The Beast

by Shantea Gauthier

  “Stop,” Simon said, rushing forward to take my hand.

  I gave a halfhearted swing with my good hand, but the searing pain significantly weakened my anger.

  He held my wrist and wrapped his fingers around my limp hand. Face expressionless, he started to pull at my hand. He squeezed and pulled, from wrist to fingers. Fire shot through my body and lights danced in my eyes. If he wanted revenge for my attacking him, he could have done anything else to me. Nothing would have been half as terrible as manipulating my shattered hand. For an instant everything went black. When it all came back, I was flat on the ground, and the pain came back with it.

  Simon wasn’t done. He was still squeezing my hand, holding it still, looking past me with resolve in his eyes.

  After a few long seconds, the pain faded to an incredibly uncomfortable tingling burn. Then it was gone, and my body felt completely exhausted, but whole again. I wiggled my fingers with no immediate plans of getting off the ground.

  “What did you do?”

  Simon put an arm under my back to help me up. “I didn’t do anything. We heal quickly. I had to hold the bones in place so you didn’t end up with a crooked hand.”

  Right, fancy purebred had a family to teach him these things. The thought made me angry all over again.

  I lurched forward to attack him.

  He wasn’t expecting it and we both lost balance and fell back to the ground with a soft plop. I tasted dry tears on our lips when they met.

  “Let’s go back home,” Simon said. “We’ll figure this out. The full moon is tomorrow. ”

  I sighed, too spent to move. “Jessica wants to have dinner with everyone tonight,” I said.

  “The whole pack?” he smirked. I could tell he was mocking me.

  “Stay out of my head,” I chided.

  He smiled and kissed me. “Then stay out of mine. You started it.”

  I need to find Sandra’s killer, I thought.

  “I know,” he said.

  I want to tear their guts out and watch them try to scream.

  Silence from Simon. I started to cry again.

  I want them to live while I rip them limb from limb and eat the pieces in front of them.

  “The police are doing the best they can to catch the guy, Jade.” Empty words.

  “It’s not good enough.” My voice caught as I shook my head. “I want to find him and I want to eat him. I want to kill him myself.”

  “What if it was me?” Simon asked. He helped me up and we tried to pat the debris from our clothes. “If you got into my head and found that I was killer, would you have killed me?”

  “You were in my head,” I said. “You already know. Would I?”

  “Yes,” he said sadly. “You would have ripped my belly open and eaten me alive.”

  Hot wind blew and carried the words away.

  chapter 22

  The morning after a full moon, two uniformed policemen greeted me at my door. I knew why they were there. The myriad notices that had shown up over the past weeks were impossible to ignore. I had no choice but to obey them. But I wasn’t going to make it fun for any of us.

  “Miss Greene?”

  I smiled brightly. “Officer Snow,” I read. “So good to see you again. I see you’ve brought your friend, Officer Kub-cub-kyub-.”

  “Kubretzki,” said Officer Kubretzki.

  “Nice to meet you. I hope that you guys aren’t here to show me that any other best friends have been ripped apart and partially eaten, are you? You remember that, don’t you? I think you even caught me when I fainted.” I gave my best impression of a sweet smile. “My hero; Officer Snow. I don’t even know your first name.”

  He shifted uncomfortably. “Miss Greene-.”

  “Please, call me Jade,” I purred. “Would you like to come in?”

  He took a breath as if to steel himself and then started again. “Miss Greene, do you know that you are trespassing?”

  “Trespassing? But this is Sandra’s house. You remember her, don’t you? Pretty blonde girl, big hole in her b-,” the words caught in my throat. I was being an ass and I knew it. Sandra would have loved it. She loved rude women. It always made her smile and laugh to see a woman acting the way I was toward a man. I would’ve gotten bonus points since they were cops.

  Snow sighed, catching on to my game. He spoke to me like I was a child. “We really don’t want to have to come back tomorrow and physically remove you. The owner said that you can take everything inside. He just needs his house back.”

  “And where do you propose I bring these things? Sandra has an extensive collection of-,” Junk, “treasured and valuable collectables. I’m sorry, had. Because she’s dead not so she doesn’t have anything.”

  “I’m sorry about that, too.” His genuine tone deflated me. It wasn’t in me to be a pain for long, especially when Jessica and I had already picked out an apartment and Jack and Cole were going to help us move Sandra’s stuff into a storage unit for safe keeping.

  “I’m sorry,” I mumbled. “It’s just been hard around here.”

  “I understand,” he said.

  I looked up at him, ready to rage.

  “My cousin was the previous victim,” he said. “You should know that we are doing absolutely everything we can to take this guy down.”

  So am I. I nodded. “Thank you. I’ll be out of here before tomorrow. You won’t have any trouble from me.”

  Jack and Cole arrived with a couple of friends and a total of three trucks and a moving van, ready to work. I could hardly touch anything without remembering when it had been acquired, crying about every happy memory. Eventually, Jessica pulled me aside, told me to go get some air.

  “You mean get out of the way,” I sniffled.

  “Yeah,” she said, giving me a squeeze. “We’ll get this done quickly. If I see anything that looks really special, I’ll make sure it’s easy to get to in storage. We’ll go through everything after it’s all moved.”

  I nodded, and started walking along one of our usual running paths, feeling displaced. Somewhere along the familiar path, I took an unusual turn and found myself in the spot where Sandra had been killed. I took a deep breath, filling my nostrils with the scent of the scene. Maybe it was possible to pick up some kind of clue, even weeks later.

  It smelled hot. The sun beat down on me from overhead and without any sort of shade it was the smell of baking dead things. It wasn't the smell of decay, it was a sweet pleasant smell, like someone had thrown a section of earth in the oven for dinner. I smelled the baking earth, some animal droppings nearby, a family of rabbits hiding in the brush, and Jessica. I smelled Beefcakes, too. I was wearing Jessica's tank top under my shirt, and the big dog managed to get his smell into everything. I tried to ignore their smells and concentrate on the old, stale smells from that night.

  Hot wind stroked my face and carried the faint scent of Sandra to me. I almost cried when it hit me, sweet and warm just like she was.

  I went to the spot where it was the strongest and tried to pick up anything else. Nothing came to me. Only Sandra's sweet blood, heat, and my clothes. I stood there until the smell of my own sweat overpowered everything, and then sat in the shade of a nearby oak tree.

  I drew a deep breath, rubbed my face vigorously with my hands, and slammed my fists ineffectually against the hard packed dirt. I felt a low grumble in my throat and realized I was growling. If I found nothing here I would follow the entire trail of her body to the incinerator. I would go to the place where they made me look at her dead face and rip throats out until someone gave me something useable.

  I looked around for hikers before I flattened myself out on the dirt, nose in the earth.

  I closed my eyes and inhaled. I got a whiff of Sandra so strong I could see her. I saw her blonde hair, streaked with blood surrounding her face. I saw the light sprinkling of freckles across the bridge of her nose, barely visible if you weren’t looking for them. I saw her standing alone in the darkness, turning toward me
. She raised her hand to point at me and when she was facing me, I saw the inside of her torn belly, dripping blood.

  I jumped off of the ground. Nothing like that had ever happened before. Was it some echo of her left behind to tell me who the killer was? Was it showing me what happened just before she was killed? Was it just all of my stress playing tricks in my mind?

  I looked around again, shook my hands to try to relax, and sprawled on the ground again.

  I closed my eyes and breathed in deeply.

  I smelled Sandra. I smelled the dirt, the mud buried deep under the baking soil. I smelled the clothes I was wearing. I smelled my sweat.

  I smelled Simon.

  I breathed again and, even stronger, the scent of Simon filled my nostrils.

  A low chuckle made me jump.

  "I thought I'd find you here," Simon said.

  I glared at him. "How long have you been stalking me?"

  "Long enough to watch you jump at every little noise. I thought you heard me the first time you jumped off the ground."

  "No. I didn't hear anything." I only saw Sandra's living dead body pointing at me. No sound at all.

  "Smell anything good?"

  I shook my head. "Only her. And myself. And you."

  "I had that problem too.”

  “You came out here?”

  He nodded and reached out for my hand. “Not long after it happened. There was nothing then either.”

  I looked at the ground. It was supposed to be easier. I would catch a scent and then track the owner. Then, when it was a full moon I would find him and eat him alive.

  “On the bright side,” Simon said, “it looks like Officer Snow is going a little rogue on us. He’s got pictures, copies of files, pretty much everything in his house.”

  I looked up. “Officer Snow?”

  Simon nodded. “His cousin was-.”

  “The victim before Sandra. He told me that. How do you know that he has all that stuff?”

  Simon gave a sly smile. “I saw it.”

  “How?” I repeated.

  He turned and started to walk away.

  “Hey!” I followed.

  He looked over his shoulder and started walking faster, grinning now.

  I sped up, trying to catch him and he started running. I smiled and chased after him. He ran faster and I ran faster to match him. We tore through the dry grass and prickly summer plants, laughing and tumbling. He managed to stay just two steps ahead. We tumbled down one hillside and raced up another, gasping for breath and laughing.

  I finally caught Simon when he stopped at the crest of a hill.

  Fire.

  Tongues of flame licked upward from the hillside facing us. I staggered backward, ready to turn and run, but Simon caught me. I almost fought for freedom before I saw the perimeter. It looked like an area had been outlined with piled sand and rocks four feet thick. There were fire trucks with flashing lights and uniformed fire fighters just standing and… watching?

  I looked up at Simon.

  “It’s a prescribed burn,” he said.

  I relaxed and felt my feet touch the ground. I let myself sink down and tugged Simon's sleeve for him to sit beside me. We leaned against each other, allowing our heads to touch, and watched the fire burn.

  How did you see Snow's house? I asked.

  I was answered in a feeling like a memory instead of words. I was looking up and down a quiet street, and then knocking on a door. It was a blue door and it was dark. When no one answered I turned the knob and opened the door.

  I walked right in, Simon said. Our friend Snow believes that if someone wants to break in, they'll be more sophisticated than to try the doorknob.

  On the hillside facing us, the grass fire started to burn out. The smell of smoke and charcoal mingled with the fresh scent of deodorant and toothpaste. Someone was approaching.

  "Oh, we missed it!" he said from behind us.

  I turned slowly to look at them and noticed that there was a man, a woman, and a younger teenage boy.

  "What time did it start?" the woman asked.

  "I don't know," Simon answered. "We were hiking and we saw it when it was already in progress, maybe twenty minutes ago.

  "Bummer," said the man.

  "It's still burning," the kid pointed out. "Can we still watch it?"

  "Sure," said the man. "Are we interrupting anything?"

  I smiled. "No, pull up a rock."

  "It's a good thing you guys weren't hiking on that side," the kid said. "If you didn't know it was going on."

  "Phil, you're probably the only one who did know this was going to happen," the woman said. I couldn't be sure that she was his mom. They smelled similar but different. The soap and detergent and shampoo and food were the same, but the blood was too different. Adopted, maybe. "I still don't even know what they're doing. Why would they intentionally start a fire?"

  I leaned against Simon, and asked, So we're going back to Snow's house, right?

  We'll discuss that later.

  "Mom, I explained it like six times already. They burn it early when it's not windy so that it can't catch on fire when it gets windy and hot."

  "I get that," she said. "It just doesn't make any sense to set a fire to prevent a fire."

  The kid shot us a "can you believe this lady?" look and explained further.

  "If they burn it now, it can't burn again."

  "Right. I get that. But if the point is for it not to burn, then burning it doesn't really stop that, does it?"

  The kid let out a sigh of exasperation. "Oh my god. It does stop it because it can't burn again."

  The man snickered and the woman let a smirk slip.

  "Oh my god, mom. You're messing with me aren't you?"

  They all laughed. I smiled with them.

  Tonight, I said to Simon. Let's go back tonight.

  Not tonight, he'll be home.

  Tomorrow then.

  We'll see.

  We sat on the hill until the last of the flames were out and watched the firemen march like aliens in a slow motion conga line, stomp the embers out. It was an all-day affair, but I didn't mind. I liked sitting with Simon. I could have stayed for hours longer, but there was no reason to.

  "Come on," he said. "Let me buy you dinner. Great White Buffalo?"

  chapter 23

  The fires started in Santa Barbara.

  Jessica and I were watching the news on Sandra’s TV in our apartment full of boxes, eating cereal from mismatched bowls, using Beefcakes to rest our feet. The fires blazed live on the screen, flicking back and forth between burning trees and helicopters.

  Jessica looked down at her phone.

  “Ha! Everyone online is like surprised that there’s a fire. It happens every year. Seriously, people?”

  I smiled.

  "So what are you doing today?" she asked.

  "Hanging out with Simon," I said, sipping the last bit of almond milk from the bowl. "What are you up to?"

  She shrugged. "Probably going to do a little shopping later. I kind of want a new green dress. I look great in green."

  "Oh, how fun," I said. Fun for her. She looked good in anything and everything, especially if it was in green. For me, on the other hand, trying on clothes was a nightmare.

  "Speaking of clothes," I said. "I need to get dressed."

  Jessica nodded and waved me off with her spoon. "See ya."

  I dressed with feverish excitement. The plan was to go back to Snow's house and look at the files he had on the killer. Simon's memory had made it look like there was a wall covered in newspaper clippings and photos, but the memory wasn't clear enough to give me a detailed image to go off of.

  I pulled on a pair of loose jeans, a top that was meant to be tight but was now flowy, and a pair of white socks. Maybe trying on clothes wouldn’t be a nightmare now that I had a werewolf metabolism. At least until I got to the price tag. I all but skipped down the hall back into the living room.

  "You got a text fro
m Simon," Jessica said, waving my phone around.

  I took it and read it. "No. I'm not going."

  No? I looked at the last message I'd sent him, three days old, asking if he liked lamb.

  I started to respond, but couldn't think of anything to say. I didn't need him to go with me. I knew the house by sight thanks to his memory, I knew that Officer Snow would be out, and I knew what I was looking for.

  "What are you going to do?" Jessica asked, as though reading my thoughts.

  "I'm still going," I said. "I'll just be back a little earlier."

  "Oh, yay, you should come shopping with me!" she said. "You desperately need new clothes."

  I looked down at myself. I tried not to pay too much attention, but she was right. I looked horrible in the ill-fitting clothes. I’d have to face the nightmare sooner or later. I smiled. "Yeah, when I get back we should do that. I can always use a friend in the dressing room."

  She beamed up at me and I left to go visit Officer Snow's house. I did just as Simon had, I knocked on the door. When no one answered, I tried the doorknob.

  Locked.

  It didn't matter much, a window was cracked and I easily pushed it open and shimmied inside. I followed the path Simon had taken to the upstairs room full of files and notes and pictures. It looked like it belonged in a TV show. Snow was the obsessed detective, bent on catching the killer. The problem was that he didn't seem to have anything useful. He had more blurry cell phone pictures of me, but the best one had apparently been sold to the newspaper. He had other officer's notes, which only seemed to confirm what the media already knew.

  I found the notes about Sandra's death. They were so cold and clinical, like she was never a person at all, like she was born a piece of meat with a head.

  The doorknob turned behind me.

  With a speed I didn't know my human form possessed, I darted into a closet across the room.