it I would do anything to protect the wolves I loved.
Anything.
****
Every night I dreamt of him. Every night it was a little different, but still the same. Hunter and I would spend time together, usually in his room. We laid on his bed, my head on his shoulder, and our hands entwined. I remembered laughing in the dreams. I remember his laugh. The full-belly, amazing laugh that I loved to hear. That I felt he only gave to me. He was so open in those moments. Sometimes we wouldn’t be laughing, or talking.
This dream was different. We were outside under the stars. The sky was clear, the moon was so close and bright that the world around us was clear. He was standing between two trees at the line of the woods. I headed towards him. I felt like I couldn’t get to him close enough.
“Look at you all dressed up.”
I smiled.
He was wearing black sports jacket, with his best pair of pants, and his feet were bare. I bit my lip as I looked at him. He really did look good, his beard was a little longer than usual and his hair had grown. I liked it. I wanted to run my hands through it and put it in a bun just to see how it looked. Hunter’s yellow eyes met mine.
“Would it hurt you to say I look handsome?” he said. His voice was as gruff as I remembered it. It sent zings right to my heart and my gut. I felt the butterflies start again and I felt friction starting to build. Hunter’s lips split into that shit-eating grin that I loved. He knew what he was doing this to me on purpose, and he was damn proud of it.
“You are very handsome, you don’t need me to tell you that.”
I pressed my hands on his chest. He felt so solid underneath me and I wanted to cuddle closer. And it was my dream, so I did. I moved my arms around his wide chest and set my head over his heart.
“I need you to tell me, because you are the only one that matters.”
“You’ll survive without me,” I whispered. I felt the tears forming in my eyes. I knew there was a chance that I wasn’t coming out of any of this alive. I pressed my tears into his shirt.
“I was barely surviving before you. How could you expect me to survive after knowing you? After falling in love with you?”
“Please don’t say that Hunter.” I couldn’t bear to think that he loved me, even in a dream. He asked me how he was expected to survive without me. How was I supposed to live without him? Any way this ends, it ends with me alone and far from him. I could never make him stay with me. I was still everything he hated. Even if I managed to save the wolves from this spell that they were threatened with so many centuries ago still didn’t change that I felt like a monster.
No, I couldn’t do that to him. I couldn’t let him live that lie.
“I am a dream, Colette. You wouldn’t even want me here to say I love you?” he whispered, sounding hurt.
“I want you to say it and mean it like the air I breathe. But what my heart wants, and what my mind knows are two very different things. I want to be selfish enough to say yes, but as long as part of me believes that you don’t love it, I can walk away. Dreams give us hope.”
Hunter leaned back so that he could see me. He pushed my hair out of my face. I closed my eyes. I loved the sensation of his hands through my hair. I opened my eyes to see him smiling at me. It was the smile, the one that brought me to my knees and made me feel like everything was going to be all alright.
“A tiny thing like you? You destroy me by walking away,” he whispered as he leaned in and pressed a kiss against my forehead. I let out a cry, a laugh, but when I went to wipe away my tears he was there. He brushed the pads of his thumbs to each corner of my eye.
“Hunter, there is so much I want to tell you about me. But…it would kill me to make you hate me,” I answered. We were silent for a while.