Dear Wesley,

Thank you for being honest with me. It’s not a surprise that you don’t want me as a friend. I’m used to people not wanting me.

You see, I’m an orphan. My parents left me when I was a baby. I was only a few days old. I have lived in pretty much one home a year since I was a baby. So I guess that would make it nine homes now, since I am nine years old. And since I move so much, it makes it harder to make friends.

I’m not telling you this to make you feel bad. I just wanted to tell you I know why you did it and even though you didn’t ask for it, I forgive you.

I hope you get your A.

Haven Kenway

**********

WESLEY POV

The reply letter came in our packhouse mail almost a week after I sent mine. I didn’t realize that I wrote my home address as the return address on the envelope instead of the school’s address.

I arrived home to find the letter was already opened. It was on the small, round dining table in the kitchen of the alpha suite (we called it a suite, but it was really more like a penthouse apartment) where my family and I lived. My mom sat in the chair facing the doorway, giving me “the look”.

Every kid knew that look. It was the look that put the fear of Selene in the toughest of wolves and Lycans. The look that made even my dad, Alpha Harrison Stone of the Crescent Lake Pack, tuck his tail between his legs and say, “I’m sorry,” before he even knew what he did wrong. The look that said, “You done messed up.” That look.

Don’t get me wrong. My mom, Luna Emily Stone, was the best mom any Lycan could ever ask for. I mean that. She was truly the glue that held our family, and our pack, together, just like any good Luna should.

That’s why the ancestors of our pack made a rule that the alpha heir could only take over the pack once they found their mate — be it fated or chosen — so they had the person who could balance them, and keep them from being too overworked or stressed.

Obviously, the pack had the Beta, Gamma, and Delta positions to help the Alpha with that as well, but those people couldn’t calm down an angry, irritated Lycan in the same way their mate could. Even if something happened to the current alpha before the heir found their mate, the next highest ranked member with a mate would run the pack until the heir found or chose their mate.

Not all werewolf packs handled succession that way. Some packs designated an age at which they handed the pack over, and others let the current alpha decide when their heir was ready. But this was the way our pack had done things since the beginning.

With that look on my mom’s face, I was likely in for an earful. I didn’t get in trouble often. I was usually well-behaved and a rule follower, but just like any preteen kid — wolf or Lycan or human — I messed up occasionally.

I sat down in the chair right across from her, folding my hands on top of the table as I eyed her curiously. She gestured at the opened letter on the table, so I picked it up, took out the letter, and read it to myself.

With each word, I shrank further and further into my seat at the table, my mother’s eyes boring a hole straight into my brain, as if she might extract the words that I had written to this girl that made her respond so coldly to me.

We didn’t get names when we got the assignment. Mrs. Appleton said her sister would just distribute the letters randomly to the students in her class. How was I supposed to know that my letter would be given to the one student in class who needed a friend more than anybody else?

That didn’t change the fact that I now realized I shouldn’t have written what I did. It wouldn’t have mattered who she had given the letter to. Even if the student was someone who had tons of friends, my words would have been rude no matter what.

I lifted my eyes to meet the steely gaze of my mother’s gray eyes, and she could already see the remorse in mine, could already see that I understood I had made a huge mistake. She softened a bit, and leaned across the table and placed her hand over mine, as she said in a soft voice, “You know what you need to do.”

I nodded. She was right. I knew what I needed to do. I needed to do what any true alpha, any alpha worth his title, would do: own up to my mistake.

So many alphas thought they never needed to apologize when they were wrong, or even worse, that they couldn’t possibly ever do anything wrong. One of the most important things my father had emphasized to me during my alpha training was to own up to my mistakes.

We were just as imperfect as any other person — human or wolf. Being an alpha didn’t change that. We were just as prone to mistakes — or fuck ups, as Dad liked to say when my mother wasn’t around — as the rest of the world.

What made us different was showing that we realize we’d messed up, and how we reacted to that mistake, and whether we changed ourselves or if we kept making the same mistake over and over and over. If we truly learned from our actions, we could grow and move forward. If we kept repeating our errors, well, then that just showed that we were stuck in our ways.

These actions affected our pack as well. If the alpha was stubborn and set in his ways, then the pack would be stuck in the past. They’d plateau and never rise above the others or continue to be successful. But if an alpha was open-minded and able to learn and grow, then the pack would thrive and succeed in all of their endeavors.

My mother stood up from her chair at our small table and walked through the doorway of the dining room. Her heels clicked on the wood floor for several steps, and then she paused, picked something up, and headed back towards me.

I twisted in my chair so I could see her when she came back into the room. She was carrying my backpack that I had left unceremoniously next to the front door of our apartment. She sat it down on the floor next to my chair, her unwavering gaze boring through my skull as I tried to avoid eye contact with her.

“I am leaving to pick your sister up from pup care,” she told me. “I expect your letter to be finished by the time I get back with Madeleine.”

With that, she turned on her heel and walked out of our apartment, leaving me alone with the letter from Haven and my own thoughts.

I sat there for a few minutes, the only sound the ticking of our old grandfather clock in the living room. I thought about what I wanted to write to this girl. Haven.

I slowly got out my pencil and a piece of paper from my backpack, and set them on the table in front of me as I got into my writing mode.

At first, it was difficult for me to find the words to say to her, but the more I wrote, the easier it became, until the pencil in my hand could not keep up with the words flowing through my mind.

By the time Mom returned with Maddie, I had written the longest letter I had ever written in my life. I had an envelope from my father’s small office in our apartment already addressed and sitting next to the letter on the dining room table. I stood straight and tall next to it, waiting for my mother to inspect my writing.

She surprised me, however, by only checking to see if I finished it. Then she nodded without a word and walked away. She was putting her faith in me to treat this girl respectfully in my letter, and I was proud that she trusted me enough to not check over every word on the page.

I quickly folded the letter and carefully stuffed it in the envelope, sealing it and setting it in the stack of outgoing mail near our front door, just as Maddie came barreling into me. Her arms wrapped around my legs, nearly causing me to fall over on top of her.

Her tiny giggles echoed through the entry, mingling with my laugh that was becoming deeper as I neared the age of receiving my Lycan. I lifted her little three-year-old body with ease, throwing her over my shoulder like a sack of potatoes. Her giggles turned into full belly laughs as I ran through our home with her dangling behind me.

“Wessy!” she shrieked, just as I threw her down on her back onto her princess pink bed, topped with the squishiest feather duvet and the most ridiculous frilly and lacy pillows I had ever laid eyes on.

She wriggled around, trying to flee. But of course I was faster than her, and my hands tickled her belly before she even had the chance to attempt an escape. Her tiny legs kicked towards me as I continued tickling her, but I stopped before she became too hysterical or out of breath or, even worse, wet herself.

I turned to leave her room, hoping to wrangle Sebastian or Reid into playing a video game with me, but her little voice asked from behind me, “Wessy, pwease wead me a stowy?”

I sighed, and looked at her, prepared to say no, but of course she was giving me the wolf pup eyes, complete with the pouty bottom lip and batting eyelashes, her little hands clasped under her chin as she silently begged me. I couldn’t say no to that face. No one could. Maddie had perfected that look, further cementing her status as the princess of our pack.

Without a word, I moved back to her bed, grabbing our copy of The Goddess’s Tales from her bookshelf. The book of myths and legends and fairy tales was passed down through the generations in our family, but had somehow remained in decent condition, even with its age. It was well-loved, but the binding was still intact, and none of the pages had tears or bends.

The tales in the book made up all the stories that had been told over the centuries about Selene. No one knew anymore which of them, or which parts of them, were true. But every werewolf and Lycan heard them growing up, just as human children heard their own fairy tales, such as Cinderella or Hansel and Gretel.

They did not know most of their stories were based on a sliver of truth. That the magical beings they read about were actually all around them, hidden in plain sight.

“Which one shall we read today, Maddie?” I asked her, holding the book up for her to see.

She clapped her hands excitedly, settling herself next to me and saying, “Ria! I want Ria!”

I groaned. She always wanted Asteria’s story. “No, we just read that one the other day,” I argued.

I thumbed through the pages, looking at the titles as I flipped through them. “How about ‘The Alpha Pup’s Best Friend?’” I suggested, showing her the page.

“No!” she shouted.

I sighed. That was one of my favorites, because it told of the first beta, and I always thought of mine and Reid’s friendship.

I flipped through the book some more until I ended up back at the very beginning. The first story, the story of our origins.

“‘The First of the Wolves’?” I asked, peeking at her from the corner of my eye.

Her eyes lit up, but then she forced a frown. However, it was too late. I had already seen her excitement.

“First wolves it is!” I exclaimed in triumph, and she giggled and settled in next to me as I began to read.

WESLEY POV

“Once upon a time, two peeps fell in love and-”

“Dat’s not how it goes, Wessy!” Maddie laughed, pushing me with her little hands.

I pretended to fall down on the mattress from her shove. “Wessy!” she whined, pulling on my arm.

“Okay, okay,” I chuckled. “I’ll start over!”

I took a breath and began again.

“A long time ago, when the world was brand new, the gods and goddesses walked among us. They lived within the world they had created, celebrating in its beauty and its bounty with the people of the land. The gods and humans and other beings lived together in harmony, celebrating the magnificence they lived in.”

“What’s magfishinence?” Maddie interrupted.

“Magnificence,” I corrected.

“Yeah dat.”

“It means wonderful or great,” I told her. “Can I keep reading?”

She nodded, and I continued.

“But the peace among the inhabitants was a tentative peace, a fragile peace. As such, each of the gods and goddesses created warriors, their own followers blessed with a touch of their magic to be stronger than the average human.

“Selene, the goddess of the moon, gave each of her warriors a special connection to a wolf. This wolf was their companion, their friend, their extra eyes and ears and strength. They could communicate mentally with their wolf, and they had a life bond with them — one could not live without the other.

“The bond formed when both were young, and the wolves would live until the human died — either by natural causes, old age, or in battle.

“The warriors loved their canine companions and treated them even better than a pet. They trained with them, ate with them, hunted with them, and lived with them.

“As you might have guessed, however, not all was as it seemed, and not all the beings of the world were content with how the gods and goddesses had chosen their favorites.

“There was another clan, Clan Vígi, a clan who thrived on bloodshed and violence, who also worshiped Selene above any other. But she had not chosen them as her blessed warriors, and they held a grudge against the clan she had chosen, Clan Adalwolf.”

“I don’t like dem,” Maddie grumbled.

“You’re not supposed to,” I pointed out. “Now let me read.”

She muttered something under her breath, but let me read.

“This jealousy and this grudge festered and grew over the years until it became a deep-seated hatred. It ran so deep, became so ingrained into their lives, that none of the clan members remembered the origins of their envy. They only knew that the clan was their enemy, and that they deserved more than they had received.

“That year, at the annual gathering of the clans, the leader of Clan Vígi brought his daughter, Eydís, with him for the first time. She had just become of age, and he was hoping to make a match for her with the leader of another clan.

“I’m going to be Eydís for Halloween dis year,” she told me.

“Cool,” I sighed, then I paused, glancing at her to see if she would interrupt again.

She smiled at me, waiting, and I kept going.

“People always drank and partied on the first night of the gathering. It was a noisy event, an event where the clans put aside their differences, for the most part, and just celebrated life.

“Karl, of Clan Adalwolf, was there with two of his friends, Norman and Wilhelm. All three of them were looking to make matches with females while at the gathering. They were ready to settle down from their wild ways and raise families of their own.

“It was typical for members of the warrior clans to find a life partner at the gathering, but it was not typical for members of Clan Adalwolf to choose a partner from a different clan. Doing so would cause issues, as their partner would not have a wolf companion, and would be unable to take part in many of their customs, since only Clan Adalwolf members had such companions.

“Eydís immediately captivated Karl when he first laid eyes on her. He knew then and there that she was the only female for him, and he declared he would have no other.

“He approached her, and told her of his intentions, not knowing what clan she hailed from or even caring what clan she belonged to. He cared only for her soft smile and her sparkling eyes and her long, dark hair that he longed to run his fingers through.

“As the night wore on, the two drifted away from the revel so they could learn more about each other. Eydís was just as taken with Karl as he was with her, and by the time the sun began to rise, they had agreed to speak to their parents to arrange a match.

“When Karl walked her back to where her clan was staying for the gathering, it shocked him to see she was not only a member of his clan’s greatest enemy, but the daughter of their leader. He was undeterred, however. In fact, his resolve to have Eydís only deepened. He had hopes that their union might bring an end to the long endured feuding of their people.”

“Farting?”

“FEUDING!”

“Sounds like farting to me,” she giggled.

I ground my teeth together but kept going.

“He left Eydís at the edge of her campsite and returned to his own clan, vowing to himself that he would convince Clan Adalwolf to accept a member of Clan Vígi by the end of the gathering.

“Throughout the long days of the gathering, Eydís and Karl met as much as possible, almost always in secret. Karl showed her the ways of the wolf warriors, and it delighted her to spend time not only with him, but with his wolf companion as well.

“As the days continued, Karl noticed a small female wolf beginning to approach the area where they would meet. She would draw closer to them with each passing day, until at last, she drew the courage to walk right up to Eydís.

“When Eydís reached out to pet the wolf, a spark passed between the two, forging a connection between them, just as all members of Clan Adalwolf had with their own wolves.

“I can’t wait until I get my wolfy,” Maddie said, her legs bouncing on the bed. “She is going to be so so so so so pwetty!”

“You’ll get a Lycan though,” I pointed out.

She frowned, then asked, “But she’ll still be pwetty, wight?”

“I’m sure she’ll be beautiful,” I said with a smile.

She smiled back, then pointed at the book. “Wead!”

“Eydís was first shocked, then ecstatic when she realized she had been given her own wolf companion. She danced with joy, her wolf leaping and prancing along beside her in celebration. Karl and his wolf joined as well, until the four of them were too tired to continue. They sat with their wolf friends on the floor of the forest, and after their adrenaline had worn off, they fell asleep.

“Unbeknownst to them, their families were in a panic, searching high and low for their missing members. No one had seen them since the previous morning, and everyone was beginning to worry. Accusations flew. Each clan was convinced the other had done something to hurt Eydís and Karl.

“As tempers rose, and each clan started to reach for their weapons, Wilhelm and Norman interfered, stepping between the two clans, their chosen partners’ hands grasped in their own. For they too had chosen members of Clan Vígi as their life partners. And like Eydís, their partners had also been given their own wolf companions.

“As Norman and Wilhelm spoke to the clans with Frida and Dagmar at their sides, explaining what had happened, many of the people around them lowered their weapons. They realized if their children could set aside their differences to join together, that maybe they should as well.

“As this was happening, Karl and Eydís returned, unaware of the issue that had arisen in their absence. And while many members of the clans began to see they were wrong to hold their grudge for so long, Eydís’s father was unhappy to see his daughter with a member of the Adalwolf Clan.

“In his rage, he lashed out, raising his weapon against Karl’s wolf, for he knew if he killed his wolf that Karl would die as well.

“Eydís saw her father’s intentions, and rushed in front of the wolf to defend him. She closed her eyes, prepared to feel the fatal blow delivered by her own father.

“But the blow never came. Instead, the sword fell to the ground with a loud thud. Her father dropped to his knees in front of his daughter.

“She opened her eyes to find him in the dirt, tears forming in his eyes as he looked at her with regret.

“He realized then how dangerous the jealousy and hatred they held towards Clan Adalwolf truly was. He had almost killed his own daughter because of his misguided anger.

“He begged Eydís and Karl for their forgiveness. They, seeing his true regret, of course granted it. The two clans mingled, and her father gave his blessing to their match, as well as to the matches between Norman and Dagmar and Wilhelm and Frida.

“Upon seeing the clans put aside their differences to join together as one, Selene decided to grant Clan Vígi with wolf companions as well.

“The clans celebrated this momentous offering together, merging their two clans with the union of Eydís and Karl, as well as their friends. Selene attended the celebration, and to honor and thank the six young clan members, she merged their human and wolf spirits into one, allowing them to shift at will, and thus creating in them the first werewolves, from whom we are all descended.”

The door to Maddie’s room slammed against the wall hard as Sebastian ran in and whisper-yelled, “Hide me!”

I rolled my eyes and gestured at the book in my lap. “Can’t you see we’re reading?”

“Can’t you see my life is in peril?!” he retorted, then jumped over the bed to the gap between the frame and the wall.

He began pulling Maddie’s pillows and stuffed animals on top of him to block him from view.

“What did you do?” I asked him as Maddie and I just sat there watching him.

“I drew a penis on Reid’s forehead while he was sleeping on our couch,” he explained, way too calm.

“Um… why?” I sighed. “Why would you do that?”

“Well, he called me a dickhead earlier.”

“What’s a dickhead?” Maddie asked.

“I’ll tell you when you’re older,” Seb replied. “Anyway, I drew one on his face and then when he woke up I said ‘Who is the dickhead now?’ And now I’m running for my life.”

“WEID! BASTIAN IS IN HERE!” Maddie yelled at the top of her lungs before giving Sebastian a smug grin.

“Oh, no, you did NOT just do that!” Sebastian yelled. “TRAITOR!”

He jumped up out of his hiding spot just as Reid appeared in the doorway, his face bright red with a giant dick drawn with permanent marker onto his forehead.

I stifled my laughter with the book, as Sebastian stood there frozen.

“Well, it is nice to know someone is on my side,” Reid said with a wink at Maddie.

Seb glanced at me, and Reid dove forward.

“AHH!” Sebastian screamed as he darted around Reid and out the door.

Footsteps echoed through the hall and down the steps as Reid followed after him, Maddie close behind chanting “GET SEB! GET SEB! GET SEB!”

I sighed again and tossed the book on her bed. “I give up,” I muttered, then ran after my friend to hopefully save my brother from a slow and gruesome death at the hands of my future beta.

Dear Haven,

It’s me. Wesley. Wesley Stone.

Well, I guess that it is probably pretty obvious that it’s me, since my name is on the outside of the envelope, and I’m also probably the only person who writes you letters.

Crap. That probably sounded ruder than I meant it to. I just meant that most people don’t really write letters nowadays, so if you were to receive a letter from someone, it would make sense for it to be a letter from someone who had already written you a letter before. Not that no one would want to write you a letter. That’s not what I meant.

Great, now I’m rambling. You probably won’t even read this, and I wouldn’t blame you if you didn’t. I was kind of rude to you before. No, scratch that, I was REALLY rude to you before.

I could try to push the blame off of myself and say something like “Well, I didn’t know that my pen pal would be an orphan,” but that would be immature of me, because, no matter who the letter was for, I should have never written the letter the way I did. And for that, I am truly, deeply, sorry.

I know I don’t deserve your forgiveness, and I honestly wouldn’t blame you if you never want to write to me again, but I had to at least let you know that I realize I was an ass to you. (I know you’re only nine, so I’m sorry for the language, but it’s truthfully the best word to describe me right now.)

If you’re even reading this letter, and you don’t want to forgive me, then… that’s fine. I understand. And if you don’t want to forgive me, and you’re still reading this letter then… you can stop reading it now and throw it away or burn it or rip it up or put it in a shredder… whatever makes you happy, however you want to get rid of it… that’s what you should do now.

However… If you do want to forgive me, then… I’d really like to have a second chance. A fresh start. I’m not saying to forget what happened before. Just that I would like a chance for us to try this whole pen pal thing again, and just see what happens?

The truth is, even with my two best friends, Reid and Nolan, and my brother, Sebastian, I still sometimes feel like there is something missing. Maybe it’s you? Maybe I need a friend with a different perspective on life, someone who didn’t grow up beside me, someone who hasn’t always been my friend.

So, what do you say? Do you think you can give me a chance?

Again, I totally understand if you don’t want to. I don’t deserve it. I really don’t. To be honest, I don’t think I deserve to have you open this letter or even touch the envelope. So, if you’ve made it this far, I guess that means you don’t hate me as much as I think you probably should.

I’m rambling again.

Just… think about it, Haven.

I hope to hear from you soon.

Your friend (hopefully),

Wesley Stone

**********

HAVEN POV

My day started the same as most days. I got up, brushed my teeth, got dressed, ate breakfast, and rode to school in Shirley’s car. She played my favorite songs on the stereo during the drive and told me to have a good day as I got out of the car once we’d arrived at the school.

I dropped my backpack off outside of my classroom once I entered the campus, and I went to the playground, where I sat on the swings by myself, while all the other students found their friends as they arrived.

Then the bell rang, and that’s when the predictable flow of my day went completely off course.

I was not expecting to walk into my classroom and find a letter from Wesley Stone sitting on my desk. I was not expecting to ever hear from him again. It had been about a week since we had sent our reply letters, and no one else had received a second letter from their so-called pen pal.

I glanced around the room, checking to see if anyone else had an envelope on their desk, but it was painfully clear I was the only one.

I shoved it into my desk before anyone else could see it, and I had left it there all day, hardly able to focus on what Mrs. Rodrigo was saying or teaching or assigning us. I only took it out right at the end of the day, when we were packing up our things before it was time for dismissal.

And that’s how I ended up sitting in the backseat of Jack’s car, holding the envelope and staring at it, trying to decide if I should open it or not.

“What do you have there, Haven?”

I glanced up to see Jack’s eyes staring at me in the rearview, watching me and waiting for my response. “It’s a letter,” I told him quietly.

He didn’t respond at first, and I wondered if he even heard me as I turned my attention out the back window.

“A letter? Who from?” he asked as he made a left turn onto the road that led away from the school.

I sighed, turning my head back to look in his direction. “Wesley. My pen pal.”

“Pen pal? That sounds like fun. I didn’t even know people still did that kind of thing.”

I nodded at him, not really sure how to respond to that statement. It hadn’t really been fun so far, but he didn’t know that.

“What does the letter say?”

“I don’t know,” I said with a shrug. “I haven’t opened it yet.”

“Why not?”

I pressed my lips together, deciding how much to tell him about what had happened with Wesley and this pen pal assignment.

“What’s wrong, Haven?” Jack asked, his head looking directly at me now, while we waited at a stoplight.

I released my lips, blowing out air from my mouth to keep myself calm and to prevent my voice from shaking when I spoke. “He wasn’t very kind in his first letter,” I finally said.

“What do you mean? What did he say?” His brows pulled into a sharp frown at my words, and a tiny part of the walls I had built around my heart crumbled a little at his desire to help me and his need to know how someone had hurt me.

A horn honked behind us, making both of us jump slightly, and Jack muttered, “Shit!” as he quickly turned forward and continued driving. “Don’t tell your mom I said that,” he said to me, looking at me in the mirror again with a wink.

I rolled my eyes a little and giggled. Shirley was just as bad as Jack about cursing while driving, and both of them always asked me to keep it from the other. It was pretty hilarious.

“I don’t remember what it said,” I told him, continuing our conversation about Wesley. “I threw it away at school.”

That was not actually true. I saved it, and took it home, hiding it in the bag I always had ready and packed for when social services came to take me to a new home.

I wasn’t sure why I saved it. I was prepared to tear it up and throw it in the trash, but at the last second, I put it in my backpack instead, and took it home to put with the small amount of meaningful, personal items that I had collected in my short life.

We pulled into the driveway, and I got out of the car before Jack even put it in park, bounding up the steps to the front porch, and racing through the front door. I dropped off my purple backpack on the designated hook in the entryway, hoping to avoid him asking anymore questions about Wesley and his first letter.

For some reason, I felt it was important to protect him. If I told Jack what he said to me in the first letter, Jack would tell Mrs. Rodrigo, who would then tell her sister who is the teacher of the class we exchanged letters with in California, and then Wesley would probably get in trouble.

And, even though he probably deserved it, I just didn’t think it was right for him to get punished for something he honestly didn’t really mean. He was just a kid. Just like me.

As soon as I got up the stairs, I turned right and entered my bedroom, closing the door behind me immediately. I sank down to the floor with my back against the door, and carefully opened the letter.

My heart pounded in my chest as I read his words, my hands on either side of the letter shaking just enough that I had to set the paper on my legs in order to read it properly. I was so nervous about what I might find written there, afraid his words might hurt me again.

I don’t know why I was even reading it, especially after how he treated me the first time, but I couldn’t stop myself. My curiosity had gotten the best of me, and I had to know what he had to say this time.

I read through the letter way too fast the first time, my brain barely processing the words on the paper in front of me. I started it again, this time slowing down to actually understand what he said to me.

As I reread, another tiny part of the walls around my heart came down. He was sorry. Really, truly, honestly sorry. And he wanted to try again. He wanted to maybe even be my friend.

And honestly, he was kind of funny. The way he rattled on in his writing, his inner thoughts coming out directly onto the page — I could totally imagine him talking to himself like that in real life, a constant stream of thoughts and words about everything and anything that was happening around him during his day-to-day activities.

A small smile formed on my lips as I read it for a third time. I moved from the floor by my door to the full size bed sitting in the middle of the large bedroom I had been lucky enough to call my own for the last year. I flopped down onto my stomach and grabbed my blanket that they found me with, my eyes never leaving the paper in front of me.

When I’d finally finished reading it, I set it down on the comforter and crossed my arms under my chin on the bed.

My eyes scanned the room around me, taking in every minor detail. The pristine white computer desk next to the window, the walk-in closet filled with more clothes than I could ever possibly wear, and the much too large for me attached bathroom, complete with a shower and a separate tub.

Even with these luxuries that I had never truly had access to until moving there, the room still didn’t feel like it was completely mine. It still felt like there was something missing. It still didn’t have those personal touches that made it say, “this is Haven’s space.”

I thought about the small amount of movies and television shows I had watched, picturing the rooms of the kids in those stories, and I realized what they all had in common that my room was lacking.

Friends. Or at least, tokens of those friendships. There were no photos on the walls, or on top of the dresser, or pinned to the bulletin board by my desk. There were no knickknacks or trinkets from carnivals or arcade visits. No movie tickets from months ago. No handwritten notes passed during class or at recess or at lunchtime.

I’d never really made any friends in any of my former homes. Part of it was moving so much and joining classes in the middle of the year when friendships have already formed.

But part of it was also because of me. Because I didn’t want to let people in too much, because I was too afraid of having to say goodbye, because I was too focused on protecting my heart from the pain of rejection and the inevitable farewell that would take place. That was why I still couldn’t bring myself to refer to Jack and Shirley as “Mom” and “Dad.”

But maybe… maybe Wesley was my chance. My chance to actually have a friend, someone who would stick around no matter what, no matter where my life took me.

Maybe he was my chance to heal myself, to let people see behind the wall that I had always kept erected around myself. Maybe, by giving him a second chance, he could be my second chance. Maybe I could finally find some happiness.

I sprang into action, moving to my desk, my blanket laid across my lap in my rolling chair. I grabbed the first piece of paper and writing utensil I could find — a hot pink felt-tip pen — instead of searching for the perfect pencil and paper like I did the first time I wrote a letter to Wesley.

I didn’t have the time for perfection. I needed to get the words that were in my head onto a piece of paper as quickly as possible before I forgot them. This wasn’t the time for perfection. This was the time for honesty, for messy and chaotic and all the things that I truly was on the inside.

I don’t know how long I sat at my desk writing my reply, but before I even knew it, Shirley was knocking on my bedroom door to call me down for dinner.

I stretched my arms above my head, wiggling my fingers to release the tension from writing so furiously for so long. Then I climbed out of my chair, leaving my room and heading downstairs to the kitchen for dinner.

It was a Thursday, and on Thursdays, we ate in the kitchen at the counter, and we always had pizza. Most people always had pizza on Fridays, but Jack insisted Thursday was the better pizza day, because since everyone else did it on Fridays, it was less busy at the pizzeria on Thursdays.

So, we would we get our pizza faster and it would be a better quality. I did not know if there was any truth in his theory, but I enjoyed our Thursday night pizza nights and looked forward to them every week.

I grabbed two slices of pizza — one veggie, and one ham and pineapple — and took my spot on the middle bar stool, directly in between Jack and Shirley. I made sure to put my square plate so it sat directly within the perimeter of four of the square tiles on the countertop, just as I always did when I eat at the counter.

I barely paid attention to Jack and Shirley’s conversation, my mind still back in my room, thinking about the letter sitting on my desk, waiting to be put into an envelope and stamped and sent off into the world. But in order to do that, I needed to ask for some help.

I looked between Jack and Shirley, observing the people who had made me feel more at home than anyone else ever had. They had shown me more love and care in one year than I had ever felt in the rest of my years combined. If I could give Wesley, a boy who accidentally hurt me, a second chance, shouldn’t I be able to give two people who had only ever tried to help me a first chance?

I cleared my throat, sitting up a little straighter on my stool, readying myself as I said, “Um… Mom? Dad? I need to mail a letter.”

I’d never understood the saying “silence is louder than words” until I let those two words slip out of my mouth. Both of them froze mid action, their eyes wide and glistening. Jack — Dad — swallowed thickly. His gentle eyes with the small wrinkles at the corner met Shirley’s — Mom’s — over the top of my head.

He blinked a few times, his surprise clear on his face, before he finally spoke to me, his hand covering mine on the counter. “Yeah. Yeah, of course, sweetie. Whatever you need.”

He smiled at me, his face a mix of hope and joy, and when I looked at Mom, she was wearing a matching expression, although she had a few small tears escaping from her eyes.

She said nothing, though. She just tucked a stray hair behind my ear, then slipped around the island into the kitchen, opening the freezer and taking out a tub of my favorite chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream.

She didn’t need words to tell me how she felt. I could see it in her actions, and in the way she kept looking over at me, her warm gaze putting another crack in my slowly crumbling walls.