My Crush's Rival Made me an Alpha

Determination

Wesley pushed into his dorm feeling fatigued. He expected to meet his roommate, Ralph, but only the quiet walls greeted him with a wave of silence. His roommate was gone, probably off to class or the gym or wherever normal people with normal lives went at this hour. For once, Wesley was grateful. Silence was exactly what he needed at the moment.

He stepped inside and shut the door gently behind him, leaning against it for a moment. His pulse was still unsettled, beating in uneven thumps as his mind replayed his encounter with that pretty girl.

‘I’m a werewolf…’

She had said it casually, like someone telling him he had forgotten to tie his shoelace, and it only left him confused as to the truth of it.

Wesley dragged himself to the bed and collapsed face-first into the thin mattress. He stayed that way for a while, breathing into the fabric, letting the exhaustion sink into him. He had classes to attend, he probably should have gone to at least take some notes…but how was he supposed to sit in a classroom right now and pretend nothing had changed?

Pretend he didn’t feel like he had been rewired from the inside out as his senses weirded out? There’s no way he wouldn’t end up freaking out. So if he was going to lose his mind, it’s better it happened in his room.

Eventually Wesley rolled onto his back and stared up at the ceiling.

“What is happening to me…” he whispered, now calm enough to rationalize.

His fingers twitched, and he lifted his hands into his line of sight. They looked normal, like the same hands he’d always had. That’s how he could describe it.

But now, as he stared, he felt something beneath the surface. He felt the strength in his veins, coiled and dense, like a living thing trapped inside his bones.

He flexed his muscles, and they were strangely bolder.

A strange warmth shot through his arms, a pressure, a rush. It was not painful… just powerful. He’s never felt this strong before.

Wesley sat up quickly, his breath uneven.

His eyes drifted across the room, scanning without meaning to…and then he froze.

In the corner, near the wall, a trail of tiny ants moved like a perfectly organized army. He could see them clearly. Each one, he could see their legs, their antennae, their glossy backs. He shouldn’t be able to. No one could see to such a detailed extent from across the room.

His ears twitched at a noise outside.

Tap! Tap!

Far down the hallway, he could hear someone’s footsteps as they entered the hallway, sneaker squeaking at some point. He could hear them laughing, before a door shutting severed the sound. Wesley could tell the person had entered their dorm room.

Wesley swallowed nervously, startled. His senses weren’t just sharper, they were pretty overwhelming.

He could even smell the familiar scent of his roommate’s cologne in the room. It was faint but distinct, as if the boy had sprayed it moments ago and not hours earlier. The scent trail lingered in the air in a direction Wesley somehow instinctively felt like if he stood up right now, he could follow the smell and find him.

His chest tightened with both thrill and fear.

“These… these are werewolf things,” he whispered to himself. “This is real. This is actually real.”

A shaky laugh escaped his throat, half delight, half panic.

He has superpowers!

He felt special. More like different.

 Like he mattered in a way he never had.

But the excitement thinned quickly, eaten away by fear. Every book he had read, every movie, every legend echoed in his mind.

The curse of the full moons that causes forced transformations into wolves and perhaps losing control and hurting people.

He pressed his palms to his face, suddenly suffocating under the possibilities.

He should have asked her more. He should have asked-

His heart dropped.

…That girl, he didn’t even know her name.

Wesley groaned and flopped back on his pillow. How could he be this stupid?

‘Besides, how did I become a werewolf?’ Wesley focused on a serious issue. Although he believed the wolf that attacked him the last night must have been a werewolf too, he still had no idea who it was.

More so, could it be that they’d also lost control and had attacked him? ’Last night was a full moon too.’

If so, that could turn out to be a huge problem for him. Unless he found a way to stop himself from losing control too.

‘That girl did say it’s not as bad as it sounds…’ Wesley thought, but he still wasn’t sure. ‘Ahh!’ he sighed in agony.

His life just keeps getting complicated!

He got bitten and turned into a werewolf, and now he had no idea what to do and what to not do. Not to speak of him having to join the hockey team and face so much ridicule just because he was recruited into some insane revenge plan by a pretty girl, and thrust into a fake relationship that he couldn’t say no to!

“Life sucks!” Wesley muttered in a groan.

Just as he sulked in his misery, the girl’s face flashed in his mind once again: resplendent and just perfect. Wesley remembered her eyes, with that confident, beautiful, and dangerous glint as they stared into his.

The way she’d said “We’re dating now.”

The way she looked mildly offended when he’d suggested her whole shenanigan was all about getting revenge on Emma and Ethan.

A strange mix of embarrassment and something else blurred through his chest.

How could a girl like her want anything to do with him? It was quite obvious…

She didn’t want him. She wanted to use him.

‘Of course,’ Wesley sighed and stared at the ceiling until it blurred, disappointment curling quietly in his chest. He wasn’t even hurt by the idea of being used, only by the fact that he was the type of person who made sense to her to be used.

 A nobody.

 A safe choice.

Someone who had nothing going for him.

“It’s fine,” he muttered, trying to convince himself. “It’s not a big deal. It’s just… an experience. Something to remember in college.”

He swallowed hard and shook the thought off.

Then, Emma drifted into his thoughts. The way she laughed with Ethan, while holding his hands, the way she used to lean out her window toward his, the late-night conversations they once shared.

Before Ethan, before all of this…

He would never have her now. He knew that.

But a small, stubborn part of him whispered that if he ever had a chance again, he wanted to be someone who at least had the courage to try.

He turned his head toward the window. The fading afternoon light gathered in the glass, soft and pale. For the first time in a long time, he felt something restless inside.

It was anticipation.

He reeled in the feeling for a while before he remembered something.

The girl had said to meet her later tonight at the same spot.

Another rush of nerves hit him. He sat up quickly and went to his luggage, rummaging through the messy pile for something… anything that could pass as decent.

He flashed a grin when he found and picked up his “best” outfit: His cleanest hoodie, the dark blue one without frayed cuffs, and a pair of black jeans that weren’t faded at the knees.

It isn’t impressive, but at least, it’s much more presentable.

He laid them out on the bed, sighing in relief. Then, sitting on the edge of the mattress, he exhaled shakily.

He was nervous, excited, and terrified as to what comes next. And for the first time in a very long time… he was looking forward to something again and somehow, that made him feel relevant.

“ I’ll go through this step by step, whatever comes, I’m still Wesley Quigley.’ He told himself, this time, seriously.