He smiled and said, “I guess if you froze it, but that defeats the point of a bubble because now you have an ice cube. Or... well, an ice ball?”
Both of their eyes lit up, and Miranda said, “Can we make ice bubbles in the freezer?”
“Not the freezer...”
He brought it on himself!
That’s how we did things around the house that week of the summer — endless teasing and poking. And when the kids were asleep, and Josh had finally gotten tired of hearing himself, there was poking of a different sort.
I can’t tell you the details of why Omegas will only bear children with soul mates and will actively stop breeding otherwise. It’s something really esoteric and probably isn’t supposed to be understood.
On July 4th weekend, Frederick was off, and he decided that we ought to go to Donatello park.
It was a muggy day, uncomfortable and hot. But the sun was brighter than I think I had seen it in years, and looking at the trees swaying in the light breeze while people walked along the path made me feel nostalgic for when I was a little kitten myself. My family would take me to a similar park up north, one that wasn’t quite as large but had a similar level of natural magic in it, something that couldn’t be replicated in the blocky 3D graphics of the video games the kids would play.
They went on to play on swings and slides, mingling with some other kids that were already there. Most of the park was packed with revelers. Most wore red, white, and blue. The rest were wearing basic tees and shorts or jeans.
Everyone except for Frederick looked as comfortable as they could. Frederick, on the other hand, was in yet another black suit. This one was very different from all the rest because the stripes on this one were horizontal instead of vertical. How exciting and original!
In all seriousness, I couldn’t fault him for looking so fly at all times. It was everything I wanted in a man come true, after all.
A radio system was set up at the Donatello Center, blaring bassy music. What’s the most bass-heavy music you can imagine?
How about “Hey now, you’re an all-star, get your game on, go play; Hey now, you’re a rock star, get the show on, get paid; And all that glitters is gold; Only shooting stars break the mold!” Not bassy music, but a fun song nonetheless. I didn’t catch the name of the band, and it came on just after we arrived, but no matter what we heard, it was unfitting for the thick air we had to deal with. This was mugginess I’d never felt before and only heard stories about. Apparently people in the deep south and Caribbean had to deal with this?
It wasn’t actually unbearable, but it did make the air feel stickier than it had any right to be.
In full view of everyone else, Frederick pulled his pipe from his lips, set it in his blazer pocket, and shifting into a Unicorn. Some people stepped back as his body extended, and a few women and twinky boys marveled at his impressively huge horn that seemed longer than his snout (oh trust me, I’ve had fun with that thing). But before any nonconsensual stroking could start, he brought his muzzle over to me, and I rubbed his face.
I had Josh strapped onto my chest and kept kissing his tufts of hair often as we moved as if I was happy to know he was still there.
It was a beautiful setup, I thought. I’d ride Frederick around the park, and we’d have a wonderful memory to make with Josh. You know: something to tell him when he was older.
In response to Frederick shifting, several more people shifted, and soon there was a massive gathering of shifters mingling with the nonshifters. Dragons, wolves, bears, Sasquatch, cats, dogs, even dolphins! It made the entire gathering that much more festive compared to when there were only boring humans here.
My legs spread out and over Frederick’s powerful back, I pat his neck, and he started trotting.
I felt like a prince and started waving to people. Some waved back, and a few took pictures on yellow and black disposable cameras.
We moved along well with me bouncing on Frederick’s back. We had done this before, I told myself, but I was still really anxious because this was the first time I’d be riding with Josh.
Frederick looked back at me, his eye fluttering, before he looked forward.
Any people in his path scattered. But then someone didn’t move.
It was a poor little old grandma, someone who probably couldn’t hear well because she didn’t react quickly to the people pointing out the trotting Unicorn coming right at her.
Frederick stopped in time and let her pass, and I thought she was pretty adorable too.
Until she turned around and screamed like a goat at the sight of the towering Unicorn with the catboy & his butt baby on top.
This startled Frederick, and he lifted up his two front legs.
I tried hanging on, but my grip slipped.
Josh and I went tumbling, and I hit the ground front first.
Frederick
Oh fuck! Oh fuck! Oh fuck! Oh fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck!!
I shifted right back into my human form and ran to Stuart’s side, picking him up and pulling him closer. When I saw he was mostly alright, I checked Josh in front.
He was crying, so at least he was alive, I thought to myself with a massive gasp and exhale.
But then I saw that he definitely wasn’t like himself. His cries were different from a normal cry.
I ran my fingers across his beautiful face.
His beautiful, little, furry face.
His beautiful, little, furry wolf face.
I fell back and had to catch my breath.
Stuart looked down and gasped when he saw his child.
“Oh my god!”
That face and form were that of a canine undoubtedly. The ears were suspect as was the twirling tail, and there was something on his forehead that looked a bit like a horn trying to punch out from a cat-like ‘M,’ but if you presented that creature to me, I’d tell you it was a wolf pup. And that creature was my son, Josh.
Or was he really my son?
I could’ve gotten to my feet, but I was so floored that I was literally sitting on my ass for several minutes. People crowded around, asking if we were alright. When I looked at Josh again, he had already shifted back into that adorable little bean.
“Yeah, I’m fine,” I kept saying to passersby. When one asked if we needed an ambulance, I said, “Sure, you might as well get one. Just to make sure.”
Stuart hugged Josh for several minutes, holding him so tight that he could’ve popped. I was concerned about the bloody gash on the top right of his forehead, knee-walking towards him, and said, “Look at you, you’re hurt.”
He shook his head. “I’m fine. I-is Josh fine?”
This made me involuntarily laugh. He was hugging a very loud Josh who was probably more upset about the heat and not having his bottle than the fact he just survived a fall that has killed many grown-ups before him.
I pulled him closer and hugged him, getting Josh in there but at a more comfortable angle so that he wouldn’t suffocate between two chests.
Finally, he said again, “Are you sure he’s okay?”
And I knew exactly what he was saying. I didn’t want to think about it much myself. The idea that I might have been raising another man’s child this entire time. I didn’t know. I couldn’t know. And even if it was true, who cared?
We went back to Dr. Jerome. He was such an amiable man, a bit on the heavy side, and with a thick black mustache that made him look like he had stumbled out of the 1970s. He was a man I knew and trusted even though we had only met less than a year prior.
He was still looking up at us, keeping an optimistic demeanor as he said, “You’re fine! No internal damage, and the scar on your head should heal in a few weeks. As for the babe, it’s remarkable. There’s not a scratch on him.”
Stuart was comforted heavily by the news, exhaling loudly. “Thank the heavens.”
I stepped forward and asked, “Well, that’s not the only reason why we’re here. The biggest reason, yes, but...” I had my hat
on and held it over my gut, maybe trying to stop those butterflies just in case I was told something I didn’t want to hear.
He looked at me, scribbling something down on a notepad. “Just tell me, I can help.”
“When they fell, Josh... he had shifted.”
“That’s a natural reaction for most shifter infants. Since the human form is entirely helpless but most animals can run away not long after birth, it’s a natural instinct that the shifter will turn into their true animal selves for the extra ability to escape danger.”
“I-I know that.” It hurt me sounding so vulnerable. I was supposed to be an Alpha, and yet here I was, stuttering like a Beta. Realizing this, I set my hat back on my head and folded my arms. It was time to confront this potential truth head-on and accept whatever was possible. “When he shifted, he looked like a wolf cub. So what I want to know is if it’s possible for a shifted baby to look like another creature than what they actually are.”
“’Corn and cat, right?”
I didn’t like that abbreviation. It made my proud and illustrious species sound edible. “Yes.”
“That sounds a bit odd, I agree. Unfortunately, I’m unaware of any potential cause for why, except for the obvious.”
I inhaled through my nose. The ‘obvious’ was the possibility I wanted to hear the least.
Stuart kept looking back and forth between us and licked his lips over and over to the point that I thought he was going to wear them down to the skull bone beneath. I knew what that meant, and it dredged up terrible memories of our ordeal with that fool, Jack.
“What’s this about again?”
I looked right at him and said, “You weren’t listening?”
He looked all around by darting his blue eyes left and right trying to find something that wasn’t there. “I mean....”
Dr. Jerome said, “It might be nothing! Who knows. What ought to matter right now is that the baby is safe and sound.”
Immediately, Stuart nodded and shouted, “Yes.” Then he took Josh from atop the counter and squeezed him tight.
I wrapped my arm around Stuart and said to Jerome, “Well then, if any more complications arise, we’ll come back here immediately.”
“You best do that. It wasn’t that long ago that Stuart was in here half-coughing up blood.”
I started. “Blood?”
“Oh no, no,” he said. “It was nothing life-threatening. Often when there’s pneumonia, fluid build-up in the lungs will cause there to be some blood mixed in due to weakened lining on the esophagus.”
I pressed my chest and said, “Oh. Phew.”
“Oh, that’s really not something that’s good,” he added. “If you ever see blood coming from an orifice—"
Stuart butted in and said, “Trust me, I know. I and just about every Omega and woman on Earth.”
Dr. Jerome smiled, and I chuckled under our breath. It felt good to laugh, even at such a bizarre time of stress.
We left the doctor’s office, and we held each other tight while Stuart also held Josh in his arms (perhaps a better way to put it is that I held him tight and he held Josh? I’m getting better at Dadding, I swear).
I said silently to him under my breath, “It’s all fine, baby. It’s all fine. We can work this out.”
He said with a warble to his voice, “There’s nothing to work out. I swear that Josh is a Cat or a Unicorn hybrid. I know this is the case. It can’t be anything else.”
We sat in a couple of blue plastic chairs, the kind without armrests, and rocked each other.
It really did hurt, but I was dedicated to making this work. What was the reason why Josh was a wolf cub? Or was he a wolf cub at all? I knew what I saw, and if we went back to the park and asked the people who saw the fall, they’d have said that Josh was a wolf, I was sure.
There were a few oddities as well, and that catlike forehead M, the “Mary’s M” some called it, was enough to make me doubt myself. Wolves didn’t have Mary’s M. That was only a feline thing. And I knew I saw the beginnings of a Unicorn’s horn growth right under it. That was absolutely what I was seeing, and nothing could convince me otherwise.
But at the same time, nothing could convince me that I wasn’t also seeing those canine paws and the very wolf-like eyes.
Something was wrong with Josh all this time, and I felt helpless not knowing what.
OXO
“Artemis will know,” said that cute Omega voice.
I sighed into my phone and said, “Are you sure?”
Tommy replied, “She’s always been right before. And you should see my face right now. I look just like Justin Timberlake!”
I chuckled a few times, imagining his round face taking up the N’SYNC kid’s own baby cheeks. He made a point. Artemis was a powerful witch in her own right, and you only became that powerful through great study of the magical and paranormal.
“Where is she now?”
“She should be at her bookshop. I don’t think you’ve ever been there!”
He gave me the instructions, and we promptly left the hospital, taking a b-line straight to Ginger Street.
There, nestled behind some trees and covered in some vines, was a nondescript one-story shop. When we walked in, the aroma of old, book-worm and time-eaten paper filled or noses and gave me an undying sense of nostalgia for something I myself never experienced.
It was magical, being surrounded by so many books. But behind all those books was that short woman again. This time she had ditched the grandmother glasses and floral shirt and was wearing what I could only describe as a “bookish girl” style. Funny as hell, I knew exactly what that style was even though I had a feeling I had never seen anyone wearing it growing up.
This time around, she was wearing form-fitting jeans, but a long gray sweater mostly obscured her pelvis, and the sleeves of the sweater went just a bit over her wrists to slightly cover her palms. A Wiccan pentacle necklace hung from her neck, and she also donned Vans loafers.
She didn’t have the body of a supermodel: she could best be described as slightly chubby. And her hair was a bob that went down to her shoulders, with a flat line of bangs just barely above her eyes. If I had never met her before, the very first thing I’d have assumed about her was that she was into reading paranormal romance books, particularly the ones with edgy and minimalist covers. Those and maybe H.P. Lovecraft (a lot of goth and outcast girls I did grow up around loved shipping various Shoggoth-style monsters with each other for some weird reason).
She was carrying a short stack of books in her hands, and I could see from the covers that these were an entire row of Harry Potter books— including one I had never seen before.
“Artemis?”
She turned to me and said, “Hail, fellow! It’s that hunk. And his Alpha too.”
I was about to say something, but her misdirection caught me off guard.
She set her books on a shelf and said, “What brings you around these parts?”
Stuart carried Josh around on his shoulder. He had the carriage, but I understood what he was doing: he wanted to feel Josh. It was a mother’s instinct to always know his child was still there, and cutting off that physical bond with a plastic carriage wouldn’t do in such an hour.
Artemis said, “Uh oh!”
“What’s ‘uh oh?’”
She had her fists on her hips and bent forward to say, “Whenever someone’s bringing their baby inside here, it’s always a bad sign.”
I frowned and looked to Stuart and Josh.
Artemis grabbed my arm and pulled me towards her. “No, don’t take that the wrong way.” Then she pulled Stuart further into the shop, and it didn’t take long for me to see that there was more to the store than I initially expected. It was one of those impossible box sorts of places, where the outside was much smaller than the inside. Even though the aisles and shelves of books took up a small space that fit what looked like a cozy little hole in the wall, there was a much larger den behind them that looked a sus
piciously lot like a witch’s coven. This was what I wanted to see, however: evidence that she was still practicing and could help us.
The coven itself was a square room with an obsidian tabernacle at the end, and above the tabernacle was a bizarre juxtaposition of a Christian cross above a Pagan star. I knew of Christian imagery, but I was unfamiliar with the Wiccan world.
She pressed her sleeve-covered wrists on her cheeks, making her face look even smaller and accentuating the size of her eyes. “Let me guess. The baby’s sick?”
I blinked. “No, madam. He’s actually quite healthy. It’s something else entirely.” I removed my hat, remembering that I still had it on and not wanting to be rude. “It appears an unusual phenomenon has occurred for his birth: he has the form of a wolf cub, despite being borne of a Cat and Unicorn. And indeed, he also has Cat and Unicorn features.
She pulled her wrists away and said, “So three bits of semen found their way into Stuart’s womb then! Problem solved. Now, would you like to read the tales of Potter’s escapades with his godfather, Sirius?” She handed a book to me, and I didn’t even see where she pulled it from.
Stuart shouted, “What? That’d didn’t help at all! What do you mean three bits of semen? I didn’t get fucked by a wolf!”
I stopped. What was he saying? Of course he did. And he even told me as such.
I turned to him and said, “Are you so sure about that, Stu?”
He didn’t even blink. Rather, his eyes immediately got starry, and he said, “Babe...”
Both of us knew what happened that day I first came to Brooks Creek. Tommy had scared me off all because of a paranoid assumption about my new living quarters, and that gave Stuart the time he needed to have some fun with Alphas and Betas at the [rainbow] sex club.
Artemis butted in between us and said, “You know... If it doesn’t matter to you two, I could always check the baby to see for myself.”
“No,” I said. “The only way you could get Josh to shift is to put him in danger or give him some weird elixir, and we don’t need that right now.”
A New Millennium's Omega Page 10