In a Heartbeat (MxM)

Prologue

Third Person POV

It was a typical Sunday morning for miss Helen, the old lady who lived across the abandoned house. With her coffee mug on the front porch table and her garden shears next to her, she gathered a few buckets to collect the seasonal and year-round flowers within her well-kept garden. She usually reserved the pruning and weeding for Saturdays, while she collected only the best of the garden's bounty for her weekly bouquets.

Miss Helen was known for her immaculate and beautiful bouquets, a hobby she had picked up after her late husband introduced her to various flowers. Miss Helen had retired long before his passing and enjoyed spending her retirement days in keeping her yard and garden in tip-top shape. Although she was pushing her late 70s, miss Helen was notorious for being very active and perfectly capable of maintaining her home and garden on her own.

Like any Sunday, miss Helen would prepare to collect various cuttings of the season's flowers to put into her bouquets, setting aside enough flowers and decorative leaves for the nine weekly bouquets she would make. She would tie the bouquets in cellophane, gift wrap, and in a decorative bow, often with colors one of the nine recipients had favored, and walk across the street to the abandoned house.

The deserted house across the street was once a lively home for a family of nine. A family that miss Helen had the pleasure of knowing and see growing up. Miss Helen loved this family as if it were her own, especially after losing her beloved husband. She had gladly babysat, bought gifts, and played with the younger kids, often watching the youngest pups play and chase each other. 

What used to be a lively home teeming with joy and life, was now an eerie skeleton, a mere house lost to time. 

But miss Helen loved the family too much to let this abandoned house go to ruin. She refused to wallow in the sorrowful and eerie ambiance the house seemed to exude. Instead, miss Helen did what she did best; garden.

Along with the help of many pack members, miss Helen had begun planting flowers and trees in their front lawn. She began with a few flower bushes, then a shade tree. And suddenly, pack members congregated together to help miss Helen honor and cherish the late family. One family had offered to engrave stones for each family member, another donated a bench. People who had barely known the family had offered their condolences to remember the remnants of the abandoned home that had held a once lively and adored family of nine.

And suddenly, the entire atmosphere of the abandoned house had begun to change. It became a place to remember the family, a place to remember the true reason behind their death, and what this family had meant to the pack. It offered a bittersweet and stark reminder of the dark day that had haunted the pack members.

For sixteen years, people would gather and offer flowers, cards, and offerings for the tragedy that had befallen on the deserted home's family. For sixteen years, miss Helen would put nine bouquets together every Sunday to place at each engraved stone. For sixteen years, miss Helen, and the other pack members had often gone to the garden to remember the names of the eight deceased family members, and remember the name of the one lone survivor of the family. For sixteen years, the pack members had often wondered the true story behind the lone survivor, the truth behind the controversy that had started this tragedy, and whether the fate of the exiled lone survivor had a happy ending.

Miss Helen was the first pack member to arrive at the garden that morning, the first to reach the engraved stone of the lone survivor, Simon. The family's second oldest, the one miss Helen had adored the most. The one that was accused of a crime he hadn't committed.  A crime that had costed not only Simon's family but costed the pack's trust in their leader. A crime that miss Helen had believed to be a guise to an issue far greater than the pack has ever seen. She placed the specially made bouquet for Simon down at his stone, staring at the stone before her.

Sixteen years ago, miss Helen had been sitting with Simon on her front porch, listening to her favorite oldie music and sipping freshly brewed coffee. He had spent most Sunday mornings with miss Helen here on her porch and even spent time helping with her gardening. It was Sunday mornings like this that miss Helen and Simon had gotten to know each other fairly well. They both appreciated the old romantic songs she played and enjoyed the spring flowers miss Helen's late husband had planted for her. It was Sundays like this where miss Helen and Simon had chatted about their hopes and dreams.

And now, sixteen years later, miss Helen continued to share her hopes and dreams with Simon, through his stone in the garden she'd knew Simon would have loved. 

But today was not a typical Sunday.

For sixteen years, miss Helen's hopes and dreams she shared every Sunday at Simon's stone was finally coming true.

"You're finally coming home," she cried, caressing the stone before her.

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It's fairly short, but I'm hoping it introduces a bit about Simon before I get into the heat of exactly what happened to him and his family in the next chapter. Miss Helen will be important later, but she is definitely not a major character. And to clarify, these stones aren't tombstones or their graves, they're just stones that are placed in the garden to remember them.