“I don’t need—”
“You don’t know what you need,” she said, sounding irritated. “That much is obvious. Otherwise you wouldn’t be here.”
I didn’t fight her as she pulled me toward the back of the store. It seemed like too much work. And she was right. I was exhausted, and it’d been a long time since I’d seen a friendly face. There was a voice at the back of my head warning me that this could be a trap, that I couldn’t trust her, but it was negligible.
She led me to a small office. There was a cot against one wall. She pushed me down onto it and crouched before me to slide off my boots. I didn’t stop her. I could barely keep my eyes open. “What have you done to me?” I muttered, my words slow and thick like molasses.
“Nothing you can’t handle. Sleep, wolf. Nothing can harm you here.”
I wanted to believe her.
In the end I didn’t have a choice.
My eyes closed and didn’t open for two days.
KELLY SAID, “HEY.”
I grinned at him. “Hi.”
Kelly said, “This isn’t real.”
I ached. “I know.”
Kelly said, “Is it worth it?”
I leaned my head back against a tree. “I don’t know.”
Kelly said, “Do you remember when Robbie was taken?”
I nodded tightly. “I… should have done more. For him. For you.”
Kelly said, “Maybe. It’s weird, isn’t it? Looking back. The choices we’ve made. Where they’ve led us.”
The grass swayed in a cool breeze. “I’m lost.”
Kelly looked away. “I know you think so. But you know where I am. You know I’m waiting for you.”
“I’m sorry.”
“For what?”
“Everything.”
He shook his head but didn’t speak.
“I thought it was for the best. To keep you safe. That I could find them on my own.”
“And do what?”
“I don’t know.”
“So you just ran away, half-cocked, with barely an idea of what to do.”
I said, “That sounds about right” and “Can you say my name?” and “I know this isn’t real, I know it’s just a dream, but please just say my name.”
And there, in the warm sunlight, he said, “Carter. Carter. Carter.”
I reached for him.
He wasn’t there.
I OPENED MY EYES.
A ceiling fan spun lazily.
I sat up with a groan, my head foggy.
A piece of paper fluttered in my lap.
I picked it up. There, in sharp script, were the words:
Your wolfsong will always be heard xx
THE SHOP LOOKED AS IF it’d been empty for a long time. A thick layer of dust covered the counter. The shelves were bare. The bones were gone.
There was a placard in the window where the neon sign had been.
FOR RENT, it said, followed by the name of a realty company and a phone number.
THE TRUCK WAS WHERE I’D LEFT IT in the parking lot.
A slip of paper lay underneath the windshield wiper. I thought it was a ticket.
It wasn’t.
As I got closer, I knew.
It was wild, the scent. Like an old forest untouched by man, overgrown and thick.
I recognized it.
Don’t. Touch. Him.
I rushed forward and grabbed the paper, almost tearing it as I opened it.
ARE YOU TRYING TO GET YOURSELF KILLED?
“Fuck you too,” I said in a choked whisper.
But I was smiling.
And for a moment, it felt like it was enough.
better candy/need to stop
Five months later I was barely holding on.
It was the Sunday before the full moon.
I was driving down a road to nowhere, lost in my head. I was thinking about tradition, about how everyone was together and there’d be food on the table, so much food that even a wolf pack wouldn’t be able to eat it all. Mom would be in the kitchen, her radio playing old music. She’d be singing, I knew, singing in a way that felt like heartbreak.
Ox and Joe would be outside manning the grill. The air would be cool, the leaves of October gold and red and green. They’d be standing side by side, their shoulders brushing.
Rico and Tanner and Chris were setting up the table and chairs in the grass. They were stronger now, the three of them, Rico having taken to the wolf as if he had always been that way. They were laughing over some little thing, and Rico was trying to be subtle about getting his scent on his friends but failing miserably. Tanner and Chris gave him crap for it, but they hugged him, their cheeks rubbing together.
Jessie was putting Mark and Gordo to work, handing them dishes to carry outside. Gordo was scowling, but he didn’t mean it. It’d been a long time since he had. There was a light in his eyes, something bright and fierce, a fire that had been rekindled after a cold darkness. He stopped just outside of the back door and looked at all the others. His stump itched, but it always did, and he’d learned to ignore it. Phantom limb syndrome was a bitch, and there were days when he’d almost forget that he didn’t have a hand. He’d adapted. And when he thought no one was watching, he’d allow himself to smile.
“Good, right?” Mark whispered in his ear.
“Yeah,” he said roughly. “It’s good.”
Robbie and Kelly came around the side of the house, their hands joined.
My breath caught in my throat.
“Hey,” Kelly said.
I couldn’t speak.
“Carter?” He sounded concerned. “Are you okay?”
I shook my head.
He glanced at Robbie before nodding toward the table. Robbie kissed him on the cheek and left us alone.
“What’s wrong?” Kelly said in a low voice, even though it didn’t matter. Everyone would be able to hear us. Even Jessie.
“I don’t know,” I said. My throat felt raw, my eyes burning.
“That’s okay. You don’t always have to know.” He shook his head. “Sometimes we can be sad without having a reason. It’s part of being human.”
“We’re not human,” I reminded him.
He rolled his eyes. “You know what I mean.”
And then I said, “I’m not really here.”
“Of course you are,” he said. “Where else would you be?”
“Far away.”
“Why?”
Mom came out of the kitchen. She glanced at us curiously, and when she smiled, it felt like the sun. She left us alone.
“Hey,” Kelly said, and I looked back at him. “Come on.” He grabbed me by the hand and began pulling me toward the woods.
The sounds of the others faded behind us. I looked up through the canopy of the trees to see blue, blue, blue, and though it was faint, I could see the moon, not quite full, but close.
“Do you remember when we were kids?” Kelly asked, looking back at me over his shoulder. “Halloween. You were… seven. I think. Seven or eight. And for some reason you’d gotten it in your head that we needed to go trick-or-treating outside of Caswell. One of the other kids had told you that there was better candy at human houses.”