Her Second Chance✔ (Completed under edit)

3 (Edited)

Cari

The room was still dark, though she instantly became aware of strong light sneaking through the edges of the drawn curtains. For a moment, panic swelled inside her at the drawn curtains - something she never did - and the now unfamiliar room. Then she remembered last night, or it might've been this morning.

All Cari wanted was to bury herself in bed, to lose her tired body in sleep but she wasn't in her home. A glance at the clock showed her it was already 10:23 and she had never slept this long, no matter how tired she was. With some effort, she levered herself out of the bed. She had to brace herself against the wall as a dizzy spell washed over her. They'd been happening more frequently this year.

Once the spell was over, she relied on the walls and furniture to hold her up as she made her way to the bathroom. Ten years ago, it had held her favourite products, her spare robe hooked to the door and a spare toothbrush for her. The bedroom had been designed with her taste in mind and the closet had held some of her clothes. No more.

It was now all designed with the blandness people used for a guestroom. She found a new toothbrush on top of some clothes that had been left for her. Opening it up with trembling hands, Cari brushed her teeth before taking a quick shower.

She felt refreshed afterwards but the clothes turned out to be a nightmare. They were meant to be figure-hugging, in the size she should have been. As she looked at them, she realized they were her clothes even though she'd never worn them. She remembered buying them with Anne a few weeks before her friend abandoned her.

Cari was still curvy, her hips had never yielded to any diet or exercise and her chest was still as ample. Yet somehow she'd lost too much weight. The baggy clothes she'd taken to wearing had hidden how skinny her waist had become, how her ribs were now showing and how stick-like her legs were.

Wearing her former style showed all that. The skinny jeans were tight around her hips, but otherwise baggy. Which was a really weird thing and looked even worse. The stretch top somehow clung to her even as it appeared also baggy. In short, she looked awful. Like someone who'd shopped in the lost and found basket.

Now Cari really wanted to bury herself away, but then what was one more humiliation? She was sure in no time the whole pack would know her shame. From the mirror, dry eyes that wanted to cry but had no more moisture looked back at her. Haunted eyes in a gaunt face that showed so much weariness.

With a weary sigh, she walked away from her depressing self and out of the room. There was no point in hiding. She met no one but halfway down the stairs, she heard raised voices coming from the back of the house. From the formal sitting room.

Too tired and cowardly Cari turned to go to the kitchen and see if she could manage to swallow something. In all these years her appetite had died and even when she forced herself to eat the food seemed to do her no good.

As she entered the kitchen, she found herself enveloped in warm soft arms that held her as if she were precious. "Oh my sweet girl, I missed you." The pack member who'd cooked for the Gamma family as long as Cari could remember sniffed as she held her longer.

"Now, I've made something for you to eat." She continued as she drew away and wiped the tears on her face. "Come, sit." She drew Cari to one of the island stools.

Obediently she did. The woman busied herself, pouring some juice for her and taking out a ready-made plate from the warmer and setting it before an uncomfortable Cari. She had known this woman so well at one point, had loved her like another grandmother. But in the last decade, Cari had distanced herself from the pack. She hadn't even known her grandfather had wanted to mate her off.