Chapter 7 – The Alpha’s Pen Pal Novel Free Online by Allie Carstens

Filed to story: The Alpha’s Pen Pal Book

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

And, even though he deserved it, I didn’t think it was right for him to get punished for something he 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. I sank to the floor with my back against the door and opened the letter.

My heart pounded in my chest as I read his words, my hands shaking enough that I had to set the paper on my legs in order to read it. 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 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 be my friend.

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

A small smile formed on my lips as I read it a third time. I moved from the floor to the full-size bed 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 the blanket they found me with, my eyes never leaving the paper in front of me.

When I’d 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 detail. The pristine white computer desk next to the window, the walk-in closet filled with more clothes than I could ever wear, and the much-too-large-for-me attached bathroom, complete with a shower and a separate tub.

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

I thought about the movies and television shows I had watched, picturing the rooms 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 knick-knacks or trinkets from carnivals or arcade visits. No movie tickets from months ago. No handwritten notes passed during class or at recess or lunchtime.

I’d never 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 had 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 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 I had always kept around myself. Maybe, by giving him a second chance, he could be my second chance. Maybe I could 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 wrinkled paper with a slight rip and 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 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 I was on the inside.

When the letter was done, 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 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 get our pizza faster, and it would be 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, in between Jack and Shirley. I made sure to put my square plate so it sat within the perimeter of four of the square tiles on the countertop, just as I always did when I eat at the counter.

I didn’t pay 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, stamped, and sent off into the world. But in order to do that, I needed to ask for 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 a little straighter on my stool, readying myself. “Um… Mom? Dad? I need to mail a letter,” I said.

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 green 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 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 wore a matching expression, although she had a few small tears escaping her blue 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 the crumbling walls around my heart.

Dear

Wesley,

I already told you in my first letter to you that I forgive you. I know you didn’t mean what you said, and I know you didn’t mean to hurt me or whoever got your letter. I know you’re just a kid.

Shirley, my foster mom, always says it’s not about the mistakes that you make, but whether you learn from those mistakes. It’s about what you do next. That’s what is important. That’s what makes you a good person or not.

I am willing to give you a second chance. I need a friend. Like I told you before, I don’t really have many friends. I’ve moved homes too many times. My social worker says I shut people out too easily to make many friends. So, you’ll be my first one.

All right. Since we’re making this a fresh start, I’ll go first. Starting over. Pretend we’ve never met. Or written.

Hi. I’m Haven Kenway. No middle name. That was the name stitched on the blanket wrapped around me when they found me in front of a fire station when I was only a few days old.

I’ve never met my birth parents. I don’t even know if they are alive anymore, or what their names are, or anything about them. The social workers were never able to find any information about either of them. I’m the most confusing case of an abandoned baby they’ve ever had.

I am a foster child. I’ve lived in nine different homes since I was a baby. The family I live with right now is the best family I’ve been with in my life, and I hope I stay here longer than my current record for staying in one home, which is one and a half years.

I remember in your letter you mentioned a brother, Sebastian. Is he older or younger? Do you have any other siblings? What’s it like to have a brother? Or a sister, if you have one?

I have no siblings. Well, that I know of, anyway. I guess, my foster parents have two children, but they are both grown and moved out of the house. I’ve met them several times, though, and they’re both really nice people.

I guess, also, I’ve had siblings in my previous foster homes, but most of the time they were much younger or much older than me, and with how often I moved families, I never really had much time to form any sort of bond with them.

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