“Scared?” Mr. Atherton's face takes on a mask of adorable confusion. A hint of pain breaks through. “Of what?”
Toni's look is pitying. “Just scared in general, I think.”
“Antonia Marie!” Viv Fox calls dramatically down the hallway. She stalks into sight, stops just outside the door.
“Hello, Vivianne.”
Mr. Atherton's simple greeting is deep, warm and yet cautious. As if he's the one frightened of her, but not for anything physical she might do to him.
She blinks, blushing. It's almost as if she's surprised to see him in his office. Or if she didn't realize where she was going when she chased after her errant offspring. “Michael.”
All at once, we notice her bruises.
“What happened?” Tod and Mr. Atherton demand, in sync.
Another young Fox, the mirror image of Tod eight years or so ago, creeps into the room around his mother. His attempt at going unnoticed fails, and his brother narrows his eyes on him. “What happened, Scot?”
Toni's the one who answers though, not Scot. Scot just cowers under his brother's disapproval. “Daddy.”
“What?” Tod stares at her.
Mr. Atherton starts to growl.
“Michael, don't,” Viviane says quickly. “My mother's handling it.”
“How?” he demands.
The abused vixen looks down at the carpet. “It's a den matter.”
The wolf stares at her for several heartbeats, and a new growl adds itself to his.
“Then why are you here?”
Oh, expletive. I'm the one growling with him.
“Mike...” The warning in Tod's voice is my tip-off he's trying to control me rather than answering the question. His hand wrapping around my arm would also be a clue.
My fingers twine around his where he holds me, using the contact as a grounding force. I have no idea why I am so angry right now, but I can feel the claws trying to form.
Tod's siblings stare at me, but neither his mother nor Mr. Atherton pay me any mind at all. The latter is too busy watching the former, who focuses on the floor as if praying it will open up and swallow her. I know the feeling well.
After a few very tense moments, Tod says in a remarkably quiet voice, “It was a good question, Mom.”
Vivianne's eyes shimmer when she looks up, timid and terrified. The stress in Mr. Atherton's jaw starts to relax as his gaze softens. “What do you need, Viv?”
“I don't know. I just...” Tears flow freely down her marbled cheeks now. She gives up trying to communicate as Mr. Atherton rushes to her, crushing her against him, and running his hands down her back.
“It's alright,” he whispers.
Several pieces of information slide together in my head. The tone he uses for her. The fear and longing when he looks at her. Even the way he treats her children, which is ever so slightly different from the way he acts around the other students. He's fond of most of us, but there's an extra affection and concern around the Fox kids I never stopped to consider before.
Jerking my head at the Fox kid holding onto me, I pull him out of the room. “They need some time alone,” I whisper to him. “And we should find Sam.”
The other two trail after us to the dining room, where Sam and Aliah sit with an open textbook between them. They start when they notice the extra people with us, and Sam lets out a happy squeal before jumping up to embrace the pair.
“Mom brought them,” Tod tells her, his voice ominous.
Aliah and Sam follow us to the food line, wanting to know more. “When?” Sam demands. “And why? And where is she?”
Toni wraps her arms around her sister's. She grabs a plate of pancakes from the serving counter before answering. “Just now. Something bad happened. She needed to be with Michael.”
My friend's eyebrows knit together. “How bad?”
“Daddy showed up.” Toni swallows with a barely perceptible shiver as she moves away from the counter to let me take a plate. “He didn't like not being let in. He...”
Scot finishes for her. “He beat her up pretty bad. I dialed 911.”
Tod's teeth are gnashing together loud enough for people around us to hear them. Aliah puts a hand on his arm, trying to be soothing, but it doesn't break his tension at all.
“And now Mike's probably going to kill him,” Toni states, not sounding too distressed by the idea.
Tod frowns at her, confused.
“Well, she is his life mate,” I respond, going to grab my chocolate milk.
“What?” Tod blurts behind me.
“Life mate,” Sam repeats. “It's something wolves have.”
“I know what a life mate is!” He follows me to the table with short, rapid steps. “But what the hell makes you think my mother is his?”
Toni rolls her eyes and takes a seat. “Because it's obvious.”
“To who?” he wants to know.
Settling into the chair she vacated, Sam lets out a grunt of frustration. “Oh, come on. You never noticed? He's been in love with her since the dawn of time!”
“It's not his fault,” Toni puts in with kindness. “Tod can't help being a boy.” She gives her big brother a mocking little smile, which he counters with a sneer.
“Remember the day Kim got here?” I ask, ripping off a sliver of pancake with my fingers. “Your mom called him some time after breakfast, and he was in Seattle, which is over four hours from here, by lunch. As in, she called, and he jumped.” I run the pancake through a puddle of syrup, but don't eat it yet. “He hung up the phone and then ran to the airplane. Didn't even think about it.” The pancake goes to my mouth.
“Because she was tied into the mystery of you.”
I shake my head as I chew my food. “No,” I state when I'm done. “It was because of who called. Your mother could have been calling to ask for help with a splinter. The response would have been the same.”
Tod looks miffed about this while Scot, sitting beside his elder brother, appears to be confused. Okay, fine, Scot is ten. Scot has room to be unconvinced. But surely Tod should recognize the symptoms of a hopeless romantic entanglement.
Then again... I think about about Lyly and remember how Tod had said not that he was in love with her, but that he had always assumed he was, and I have to wonder.
“I don't understand,” Scot says, sad and hesitant. “Why wouldn't she want to be with him before now? This isn't the first time Daddy's hit her, and he was never around anyway.”
Yeah, alright. That's a decent thing to be confused about.
“This isn't the first time?” Tod demands.
“He's a wolf,” Sam tells Scot gently. “They're pretty...”
“Violent?” I wager.
“No.” She gives me a disapproving look. “Intense.”
Toni makes a sound of agreement. “I mean, how freaky is it to be told, 'Hey, I don't know you, but you're my life mate, and the only way you're going to get rid of me is by dying.' Seriously?”
“But he loves her!” I protest.
Aliah nods. “And, she did get away from him, didn't she?”
“She moved to Seattle,” Sam acknowledges. “And he just let her.”
“As far as we know,” Tod qualifies. He doesn't sound like he's accusing Mr. Atherton of anything, though, it's just he is so thrown by events he honestly has no idea how to react.
Sam waves a dismissive hand at him. “And it's all impressive that he loved her enough to let her go. But, I don't know, maybe the problem was how he just let her go,” she proposes. “Maybe he was supposed to throw a fit and drag her back home by her hair.”
“That's stupid,” Tod tells her.
“No,” Toni counters. “That's feminine thought.”
“Same thing,” mutters Scot.
Sam rolls her eyes. “Eat your breakfast, smarty pants.”
Scot sticks his tongue out at her, but digs into his food with remarkable zest.
Tod just stares at his plate, too deep in shock to eat.
He still hasn't said anything new when we all finish up and go to change for skiing, the younger foxes borrowing stuff because they didn't think to bring their ski things when they left Seattle. Apparently, they left almost immediately once their mother made her decision to come up here.
We go up to the mountain in Tod's car, to give them more freedom about when they come back than if we'd taken the bus. It's too small for both me and Aliah, so she stays behind to come up later, thus saving me from a ride spent being stared at. The foxes may have reason to be distracted from the mystery of what I changed into last night, but the rest of the school is going to want to know.
Tod stays virtually silent, but Toni and Sam more than make up for his reticence with wild gossip about people they know back in Washington. Things will be interesting next year with Tod gone and Toni at school.
I find I don't like to think about Tod leaving. Not that I suppose he'll be completely out of my life when his sisters will be so much in it. Still, the concept leaves a cold pit somewhere inside of me.
Putting on my too-thin gloves, I think sadly about Warren's pair. He wasn't at breakfast today, but he'll be back tomorrow. I suppose I'll return them to him then. But what am I going to do about his shirt? If I just put it back in his room, he's going to smell me on it. If I wash it, will he realize something is up with it? Even if I get the right detergent, maybe he'll notice it was supposed to be dirty. And if I keep it, then I stole it.
“Earth to Michaela!” Sam moves her hand moving up and down in front of my face. “We asked if you wanted to hit the backside with us.”
Unconsciously, I look towards the lift that would take me to the top of the mountain. “No,” I say slowly. “My brain's pretty fried. I'll stay on the easier stuff. You guys have fun.”
Shrugging, the three younger foxes push off towards the lift line. Tod stays in place, watching me. “You alright?”
“Yeah.” I give him a smile that I hope is reassuring before narrowing my eyes with concern. “Are you?”
His head shakes. “Other than being a blind idiot, you mean?”
“You are not an idiot,” I state with firm insistence. “You're one of the smartest people I know, fox.”
An eyebrow goes up. “Thanks. But I notice you aren't arguing against the blind part.”
I use the fact I haven't gotten my skis on yet as an excuse to look at the ground. Clicking my first boot into its binding, I sigh. “There are a lot of things you don't see.”
“So it would seem.” He sighs. “What else am I missing?”
I slide the second boot onto its ski and give my friend smile. “The point of life is figuring that out.”
His eyes roll. “Right.” He waves, then skates away after his siblings.
Much more awkwardly, I push my poles into the snow and move toward a lift that only services green slopes.
Three runs into the morning, I realize this isn't the distraction I'd hoped it would be. My form is off. I keep falling. I need new gloves. And I'm just not having fun today.
After taking my ski things back to their locker and picking up a replacement pair of gloves that costs me all that's left of my birthday money, I go over to the coffee shop and borrow one of their collections of short stories to curl up in an armchair with near the fireplace.
“What, all alone? Couldn't find anyone else's boyfriend to keep you company?”
Sighing down at the book, I don't look up at Lyly. Last time I talked to her, she begged me to help her. Guess her gratitude over me being willing to do that wore off.
“Too bad you can't find and keep one of your own,” snarks a second voice.
My fingers clutch the edges of the novel. “I had Troy for six months, Kim. He broke up with you after, what, a week?”
“Three. We were together for two weeks before you ever found out about it.” She brags of this as though it is something to be proud of. “And I broke up with him.”
“Very sensible of you,” I tell her, still gazing at the text before me. “Boyfriends who cheat on the girl before you frequently become boyfriends who cheat on you.”
“No one has ever cheated on me,” she claims, her tone inarguable and assured.
“Bill Stevens. Ninth grade.”
“Yeah, but that girl went to another school,” Kim defends instantly. As if what school the girl had gone to could possibly make a difference.
“Whatever.” Sticking a finger in my place in the book, I yawn and stretch. “Did you two come over here for a reason?”
“Yeah.” Lyly strikes a dramatic pose. “Tod's mine. You need to stay away from him.”
“Ah.” I put the book face down on the side of the chair and fold my hands demurely in my lap. In all honesty, I've been expecting this confrontation for weeks. “So, Tod's not allowed to play with me anymore?”
“No, he isn't.” Her features contort into an ugly visage of hatred. Interesting. I guess she can be unattractive if she tries hard enough.
“Have you told him?” I ask reasonably.
Her eyes narrow into slender daggers. “I'm telling you.”
I smile. “I'll keep your opinions in mind. But you need to keep in mind I'm his friend, not yours.”
“I don't trust you.” The words lack emotion, more a statement of fact than an actual attack.
Which begs the question, “Do you trust Tod?”
She absolutely glowers. “You already stole Seth from Simone. Do you have to ruin every relationship in this school?”
There's a growl from behind me. “She did not take my brother from Simone. He was always going to challenge to be free of her.”
Lyly glares at Amber. “Yeah? Well, he never said a word about it until she showed up.” Her finger jabs at me in accusation.
“He spoke plenty of it to me,” Amber states with calm alacrity as she places her hand on the back of my chair. “Since we were in preschool, back when he first realized what he had been committed to, he's been telling me he'd fight it. If Mike had anything at all to do with it, then all she did was give him an extra push. And I thank her for that.”
The other two watch her with stunned expressions, dropped jaws and all. “Simone is your friend,” Lyly whispers, astonished and appalled.
Amber's face goes cold. “Simone is a member of my community,” she says with a complete, and frightening, lack of warmth. “But she was never my friend.”
The leopard leans over me. “But Michaela is my friend. And if you desire to remain healthy, little fox, you will leave her alone.”
Lyly just stares.
“Mike's not worth fighting over,” Kim drawls, trying to sound bored. If I couldn't hear how fast her heart is beating, I might have believed it. But Amber managed to scare her, too.
“Yeah,” Lyly mutters in agreement.
“And she's not a threat to you and Tod anyway.” Kim tosses her hair and gives her hips a little shake. “She's way too freakish.”
Freakish. She doesn't mean I'm a freak for being a new kind of were either, or because of my scent. If that's what she meant, then she'd be a freak too. No, it's just a word she's been tossing at me for years. Once upon a time, it hurt my feelings. Back before I realized that if she was normal, then I wanted to be a freak.
My tormentors saunter away, acting as if they won our little battle. Whatever.
“I'm sorry,” Amber whispers.
“For what?” I turn in the chair so I can see her.
“For claiming the right to name you friend.” Her eyes, the same color as her name, drop to the floor and refuse to meet mine. “I know I don't deserve the honor.”
“Sure you do.” I smile at Seth's strange sister, wondering if it's normal for her to talk like she lives in a fantasy novel. I've never heard her say enough to know for sure. “You just defended me against my arch-enemies. Usually people stand in line to stab me in the back and get on Kim's good side.”
“Why?” Her eyes move up to squint at me. “Are the people in your old school unusually dimwi
tted?”
I never did figure that out, actually. Yes, she's prettier than I am. Yes, she's wittier than I am. But she's mean and petty and shallow too. What is the attraction? And why don't the weres echo that draw? Is it simply that animals are good judges of character?
Instead of getting into that, I laugh softly. “See, spoken like my friend.” Waving at the chair next to mine, I invite her to sit down.
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