Love, Bitterly Sweet

Chapter One

Two and a half months later

I sigh as I look at myself in the mirror. This year is basically my last chance to find my mate if I want to stay in the pack. I’ve already exhausted almost all of the weres older and younger than I am.

Now I can only hope that one of the sophomores will be my mate. Over the past two years, I’ve learned how to surreptitiously glance into the eyes of every were I come across, since that’s how you recognize your mate. I don’t even discriminate against the females. I’m not attracted to girls, but who’s to say fate doesn’t agree? I’m not going to risk missing my mate just because I’m scared of being labeled a lesbian. I have no problems with being one if I’m meant to be. Besides, Jason and Lucas make an amazing couple and even though Jason knew he was gay, he never dated a guy while he was in high school.

I know that it’s not likely my mate will be in the sophomore class, but I’m still hoping. I already checked them all out last year, and I wasn’t attracted to a single one. It doesn’t really mean anything since my Aunt Lindy has been my mom’s best friend since kindergarten and she didn’t find out my uncle was her mate until her junior year of high school when he came home from college one day. Since you can’t find your mate until you’re both sixteen, I wouldn’t have felt an instant connection to any of the freshman last year. I just wish I could say I thought at least one of them was a possibility.

It doesn’t help that I don’t know of a single mated heterosexual couple where the female is older than the male. It just doesn’t happen, not very often anyway. I think it has something to do with the male wolves being able to provide for their females. Or maybe it has to do with the female’s limited reproductive span. Stupid, if you ask me. Werewolves should just adapt to the twenty-first century. They may not be called wolves, but older women with the hots for younger guys are called cougars for a reason. Not that I’m a cougar or anything.

Being a girl sucks, I think as I reach into my drawer for a tampon. Not only do I have to deal with this, and on the first day of school no less, but I’ll have to join whatever pack my mate, if he’s a guy, is in. And that just blows. I don’t want to leave my pack, my family. I’m not like my mom was – I have no desire to travel beyond our pack’s territory. I want to stay here. I don’t want to have to give up everything I know to move to who knows where.

I know it’s silly. While Jason and Lucas haven’t figured out their situation yet, Ashley has no problems with moving to our town when she and Matt get married next summer. I already asked her how she felt about leaving her pack. I understand the whole concept of wanting to be with your mate, no matter where he is, but I just don’t like the idea of not seeing my friends and family again. It’s almost understood that females will basically have very limited contact with everyone they knew growing up once they’re mated. It doesn’t seem fair. Nothing’s fair about being a girl.

After finishing up in the bathroom, I head downstairs for breakfast. I can hear my parents talking in the kitchen and their obviously flirty banter makes me somewhat sad. I love the fact that they’re still so much in love, even though it does get gross every once in a while, but I’m already stressed about finding my own mate that being around mated weres, even if they are my own parents, just upsets me sometimes. It’s ridiculous, but true.

“First day of school blues?,” my dad asks as he kisses the top of my head.

“I guess so. I don’t know,” I reply half-heartedly while sitting down at the kitchen table.

“Hey – you okay?”

I look up to find my dad staring at me, concerned. I suppose I could just confess my reason for acting so depressed, but I know my parents already have a lot on their plate. They found out a couple of weeks ago that some members of a pack in Arizona turned on their Alpha and killed him, sending the entire pack into frenzy. More than half of the weres died before things settled down. The news didn’t really affect us since we live in Massachusetts, but it did make my parents unusually worried. I have a feeling there’s more to the story than they’re letting on, so I don’t want to bother them with my stupid insecurities.