The Frenzy

by Francesca Lia Block

  “That house is messed up,” he said. “Why’s it so cold?”

  “Maybe it really is haunted.”

  “Like me.” Corey glanced at me sideways.

  “What?” I’d lost the thread of conversation so I just stared at him.

  “I can’t stop thinking about you.”

  “Me, too,” I said. “You.”

  “It sucks.”

  “I know. Listen, Corey, I’m sorry. I wanted to apologize.”

  He nodded but he wouldn’t look me in the eye.

  “The reason I didn’t make love with you isn’t because I don’t want to. And it’s not because I’m scared for the reasons you think.” A flood of relief washed over me; I was going to be able to share my secret….

  “What is it? You know you can tell me anything. I’ve known you forever.”

  I reached out and touched his arm. A jolt of electricity went through me and I had to move my hand away.

  “I’m afraid I’m a monster,” I said. “And that if we make love something bad might happen because of that.”

  “What do you mean ‘a monster’?”

  I struggled for the words but they stuck in my throat like a piece of poison apple. I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t tell him.

  “Just … that … I wouldn’t do it right or …”

  “Liv!” He stopped me, grabbed my hand, and I surrendered to the electric currents pulsing through my body. “This is me here you’re talking to. What are you going on about, crazy girl?”

  “I know. I’m sorry.” I lowered my head. “Can we get out of here?”

  I gripped his hand tighter and we stood up and began to walk silently away from the cold house and toward the woods. I didn’t feel giddy or even filled with the usual desire. I felt serious, as if we were embarking on a journey—something sacred. I knew I wanted to be with Corey but I was also afraid. I still hadn’t been able to tell him the truth. I had trusted him with everything but this.

  As if he could read my thoughts, he said, “There’s nothing to be scared of, Liv. We love each other. That’s what matters, right?”

  It was true. And I wanted to believe that was all that mattered.

  Love

  Corey had a flashlight and he shone it along the path, a pale flicker of comfort, as we went deeper into the trees. We’d taken this path so many times before as children, really, even though we thought we were grown up, holding hands like kids in a fairy tale, safe—from whatever mystery lurked in the dark—only because we had each other. Now I knew one thing that lurked in the dark and it was me. But at that moment I was safe from that, too.

  We lay down by the creek on a patch of mossy ground among some roots. Corey made a pillow for me with his sweatshirt. Our bodies were almost the same length and size, his legs just a little longer and hips just a little narrower. We lay on our sides, looking at each other, our hands entwined. I loved the pale color of my skin against the warm glow of his. Corey’s eyes shone in the darkness like the eyes of an animal and for a moment I thought he was like me, too, but then he kissed me and I knew it was just desire that had changed him.

  They say it will hurt. It didn’t hurt, maybe because of what my body had already been through when I changed. In spite of my initial fear, it felt like I was safe, completely safe.

  They say it will be short the first time. It wasn’t short. Just because Corey had waited so long didn’t mean he had to make it happen all at once. Our bodies took their time.

  They say you will lose yourself. It wasn’t true. I felt as if I had finally found myself and the girl in Corey’s arms wasn’t a monster, not at all.

  The only problem was I couldn’t feel it entirely. They say that’s a side effect of the meds I take. It was okay, I was still happy to be with Corey, but it was like the lower half of my body wasn’t quite all the way there, like it maybe even belonged to someone else. For the first time I wondered about going off the Lexapro. Maybe I didn’t need that anymore. Maybe now that Corey and I made love, I thought in my euphoric state, maybe I won’t be as susceptible to changing. Maybe I’m cured, I imagined as I drifted in and out of a dream.

  Afterward Corey’s eyes turned soft and calm again and he snuggled me in his arms.

  If you saw us you would have thought we were just a boy and girl who had loved each other for a long time and finally made love—just a normal boy and girl who had waited what might be considered abnormally long. That’s how I felt until I got home that night.

  But later, as I lay in my bed, looking at the hair on my body, I remembered that we weren’t normal.

  Corey and I could never be. He was a boy and I was a monster. I knew that even though I hadn’t turned into a wolf when we made love, even though I loved him more than anyone on earth, I could possibly still hurt him; he was not my kind. My kind waited for me in the woods. And they had a task they wanted me to perform, one I couldn’t do.

  Early the next morning I called Pace. He sounded small and hoarse.

  “I went by the house,” I said.

  “Yeah?”

  I could tell by the tight sound of his voice that he didn’t want me to talk about it. Maybe he didn’t want to think about Michael but I wondered if it might be good for him to talk about it anyway.

  “It felt really creepy there.”

  He was quiet on the other end, for an uncomfortably long amount of time. Then he said, “Did you go inside?” There was so much tension in the way he asked and I knew he meant, Was Michael there?

  “No one was there. It was really cold in a way I can’t explain. I felt sick to my stomach.”

  “Me, too,” he said. “Sick.”

  “Why, do you think? They say it’s haunted so …”

  Pace cut me off. “I don’t want to talk about it,” he said. He was quiet for a moment, then he added, “Tell me about you. Have you talked to Corey?”

  “We saw each other last night,” I said.

  “You made up?”

  I didn’t want to make Pace feel worse but I needed to share what had happened, the beauty of it, like he’d said, and the fears that I still had. “More than that.”

  “You had sex?”

  “Yes.”

  “How was it?”

  “It was great,” I said.

  “You don’t sound entirely great.”

  “Neither do you.” I suddenly really heard the sadness thickening his words. “Are you okay?”

  “Oh, yeah. Everything’s cool.”

  I wasn’t sure it was true so I asked if he wanted me to come over after work.

  “No, it’s all right. I just want to be alone right now.”

  “Are you sure?” I asked, but, again, I didn’t push him. I had so much on my mind. I had learned why I was what I was, what it was called. I had made love to Corey but not told him what I was.

  I had met my pack and they wanted me to kill my own mother.

  “Love is a werewolf,” I wrote in my diary after Pace left. “Influenced by the moon and terror. And always about to change. Romantic love can blind you, too, just the way I could become blinded by the curse of the animal inside. It can make you neglect what is most important at the time.”

  Brothers

  Victor is the oldest. He is the biggest and strongest, the most handsome, the leader. His eyes are fierce and he rarely speaks. He is the one who I had noticed first on the road that night, and who I had never been able to forget.

  Sebastian is second. He is more shy and gentle and follows Victor around, waiting for instructions from his brother.

  Felix is third. He is quick and light, a prankster, always in motion.

  Marcos, fourth, is heavyset and serious.

  Gregory and Frederick are the twins. They stay to themselves and communicate to each other without words.

  Amorus is the baby, a small version of Victor but less brooding.

  These are my wolf brothers. The night after I made love with Corey I woke to a soft howling sound, like wind in my ear, and saw seven
pairs of eyes watching me from the dark corners of my room.

  “Come with us,” Victor said. “Come run with us.”

  I pulled the sheets around me. I was only wearing a boy’s undershirt and panties.

  “I can’t,” I said.

  “You don’t have to be afraid,” said Felix.

  I closed my eyes tight like a child who thinks she can make the monsters go away if she just doesn’t look at them. It got very silent. I couldn’t even hear a breath, except my own. But when I opened my eyes they were all still there.

  Amorus approached me. He was a little younger than me with big, sweet eyes. He put out his hand and lightly pawed my knee under the sheet, cocked his head to the side.

  “What do you want?” I said into the darkness where the rest of them waited.

  “We want to help you. We want to teach you about what you are.” It was Victor’s voice again. He came up behind Amorus and put his hand on his little brother’s shoulder, ruffled the top of Amorus’s head with his chin.

  “Sasha told me to kill my mother,” I said. “How do I know you won’t do that?” I looked around at the eyes glowing in the darkness. “She’s my mother!”

  “Sometimes Sasha gets carried away,” Victor said softly. “We don’t want to hurt your mother. We couldn’t anyway. She’s safe from us.”

  “Safe!” I could feel my fear turning to anger. The hairs prickled up on my arms. “I’m not safe from you! There are seven men in my bedroom!”

  Victor motioned for Sebastian to come forward. He stood behind his brother as Sebastian spoke. “Not seven men, sister. Seven unarmed wolves. And your daddy sleeps with a shotgun under the bed. And your mother never takes off her silver cross.”

  I closed my eyes again, put my hands over my ears and shook my head from side to side to make the dream go away. But it wasn’t a dream. They were all still there when I opened my eyes.

  Scoot finally heard them. He was scratching at my door, whining and barking.

  Victor was staring at me. He made a gesture with his head for me to follow him, went to the window and disappeared. One by one each brother did the same.

  I sat frozen in my bed. What the hell had just happened? I realized I was holding my breath and I gasped for air. Then I went to the window and peeked out. They were huddled on the grass looking up at me, except for Victor who had turned away, facing the woods. I could run with my brothers; my legs were already tingling with the sensation of freedom.

  I could smell the night, feed on it. It would course through me; I would be a part of it. I would run and play and feast on flesh, get drunk on blood all night with seven beautiful young men.

  But Corey? He would look into my eyes the next time I saw him and sense that I had moved further away, become even less like him.

  Yes, Corey. I’m a werewolf. I thirst after human blood and I run all night with a pack of seven males. I could kill you if I wanted. Rage lives inside of me, waiting to come out in the shape of a monster.

  I could betray Corey and be true to a part of my nature or I could choose not to. Corey was right, though I chose to ignore it; we were different. I was much wilder.

  I shivered, got back in bed, pulled the covers over my head and began to scribble furiously in my diary.

  “Liv,” called the night, “Liv.”

  I ignored her.

  July

  After that night I tried to shut out everything except for Corey. I figured if I stayed focused on him and the joy we could give to each other nothing else could hurt me. If I were careful I wouldn’t have to deal with my father’s anger or my mother’s fear. I wouldn’t have to think about Sasha and what she wanted me to do and what she wanted to do herself but couldn’t. I could just go to work serving ice cream, perform for Nieberding in therapy once a week and spend all my free time, that month of July, with Corey.

  I wanted to feel our lovemaking more and I decided that the more sex we had, the safer I was from the frenzy. I had thought that making love would trigger it but instead being with a boy who loved me and whom I loved had seemed to calm me. So I stopped taking my meds. I felt more when Corey was inside of me and I always cried. But it was a good cry, a release.

  “Are you okay?” he asked over and over, kissing my face.

  “Yes. It feels good to feel,” I would tell him. I needed to cry as much as I needed to feel pleasure.

  “Well, I guess my music mixes are finally working on you, baby,” he said.

  Maybe I should tell him, I thought. But I could never bring myself to do it.

  I liked to pretend that I was cured; maybe love had cured me.

  We stopped going to the woods. I was afraid that Sasha or the boys might find me so we went out into the cornfields instead.

  I missed the woods. I longed for them, actually, the way you want to taste certain delicious foods you’re deathly allergic to, or the way you touch someone you love when it has been too long. I dreamed about the woods at night and it felt so real, as if I were running through the darkness with my scary, beautiful brothers, following the scent in the air that would lead us to our prey. I woke with the ache in my hips and teeth and had to touch myself to make sure I hadn’t changed. I sniffed my skin for the scent of the forest and felt for leaves in my hair, wondering if I had wandered into the old grove in my sleep and found my way back to bed. But I knew I could only go in my dreams. And besides, I had Corey’s body and his sweet words to help me forget.

  Corey didn’t question the change of location. He just seemed happy to be alone with me. There was an abandoned barn on the outside of town and we made love there as the last light of the day slanted through the broken beams.

  On the Fourth of July we climbed all the way up onto the roof and watched the fireworks from the show at the college field cascade down the sky. There were big booms of red, white and blue and explosions of poison green but my favorite ones were the pale white-gold shimmers like something angelic.

  I told Corey and he said, “You’re my angel.”

  “I’m so not,” I answered.

  “My fallen angel, then.”

  “No doubt.”

  Sometimes if I’d had an especially hard day I’d be distracted by the faint scent of farm animals in the barn and I felt a weird urge—a frantic stirring that started in my stomach—but then I only kissed Corey harder and forgot my appetite and was satisfied that way. I got home by dark so my mom and dad stayed off my back. Sometimes I took a chance by sneaking out at night through the window, locking my door from the inside behind me. I figured my mom and dad trusted me enough, now that I was in therapy and keeping up an act of following all their rules. I think my dad was ashamed about the time he hit me so he gave me more space than he had before. Maybe Nieberding had had a talk with him. Sometimes on weekends I could get away with staying out later legitimately, if I told them I was with Pace. He always covered for me.

  But during that time I shut Pace out, too. I was so dizzy with love for Corey, and fear that it might end, that I might change, that I wasn’t there for my best friend. After whatever had happened with the guy, Michael, Pace had kind of shut down on me but I guess I also had pulled away from him a little when our relationship seemed to bother my boyfriend.

  We saw each other only a few times, Pace and I. The last time, we went back to the house on Green. He asked me to go with him but I wish I had told him not to go.

  “Why are we here?” I asked. “I thought you didn’t want to go back.”

  “It’s okay now,” he said. His voice was soft, too soft, resigned, but I didn’t understand what that meant then.

  We sat inside there, just looking around at the shadows, shivering with cold, and he took off his button-down—the kind he always wore with under-shirts—and gave it to me to put on over my tank top. He insisted. He said it looked good on me and when we left he made me keep it. I wore it home even though I was hot by then. I hung it in my closet and forgot about it.

  I forgot about the shirt in the same
way I had neglected one of the only people who accepted me as I was when maybe I could have helped him.

  Full Moon

  I had even started avoiding Joe Ranger. But one night crossing the plaza on my way to meet Corey, I saw the rushing shadows of skateboarders—Carl Olaf and his friends. To avoid them, I turned and found myself in front of Joe’s prosthetics shop. He was drinking from a can of Red Bull and wiping the sweat off his brow.

  “There you are,” he growled.

  I had trouble looking at him. “Hi, Joey.”

  “You been avoiding me.”

  “No, I just see Corey a lot lately. He’s leaving for New York soon.”

  Joe nodded and took something out of his workshirt pocket. It was a tiny rabbit. He petted it gently with his thumb. I couldn’t help smiling when I saw it.

  “Who’s that?” I asked.

  “Stella. She’s like a kitten, huh?”

  “You do have a way with them,” I said.

  “I used to have a way with them but one won’t come chat anymore.” He gave me a knowing look and I avoided his gaze again.

  “One,” meaning me. But I’d meant animals when I said “them,” and Joe knew it, too.

  “They get skittish around the full moon,” he said. “Know why?”

  I shook my head. Didn’t really want him to tell me but I knew he wouldn’t stop now.

  “Predator and prey. They know they’re more visible, more in danger. When it wanes they can relax a little.”

  He was right to use the word skittish. That’s how I felt. “I have to go meet Corey,” I said.

  “Yeah. But don’t be a stranger.” Joe winked.

  I nodded and waved to him.

  “Watch out for those woods,” he called. “Full moon coming.”

  And it did, as it inevitably does. They say it can make you mad.

  Maybe that is what happened with the full moon murderer.

  Maybe that is what happened with Pace.

  I only know that when I got home at sunset the next day, after making love with Corey in the barn, my mom was on the phone and her face looked pale and tight. She was standing at the sink, holding on to the counter for support and her voice was low. When she saw me her eyes flashed and I knew it was something bad.