Her face was normal enough except for the eyes, which were reflecting the light coming in from the bathroom window from the streetlamp outside. The eyes of a nocturnal predator.
In her panicked haste, she hadn't questioned how she'd made it down the dark, cluttered hall without stumbling. I must have Changed partially over.
Catherine splashed her face with water, icy cold from the pipes that had been gently chilled by the crisp night air. When she opened her eyes again, the bathroom had been submerged in darkness. She could no longer see her eyes, much less her face, in the mirror, but knew that they had reverted back to their normal hazel.
Human eyes.
But she wasn't human. And she never would be, either, no matter how hard she and her family pretended otherwise. That was the kicker, the pièce de résistance. She was a shape-shifter, an unsettled one, which made the dream that much more horrific. There was a possibility, however remote, that her final form…would be a cricket.
She gagged again, wretchedly, bringing up a few ropy strands of saliva. The taste in her mouth was disgustingly acidic, and her stomach was clenching like a vise. Pathetic, thought Predator, with scorn.
Catherine had contemplated following David's advice but now that was out of the question. She was going through with her plan with or without David's help. There was no way in hell she could do the vivisection now. Just thinking about cutting into those poor creatures sapped away all her strength and left her feeling nauseated; it would be like cutting into herself.
Of course, she ate meat—had to, for the energy it provided, as most other shape-shifters did—but there was a difference between killing for nourishment and killing for curiosity or sport.
She kicked the damp sheets off her bed and sat there in the dark, with her knees hugged to her chest, listening to the gradual slowing of her heart, and the quiet scratching of branches on the windowpanes.
But there's no tree outside my room.
She got to her feet and yanked open the window. A blast of cold air swirled through her bedroom and she shivered violently. It was cold, but she could hear mewing. She stuck her head out the window. There was a kitten—a very small calico, probably about eight weeks old—curled up on the storm gutter in a quivering ball of orange and black fur as it tried to shield its tiny body from the wind. Catherine's heart melted instantly.
Animals tended to react oddly to her scent. She carried traces of different animals on her clothing, and shape-shifters didn't smell like ordinary humans to start with. There were some places she could never go because of the commotions she caused. Places like dog parks, pet shops, zoos were all out-of-bounds.
Unfortunate, really. She had always really loved animals. The feeling just wasn't mutual.
She reached out timidly, ready to draw back if the kitten decided it preferred attack to rescue. Hoping that because it was so young, it wouldn't be as wary as animals that were already fully grown. The kitten didn't move from its huddled position, and her fingers passed along its spine unscathed. She stroked the mottled fur. The kitten was very soft and clean—obviously not a feral or a stray. A rough tongue licked at her fingers, and she found herself grinning widely.
“Okay. You can stay, you manipulative little beast.”
She scooped the cat up and shut the window. The kitten immediately made for the bed, curling its tail around its body as it nestled on the pillow. Catherine eyed her cautiously.
“Are you house-trained?”
The kitten looked offended.
“Right. Of course you are. Sorry I asked.”
Sleepily, Catherine made a mental note to go out to the store tomorrow for cat litter and food.
•◌•◌•◌•◌•
“In the words of Caroline Lamb, Byronic heroes are 'mad, bad, and dangerous to know'.”
Mr. Bruin walked around the classroom, forcing them to turn their heads constantly to keep him in sight.
“She was right,” he finished, fixing each of them with an expression of irony that was lost on the majority. Most of the class was starting to doze off. It was the second half of the last block of the day, and he had long since lost his audience. “The phrase was coined from the life and poetry of an actual man, a deeply-flawed man. The poet, Lord Byron.
“Unlike your typical heroes, which generally promote character traits we would desire in ourselves, Byronic heroes are imperfect, their flaws highly romanticized. They appear in many times and forms, but share many common characteristics that are somewhat universal.
“For example, they are frequently emotional, mercurial—sometimes this results from problems with mental health; they are passionate; they have dark, checkered, mysterious pasts; they are intelligent, but in ways that they use to manipulate others or that have cultivated and/or manifested in a cynical view of the world; and last, but certainly not least, they are attractive—either sexually, financially, or socially. They are charming, these Byronic heroes. But not someone you would want to bring home to mother.”
That got a few intrigued blinks from the students who were still awake enough to hear him.
Mr. Bruin chuckled. “One of the most famous examples is a character from the book you should have already started reading. Jane Eyre's very own Mr. Rochester is a wonderful example of a Byronic hero. He is quite passionate, for his time…but it is a kind of restrained passion, fraught with angst; he is attractive, at least, according to our protagonist, Jane; he has the dark and terrible secret, a crazy wife he keeps locked away in one of the upstairs rooms; and he is manipulative, quite manipulative, dressing up as a fortune-teller to see what Jane's true feelings are about him, and hiding his wife from her in an attempt to further the relationship.”
Catherine had to admit, that was a pretty creepy thing to do. If a guy did that to her, she wouldn't think it romantic at all. She'd tear his throat out. She'd be pissed. And Jane had been pissed. That was probably why Catherine liked her; she had a good, solid backbone.
Certainly Jane Eyre was better than the whiny, melodramatic characters in Wuthering Heights. All they did was pine for each other and bemoan their so-called tragic circumstances which had been completely and unequivocally their own damn faults. Plus, sharing the same name as one of the main characters in the book had resulted in numerous jibes that went something along the lines of, “Hey, Catherine, where's Heathcliff?”
“For those gentlemen in the audience thinking about trying that out for yourselves with your own girlfriends—” Mr. Bruin was still talking “—it didn't end well.”
I'll say.
Catherine bolted out of the classroom, checking her watch as she did. The next bus was coming in about three minutes. If she caught it, she'd only have to wait another five to transfer to the 20 A. It was one of the rare times when the connecting buses synced up nicely.
The other night she'd written out a list of all the things she needed to buy: litter box, cat sand, supper dish, food and toys. The total came to about fifty dollars. Ouch. Forty dollars bought like twenty gallons of gas. But what was she supposed to do? Leave the kitten out there to fend for herself? She was scarcely larger than Catherine's hand, and far too adorable for her own good.
And it wasn't like her mother was letting her drive the car, anyway.
Sharon saw Catherine leaving the English building from across campus and ran over with a bounce in her step. “Going somewhere?”
“Shopping.”
“Ooh, where are you going? Target? I hear Macy's is having a sale!”
“Not that kind of shopping.” She held up her list.
Sharon's face creased in confusion. She picked up her pace a little to keep up with Catherine's brisk stride. “You got a cat?”
“Sort of. I found her on the roof last night. I think she's a runaway.”
“Ugh. Make sure it doesn't have fleas at least.”
“She doesn't have fleas. I checked.”
“Okay. Okay. Chill out. What's she like?”
“Sweet. Crazy intellig
ent.” Catherine frowned. “It was the damnedest thing. I woke up this morning and realized that I hadn't set out anywhere for her to, you know, do her business.”
“Let me guess. She gave your rug 'the business'.”
“No, that's the thing. She did it on a piece of binder paper.”
“That's lucky.”
“Old binder paper. Something I was going to throw away anyway.”
“I'd get the cat box anyway. Otherwise, you're really going to be shit out of luck.”
“I think that's the wisest thing I've heard you say, ever.”
“Well, make sure you quote me on Facebook. I want this moment to go down in history.”
They were almost at the bus stop with just a minute to spare. Sharon waved at a tall, attractive guy standing in the parking lot. He was a little mean-looking, rough. He didn't wave back.
“That's Mike. He and I are going bowling. I was gonna ask if you wanted to come but I guess you're okay.”
“Nope, sorry.”
“Have fun shopping, girlfriend.”
With a final wave, she danced off to meet Mike. He kissed her in a way that started out PG-13 and ended up bordering on R. The whole time, he kept his eyes open, and focused on Catherine, who looked away, cursing herself for it the moment she did.
What a creep. What did Sharon see in him? She was too good for that lowlife.
Why do women always feel they have to settle for less?
•◌•◌•◌•◌•
The bus let her off at the shopping center bus stop. From there it was just a short walk to Pet-Mo (the Mo standing for Mo' Money, she supposed). She thought about the kitten. How she'd crapped on the binder paper instead of the floor. How she almost seemed to tilt and bob her head as Catherine spoke, in all the same places that a human listener would. The pheromones she emitted even smelled the same as a human listener would—receptiveness, disgust, anger, shame.
Was she reading too much into this, like Sharon said? Was she going crazy?
She heard footsteps behind her, and was half-turning around even when she heard the distinctly male voice say, “I recommend the tuna.”
Catherine found herself looking into the bottomless blue eyes of one of the workers. He grinned at her, slowly, insolently. His name tag said “Ryan.” There was a box of cat food at his feet.
“Tuna,” he repeated, nodding at the can. “They don't like the chicken. Probably because it's not real chicken.” He added this in a low aside. “All the guts that are fit to can, and all that.”
She almost smiled. Almost. He was cute, although his proximity to the cat food made him smell too appetizing, but there was something off about him. Like the way he was standing so close to her, closer than polite human contact allowed. And his eyes. She didn't really like those, either. They were the kind of eyes that saw too much.
She edged away, discreetly putting space between them as she reached for one of the cans of salmon cat food instead. “Do I know you?”
“No, but I've seen you around school.” He started shelving a couple of the cans. Very slowly. “You're the girl who almost got hit by that car.”
“That's an understatement,” she said, moving around him to check out the dry brands.
“What did you do? Piss off the mob?”
So it was information he wanted. “I piss a lot of people off.”
She thought she saw him smile. “I might be able to help you with that.”
“Oh?”
“There's a meeting tonight. At our school. It's a youth group.” His eyes flickered over her in a way she didn't care for. “You should join. People find it helps them battle their…demons.”
“This club of yours. It wouldn't happen to be called Sterling Rep, would it?”
Ryan's smile widened. “You've heard of us.”
Even as she spoke them, she realized that David had said almost exactly the same thing to her.
Ryan's eyebrows shot up. They were thick, and a little too dark. As if someone had drawn them on with Sharpie. “What's that supposed to mean?”
“It means thanks for the cat food recommendation. I guess I'll be seeing you later.”
“Hey, gimme a chance.” He grabbed her shoulder as she went by. “I wasn't finished.”
She let her eyes drop to his hand, then looked him square in the eye. “Let go of my arm.”
He tightened his hold. Not a lot. Not enough to be overtly threatening. Just enough so that she could feel it. Fear and anger corkscrewed through her, in equal parts, braiding blazing ribbons of emotion that called the beasts to the surface.
“I'm serious, Catherine. What people like you need is a cause to focus their anger towards.”
“If you don't let go of me,” she said, very quietly, “I'm going to focus my anger towards the cause of kicking your ass.”
He laughed, as if he found this idea quite amusing. He also let her go.
Wise decision.
She paid the thirty-six dollars and seventy-nine cents. As the older woman at the register handed her back her change, Catherine looked up and forgot how to breathe. Leaning against the lamp post across the street was the witch from the gully.
What was he doing here?
She wasn't the only one who noticed him standing there. Ryan had frozen in the act of shelving boxes of dog treats. His left hand brushed against the pants of his uniform. As if he were reaching for a weapon that wasn't there.
The witch's eyes met hers through the very thin membrane of glass separating them.
Very deliberately, he ran his finger across his throat. You're dead, that gesture meant. When she stiffened, he gave her a smile that was calculating in the sheer measure of its cruelty as he dropped into a bow.
Ryan's eyes flicked from her, to the window, and back again. He raised an eyebrow and she saw his lips twitch into a smirk of understanding—although what he knew, or thought he knew, she wasn't sure. Didn't want to be, either.
What was the witch doing here? In broad daylight?
“Your change!” the lady snapped, waving her hand with the crisp bills and jangling coins as if she had been holding it out too long for her liking.
Mumbling an apology, fighting back the urge to rip said hand off, Catherine grabbed her change and headed for the exit. She was too late, though. The witch had already vanished—his presence extinguished as neatly as a snuffed-out candle. She couldn't even smell him.
Fuck.
When she glanced back at the Pet-Mo store, she saw that Ryan had disappeared, too.
Chapter Twelve
“Hi David. This is Catherine. I'm just calling to let you know that I'm going through with it. I'll be leaving around eleven tonight, so if I don't show up to lab tomorrow, you'll know why. I thought it was only fair to let you know ahead of time, you being my lab partner and all.” She paused. “And I know it doesn't mean much, but I'm sorry. About what I said.”
She ended the call. Shut her eyes. For a while, she didn't even move. She just lay on her bed trying to—what was it the human boy had said?—quiet her demons.
When she opened her eyes again, the kitten was watching her. There was something very human in its expression. “Don't judge me,” said Catherine. “I know what I'm doing.”
The cat meowed.
Catherine rolled her eyes. Even the fucking cat disapproves.
Later that night she slipped out of bed fully-clothed. Carrying her sneakers beneath her arm, she tiptoed down the hallway to the stairs. Her parents and brother were snoring in their respective rooms. Hopefully the noise would mask any sounds she made during her escape. Her father, an Alsatian, had exceptionally good hearing, even for a shape-shifter.
As she locked the front door with a key that she'd filched from the key cupboard in the kitchen, the cold permeated through her clothing, chilling her skin. The sweatshirt she'd added was barely warm enough. Catherine wrapped the sleeves around her hands like mittens to keep out the bite of the air.
How was she going to get to t
he school? It would take her half the night to walk there, and taking the bus this late was out of the question. The witch was still out there. She wasn't going to wait at the bus stop alone like a sitting duck.
Bike, she decided. At least then, she'd be in motion.
She unlatched the side gate and walked through to the backyard. Her bike was propped up against the fence, beside the blackberry bush, where it had been sitting, collecting dust since last summer.
She straddled the seat and wheeled her bike out of the grasping, thorny branches, half-riding, half-walking. As she pedaled, she grew more at ease. Just in case, though, she did a few practice turns in the cul-de-sac. The pumping motions of her legs gave her something apart from the cold to focus on.
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