Chapter 39

Mia

My dress, my stepmother’s dress, suffocated me. She was slimmer than me, but due to the laced dirndl-bodice, I was able to draw shallow breaths and, as she pointed out, it wouldn’t be for long. I could see them gathering for the ceremony outside my window, in the clearing where we usually held pack feasts and celebrated the turn of the seasons. Or had, when Mom was alive. Somehow, since she passed, the joy had gone out of not just our family but the whole pack. Oh, we gathered for the important holidays, but without Mom to make the arrangements and plan all the food and decorations, to stir the spirit of the pack, it always fell flat.

Nikki, who even now was directing the final touches to my coiffure and fluffing the ridiculous poufy veil, just didn’t have what it took to be a true pack mother. And she couldn’t hide her joy, didn’t even try to hide her elation, at my leaving. She even smiled at my reflection in the mirror. “You look very pretty, Mia. But you have to smile.” She p