Golden Glade Get Lonely

Hoping to catch a wild @Laurel, but anyone that's a part of Golden Glade is welcome!

The glade was theirs without contest, and Reek's family finally had some much needed rest. The worst of the snows had passed and everyone had made it though alive, apart from some of Tambourine's poor toes. For the first few days, Reek had been on edge after the Glade's claiming, as he feared that the old pack that occupied the territory would regroup and try to reclaim what was once theirs. He knew that they would best them a second time, just as they did before, but Reek hoped that they would never return.

And as days turned into weeks, Reek's unease was put to rest. The Glade was his.

It was a time of celebration in Reek's heart, but still there was unrest among his subordinates -- unrest among his own family. His heart hurt for Laurel, as it always did. Trudging though the receding snow of a nearly unfamiliar territory, Reek followed his daughter's trail specifically.

Life hadn't been that great since they'd taken over the pack. It was just another place, and in hindsight Laurel wondered if it was any better than the Grotto at all. It wasn't all that golden to her, but then, she wore grey-tinted goggles of late.

Being deterred from hurting the pup didn't help any, and neither did nobody noticing the feat — except for the one who'd stopped her. She felt like she kept trying, but that she was swimming up against a current she could not quite master. Like all her attempts were in vain.

She'd been skulking around alone for the most part since they'd taken the pack, and she hadn't expected to find anyone that day. She was walking along a small trickle of frozen water as the wind swept through her fur, and was surprised that when she looked over her shoulder she saw her father there, heading towards her.

It had been, and had always been, Reek's prerogative to be a present and loving father. The job, however, proved to be much more difficult than he could have ever imagined it to be. Having been raised by a single parent himself, Reek had never had a father to compare himself to. He had to start from scratch and rely purely on instinct -- but sometimes, that wasn't enough. In some ways, he tried to emulate his mother: her patience and understanding were traits that Reek tried hard to hold true.

He tried his hardest, but his hardest hadn't been enough for his girls.

He found her alone, and he immediately thought of how lonely she must have been without her sister. It had been months since Indra had run away, and all Reek could hope was that she found her mother -- that she was safe, despite the fact that he would never see her again. Taking to his daughter's side, Reek spoke softly. "Want to take a walk with your old man?" He left the option open, as he knew their relationship was strained. Reek did not wish to impose.

They'd never really looked much for Indra, what with the tragedy that had happened — that she had caused — but in a way, that she felt Astik and Tapat had caused, and Jhala had caused, because they shouldn't have been born at all. Maybe Indra'd still be safe and sound with them if they had never happened at all. She had tried her best to live without Indra and she had tried her best to start afresh, but it turned out that there wasn't really such a thing as 'starting anew'. You always carried the remnants of the past with you, no matter where you went. She hated Moonbrook, too, for stopping her from killing the pup at Golden Glade. She could've maybe proven something to her father if she had managed and if he had seen her do it, but now, it was all moot and the only one who'd noticed at all was the one stupid pack mate who'd wanted to stop her.

Needless to say, she hadn't expected her father to find her that day. She wasn't too sure she felt like a walk, because social interaction just seemed like a hassle and she would always just say or do something to offend someone else. She wondered often if she should just leave and be on her own, but somehow, she always stayed because she just wasn't ready to strike out on her own.

Even though she wanted to scream no, she ended up saying, "Sure," though it was clear from the way she said it that she wasn't too enthusiastic about it herself. She waited for him to lead the way, following at the shoulder but not as chatty as she once used to be.

He waited with ears falling back against the crest of his skull in earnest before his daughter could offer a reply. For her to accept his offer was unexpected. Truthfully, Reek thought that she would reject him outright. Though he could hear the solemn disinterest in her voice, she agreed. Laurel took his side, trailing just behind as Reek led the way though the snow-swept glade. He looked back, eyes catching his daughter's face as she followed behind him in silence. With their relationship the way it was, Reek really didn't know what to say.

He never really did, because every time he opened his mouth, Reek felt like he was driving the wedge between the two of them deeper and deeper.

But finally, after a few minutes of silence, Reek spoke. "I'm, uh --" he stuttered, stumbling with hesitation. "I'm glad you came." When they had made their flight from the grotto, Reek had been hopefull that his seperation from the faith would somehow help repair his relationship with his family. So far, it hadn't done much.

Laurel didn't know what to say, feeling uncomfortable and not knowing what she could do about it. She was slowly coming onto the realisation that things'd simply never be the same again, no matter what they did. And she could sense that he felt the same, from the way that he moved to the way he talked around her. He was clearly uncomfortable and she wondered if it was because he could see nothing but the monster that tried to kill his son when he looked at her. She was officially an adult now but felt nothing like it.

"Oh," she said, not knowing what to say. She wasn't very happy she came. She just came because she had nowhere else to go. Because no matter how much she wanted to leave, she didn't know how to.

Then, suddenly, "Why?" It had come out before she realised, and it wasn't intended, but now that she had said it she looked at him, awaiting an answer, and hoping that it'd be convincing enough to make her believe it.

Reek stopped and fell silent, as if a great weight of contemplation fell upon him. Looking to his daughter, Reek bore all in his expression; intense pain and unconditional love both flashed in Reek's eyes. After everything she had done, after all their family went though -- Reek still loved his daughter with all of his being. Abundant love was one thing, however, it was not enough to dispel the seeds of mistrust and unease that Laurel's violent outburst had sown in Reek's mind. He did his best to move past it, but there was only so much a man could process.

"Because you'll always be my daughter," he answered. No matter how hard she hurt him, Laurel could not change that. Nor could she stop Reek from trying. "I know after everything, you probably won't believe me, but you're still my world Lorry." He looked down, having offered his heart in full to his child before falling silent for a short spell. "I'm -- I'm trying to move past it." He was trying to forgive.

He was trying, but it just didn't seem to be enough. Laurel couldn't help but catch that he was trying to move past it, and of course she instantly knew what it was — what she'd done, what Jhala would never be able to forgive and maybe neither would Reek. Ears folded back and she looked away with a frown on her face. "I know," she muttered, but she didn't really. Maybe because she believed that moving on wasn't really possible.

"Why didn't you kill me?" she asked, still looking away, carefully avoiding having to look at him as though this was just a casual conversation they were having.

Her question hit Reek like a swift punch to the gut. He felt as if the air had been stolen from his lungs. Even in his fury directly after the incident, Reek did not want to kill Laurel. In fact, the thought hadn't even crossed his mind. "I didn't want to hurt you," he explained. Reek shook his head and sighed. "I don't ever want to hurt you." It had never been a part of Reek's plan to make his daughters hate him -- but if it was, he would have been a great success. He was, however, no great success at being a father, and he hated himself for it. "But I guess I've done that enough, haven't I?"

"You know, when I came to find you at the Creek, I just -- I just wanted so bad to be a part of your life," he continued to explain. His voice cracked and he could already hear himself beginning to choke up. "When I first saw you, I thought you were beautiful. You were everything I hoped you would be." Even then, Laurel had been the first he saw -- and when he did, the full weight of parenthood stuck him. "Its hard being a father Lorry." It was especially hard when one loved their child deeply. Harder still when the child did not love him back.

Laurel's gaze dropped to the ground the moment he started to speak, maybe because she was ashamed for asking the question in the first place, maybe because she wasn't ready to hear the answer. She listened, ears folding back uncomfortably, one of the rare displays of a view into her damaged soul. She swallowed as she listened, and there was so much she wanted to say — I wouldn't blame you if you had; sometimes I wish you had killed me that day; how could you ever love someone as ugly as me — but none of them could ever cross her lips.

He said, 'you were everything I hoped you would be', but Laurel just didn't understand, couldn't quite wrap her mind around it all. He said it was hard to be a father, but at least he had had a choice in becoming one, when she was just thrown into this life and now she was here, and it wasn't fun at all.

At last she looked at him again, piercing eyes filled with pain as she looked back at him, and her voice filled with sharp needles and shattered glass. "Is this what you hoped I would be?" She didn't mean to be a terrible daughter, she really didn't, but somehow everything that came from her mouth was a flurry of painful daggers. She wished that he knew how she really felt, how sad she was and how much she hated herself, but showing those things seemed like the dumbest thing she could do; like it would take the last shreds of love he might feel for her from his grasp.

"I just don't know how to do better," she admitted then, a painful admission that was nowhere near all the words she wanted to pour out and all the hurt she wanted to show. But it was all she could give at the moment.

She thought selfishly that she might be happier elsewhere, and that they would be happier, too. But she was afraid to be alone, too, afraid to get hurt and afraid to die if she would leave.

He hesitated. Reek drew to a halt beneath the cover of a stately and mature yellow cedar tree. A solemn look of contemplation then fell across his face. He needed to think carefully about what he said next. He did not want to lie to his daughter, but he knew the truth would hurt her. This was not how he wanted her to be. His hopes had always been naïve when it came to his kin -- Reek's vision of fatherhood was something akin to a fairytale. With his first litter, he found these hopes to be unrealistic.

He sighed and shook his head. When he gave his answer, Reek's voice was weary and resigned. "No." This had not been what he expected. "But I haven't been what you hoped for either." In many ways, Reek felt that most of Laurel's resentment of him had been entirely his fault. There was so much more that he wished he could have done, and even more still that he wished that he could take back.

But for what felt like the first time, Reek could see that Laurel was trying, despite her admittance that she didn't know where to begin. "Just talk to me Lorry," he pleaded as he stepped toward his daughter in earnest. "I just -- Sometimes, I feel like I don't even know you." His ears fell flat against the top of his head and a tired whine passed his lips. All he wanted was for her to open up.

No. The words hit like a brick to the face, were more painful than anything, even when she had been expecting them. She looked away, because if he would catch a glance of her eyes he would surely know how broken up inside she was at the realisation. She glossed over what he said next, that he wasn't what she expected either. She hadn't been expecting anything, as she hadn't chosen to be created, to be here. She had no choice.

He then came to pleading, and she looked at him with shock on her face, ears folding back in surprise and uncertainty as he pleaded her to talk to him. "What do you want me to say?" she asked, though it was barely a question.

She stared at him for a while, and then she asked him a question she had been dreading to ask: "Would you hate me if I left?" She wanted to look for Indra, she wanted to not be here, not be reminded of her wrongdoings and of how everybody hated her for them. She wanted to be somewhere where she was loved, and no matter how hard Reek was trying, she wasn't sure if that was ever going to happen here.

It hadn't been what Reek had wanted, but Laurel opened up... just not in the way he had hoped.

Though he had known -- though he had always known -- that Laurel was not happy with he and Jhala, it broke Reek's heart to actually hear the words. She wanted to leave, just like her sister. At least she had the gumption to talk about it before traipsing off into the unknown. He could try and sway her, to keep her here. The thought crossed Reek's mind, but his daughter's happiness was more important to him than his success or pride as a parent. If Laurel wasn't happy hear in the Glade, he was doing her a disservice as a father by keeping her here. This however, was a hard bridge to cross for Reek in an emotional sense.

"I would never hate you," he told her. Reek's voice cracked as he spoke. After everything, he could never bring himself to resent his daughter. Sometimes, he was afraid of her, but he never hated her. "You're my baby girl." His princess. Though he had used that title to lure his daughters away from the creek, he meant every word. They were, and had always been, his world.

Reek's ears fell flat against the top of his head and his expression was one of defeat. "I can't keep you here Lorry if you're unhappy," he continued. "I would if I could, but the choice has always been with you." True to his word from the day Saena tried to reclaim her daughters, Reek tried to give his children full autonomy in their choices.

He fell silent for a moment, and then, "There's still one thing I need to talk to you about. You're old enough now to understand, and you need to know why I wasn't there for you or your sister when you were babies."

i love reek so much <3
so sad to be dropping laurel, but hopefully she will be back some day ^^
edit: since i'll be dropping laurel, this is my last post -- feel free to tack on an ending and pp laurel as needed. <3

The relief was immeasurable when she heard the words from his mouth — that he would not hate her for her choices. She wasn't sure yet if she would make them, because she was afraid to be alone in the world and she was afraid to die. Maybe after the winter had truly ended it would be different, as she felt she would have more time then, a whole summer.

"Thanks," she murmured, feeling guilty and terrible for wanting to leave someone who claimed to love her so much. But however much love his words seemed to carry, it all felt very empty, very fake — Laurel didn't really know if she knew what love was at all, let alone if anyone truly did love her. What did it mean to be 'someone's world'? Did it mean they just let you go without struggle? Or that they forced you to stay close? Or was it just the kind of thing that you couldn't express in words? Thinking about it made her feel nothing, and that made her feel sad because she felt like she was barely a wolf, to feel so empty and numb about things that were so important to others.

Her thoughts were disturbed by Reek's next words. She looked shocked, as she had never thought he'd bring up such a subject, and maybe because she didn't like being confronted with the past like that. Both her parents had abandoned her, and now things were different — but that past loomed over her and her personality like a dark blanket that she didn't wish to be confronted with.

The reaction wasn't just mental, but physical, too; every muscle in her body was stiffened as she answered: "It doesn't matter why you weren't there. It matters that you're here now." She looked about ready to flee away, and it was very evident that she didn't want to talk about this subject, but for the moment found herself rooted in place.