At Dawn, in the Forest
Chapter 13

Dawn stood eye to eye with the very thing she thought would be her demise, the shower. She disliked the tiles it surrounded itself with. She disliked its form, the colors, the shape. She disliked it was able to let water fall down like a heavy rainstorm on a summer’s evening. She disliked it was capable to change temperatures, from ice-cold water of the glaciers to piping hot of the lakes surrounding volcanoes. She disliked it was able to trap someone in a closed confined space. The shower was sadistic. It was a sadistic idea and invention and whoever invented it, was barbaric.

Every other person on the planet would point out the irony of that last statement. The shower was invented to be less ‘barbaric’ to be more civilized by being clean. Either way, Dawn hated the shower. Of course, if you knew her history with the said invention you would be less judgemental to her stance on the shower.

Dawn wasn’t showered often in the lab and if she was it was often a tool used to either punish her or to keep her in line – to which Dawn never saw the difference between the two scenarios. She had either ice-cold showers where the water would be blasted from afar, or she got inhumane hot showers where she was locked in a small shower stall to which she couldn’t control the amount of water or its temperature.

Dawn knew she needed a shower, she started to smell herself and the smell reminded her of her days in the lab, so evidently she wanted to get rid of it. But to do that she had to do the thing she hated at the same time. This, Dawn thought, was the ultimate cruelty the doctors had bestowed her with, two traumas that can be only resolved to go through either one of them.

After forty-three minutes Dawn was finally ready to shower. During the shower, she tried to think of the happy memory of her first time in the woods, like she did last night with Aiden. It helped but still, flashbacks of her horrible showers in the lab still flashed through her mind. When she tried to wash her hair she got annoyed. It was so long, it had surpassed her shoulders and was almost at the length of her navel.

In the lab, she couldn’t be bothered by such a trivial thing, but now she remembered why she preferred short hair over long hair. She didn’t think twice and stepped out of the shower mid-shampooing. In the bathroom cabinet, she found a pair of scissors and cut her hair in a swift motion. Once done she felt relieved, a part of herself was restored. Her hair now barely touched her shoulders.

Dawn wanted to go shorter, but she was afraid she would butch her hair up so she was fine with this. Back in the shower, it was way easier now to clean herself, and most importantly, way quicker.

Walking down the stairs, after she was done with her shower, Dawn found her mother at the end of it. Her back stiffened. This was the first time she saw her since her outburst the other night. She didn’t know what to say.

But she didn’t need to worry about that for long. “What in the goddess name, have you done with your hair?!”

Dawn frowned. “It was annoying, so I cut it off.” She walked further, not wanting to deal with her mother right now.

“But it was so beautiful.” Rue ran her fingers through her daughter’s hair, which Dawn immensely hated. “You can say, in a way, that your long hair was the only positive outcome of your captivity.”

Dawn couldn’t believe what she was hearing. Was her mother always this… tactless? Did she make her mother greater and sweeter in her head than she really was?

“Well, I fucking disagree, okay? So back off.” The anger from last night was bubbling up again and Dawn didn’t have the energy after her already traumatizing shower to deal with another fight. She walked passed her mother.

Rue gasped. “Dawn! I raised you better than this. Where are your manners?” Her mother chided.

She sighed and kept her back facing her mother. “Maybe I left them in the lab…or maybe I would have them if you protected me better or had found me as any other parent would!” Dawn had turned around by now, which was a big mistake. For a split second, she could see the hurt she inflicted on her mother but shortly after that Dawn was slapped in the face.

Dawn immediately reacted, her walls went up and her anger was gone. She went into survival mode. She went numb. She couldn’t even see any regret in her mother’s eyes which made her even more numb, more distant to the world. In a monotone voice, she said, “I think it would be better for all of us if you went back home.”

Her mother scoffed. “I would, but we can’t. It’s kinda hard when your own daughter, and a daughter of Alpha’s not to mention, is officially a rogue. Together with this pack, we have to settle on what to do with you. Hence, why we need to stay so you won’t be cast out by the werewolf community.” And with that Rue walked off, dealing with her own emotions.

Dawn felt like a burden again. She wanted to disappear. She was confident that was in the best interest of everybody. Maybe she should try to live among the humans, maybe that was better.

Dawn went outside and climbed into a tree that wasn’t too far away from the pack house, trying to stay out of everybody’s way.

“Dawn! Dawn!” She didn’t want to respond. “Dawn?! Are you up there?” This made her look down. At the bottom of the tree stood Aiden. “Could you please come down, I am not the best tree climber.”

Dawn sighed but did what was asked of her. “Hey there, haven’t seen you all morning. How are you doing?” She shrugged her shoulders. “Fine.”

Aiden scanned with his eyes Dawn’s face and when his eyes stayed on her right cheek, she knew that he would have his suspicions. “What happened?” He carefully asked.

“Nothing.”

“This,” Aiden pointed at her whole body and her cheek specifically, “doesn’t look like nothing.”

Dawn looked up at Aiden. It wasn’t until now she really noticed him. Aiden was always there when she was in distress, helping her, taking care of her, and making sure she was alright. There was something about him Dawn found so peaceful. She didn’t know if it was his smooth voice, his warm brown eyes, or his welcoming demeanour.

Or maybe because he was just the living opposite of Dr. Willow. Aiden wasn’t old, well he was younger than her evil kidnapper, but still, she was aware that he was older than her. By how much she didn’t know. He wasn’t manipulative. Aiden was an honest man, anybody could see that. He wasn’t selfish. He cared about others and their well-being besides his own.

But mostly Aiden made Dawn feel protected. She felt like she could be who she really was, she didn’t need to keep her guard up with him. So reluctantly she admitted, “My mother slapped me.”

“I am sorry about that. That must have been awful… Do you need some comfort?”

Dawn tilted her head in confusion. “Do you need a hug, or do you want to hold hands, or do you want to punch something?”

She shrugged again. “I don’t know…”

“How about a hug?”

When Dawn didn’t respond, Aiden slowly came closer to her and she accepted it, she accepted the invitation for a hug. When his arms wrapped around her, she could feel everything. Her anger had turned into sadness, frustration, irritation, confusion, relief, and many other emotions which she didn’t know how to label.

Dawn didn’t know how much she missed this, how much she missed loving physical contact. As a child, she was often distant from anyone, except for her father. She would often be found in his arms and it was now in this moment she noticed how much she missed a simple gesture as a hug.