by JJ Jones
“So your mom used to make you chili, huh?” I asked.
“Yeah, it was kind of a staple in our house,” he replied. “It was cheap and easy to make I guess.”
“Tell me about her, about your growing up,” I asked trying to learn a little more about Logan.
“Well as you can imagine, times were different then. I mean a lot different. We didn’t have cell phones and computers and the technology that we have today. I mean even the modern conveniences of every day life like we know it just weren’t around then. We didn't even have a bathroom as only the super rich had those in their houses back then. I mean there were some things that were the same, but lots of things were very different.” His voice was distant, nostalgic, but happy.
I continued to listen as Logan told his story.
“We weren’t real rich, but we had enough,” Logan continued. “It was the early nineteen hundreds. My parents were good people. I remember so much about them, even now, a little more than a hundred years later. They loved each other. My dad never let a day pass without reminding my mom multiple times that he loved her and would do whatever it took to take care of her, my sister and me. He worked two different jobs in order to take care of us. My mom also worked as a seamstress in order to bring in extra money for the family. I think that was hard on my dad to see my mother work, but she didn’t mind. I remember seeing her work; she enjoyed the work. She would hum and sing while she worked. My sister and I would sit at her feet while she worked and sing a long with her. Some of my favorite memories of my mother were sitting at her feet while she worked.”
Almost absentmindedly, Logan hummed a song that was unfamiliar to me. I didn’t want to dispel the memory or the mood by asking him about it, so I continued to work on dinner while he half-sang and half-hummed the song.
“But things changed a lot in my family when my dad was sent off to war in 1914 for World War One, or “The Great War” as we knew it at the time. It was hard for my family. We were close and to see my dad leave was hard, especially for my mother. I remember many nights when I could hear her crying herself to sleep. But it made me become mature, because I grew-up faster and became the man of the house. I helped out my mother and picked-up odd jobs around town. People let me shovel their drive ways in the winter for a few coins and cut their grass in the summer, too. It helped to buy us groceries and put dinner on the table.”
“I’m sure it was hard,” I said and my voice must have startled him because he turned around and looked at me surprised.
“Yes, it was hard, but it also brought our family close together. We would wait for letters from my father each week and read them together. It was the highlight of my week until finally the war was over, and he came home. He came home different than he’d been before. He still loved us the same, but he was determined that I would become educated. He set aside money for me every paycheck so he could afford to send me away to school. I know he and my mother suffered so I would have money for school. I didn’t want to leave when I turned eighteen, but he didn’t give me a choice. I think he was determined that I would never see war like he did. He thought that if I was educated somehow that would make a difference. So I went to school and became a doctor. He and my mother were so proud. My sister became a nurse, too.”
“Dinner is ready,” I said putting my hand on his shoulder. “Why don’t we eat and you can continue telling me more if you’d like,” I said.
“Oh, there’s not much more to tell,” he said obviously embarrassed. “We can just eat.”
Logan moved out to the dining room. I followed him with table settings for dinner. After quickly setting the table, I brought out the food and placed it on the table. We sat next to each other.
“Thank you for making dinner, Tanisha. This looks amazing,” Logan said looking at me.
“I didn’t make everything. You helped,” I said reaching over and holding his hand.
“Oh not really. I just did what you told me,” he said laughing.
We each reached out on the table and started to dish out the chili and cornbread. It was nice to have a home cooked meal even if it was a simple one. I hadn’t realized how hungry I was until I was sitting down and ready to start eating, but my stomach was growling and aching for food. I was excited to eat.
“So after you finished school, did you work somewhere? Did you go back to your home town and set up a practice?” I asked in between bites.
I noticed that Logan was eating a hearty helping of chili already and had dished himself half the pan of cornbread, too. It made me smile, knowing that he would probably eat at least double that amount, but would wait until I had eaten my fill.
“Well not exactly,” he said.
I raised my eyebrows questioning, but didn’t say anything.
“Things became a little complicated after I was finished with school,” he said. “Unfortunately, I never really practiced medicine. I always wanted to, of course, that’s what I had trained to do, but I never really had the chance.” His tone had changed, confusing me.
I still wasn’t following him.
Logan looked down at his food, and I could tell he was frustrated with me. I felt frustrated, too until I finally realized what he was getting at.
“You were turned?” I said quietly.
He nodded.
“What happened?” I asked.
“It was while I was away at school,” he said telling me the story. “I was young and naïve to many things, but I wanted to belong, I wanted to fit in somewhere. I joined a sorority. It probably wasn’t the smartest thing to do, but it was something to give me a sense of belonging, friends and people to call a family while I was at school.”
“One night a bunch of guys and girls were out in the woods at a bonfire having a good time. This was during the time of prohibition, so we were really being rebellious by having alcohol and partying in the woods away from campus. I remember the beer, if you could even call it that, tasted terrible. I don’t know what it was made from, but it was disgusting. We didn’t care as long as we could get drunk off of it. Guys and girls were pairing off and drifting away from the warmth of the bonfire and out into the privacy of the darkness for a few hours. I didn’t have anyone in particular that I was hooking up with, but I didn’t want to seem like a loner either, so I waited until the right moment and left the bonfire to wander alone so people would think I had hooked up with some chick. I know it may sound dumb, but I didn’t want my sorority brothers to think bad of me.”
I couldn’t help but laugh a little at his innocence. Logan shot me a look that made me stop laughing although I couldn’t suppress my smile.
He continued with his story. “While I was walking around, I had to strategically avoid couples everywhere for a while until finally I found myself a nice place to sit alone. I thought I would just hang out for an hour and then make my way back to the fire and make up some story about a girl that I couldn’t remember, but then I heard something or someone nearby. Thinking it was a co-ed and another guy, I started to move, but then a creature on four legs emerged from the underbrush. At first I was too scared to move or even scream. A bear, with fur white as snow stood just feet from me. I tried to run, tried to scream for help, but I felt glued to where I sat, and my vocal cords felt frozen like ice. Still to this day, I can’t explain how she made me feel that way.”
“She?” I asked.
“Yes, she,” Logan replied. “She sprang forward on her hind legs pressing me to the ground. It was forceful, but not painful. I thought for certain she was going to rip my head off, but she didn’t. It was strange. I felt her gaze straight into my eyes, like she was telling me everything about her life story through her eyes, but yet, I knew nothing. And then she bit me. Tore the flesh straight from my body and let my blood mix with her werebear saliva. I could feel my body changing even in the seconds and minutes following; the transformation was painful and uncontrollable.”
“Who was she?” I asked.
“I never met her
in person,” Logan replied. “Others told me about her later. She was a werebear that had been turned many years ago, but was so angry and jealous about her condition and they way she had been treated because she was shifter that her goal was to turn as many people as she could before she was caught or killed by others. She preyed on young men especially. Young men like me.”
“How awful,” I said. “What happened to her?”
“A group of shifters banned together and forced her to stop for the good of our kind. She wasn’t doing any of us any good by creating an army of shifters that didn’t want to be turned. It was only making more enemies than friends. I don’t think she ever saw the truth before the end.” Logan shook his head.
“Wow,” I said. “What did you do?”
“Well, things seemed okay at first,” Logan continued. “I didn’t fully understand what had happened to me. I thought I had been bit by a bear or something. I went to the doctor and explained what happened. I never had even heard of shifters or anything. But then weird things started to happen to me. I had strange dreams, I started to become abnormally strong. My body changed to look more like it is now, and trust me, I wasn’t going to the gym. My moods were changing, too. I felt myself becoming angry and wanting to lash out at things or take control. I went for a walk one day out in the woods where everything had happened and that’s when I learned that my body was really shifting. At first I could only shift various part of my body – my legs and arms for example and it was very painful shifting back and forth from bear to human form. But the more I practiced the more I could shift and the less painful it became.”
I nodded my head fascinated by his story.
“I spent time in the library learning about shifters and the history behind them. I learned that they weren’t very accepted in our society and that I shouldn’t expose myself to anyone that I didn’t trust. I hadn’t even told my family about my shifting abilities yet, because I didn’t know how they would react. Graduation loomed closer and although I was going to graduate, I wasn’t sure what I would do once I finished school. My father of course wanted me to move back home and open up a practice in my home town. He’d been talking to all the neighbors and his friends about how great it would be to have me back home. But I worried about being back there. If anyone found out about me, what would happen to me and to my family. Being a shifter wasn’t something I could hide forever.”
“So you never went back home,” I said.
Logan shook his head. “No, I didn’t. It broke my own heart almost as much as it broke my parents, but I couldn’t do it. I had to cut ties with my family. It was the right thing to do. Just like when your dad cut ties with you and your mom, it was better that I made my way alone in the world, so I wouldn’t have people that others could hurt to get to me. It was better that way. It kept them safe, just like it kept you safe.” Logan looked up and smiled at me.
I smiled back. “So you went on the road and took odd jobs, doing construction or whatever else you could pick up because it was easier than staying in one place for too long.”
“Exactly. I didn’t want anywhere to be too familiar. So I’ve just kept on the move for most of my life, but I’ve never gone back home. Of course in my own way I’ve kept tabs on my family, or at least I did until they passed away years ago, but things worked out for the best in the end. The government and the Big Dog never were able to locate my family or use them against me, so things were okay.”
“I’m glad,” I said feeling a sense of relief for him even though I never knew his family. It was sad to think that I would never have a chance to know his family either since they had all passed away. I realized that because of Logan’s looks, I often forgot just how old he really was.
“I don’t regret it though,” Logan said looking up at me, “I want you to understand that. It may seem like I am saying that I regret being bitten and becoming a shifter. I don’t. I feel like this happened to me for a reason, as if it was my destiny. I have felt all along that I have a huge purpose. Now you have come along and all these events have happened I think I have finally realized what my purpose actually is...”
I reached across the table and placed my hand on his and squeezed. I didn’t know that I would have been able to be as positive as him if our roles had been reversed.
*
“Let me clean up from dinner and then we can have dessert out on the balcony,” I said placing my hand on his face as I started to clear the dishes.
“Here let me help,” Logan offered.
“No,” I said. “Let me do it. I want to do this. You just shared so much with me, I want to do this for you. Why don’t you find some champagne or wine and some glasses and sit out on the balcony. I will join you in a few minutes with pie.”
I had to practically push him out of the dining room toward the balcony, but eventually he didn’t argue any further.
I sat in front of the sink with a view of the balcony. I could see Logan standing with a glass of wine leaning against the edge and watching the sun set in the distance. I couldn’t imagine what it must have been like for him in the 1920s as he watched his entire future change instantly the night he was bitten. I couldn’t imagine walking out into the woods one night having all the dreams of becoming a doctor and then going home the next day knowing I would never be the same. His whole world was shattered when that shifter decided to selfishly turn as many others as she could.
I wondered how many other co-eds she had turned that night. Was it possible that other co-eds in Logan’s school were also shifters? Did he know? I resolved to ask him more about it later.
As I finished the dishes, I pulled the peach pie from the oven where I had left it to stay warm and cut two slices to take out onto the balcony. Then as I thought more about it. I placed one piece for myself, and the rest of the pie on the plate for Logan to eat, knowing that he would finish it.
I walked out to the balcony. “Hi,” I said holding out the pie for him. Logan laughed at the size of his piece.
“Why thank you for thinking of me. I should probably watch my weight a bit though,” he laughed a little.
“I didn’t want there to be any leftovers, since we can’t take them with us,” I said smiling.
“Well in that case, I guess I better eat it,” he said sighing loudly. “I poured you a glass of wine.” He pushed a glass my way.
“Oh, thanks,” I said. “White wine, good choice. It will go well with the pie.”
We ate the pie and drank the wine mostly in silence watching the sun sink and moon and stars begin to rise.
“Thanks for dinner, Tanisha. It was really nice to have a home cooked meal. And the dessert was wonderful, too. It was the perfect way to end our day. It wasn’t the best day ever, but it was a nice way to finish the day. I needed this.”
“We needed this,” I said scooting closer to him.
He moved his face closer to mine. I could feel the heat radiating from his body even as the last heat from the sun had already died away.
His slid his arm around my waist and pulled my body close to his. I could feel the beating of his heart against my chest. It had been too long since our bodies had been this close. I felt my body ache for the closeness.
I wrapped my arms around his waist and interlaced my fingers looking up into his eyes, letting him see the longing. His eyes held the same longing as mine.
His arms lifted me from the ground and carried me back inside, down the hall and into the master bedroom. Gently, Logan placed me on the bed, removing each of my shoes and then crawling playfully to meet me on the bed. I giggled like a little girl as he tickled my inner thighs and ribs.
I curled into the fetal position to protect myself until he promised he would no longer tickle me in order to coax me to open up for him. With promises of no more tickling, I pulled Logan in for a long sweet kiss. Logan forced his tongue inside my mouth, which I welcomed and returned.
I raised my chin and let him kiss and suck my neck and exposed upper che
st filling my lower body with a deep ache for his naked skin against mine. I pulled at his clothes fighting against him to take them off. I slid my hands under his shirt and ran my fingers against his muscles and bones. I rubbed his lower back and pulled him down into me.
As our bodies met, he groaned, feeling his dick against my body. He was hard and ready for me. I pulled at his pants, willing them to fall off his body. “I want you,” I whispered into his ear as I nibbled his ear lobe. “I need to feel your skin against mine.”
He smiled down at me loosening his pants and exposing his hardened cock. Just seeing it made my pussy wet. Logan laid down on the bed next to me and finished removing his pants before grabbing me and pulling me on top of him. He pulled my shirt up and over my head and unsnapped my bra with ease tossing them both to the floor.
Logan pulled my body down toward him and cupped my breasts in his hands massaging them vigorously hardening my nipples. Logan rolled me onto my back and mounted me looking me lovingly in my eyes. He kissed me passionately on the mouth before moving to my neck. I stared up at the ceiling as I placed my hands on his head and played with his wavy dark hair. He sucked hard, and moved downward spending generous amounts of time on each breast and nipple leaving no area untouched by his lips.