Every time I tried to explain, it would be dismissed as an excuse.
I was left speechless, which they took as an admission of guilt.
No one ever stood by me.
“Aunt, Audrey isn’t a troublemaker, and she didn’t cause a disaster.
“They were the ones who provoked her first. She didn’t do anything, she didn’t even talk back.”
It was Arthur. His face was calm, but I could subtly feel a chill radiating from him..
Mom was startled, but Dad, fiercely protective of his beloved daughter, wasn’t afraid of Arthur. He stuck out his neck and sneered, “I heard my daughter replaced her shifter, but I never expected a freak to pair with a freak! A snake–shifter abandoning her for a bear! What a disgrace to my
name”
Arthur shoved him back.
“She’s not a troublemaker, and she’s not a freak.
“Is she the one finding a shifter, or are you? Isn’t it enough for her to be happy?
“Isn’t your daughter’s happiness more important than your reputation?”
15
“Clap, clap, clap-*
Applause sounded from the other side. I looked in the direction of the sound and saw Hailey.
She walked towards me, leading her snow leopard.
“Well said! Who says you can’t have a bear as a shifter?”
She caught my bewildered gaze and subtly winked at me.
“You’re welcome. Consider it me repaying you.”
Only then did I remember that Hailey and I had picked up Damian together that day. The only difference was that she found a dying little snow leopard by a sewer drain.
Her family also bonded with snakes, but she insisted on raising that snow leopard, and her family also called her a freak.
Perhaps it was the kinship between two ‘freaks: I don’t know where I found the courage then, but I clutched the edge of my shirt and blurted out, “Who says you can’t have a snow leopard as a shifter?”
It left her parents speechless.
Hailey’s words were a wake–up call, and some quests began to murmur.
“She’s right, who says you can’t have a bear shifter? Calling them freaks, that’s a bit much”
“You wouldn’t know it, but this family is incredibly biased because their eldest daughter is short and not suitable for snake–bonding.”
