True Nature

3

The long-suffering moan I huffed out into my pillow was drowned out by the shrill sound of my ringtone as I was reluctantly roused from sleep. Without opening my eyes, I flapped my arm about my head wildly in an attempt to grab my phone off my bed-side table, knocking it, and a large number of other things on the floor in the process. For a brief moment, I attempted to doze off again, thinking I could ignore the noise, but it wasn't long before the ringing provoked me into grudgingly sitting up and taking the call. Almost immediately regretting answering, I mumbled an unintelligible goodbye down the line and hung up, letting out a resigned sigh. Today should have been my day off but Natasha wasn't feeling well and, as I owed her a favour, I would have to cover her shift at the café.

Tiptoeing past a still sleeping Tessa into the bathroom, I bent over the sink and stared at myself in the mirror. With the inadequate amount of 5 hours sleep (the romance novel to blame), my appearance looked fairly bleak, but I did my best to cover the dark shadows circling my light blue eyes and fix the red mop of hair on my head. After straightening out my slightly crumpled uniform as best I could and applying a little lip gloss, I quickly grabbed my coat and bag and speed-walked the 20 minutes it takes to get to the café, making it in just under 15. Out of my many part-time jobs, working at the cafe was my favourite as the owner, Ms Hudson, the sweetest old lady you could ever meet, often let me take home any left-over muffins after a shift. Since graduating high school last year, I had taken on several part-time jobs in the hopes of saving enough to travel down to Edinburgh to find work. Though she never complained about it, I knew Annie struggled to afford the bills while caring for Tessa and I, and the meagre salary I earned here wasn't enough to live off of. For now, anyway, university would have to wait.

The little bell tinkled as I pushed the café door open and murmured a sleepy good morning to the room. The other worker, Claire, was already busy setting up front, so I found a clean apron from the cupboard and helped Mrs Hudson finish preparing some of the breakfast dishes before we opened up. The few members of staff and the majority of our customers are human - the lack of pack members being one of the reasons I decided to apply for a job here in the first place. Though our pack shares the town with the humans, our existence to the outside world is still relatively unknown and interactions between humans and wolves in our village are usually limited to the time we share together at school. Funnily enough, in contrast, I knew the humans of our town far better than the majority of my pack members.

A few hours of pouring coffee and discussing the latest gossip (the juiciest of which involved an old Mrs Markham allegedly phoning the police this morning to accuse her neighbour of stealing one of her chickens), the doorbell rang again and, timing it perfectly, Josh walked in just as Mrs Hudson came out of the kitchen carrying a silver tray containing several fresh, blueberry muffins. "Good morning Ms Hudson, how are you today?" He flashed her his most charming smile as she greeted him cheerfully in return. It was no secret that Ms Hudson adored Josh. They were best buddies, and I, practically the third wheel in their friendship. Ms Hudson had been convinced Josh and I were dating for ages and, when I told her we weren't, deemed it her mission in life to marry us off, no matter how many times I told her we were just friends. "I'm here to accompany Ivy on her lunch break" Josh beamed. 

Giving me a sneakily pointed look, she smiled brightly. "Well, isn't that just lovely? You can go ahead and take your lunch break now Ivy." She gushed. Rolling my eyes, I took off my apron, grabbed a sandwich and drink to go from the café and strolled outside to get some fresh-air, Josh trailing behind me.

"You really shouldn't encourage her you know." I frowned. "If you keep visiting during my lunch break, I'll never hear the end of it."

"She's harmless" he laughed lightly. We sat down at a bench overlooking the park and, unwrapping my sandwich, I told Josh what I had been dying to confess all day - the details of the conversation I had overheard yesterday during my impromptu eavesdropping session. He listened intently as I finished my rant, swinging around in his seat and looking at me wide-eyed when I mentioned the name Tobias.