Hagen’s P.O.V

I don’t make good choices.

I knew that from the ripe age of seven, when I decided that sneaking into the kitchen, the night before my birthday, to eat my entire cake by myself was a good idea. It was reaffirmed when I turned eighteenth, had a panic attack and packed up all my shit to move to a new city the very same day.

Not my brightest moment.

I just didn’t have the best record of thinking things through, and last night hadn’t been any different.

My temples throb the moment I peel my eyes open, causing a familiar feeling of nausea to swell through my body that was already aching in that bone-deep way that told me that the one beer I’d planned to have last night had probably turned into ten.

Fuck me. As I force myself to sit up, I try and fail to ignore the way my room sways and my stomach begins to roll with disapproval.

Jesus Christ, I’m going to throw up.

I pass my slitted gaze over my nightstand, hoping to find a bottle of water waiting there, but all I find is the usual disappointment. Disappointment and my first glimpse of the aftermath of last night’s impromptu pity party.

My place was a mess, well more of a mess than usual. It wasn’t just the usual clothes scattered on the floor, separated only by random shit that never made it to its rightful home. It was a slew of beer bottles that made the air smell stale and sad, and wasn’t that just fucking depressing.

With the best pep talk I can manage in my shit state, I fight the urge to lay back down and get myself out of bed. The quicker I got water in my system, the better chance I had at not throwing it all up in a few minutes.

“God damn it, Hagen,” I grumble as I walk across my apartment that was in no better state than my bedroom.

The trail of bottles carried out here too, like some sick path I’d led for myself all the way to the kitchen where several stacked greasy boxes waited. Apparently, I’d ordered a shitton of pizza and devoured it all, not even saving a single slice for future self.

My wolf, Zyair, tries to make a comment about that – probably something about me never saving anything for anyone – but it gets lost in the hangover which I’m suddenly a little grateful for.

Zyair was an amazing wolf, better than a best friend honestly, but he was also a very judgy wolf which wasn’t the best thing for a person who had a habit of fucking things up. But we made it work, somehow.

I make it to my kitchen sink but not without panting at the end of it. I try not to be alarmed by that. I knew I was a lazy stick and I probably didn’t get out as much as I should, but shit, was I really that bad?

Now wasn’t the time to think of that, the last thing I needed was more pitiful thoughts.

Instead, I glue myself to the counter, only ducking my head under my tap for a few desperate gulps of ice-cold water every five minutes. I stay there until the fog behind my eyes starts to clear, repeating the usual routine of waiting for my genes to fix me up for my self-inflicted damage.

What had I even been drinking over last night?

Last I remembered, I was stretched out over my couch, watching some reruns of the Chiefs with one beer and then… a note had appeared on my lap.

17th November,

Be ready at 10 pm, dress nice.

I hope you haven’t forgotten your promise,

Nikola

Suddenly, last night’s pity party made a whole lot more sense.

“Like I could forget,” I grumble under my breath before ducking under my sink for another grey gulp.

Five more days. There were only five more days left until Nikola’s Birthday.

Five more days before the guy I’d run from for my entire life would come here, for me, and try his hardest to live up to every single promise he’d ever made to me since we were kids.

I shudder as all his worst declarations make a rerun in my head.

But even sooner than Nikola’s birthday, was the date I’d promised him when I was fifteen and he was ten. In exchange for a magical favour, I’d made that promise thinking that by the time Nik turned 18, I’d already be mated to another – to a woman – and that by then, he would’ve gotten over his obsession with me.

I’d just figured the date wouldn’t happen, so agreeing to it didn’t seem that bad.

If I could go back and punch myself in the face while I’d said ′fine, whatever’, I would – very, very hard.

Nikola was my mate, he’d known so since we were kids and I’d been forced to accept it when I turned 18 and saw him through new eyes.

We were mates, and it was only a matter of time before we’d have to face that.

Our five year age gap and my moving out of state had kept us apart, but now, Nik was turning 18 and I had a date I could not back out of, even if I wanted to.

Swiping my hands over my face, I let them hide me in cold darkness while my heart races a mile a minute.

Inside, I could feel my anxiety spiking, alongside that tiny sliver of worry that always came with Nikola.

He had always been so… much, even as a kid. Nikola had always known his place in the world and was never afraid to claim it, or anything else he thought belonged in it, and that had always terrified me, because to him, that included me.

Nik didn’t just want a mate to love, he wanted one to own.

But even with that building fear creeping over me, I could feel my lips pulling up at the corners just a little. Like usual, my body betrays me as it stokes that small flicker of excitement inside of me, prodding it until it was lighting me up from the inside out.

I try to fight it, try to ignore it, but there was a part of me – a tiny, microscopic part of me, that was more like a distant relative – that was tired of waiting, tired of being alone and desperate for another to fill the bond that had been one-sided for so many years.

Knowing my mate and not being able to do a thing about it was excruciating, even more so when things between us had been so… strained.

As a kid, I thought our five year age gap was a blessing. As an adult, it was nothing but torture.

Fuck, I could use another drink.

No! – Zyair snaps, finally fighting his way back through the clogging of my hangover – I never signed up to be an alcoholic so you need to cut that shit out, right now!

I am not an alcoholic – I reply in a groan.

Tell that to our fucking liver, Hagen!

Before I could reply or actually consider another drink, the rhymic vibrations of my phone make my ears twitch with alert. It takes a minute to find it, tucked under the further corner of my couch, but once I retrieve it and see the caller I.D. I almost wish I hadn’t.

“Hey dad,” I answer as cheerfully as I can as I press the phone to my ear.

Just relax, Hagen. If you’re relaxed, then dad will be relaxed.

No need to worry him with your pending alcoholism!

So you admit it!

Ignorance was key with Zyair.

“Hagen!” My dad, Julian, replies with all the happiness that made him fucking amazing. “I hope I didn’t wake you up.”

“Nah, I was already up,” I say as I slump down on the couch, “What’s up?”

“I’m fine, thanks for asking and so is your father,” Dad mocks and I could so easily picture the face he was making right now.

I groan, “How are you?”

Dad just keeps going, “We’re doing well, planning what we’ll be doing to celebrate our 30th anniversary.”

“Okay! I’m sorry,” I beg in a short groan, “I’m a horrible child, sorry! How are you guys?”

“I just told you how we are, Hagen, keep up,” Dad retorts with a pleased chuckle.

It’s hard not to return it as my body quickly relaxes.

My dad was honestly the best person I knew.

The perfect mix of kind and strong, calculated while still being giving and he’d always tried his best to make sure that me and my siblings, always knew how much he loved us.

It’d been hard moving away from home and from him, but I couldn’t stay where he was, that was even harder.

“Okay, I’m done teasing. I just wanted to call and see how you’re doing? You don’t call home enough,”

Guilt pricks at me as I rub a hand over my dishevelled hair, “I’m good, dad. I’ve been keeping myself out of trouble and classes have been good.”

“Just good?” Dad prods. I bite my lip to stifle my sigh but he hears it anyway, “Hagen, I just want you to love what you’re doing.”

Easier said than done.

“I will, it’s just a boring subject set at the moment, ” I promise, though I could hear my own lies clear as day.

In truth, I was about five minutes away from switching courses, again. I don’t know what the fuck I was thinking when I chose Geology as my next step, but it wasn’t the one.

“Alright, well, you keep me posted,” I shut my eyes and nod to myself. “I’m also calling because your dad’s fighting me on putting the lights up and I know that’s your favourite part of the holidays,” Dad explains, his tone deceptively nonchalant, “I told him you’d want to do it yourself if you’re going to be coming back soon.”

I knew this was coming.

I barely manage to keep my sigh in as I search for the perfect answer to the real question he was asking here.

Are you coming home for Nikola?

The answer should be simple, a yes or a no, but when had things between Nik and I ever been simple.

If I said yes, I’d be committing myself to see Nikola much sooner than I was ready to,

and if said no, I’d get a lecture about what it takes to be a good mate, hidden within a lecture about how important it is to be home to hang up the Christmas lights with my old man.

“I should be,” That was a safe in between, it left room for me to back out.

Silence rests between us before finally, Dad says, “Okay, well you let me know, I can’t keep hiding the lights forever.”

That gets a snort out of me as I smile up at my ceiling, “You’d think by now, he’d be too old to be moving around so much.”

“Don’t say that, we’re the same age and you know how he gets about his age,” Dad whispers quietly despite the way I was sure he was probably smiling right now. “You give me a call soon, Hagen, and let me know what’s happening, alright?”

“Will do, Dad,”

“And if you need to talk,” he adds quickly, “about your courses or even what you want to eat for the day,” I laugh out loud and Dad quickly follows, “I’m always here to listen, to help Hagen.”

My smile softens and my heart pumps a little harder, trying to fill the family bond that was achingly far, “Thanks, dad.”

“Always,” he replies quickly, “I love you.”

“Love you too,” I promise before letting the line cut.

Pressing my phone to my chest, I stare up at my ceiling and try to figure out what the fuck I was going to do.

Picking up the note from where I’d dropped it last night, I let my eyes scan over Nikola’s message again without having a heart attack.

I sweep my fingers over his clean handwriting, knowing that this was probably his fifth draft with how much of a perfectionist Nikola was.

It makes a faint smile spread across my lips, one I don’t even bother fighting.

I hadn’t actually seen or spoken to Nikola in months, so his note had been an honest surprise.

Of course, I knew his birthday was creeping closer and closer, but I tried not to think too much about it because I had no idea what was going to happen on the day itself.

I was still confused as I’d been the day I turned 18.

It was times like this that I missed my twin, Josey, most. She’d always been an annoying hardass who didn’t understand the meaning of ‘holding your tongue’ but she was also an annoying hardass who always knew what to do – at least where our lives were concerned.

I could call her and humbug her, but I knew well enough that she’d probably be training and I didn’t want to stop her from actually getting on with her life. No need for two of us to be stuck

Growing up, Josey had always just gotten it.

While I’d been stuck on my 2×2 timetables, she’d been on her 9′s. When I’d get lost going down a path we’d been a hundred times, she’d hold my hand and lead the way. And when I couldn’t sleep on my own, she’d grumble and make fun of me, but she’d always stay with me throughout the night.

She’d be with me right now if I hadn’t moved away, out of the pack and out of state.

Maybe that will be changing soon enough – Zyair whispers hopefully.

I groan in response. I had no idea what would happen when Nikola turned 18, but moving back to the pack for him was not on the table.

Why not?! – Zyair whines like the living baby he was – We’ve been waiting for so long! There’s no reason to hold back now. We should be close to him! He is our mate!

Like I didn’t know that.

I don’t bother arguing the subject we’d fought over a million times before.

Zyair didn’t get it, he literally couldn’t with the way our mate bond blinded him to all things logical, that and the fact that he didn’t really care about the age gap between Nikola and me.

I did. I cared a lot.

No matter what anyone else said, about it all being part of ′the Moon Goddess’ plan′ or how ’the bond preceded anything else’, I didn’t like the fact that I was waiting for my mate to become an adult.

It was fucking weird and it made me feel like a damn pervert. Worse yet when everything inside of me called to him in a way I shouldn’t for someone so young.

I hated it even more than I hated my mate being a guy.

I wasn’t attracted to men. It was just one of those things you knew as a kid, you knew what you liked and what you didn’t like, and I had always known that I didn’t like guys.

That fact hadn’t changed when I turned eighteen and saw Nikola just standing there, waiting for me. I’d felt a whole mountain of new emotions – fear, excitement, dread, hope – but I had not felt attraction and never had throughout all these years.

In the city, on some of my worst nights out, I’d tried to approach a few guys, thinking maybe if we were really mated then I might be bi at the very least. But nothing felt right then either, it couldn’t when I knew who my mate was.

A hybrid stone wall who didn’t understand the word boundaries.

I don’t like boundaries, I like things wide open – Zyair claims which makes me roll my eyes, because of course he did.

Well, I like shit shut.

Zyair harumphs while I roll myself onto my side and bury my face into the back of my sofa.

When I’m nuzzled in, I let it muffle the shout that rises up through until all the tension leaves me completely.

“Why does everything have to be so fucking complicated?”

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It takes forever to get my place in a semi-decent order, especially with all the impromptu breaks I take in between to stuff my face with what little food remained in my fridge.

My family liked to say I had an eating problem, I preferred to see myself as a food enthusiast.

Whichever way it went, I’d been too busy eating to notice the time or that I was insanely late to work.

Shortly after I moved, I’d picked up a job to keep myself busy, a way to burn off my anxiety while earning enough to keep me fed so I didn’t have to keep calling home for help.

I’d lost that job and three more after it until I was finally able to keep an amazing job at a local drive-in cinema…and then I’d gone and lost that too.

So now I was a 23-year-old cashier who made an effort to go to his university classes from time to time.

Honestly, the state of my life wouldn’t bother me that much if I knew where it was going, but I didn’t have a fucking clue, not like everyone else in my family.

My eldest brothers, Levi and Damon, were both the alphas to their own packs, and were happily mated to their soulmates with the cutest kids to keep them smiling. My other brother, Peter, didn’t have a mate yet, but he was living his dream as a marine biologist, travelling the world and seeing more of it than I could imagine.

And Josey, she was my age for crying out loud and somehow she knew that entering the Academy was meant for her while I still couldn’t figure out what I wanted to do with my life.

I’d changed my course about three times already and still had no idea what I wanted to do with my life.

I liked everything I tried, but the problem was, I didn’t love any of it.

I didn’t love it the way Damon geeked out over knives or the way Peter lost his shit whenever he tried to describe the latest coral reef he’d seen.

I didn’t have that thing, that spark that lit people up from the inside out and made them chase some future life that would make them happy forever.

All I had was food, and that was hardly a spark when I just ate it nonstop and hated cooking it.

I really hoped that scanning grocery items wasn’t my spark, because I wasn’t even that good at it. I still panicked every time someone came to my aisle as if they’d kill me if I didn’t move faster.

Supermarkets had a way of making humans testy.

I get the usual angry scolding for being late, the threat of being fired that would never actually happen, before I’m at my station, gesturing for the next customer to come.

Hours pass that way, with nothing but repeated, dull actions that drain me of the little life I had left in me. All the while, Nikola’s note replays itself in my mind like a broken record I couldn’t get out of my head.

“Dress nice,” I mutter under my breath with a scowl. “Who the fuck does he think he is?”

That gets me a glare from my customer but I just glare back, I wasn’t in the mood for proper customer service, I was barely in the mood for my life.

Maybe I should show up in pyjamas covered in food stains, or my oldest clothes that barely had any colour left to them, and if I was feeling nice, maybe I’d comb my hair at the very most.

While I finish my shift, my brain fills with idle thoughts of how I could teach Nikola that he didn’t control me. But they were just that, idle thoughts. I already knew that I’d let Zyair take over to get us the best clothes he could find tomorrow and I’d do more than comb my hair.

I roll my eyes at myself as I clock out for work with a case of beers under my arm.

Four more days and counting… dear Goddess help me

───────────────────

KNEGSNRTHONTIHSTEKSFDNHTEOINHSETHKOMERGAE – if you can’t already tell, I’m losing my mind!!!

Thoughts????

What do we think about older Hagen? Our favourite foodie is all grown up ughhhh. Okay I know his life looks a bit ugh right now, probably not what you expected but I promise you, Hagen is not an alcoholic!

But I really really want to hear all your thoughts so please share them.

Comment, comment, comment!!! PLEASE

ENJOY THE NEXT CHAPTER!!!!

Tippy loves you all!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!