The moment Princess left to get the pups, Faye hadn’t moved from where she was. She stayed on the couch, staring at the path her girlfriend had taken. Her eyes were completely wide and vacant, fixed entirely on the empty space near the doorway where the tall alpha had disappeared.
She couldn’t focus enough to think straight. The silence in the game room rushed in to fill the void, turning thick and heavy against her chest as her breathing became trapped, small shallow gasps barely lifting her ribs.
All she could do was lie there and wait for Princess to return. She slid down onto her side against the plush fabric, her limbs feeling totally stiff and useless as her heart thudded in a dull, hollow rhythm.
Even when Princess didn’t come back that night, which happened to be the first night they hadn’t spent together since the pups were born, Faye remained on the couch for hours. Her hands were cold, curled into tight, tense fists against her stomach.
Her mind sank deeper and deeper into her thoughts. The room felt like it was shrinking around her, the cold air from the vents blowing right over her trembling shoulders as she replayed the scene in her head.
Princess telling her that she didn’t deserve to be a mother had really done a number on her. The words felt like physical weight pressing down on her skull, making her chest tighten so hard it felt like she was running out of air entirely.
It made her remember that she once had a mother...
A mother she never truly knew.
A sudden memory flared up in the darkness of her mind, blurry and distorted, leaving a bitter taste at the back of her throat.
Her mother’s death when she was only two years old hadn’t affected her much at the time because she had been too young to understand. She hadn’t known what it meant to lose someone back then, her toddler brain only focusing on the toys in front of her.
But society did.
She remembered her brother carrying her on his shoulders while they were in a convenience store, listening to people whisper. She remembered the scratchy fabric of Paye’s old jacket against her legs, her little fingers clutching his hair while the adults nearby spoke in hushed, biting tones.
"How is that little girl coping without a mother’s care?"
"That boy is too young to be raising a little girl."
There had been so many words. The voices seemed to echo off the metal shelves of her memory, loud and intrusive, making her current breathing turn fast and ragged as she lay flat on the couch.
Even though her brother always told her to close her ears whenever people said things she didn’t want to hear...
Some words still found their way in. They had burrowed deep inside her ears, staying hidden for years until this exact moment brought them screaming back to the surface.
Lying on the couch, Faye began questioning herself. Something she hardly does..
Was she really a mother... even though she had given birth to her pups?
The physical pain of labor was nothing compared to the sharp, twisting agony currently tearing through her chest.
Did she really deserve them?
She had never experienced a mother’s love. She didn’t know what it felt like to have a gentle hand brush through her hair when she was sick, or a soft voice soothing her to sleep after a nightmare.
Would she really be able to take care of her pups and become the kind of mother she herself never had?
Her fingers dug into the fabric of the couch cushions, her muscles shaking violently under the pressure of her own doubts.
She had signed a contract without thinking about them first. The realization slammed into her brain like a speeding car, making her gasp sharply as her lungs struggled to pull in oxygen.
She never really thought through the consequences of her actions because, somehow, she and her brother had always managed to survive every hardship that came their way. They had always run, always fought, always jumped into the fire and made it out alive.
But this time was different.
Maybe...
If her mother were still alive...
Maybe she would have known how to be a good mother. She pictured a faceless woman standing over the pups’ cribs, knowing exactly what to do when they cried, while she herself just stood in the corner like a useless stranger.
The kind of mother her children deserved.
She questioned her motherhood over and over throughout the night.
The thoughts spun in a fast, chaotic circle inside her skull, faster and faster until her vision blurred and her teeth began to chatter from the sheer panic of it.
"I don’t deserve to be a mother..." Faye muttered to herself. The whisper was incredibly small, a ragged breath escaping into the empty room.
She curled into a ball on the couch, hugging her knees as quiet sobs escaped her lips. She pulled her legs tight against her chest, her forehead pressing hard against her kneecaps while hot tears finally spilled over her eyelids, soaking into her pants.
"I don’t deserve to be a mother... I don’t know what a mother does... I don’t deserve to be a mother because I don’t have a mother... I don’t know what a mother does because I don’t have a mother... I’m a bad mother..."
She kept repeating the words like a chant. Her voice was trembling, a broken murmur that she kept pushing out through her teeth, her chest heaving with every single sob that tore out of her throat.
With every repetition, they sank deeper into her mind until she started believing them. The toxic words took root in her stomach, turning heavy and solid, making her feel completely hollow and empty inside.
She didn’t even realize how much time had passed.
She didn’t notice that Princess had never come home with the pups. Her ears were ringing with her own voice, her mind locked in a tight, dark cage of her own making.
"What are you doing on the couch?"
A voice broke Faye out of her self-destructive chant. The sound was sudden and clear, cutting right through the fog in her brain and making her entire body freeze mid-breath.