacher? I could have been raised like the other pups, taught how to fight with the rest of the pack. You could have left me and never come back. But you came back and insisted on being the one to teach me how to do all this, how to be a werewolf. Why?”

She clicks her tongue, something she does when she’s annoyed. She takes the cigarette out of her mouth and crushes it under her boot. After looking at me for a while, she sighs.

“I made a promise to watch over you, kid. I’m not one to go back on my word.”

“A promise? To whom?”

“Now stop asking questions, I’m done.”

She turns around and leaves. I want to ask more, a lot more, but this stubborn woman won’t stop, and to be honest, I’m too exhausted to run after her. I sigh.

Daniel walks up to me, giving me a hand to help me up.

“She was almost nice this time. But girl, those bruises will remain for a couple of days.”

“Who cares. I can’t believe she still won’t talk to me.”

“Well, at least it’s good to know she still comes back. It’s been, what, two years since last time?” asks Danny.

“Twenty months or so, yeah,” I sigh.

“This promise. She never mentioned it before, did she?”

I shake my head. That one’s a first. Question is, who did she promise this to? To my birth parents? Or to the ones who adopted me? Someone else? I sigh while massaging my neck. When will she ever tell me the truth?

Daniel helps me back to the apartment, where I indulge myself in a cold bath. Meanwhile, I keep thinking about this whole secret surrounding my birth. For twenty years, everything I’ve found out about it comes from Reagan or my adoptive parents, and it’s not much. I was found in a forest when I was around three, alone and famished. Reagan brought me to the White Moon clan, where Clark, the Alpha, gave consent for my dad to adopt me. Reagan left right after I came to live with the Whitewoods, and only came back five years later, when she started her ruthless training.

That’s it. If that’s all of it, why do I remember nothing of this forest? Whenever I try to think about a forest, nothing comes to mind. It just feels wrong. I don’t even know how to explain it, I just know this forest thing is a lie. Moreover, when I was around ten, I found a box my mom kept in the bottom of her wardrobe. After asking a lot, she finally revealed this box contained everything I had on me when Reagan found me. The box was almost empty. It only contained two things: a blood-stained child’s dress and a necklace.

I get out of the bath, grab a towel, and walk up to my room. Reaching under my bed, I finally put my hands on the tiny box. I took it from my mom’s bedroom after the accident, to keep it with me. I take a deep breath and open it.

My old dress is there, as usual. Still white and red. The smell has faded over the years, but anyone could recognize blood. The only thing I could recognize from this dress, even back then, was Reagan’s smell. After all, she carried me while I was wearing it. I leave the dress where it is and grab the little box laying on top of it.

It’s a simple jewelry box. But when I open it, my most precious belonging is right there, shining as always. A gold necklace, with a thin chain and a unique pendant. It’s a golden sun pendant, encrusted with diamonds. But the biggest mystery is the inscription on the back of the sun. It’s written so small I had to use a magnifying glass to actually read it.

“To my Sunshine, G.”

Who is G? I keep staring at it, as clueless as always. Why did I have this necklace on me? Is it even mine? Who would call me Sunshine? Isn’t it odd to even compare a werewolf to the sunshine? We are creatures of the moon!

“…Babe?”

Daniel found me, sitting in the middle of my messy room while staring at this curious necklace. Unlike the dress, the sun necklace feels strangely familiar whenever I look at it, as if I had seen it a lot before.

“What are you thinking about?” he asks.

“That I wish that old hag talked more. I can’t believe she still won’t say a thing.”

Daniel sighs and scratches his goatee. “She probably has her reasons. So did your parents, babe.”

“Question is, what was the reason? What did they have to protect me from?”

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