by TJ Klune
He said, “My mother. She liked to dance. In the kitchen. Once, we were doing the dishes, and there was a soap bubble in my ear. She popped it. And then we danced. That was a good day, for many reasons.”
Joe’s smile was blinding.
“Things have changed since then,” Ox continued. “We’re not who we once were. We’ve lived and lost. But I like to think that she’s still here. Somewhere. Somehow. And I know she’s proud of who I am and what I’ve made for myself. My daddy said I was going to get shit all my life. He didn’t know that I would have pack who would do anything for me, as I would do everything for them. And while we may not be who we once were, we’re still here.” He glanced at me before looking back out at the others. “We’re still together.” He raised his glass. The others did the same. After a moment, I did too, though I felt like a fraud. “To Maggie. To Thomas. To all those we’ve lost and all those we’ve found again.”
“And to Ox on his motherfucking birthday,” Tanner said cheerfully, and most everyone laughed as they raised their glasses even higher.
I didn’t.
Neither did Rico.
* * *
It was slow, this meal. Leisurely.
I never wanted it to end.
I wanted to go back to the basement and hide away.
I stayed quiet for most it, taking in all the sights and sounds and smells. There was blue still, clinging and cold. Green too. Relief, though it felt fragile.
It didn’t help (hurt?) that Carter got it in his head that he needed to get his brother drunk.
“Think about it,” Carter said to Kelly from across the table. “Who knows how long you’re going to be human? You gotta go for it, Kelly.”
Tanner sighed as he glared down at his bottle of beer. “You know, this whole wolf thing lets me jump ten feet in the air from a crouch, but I can’t even get a buzz. What kind of messed-up shit is that?”
Chris nodded. “You did like to drink beer more than you liked to jump.”
Mark looked amused. “You can shift into a wolf the size of a small horse, and you regret not being able to get drunk?”
“So much,” Tanner said. “I mean, don’t get me wrong. The fact that I can shift into a killing machine is pretty damn cool, but fuck, what I wouldn’t give just to not be sober for, like, five seconds. Weed doesn’t even work on me anymore.” He blanched as he glanced at Gordo. “Not that I’ve ever been stoned before, boss. Because hugs, not drugs. Or whatever.”
Gordo snorted. “Bullshit. We got high for the first time when we were what, fourteen? Fifteen?”
“You did?” Mark asked, arching an eyebrow.
“You wouldn’t know. That was when you were an asshole and I never wanted to see you again.”
“You told me that last week,” Mark said.
Gordo rolled his eyes. “That’s because you left your wet towel on the floor. Again. You’re lucky I didn’t kick you out right then and there. You would have nowhere else to go, and I wouldn’t even feel bad about it.”
“I wouldn’t take you back,” Elizabeth agreed. “You don’t know the relief I felt when you and Gordo finally stopped being idiots. I turned your old room into a second studio. I don’t plan on changing it back. It’s probably for the best that you pick up your wet towels.”
Mark laughed at Gordo’s smug expression. “Duly noted.”
“I’m going to bring Kelly into the Lighthouse,” Carter told Bambi, “and you’re going to keep bringing drinks until Kelly throws up or goes to sleep, whichever comes first.”
Kelly pulled a face. “Let’s not do that.”
“I got you,” Bambi said easily. “He won’t be able to leave unless he has to be carried out. What’s your poison? You seem like the fruity drink kind of guy. Little umbrella. Sorority girl cocktails.”
Chris and Tanner and Carter looked delighted.
Kelly, not so much.
“I’m going to live vicariously through you,” Chris said, staring at Kelly. “Just so you know. You’re going to describe it in great detail. And you have to sing. Because everyone knows when you get super drunk, you have to sing.”
Dominique laughed but covered it up when I glanced at her. She seemed uncomfortable, and Jessie reached over and took her hand. I didn’t think she was pack, not like the others, but that didn’t mean she hadn’t heard about what I’d done. She wasn’t scared of me, but she wasn’t not either.
Rico said, “So we’re just going to act like everything is fine. Like this is normal.”
And it was weird, because I was thinking the same exact thing.
Everyone fell silent.
He glared down at the table. He was stiff with anger.
Bambi put a hand on his shoulder but pulled away when he didn’t react.
Ox frowned. “Rico. Look at me.”
Rico didn’t.
“Rico.”
He huffed but did as his Alpha asked.
“Nothing is normal,” Ox said quietly. “It hasn’t been for a long time.”
Rico shook his head. “Understatement, alfa. I get that you’re all for the greater good, but I can’t do that. I’m not like you.” He raised his voice. “Or apparently any of you. It’s like you all have memory issues, and not just our Robbie here.”
“Not cool, man,” Tanner said. He looked nervous, glancing between me and Rico. “He wasn’t…. It’s okay.”
Rico slammed his hand on the table. The plates rattled. An empty bottle fell over. “It’s not okay. You didn’t see what I did.” He swallowed, his throat clicking. His eyes were bright and glassy. “You didn’t hear it.”
Chris rubbed his jaw. “I dunno, Rico. I think I did see it. I think I did hear it. And you know what I had that you didn’t? I felt it.” He winced. “All of it. And I get you’re pissed, but let’s not do this now, okay? We’re here for Ox. We’re together. I’m not saying let bygones be bygones, but just… curb it for a little while.”
“I can go,” I said quietly. “If it makes things easier. I don’t want to—”
Kelly took my hand in his under the table. He pulled it into his lap and held on tightly.
“No,” Ox said. “You’re staying right where you are. Rico, you want to have this out? Fine. We’ll do it now.”
He recoiled slightly. “No, hey, I didn’t—it’s not like I’m trying to—”
“Yes,” Ox said flatly, “you are. And if you have a problem with a member of the pack, then we deal with it as a pack.”
“Pack,” Rico said, sounding incredulous. “He doesn’t even know who the fuck he is! We can’t feel him. Not like we used to. How the hell is he still pack? It broke. The bonds between us broke. Maybe it was Gordo’s dad, but how do you know? How the hell can you be sure that he didn’t invite it in? You all saw how he was with Michelle before Elijah came. He was begging her. And look what’s happened since. Tanner and Chris almost died. An Omega is dead. And then we find his sorry ass and we go save him, and what happens? Kelly’s wolf has been ripped from him—”
“Leave me out of this,” Kelly said. “I can speak for myself. Don’t you dare try to use me against him. It’s not fair.”
I thought Rico was going to apologize to Kelly. He didn’t. He said, “Fine. Let’s leave you out of this. But all the rest? I can’t forgive and forget. Not like the rest of you. You’re all walking on eggshells around him like you think he’s fragile. Well guess what: he’s not. I was there. I saw what he did, and if I’d had my gun, I would have killed him.”
“Holy shit,” Carter muttered as the timber wolf whined.
“That’s enough,” Gordo snapped. “I don’t want to hear another—”
“Oh, I bet you don’t,” Rico said. “I get it, papi. You’ve got your favorite back. You’re good to go.” He stood, the table shifting as he struck it with his thighs. “I’m sorry that I’m not all rah-rah Team Robbie like everyone else. But I held my friend as he died in my arms, and I can’t forget that. I won’t. And you all forcing this, acting like every
thing is fine, isn’t helping either.”
“Sit down,” Elizabeth said.
“Are you even hearing me? I’m not—”
“Sit. Down.”
The power in her voice was undeniable. Rico opened his mouth again like he was going to argue, but instead he did as he was told.
Joe said, “Maybe we should—” but Elizabeth held up her hand without looking at him, and he fell silent.
“I love you,” she said to Rico. “You’re important to me. To all of us. And you are justified in your anger.”
“Thank you, mamacita,” he said. “It’s good to know that—”
“I’m not finished. Don’t interrupt me again.”
He gulped.
“You’re justified in your anger,” she repeated. “But it’s dangerously misplaced. This is what they want. Doubt. To pit us against one another. Because if we let anger consume us, if we let it take control, then we run the risk of losing everything we love.”
“Where was this when Joe decided to break apart the pack?” Rico demanded. “When they all left to go after Richard Collins? Did you tell them the same thing?”
“You weren’t even there,” Gordo said. “You weren’t part of this then.”
“Only because you kept it from us,” Rico retorted. “We had to find out from Oxnard about all of it. You left a note and you were gone. Your life, man. We thought we knew you. We didn’t. We thought we knew Robbie. We didn’t. Because—”
“What do you want?” Elizabeth asked. “What do you hope to have happen here?”
Rico fisted his hair. “Argh. I don’t know. But I can’t just sit here and pretend nothing has changed. Everything has changed.”
I said, “I don’t remember.”
Everyone looked at me.
I wanted to run.
To find a hidey-hole in a tree and be as quiet as a mouse.
My mother laughed somewhere in my head. Little wolf, she whispered. Little wolf. Can’t you see?
I couldn’t run. I couldn’t hide.
I was very tired.
I said, “I don’t remember, and I’m sorry because I don’t know if I want to. If I did everything you’re saying, then I don’t want to remember because I don’t know that I would survive it.”
Kelly hung his head.
I looked at Tanner and Chris. “I didn’t mean to hurt you. I don’t know how I know that. But if I was here, if I was part of this pack once, then that would have been what was important to me. It’s all I’ve ever wanted. A place to belong. A home.” My voice cracked. “And if I had that, then I would never have done anything to have that taken from me.”
Tanner smiled tightly.
Chris nodded, though he looked a little pale.
I looked back at Rico. He was furious, though he kept it coiled inside. “I don’t expect you to trust me. Or even forgive me.”
“Good.”
“But I’m lost,” I admitted. “And I don’t know how to find my way back. Everything I thought my life was, everything I knew, it was a lie. Because my real life was taken from me by someone I loved. Someone I trusted. I thought I knew the way the world worked. I didn’t. I don’t know any of you. I wish I did even as I hope I never get my memory back.”
It was Kelly who moved then.
He stood abruptly, his chair falling back into the grass.
He let go of my hand as he turned and headed for the house.
“Seriously,” Carter said, standing to follow his brother, “fuck you guys. Fuck you very much.”
The timber wolf trailed after him, tail swishing back and forth.
Rico scrubbed a hand over his face. “Fuck. Ox, I’m sorry, man. I didn’t mean—”
“Yes,” Ox said, “you did. You’re hurting. I get that. You’re angry. I get that too. But you aren’t the only one who feels that way. And I think it’s time you start remembering that. We’re pack, and I’ll be damned if I’m going to let it be torn apart from the inside.”
Rico nodded jerkily. Bambi leaned over and whispered in his ear, but it wasn’t meant for me to hear, so I didn’t try to listen. Instead I turned toward the house, hearing Carter and Kelly’s muffled voices.
I thought about going after them, but before I could, a phone began to vibrate.
Gordo frowned as he pulled his phone out of his pocket. He glanced down at the screen.
He closed his eyes and sighed. “Well, their timing certainly sucks.”
“What is it?” Ox asked.
“Aileen,” he said as he looked at me. I slumped lower in my seat. It didn’t help. “Patrice. They’re early.”
house in order/pack divided
We stood on the dirt road in front of the house, watching a plume of dust rise up behind an old sedan as it drove toward us.
Bambi and Dominique had left already, heading back into town. Bambi said it’d be easier if they weren’t there, that it needed to be pack.
I didn’t like the sound of that, especially when Jessie told me Aileen and Patrice were witches.
Kelly was pale as he stood next to his brother. Carter looked as if he would have punched anyone who spoke to them, so I didn’t try. I thought I was being honest, but I’d fucked up. I didn’t know how to make things right.
With any of them.
The car stopped in front of the house.
A woman climbed out of the passenger side, a lit cigarette dangling between her teeth. She was older and worn, her skin wrinkled. But through the smoke came the stench of magic unlike anything I’d ever smelled before. It was rough and wild and made me sneeze.
The driver was a man with bone-white skin. He wore a fedora and sunglasses that covered most of his face. Pale red hair stuck out from underneath his hat, and when he took off his sunglasses, I saw his face was covered with rusty freckles. His magic felt cleansing, like it was made of white light.
Aileen coughed around her cigarette, a wet hacking sound. “Well, shit,” she said. “This is more fucked-up than I expected. You feel it?”
Patrice nodded. “Deep. Dark. Heavy. Dis isn’t gonna be easy.”
She sighed. “Yeah. We’ve got our work cut out for us. Let’s see what we see.”
* * *
“It’s best before the full moon,” Aileen said, leading us into the woods. “I’m not a fan of how close it is now, but we should try to get it over with. Don’t need to have this one turn into some kind of rage monster if we can avoid it, eh, Robbie?”
She smiled at me.
It didn’t make me feel any better.
She was plucking leaves from the bushes around her, folding them into her hand and crushing them together. I grimaced when she opened her hand again and spit into the pile.
“It ain’t pretty,” she said when she saw me watching her. “A little bit of dirty magic. But it’ll have to do. No promises, boyo. It might be too far gone.”
“What might be too far gone?” I asked, not liking the sound of any of this.
She laughed until she saw I didn’t get the joke. She looked slowly over at Gordo. “You didn’t tell him?”
Gordo shrugged. “We got busy. Family problems. And it’s Ox’s birthday. Almost.”
She snorted, exhaling a plume of smoke. “That right? Salutations, and all that. But I thought something was up. You’re all jumbled. Out of sync. Keeping secrets. That never works out for anyone.”
“That’s one way to put it,” Rico muttered.
Aileen arched an eyebrow at him. “Is it? Because it’s coming off of you almost more than anyone. Got a problem, Rico?”
“Several.”
“Then get over it. At least for today. We can’t have the negativity. It’ll mess things up. A pack divided is a pack that cannot stand true. We just drove two days to get here to help you sorry bunch. You’re not a little bitch, so stop acting like one.”
He looked outraged as Chris and Tanner laughed behind him.
She plucked a couple of small red berries from a bush, crushed them on top of the le
aves and her spit. Seeds and juice squirted out between her fingers. They were poisonous, so I recoiled when she held the mess out toward me and said, “Eat this.”
“You spit on it.”
“I am aware.”
“Then I decline,” I said. And then, because she was a powerful witch, I added, “Ma’am.”
Rico sounded like he was choking and was angry about it.
“Hmm,” Aileen said. She looked down at the wet pile in her hand. “I suppose I can get a slice of cheese and wrap it in it. That’s what I do for my dogs.” She squinted at me. “Would that help?”
Every wolf growled at her.
“That’s speciesist,” Tanner said. He blinked. “Wow. Now I understand prejudice. That’s eye-opening. Damn. I have fucked up a lot in my life. I’m going to start making amends first thing tomorrow. After Robbie scarfs down the spit berries like a good boy.”
“I’m not going to eat that,” I told her. “It’s weird, I know, but I have this thing where I don’t eat out of people’s hands after they’ve spat on them.”
“You ate cat poop once when you were shifted,” Elizabeth said mildly.
I gaped at her.
She shrugged. “Don’t look at me. I tried to stop you.”
“Dis pack,” Patrice said, shaking his head. “Just when I tink I have dem all figured out.”
I recovered. “I don’t know what you’re trying to do to me, but I don’t—”
Aileen cut me off. “Sorry, boyo. We’re not here for you. Or at least not just you. There’s not much more we can do that Gordo and your pack haven’t already tried. I’m afraid that until we can get to Livingstone, you’re going to be as you are now. This is about Kelly.”
“Oh,” I said weakly. “No one told me.”
Kelly was stiff beside me.
“I know.” She sounded frustrated. “I get things are moving fast, and there are many moving parts, but I wasn’t kidding when I said this could be a problem.” She turned to Joe and Ox. “Get your house in order, Alphas. You’re not helping anyone the way you are now.”