A Werewolf's Saga Books 1, 2, & 3 (A Werewolf's Saga Boxed Sets)

by Michael Lampman

  Frank did what he always did when he came into work, with Jimmy filling him in on everything that happened over the night. There wasn’t that much to tell him. The night went by quietly with nothing happening, so when they finished, Jimmy left him at the counter, and made his way back to the front doors. He stopped at them, and looked out to the sun-quenched morning sky, and there, he decided to wait for her. He hoped that it wouldn’t take long. Thankfully, for him, it didn’t.

  Making her way down the stairs, she looked even more wonderful than she ever did before, with the sun coming in behind him and flowing over her like a gentle dove. God, she is so beautiful. God, she is so perfect. Seeing her, his heart beat fast, and his hands went moist. The excitement in him only grew. She looks like an angel. She looks like the sun and more. “Rachel?” He left the front doors, walked up to her, and met her at the bottom of the stairs.

  She looked to him and smiled. “Jimmy?” Surprise crossed over her voice, as part of her expected him to be already gone. The other part of her felt pleased that he hadn’t left yet. However, both parts made her feel somewhat confused. She did like him, that was true, but she seemed more confused as for the reasons why she did. She thought that he was intriguing. She could only confirm that feeling, now, being there, seeing him waiting.

  He smiled back to her with glee erupting over his heart. “I’m happy that you came.” Seeing her, with the sun so brightly shining in her eyes, he felt so magical. He almost couldn’t stand it, but he also noticed that there was something else there about her too. She looked familiar to him somehow, almost like he knew her from a dream, but he didn’t know what that meant. However seeing her, it made him feel relaxed, almost serene and that’s all he cared about feeling.

  “Jimmy.” She stopped at the last step, and her smile vanished from her face. “I’m sorry Jimmy, but I’m kind of too tired to go out for breakfast.” She bowed her eyes to the floor. “Maybe some other time?” It sounded better than she rehearsed it. Saying no, made sense, at least until she could figure out everything else for herself.

  Hearing her answer sent his heart sinking deep into his chest and disappointment erupted through his mind. “Why not?” He could feel her heart beat strongly for him. He felt it there. It called to him. “Oh come on? It’ll be good for you to eat something. Get you all perked up and ready for bed.” He wasn’t going to take no for an answer, and his determination showed. “You need to eat.”

  “I don’t know.”

  She showed her honesty, and it made him melt even more. “I promise just food and maybe some coffee, and just some plain ole chitchat.” He understood her hesitation. God, he loved feeling what he was. “I won’t bite.” He smiled again, peering his head down, trying to look at her face.

  She looked up and their eyes met. She couldn’t help but smile at the look on his face. His eyes looked droopy some, and his face looked low. His smile almost looked like a whine. He looked like something between a child and a puppy dog’s face. “Oh, all right.” What could it hurt? What did I have to lose? Her smile came back again.

  “Great!” He almost shouted with the excitement wanting to explode from his chest. He turned to the doors and held out his left hand out towards them. “Shall we then?”

  She laughed slightly, and nodded. She left the bottom step and made her way towards him.

  He quickly went to the counter, took his thermos, and made it back to the door just before she reached it. That made him happy. He opened it for her and held it open.

  She walked outside, stopped on the sidewalk, and waited for him to join her.

  He did so quickly.

  “So, where we going?” she asked.

  “I have no idea.” He laughed and shrugged his shoulders. He hadn’t planned on anything that far ahead yet.

  She laughed as well. It told her that he really hadn‘t planned to ask her out. If he had, he would have known of the place that he wanted to take her, and the fact that he didn‘t know it, made her like him even more. “There’s a small little diner not that far from here, just in town. How about that?”

  He smiled. “Sure. You’re car or mine?” He shrugged again. All the while, he couldn’t help but watch her face with the sun coming up behind her. She looked even better in the daylight than she ever did in the dimness of night.

  “How about mine?” She smiled. He looked so—well—cute to her at that moment that she found it hard to keep her thought together long enough to think straight. He felt different, yes, but with his confidence showing through him, she could still see that bashful little boy still there behind it. Overall, it made her like him even more.

  “Sounds good to me.” He nodded. He convinced her to go out with him, so if she wanted to do the driving, he wasn’t going to argue with her about it. He held out his left hand again towards the parking lot. “After you.”

  She laughed some, before she turned and started walking again.

  He followed her, watching the way her soft black hair bobbed on top of her head as she moved. They reached her car quickly, and he walked around the hood of it, stopped at the passenger side, and waited for her to let him inside.

  She did, climbed in her car and unlocked his door.

  He took his seat.

  She started the car and together, they left the lot, heading out to the main access road and drove off towards town. It took only a few minutes to get there.

  She found the place, Dorothy’s Diner, pulled in front of the building, and parked along the street.

  It looked like a small place that felt tucked in along the street. Some might have called it a dive; others would have called it a mom and pop style place, but to Jimmy, it looked like something out of the 1950’s. Outside it looked peachy, almost romantic. The sidewalk ran right along the side of the front of the diner, with two old and cracked steps that led up to the front door. Large windows ran the length of the wall, with several older people, with their gray hair sparkling in the early morning sun, sitting along the windows. As far as he was concerned about it, it looked perfect. This was the place of their first date, so it felt more than just right; it felt beyond special. He reached the front door first and held it open for her.

  She walked inside and waited for him by an old looking, long counter that greeted them just inside the door.

  A young woman with her blonde hair pulled back neatly in a ponytail greeted them with a smile. “Just two?”

  Rachel returned the smile with a simple nod.

  Together, they followed her to an empty booth just to the left of the front door, along the outside wall, and there, they both sat down, one across from the other.

  “Your waiter will be with you shortly.” The ponytail bobbed, as the young woman nodded and left.

  Jimmy couldn’t drag his stare from Rachel’s beauty. He barely even noticed that the hostess was even there. It just felt so magical. It just felt so wonderful to be somewhere with her other than the labs. “So, how long have you worked for Ravenswood?” He moved around until felt comfortable on the bench. He felt so relaxed that it almost made him nervous. He wasn’t used to feeling this way, but at the same time, it felt so right.

  She likewise tried to get comfortable, sitting straight back on her bench. “About six years now.” She placed her hands to the top of the table in front of her, and folded one over the other.

  “What are you studying again?” He likewise placed his hands in front of him with his eyes never once leaving hers.

  “I’ve been working on a research project for curing illness and injuries. We’ve made some large strides over the past year or so.” She smiled. She felt tired, and she was sure that it had to be showing in her eyes. “We’re trying to find the reason behind it, a way to cure it.”

  “How did you get into that?” He nodded, completely intrigued by the sounds of her voice. He felt so turned on with the curves of her mouth. Both made him feel more excited than he ever felt before in his life.

  Instantly, she became somewhat
uncomfortable. She never liked that question. It always felt too painful. It brought out every bad memory back with force, and it made her have to look down to her hands.

  He didn’t like what he saw and regretted suddenly that he even asked the question. “You don’t have to answer that, if you don’t want to.” He never intended to make her feel that way. He hated seeing it come from her eyes. He hated feeling it emanating from her heart.

  “It’s okay,” she paused some, thinking. It’s been long enough; I should be getting over this. It’s been over a year now, almost two really, but the emotion still felt raw like it all just happened yesterday. She could still see his face. She could still feel his warmth. She could still smell his cologne, and could still feel him with her, almost like he was there with her now. When her pause ended and she felt sure that she wasn’t going to cry, she brought her mind back together again. “My brother, Robert, died not that long ago. He was very sick. He fought for his life for a long time.” She smiled at the same time. The look she carried and the sound she made didn’t mesh.

  Everything made him grow uncomfortable. “I’m sorry.” He finally dropped his eyes from hers. He had to look at something else. The shame for asking what he did, just wanted to consume his face.

  She nodded and shrugged. “It’s okay, really.” She felt a tear form in her left eye and then her right, and quickly, she rubbed at both of them with a solid swipe of her left hand. “I should be getting used to it by now.” She brought her hand back down with the other one. “It’s just—I miss him a lot sometimes.” She tried to smile again, but failed, so she just gave up.

  “You should never get used to something like that.” He looked back up and his mind flashed as his own memories flared. He too lost so much. He too lost everything. “I lost both of my parents when I was really young. I don’t remember them. You can never get used to them not being there though.” He winced some and he was right. He was just a baby when the car accident came and took them away from him. How he survived, no one would ever know. They called it a miracle, the story of his life. His maternal grandmother brought him up and she was everything he knew, but she too died when he was twelve. Foster parents then came and went, and then at eighteen, he set out on his own. He felt left alone ever since. He always was alone.

  She breathed. “I’m sorry.”

  “It’s fine.” He smiled to her wondrous eyes as they sparkled. “So you went into research trying to rid the pain?”

  She nodded. “Yeah, I came to the labs to study chemistry. When he became sick, I took care of him. I nursed him. I did everything that I could do to help him. He was my life. I spent over two years taking care of him. When he died, I had to do something to make the pain go away. I wanted to make sure that no one else would have to go through what I went through. Ravenswood gave me the chance to research it.”

  He nodded as well. “That’s a lot more than most people do. You should be proud of it.”

  She laughed some, halfhearted and subdued. “I am.” She laughed again. “That’s why this is so important to me. If I can get to the route of what makes an illness, then I can stop it, if not prevent it entirely.”

  “And that’s where Collins comes in?”

  She nodded. “Just today, I had a vial come to me to check out for its properties. It was the most incredible thing I’ve ever seen. It killed every virus that I could find to infect it. It even prevented them from attacking new cells. It was just what I was looking for. On the vial was just the name Collins written on its side. When we last spoke, you said something about meeting some Collins, so I had to check it out. I have to find him.”

  “They didn’t say anything about where it came from? Where he is?”

  “No.” She looked down to her hands. “When I looked at it, I found what I was always looking for. His cells have the capability of taking over other cells. They changed them in a way that I’ve never seen before. They not only changed them, but they also healed them when they were damaged. It was just incredible.”

  “And that’s why you wanted to see him?”

  She looked up from her hands. “If his cells could do that, then I had to meet the source.”

  “Why wouldn’t they tell you where the sample came from?” He relaxed even more, listening, and taking in her words. Her voice sounded so soft and so beautiful that it felt almost like listening to fine music. It made him feel soothing, longing, loving, and everything at once.

  She shook her head. “I don’t know that. It’s part of the reason that I needed to meet him, which now, I guess won’t happen unless I can find him.”

  A young man came up to their table and stopped right at the side of it. He wore a simple pair of jeans and a blue colored polo shirt, and looked far too young to be waiting tables.

  She looked up to him first, expecting that he was their waiter and was there to take their order.

  Jimmy kept his eyes on her. “He has to be somewhere.” He didn’t notice the man standing next to him, and for the life of him, didn’t even seem to care that he was even there.

  She smiled to him and turned her attention on the young waiter. “Could I have a coffee?”

  The waiter nodded. “Cream and sugar?”

  She nodded.

  He wrote the order down on a small pad that he held in his left hand. When he finished, he turned his attention to the man sitting to his right. “And you sir?”

  “Coffee is fine.” He never looked at him. He didn’t need to see him. His smell of staleness came in before he even came to the table. Nicotine surrounded him and the odor wanted to overwhelm his senses, that so much so, he kept everything facing towards Rachel. He couldn’t stand the smell.

  The young waiter nodded, wrote down coffee on his pad, and left.

  “Do they normally keep people at the facility?” Jimmy asked, still staring, still feeling complete joy that she was sitting there with him.

  Rachel watched the waiter leave them and then turned her attention back to him. “No. That’s what’s weird. I’ve never heard of someone called Collins working at the place, let alone living there.” She bowed her head some. “There are a lot of people who work there. I could have missed him, but I doubt that. I know almost everyone.” She shook her head. She just couldn’t and probably wouldn’t understand it. She didn’t have a clue.

  “Who said that he was living there?” he asked next and never once felt himself blink.

  “I don’t know. It’s all messed up.” She shrugged, not knowing what to think.

  “You said before that you thought that he had some kind of an infection. What did you mean by that?” He felt so smooth, sitting there, talking with her. It felt so natural. She felt so natural sitting there with him.

  Again, she shook her head and shrugged. “There’s no other way to describe what his cells seem to do. If he does have some sort of an infection, I need to know what it is. Not just for the healing principle of what they do, but for what they do when they change the cell. It’s as if those cells are being changed into something else entirely. I can‘t imagine what that would do to someone. I can‘t imagine it at all.”

  “What do you mean change him?”

  “Well—the cells have an almost mutation effect. I’m not sure of what type, I’ll need to do more tests, but they just attack a healthy cell and change it.”

  “You don’t know into what?”

  She shook her head. “I have no idea.” She nodded as an idea flashed forward into her thoughts. He knew him. Jimmy met him. He might have something I can use. “Tell me about him? What did he look like? What did he act like? You seem to be the only one that saw him.”

  He downed his eyes, thinking some. He, quite frankly, didn’t know all that much really. He did of course, he knew that, he just couldn’t remember any of it, and he had no clue what that meant. “He didn’t look any different. He did look over all extremely healthy, except for his teeth.” He laughed.

  “What about his teeth?” She felt intrigued. />
  He looked up again. “He had bad teeth. Really bad breath. He smelled like he was rotting or something.”

  She nodded. Her experience actually understood that. That makes sense. Teeth don’t grow. They aren’t replenished. The healing effect might not heal them. “What else? Anything you can remember about him might help.” She smiled.

  Her smile can melt the sun! “There’s not much else to tell. He just seemed fine. He seemed free, a free spirit. He seemed fun.”

  She nodded. Maybe he doesn’t know all that much after all.

  He watched her and could feel her disappointment. He had to turn from it and look out the window on his right. The sun felt so bright, it felt warm. Seeing the glass, his mind flashed and his thoughts swarmed over. He no longer saw glass, but what looked like a mirror instead of it, and saw someone standing there, looking at themself in the mirror. Slowly, the person’s face came into focus and he noticed that it was Collins. Remember, Collins’ said. He smiled. Remember me. You must remember me. Remember him. His voice sounded strong. It had to be his memory, and suddenly, he came to the realization that he seemed to be living out his life. That thought alone made everything feel weird. It felt beyond abnormal and it made him blink. When he did, he saw the glass again, so he turned back to her.