Reborn (29 page)

I drop in front of the one I buried him under two summers ago. He had to have been the oldest-lived wolf ever.

I place the stone from my pocket in the pile and just let the tears come.

"I miss you, buddy."

He died old, fat, and happy. He died sleeping next to a warm dish of food. If anyone deserved that death it was him.

I look up at the sky and smile, "You all hug each other for me."

Anna and I still cry every time we come. Sarah refuses to come. She won't see him in the ground.

Someone once told me to find another timber wolf for a pet. They didn’t understand he was never my pet. He was my family. He was the warmth in the dark and the person I needed to not be alone.

No one but Anna, Sarah, and Jake can understand the value of Leo. He was family.

Anna grips my hand and I try to smile. "I wish he could have lived forever."

Anna nods and sniffles, "Me too."

I look down at the spot on my skin, where I had the smithy burn his name into my arm, and rub the scar.

I look at Anna and know Leo led them to me. I like to think that he knew one day he would be gone and I would be alone. He found a family for me. He chose them and I don’t think anyone could have chosen better.

Through the thick and thin, and the good and the bad, no one but Leo could have found me a better place to fit in or better people.

No one knew me the way Leo did.

I believe in God because of the two people in front of me—Meg and Leo, angels in disguise.

There are a thousand things I could have changed and made different than they are now, but then maybe I wouldn’t have the life I do. Everyday there is more. More love, more happiness, and more gratitude for everyday I wake up free.

They say that the world was built for two. I used to doubt that and think that two was a long lost dream. I used to believe we didn’t deserve the happiness of the perfect place we all remembered.

But that world wasn’t ever real; it never existed. It was a daydream and a memory we made up. We didn’t want the change, but in some ways we needed it.

Some things were easier before, but almost everything is better now.

Nothing is instant; evil and hatred take time. It isn’t as easy as using the internet to make hate, or commit crimes from a speeding car with a gun out the window. Everything takes time and effort. The good and the bad.

I see now that true love isn’t fickle; it's what we put into it. If we work hard at loving someone, then no one can corrupt the love we have.

I see everything differently than before and I have Leo to thank for that.

I wasn’t born into this world. I had to learn how to survive and live with the other people in it. But like Jake always says, I was raised by wolves, so I had to expect it was going to be hard to learn how to fit in.

Looking back on it all, I can't think of a better way to be raised than by a wolf, and I can't think of a better wolf to raise a savage little girl all on his own.

I lift the rock I found, with the pretty crystals in it, to my lips and kiss it. The warmth of the stone against my lips is a comfort. I place it back down on the pile and hold my hand there, "I love you both."

I get up and walk away, holding the hand of my sister, grateful for my ‘us’. Because it's us and them, it always was.

The End