Luna? No sir i'm a Marine

Story time

I led him down a path that I haven't walked in 5 years. It's exactly as I remember it but with the small addition that changed my life.

A small gold plaque. That's all it is but it represents so much more than that. It symbolises a life. A life that was cut short, a life that changed mine.

Luke hasn't uttered a word.

I watched the swing sway back and forth in the wind. A gentle reminder of what it used to do.

I can remember it as though it was yesterday. Giggling, her blonde ringlets blowing behind her as she rushed towards the swing. This was our special spot, our little secret. My dad put that swing there for me when I was younger, no one uses it anymore so I thought it would be perfect her. She loved it. Every chance she got she would ask if we could go there again.

Her once bubbly personality that inhabited this area now represented by a ghostly swing and a plaque on a tree.

I could feel the tears welling in my eyes. Coming back here was like pulling the plug that I put to bottle it all up. Luke wrapped me in his arms and pulled me into his chest. Slowly rocking us back and forth. My mum was right. I have to tell him, he deserves to know.

After I let go he walked towards the giant oak as I wiped my eyes. His thumb brushed across the engraving as he slowly read out what was written.

"Alexis Caitlin Smyth
2007-2010
You would be here today if Heaven wasn't so far away"

He turned around to face me and he looked broken. His voice cracked as he spoke
"Wa-was she yours?"
It was like he's a house of cards and i'm the wind. I thought I was vulnerable but it looks like he's ready to crawl into a ball and cry his heart out. It's so unusual to see a big tough Alpha such a wreck but when we're together it's like our normal rules don't apply. When he's around so are my emotions, there's never a dull moment with us.

I walked towards him and wrapped my arms around his waist.
"No"
I could see him visibly relax. I rested my head on his chest as listened as his heartbeat sped up. I couldn't stop the grin that spread across my face.
"You hear that? It only happens when you're around." Literally butterflies everywhere. Knowing that you have that affect on someone, it's just. There are no words to explain it.

"I told my mum about us and she told me I had to bring you here. She's right, you deserve an explanation. I know I over reacted about the whole kiss thing and I find it hard to love, after what happened. I do have my reasons and well this is it."

I felt Luke rock us gently from side to side again, one arm wrapped around my shoulders and the other rubbing my back.

"Alexis was my niece. My older Brother, Sam and Vanessa were high school sweethearts. They were each others first everything, love, kiss, relationship and as it turned out, child. Or so we thought. They fought a lot and we all put it down to the stress of having a child. But after Alexis was born things got bad. Vanessa started going out all the time, she started doing drugs. I had to watch Sam try and pick up the pieces. All he could say was that it's just a rough patch and that he loves her. Love, it was all in the name of love. Love of his girlfriend, the mother of his child and his beautiful daughter. Until one day, Sam had had enough and tried to take Alexis away. That's when Vanessa confessed. She had been cheating on him with the man that got her into drugs, she was just using my brother because he was popular, she didn't have to work and her family approved. The worst thing was that she told him that Alexis wasn't his. But in our hearts the gorgeous brown eyed toddler, who was named after me, was family. No matter what the DNA test proved. Sam had been more of a parent to her than either of her biological parents."

I took a deep breath. I know what's coming next. The scene replaying in my mind. The what if's? The buts, the what if I did that different's.

"Sam took her to court. He wanted custody of Alexis. He proved that Vanessa was a junkie and her father nothing but a ghost in the wind yet he had not legal right. His name wasn't on her birth certificate and she's not biologically his. So in the courts eyes he had no rights yet it was ok to leave Alexis in the arms of an unfit mother. Vanessa let us see her but it was mainly to babysit when she was out partying. She was not fit to be a mother but yet she was. Alexis was the sweetest child you could ever wish for. One day we couldn't babysit.
We were in the hospital, Sam broke his arm and I fractured my ankle........he was chasing me and I fell out of the tree but he broke my fall.
The next morning we got a phone call. Vanessa had left Alexis in the bath while she snorted something. She passed out and left my niece in the bath. Alexis slipped underwater and with no one there to help her she drowned."