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For the most part, my upbringing — what I could remember, anyway — was my mother’s culture. Hers, and the pack’s. But every once in a while, my father would insist on something. He was rarely pushy with my mother, I knew that. But knowing what I know now about how relationships worked (or didn’t work), I seriously suspected that one of those rare moments he decided to insist on something was games and toys from his childhood.
Candyland must have been one of those things. I could still remember the box—it was worn, even the first time we played. It must have come from his home. Maybe my Grammie had gotten it for him.
This version was new, of course. I even had to remove the cellophane. The art had clearly been updated, and I found myself feeling a bit nostalgic for what I remembered, but it didn’t surprise me that Fiona would make sure Bella had new things. Besides, where would she get an old, used board game? Fiona didn’t strike me as particularly sentimental, but if she was, it stood to reason that her own grandsons would get the family copy.
Bella sat quietly as I set up the pieces, her eyes wide, enraptured by the bright colors. I smiled, taking a quick moment to refresh myself on the rules before I explained them to her. It only took a moment to remember why Candyland was such a good game for kids — there was no reading, and only minimal counting. It could be fun for anyone. All Bella needed to do was be able to distinguish colors, and I had no reason to believe she was colorblind.
Yet, I realized about halfway through our game that Bella had no trouble distinguishing the colors from one another, but she didn’t appear to know all of their names. When I said “red,” she had clearly understood that, but when I said something about “blue” on her turn, she just stared at me.
How long did Dr. Hayes say she was in there?
Now that I thought about it, there really wasn’t much by the way ofcolorfor a child to interact with in that horrible place. I had no idea what her living situation was like before her parents had been captured and taken to the Project Night Moon facility, but…as far as I knew, a two-year-old child had a pretty limited vocabulary, right? Even if her upbringing had been completely normal before that point, she probably hadn’t been talking much before she was taken.
The very idea made my heart ache. But we finished the game and I started to pack the board back up, not wanting to push the issue any further.
“No,” Bella said, so soft I almost didn’t hear her.
I paused and blinked, tilting my head. “What was that, peanut?”
She shook her head, pointing at the pieces I’d started collecting in my hands. “No,” she said, just a fraction louder. “Go again. Please?”
I stared at her for a moment, so surprised to hear her say anything, I almost didn’t process her words. “I…yes, of course!” I said, beaming at her. I put the pieces back down and started fixing up the board again. “Did you like it?”
Bella gave a firm nod, reaching for the same marker she used the first time. I laughed gently. “Should I be the same color, too?” I asked.
This time she shook her head, looking thoughtful before selecting the blue gingerbread man token for me. She held it out. “This one?” I asked, and she gave a decisive nod. “Okay. I’ll be blue,” I said.
Bella brightened a little, leaning against the coffee table as she watched me.
“Do you want to go first?”
She paused again and nodded. “Yes,” she said. To my great surprise, once she drew her first card and revealed it, she looked up at me questioningly. “Green?”
If it was at all possible, I smiled a little brighter at her, nodding eagerly. “Yes! That’s green,” I said. Her own smile grew by leaps and bounds, picking up her yellow gingerbread man to move it to the first green spot.
She didn’t speak each time she drew a card, but every once in a while, she’d pull out a color and ask me. More often than not, she had it correct — but sometimes she’d simply pause and look at me. I realized after a moment she was waiting for some kind of explanation, and I’d name the color again for her.
It had been a distressing idea only twenty minutes ago, but seeing Bella sointerestedin something…I didn’t know how to explain it. The girl was clearly enjoying herself, enough to ask for a third round the moment she crossed over the finish line. “Again, please,” she said, her little voice a little louder. There was no tremble in it that time. How could I possibly say no when she was so happy?
I had lost track of the number of rounds we played when Bella pushed herself back from the table, giving a little hum. She fixed me with a sharp look, one I was quickly coming to realize meant that the young alpha was thinking about something. “Iris’s mama?” she asked, tipping her head to the side in curiosity.
“Hm?” I tipped my head in a mirror, trying to parse what she was asking. I was pretty confident she wasn’t asking ifIwas her mother — she’d asked about the woman only the day before. “My mama?”
She nodded, looking up at me with wide eyes before she looked around, as if noting it was just her and me. I gave her a wry smile. “This isn’t my home, peanut,” I explained, finally starting to pick up the game. This time, Bella didn’t stop me. “We’re just staying here for a little bit. Re — Mr. Remus owns this house.”
Should I call him Mr. Remus or Uncle Remus? Ugh.
Bella made a low noise, and for a few moments, I thought this answer satisfied her. I should have known better. She leaned forward against the coffee table and caught my gaze again. “Mama where?”
I licked my lips. Explaining that my mother had been gone for over a decade wasnota conversation I wanted to have with anyone, much less a child who had recently watched her mother get brutally assaulted and possibly…
No. Eli’s right, there’s a chance that maybe her parents are alive. They might not be. I can’t lead her down either path until I know for sure.
“I don’t live with my parents anymore,” I explained instead, staring down at the box I was packing back up. “When we get big, we move out and live on our own.”
Most people did, anyway. I supposed Eli still seemed to have a pack house. My mama didn’t live with her parents, but only because they had passed on when I was very, very small. If they had still been alive, they probably would have been our neighbors when I grew up. I did remember that whenever I went to Alice’s house, it wasn’t just her mother there — it was her aunt and her grandmother, too.
“Oh.” I looked up to see Bella frowning down at her plushie wolf, running a hand over its soft fur as if she was trying to process this. “Why?”
