by C. D. Bell
Bree nodded.
“Have you seen her? She took off after the race.”
“She did?” Bree was confused. It was hard to think straight with Luc looking at her. She couldn’t tell if he was angry or amused.
“Yeah, she ran so hard she should have been puking on the sidelines, but she just kept going. I don’t even think she slowed down.”
“I was wondering,” Bree said, “where she was.”
“If you find her, tell her she broke the course record.” He shook his head like he was still digesting the news. “By ten seconds.”
“Wow,” said Bree. Records were usually broken by half-second differences in time.
Before Bree could think of anything to say, Luc was gone.
Bree had to run to the grocery store for more sodas for the student council concession and by the time she got worried enough about Nessa to go looking for her, it was already afternoon. She looked at the soccer game and went by football and concluded Nessa was no longer at school. With a sigh, Bree left the shouts and yells of the games she wanted to watch behind, and headed for Nessa’s house.
No one was home, which made sense. Everyone in Tether who wasn’t working would be at Homecoming right now. Bree knocked a few times anyway. Nessa was probably watching Cassian take a corner kick, she thought. Just in case she was wrong, Bree tried the door anyway. It was open.
Bree called Nessa’s name and made her way through the house. She poked her head in the kitchen and climbed the stairs until she reached the closed door of the room Nessa and Delphine shared. Standing outside, she gave a light knock, and when there was no answer, she tried the handle. It was locked.
“Nessa,” she said. “Are you in there? I saw your finish. It was…amazing. Luc was asking about you. Everyone was. Coach Hoffman accepted your trophy. You won a trophy. Isn’t that awesome? He said you broke the course record. Did you know that? You broke it by ten seconds!”
Bree thought she heard movement. But still no answer. “Nessa?”
Something Bree liked about Nessa was how undramatic she was. How honest. Nessa was not the type to lock herself in her room to get attention. This had to be something serious.
“Nessa, open the door,” Bree said in the firm voice she used when freshmen showed up to the first student council meeting of the year with “ideas” about changing the cafeteria menu or staging a dance every weekend. “I’m starting to get worried.”
“I’ll be okay,” Nessa said from inside, her voice muffled like she had her face buried in her pillow.
“You don’t seem okay,” Bree stated. “I’m your best friend, and I can tell. You know you can trust me. Open up this door, tell me what’s going on, and we’ll figure out what to do.”
From inside the room: nothing.
Bree waited. There was nothing like having a truck driver for a father to teach you that silence can sometimes be the best strategy to win a negotiation. But silence was not Bree’s strength, and she was already thinking that she’d been quiet long enough and it was time to start threatening, when there was a squeak of bed springs and a thump from inside the room, like Nessa’s feet had just hit the floor. Bree heard steps. She felt the doorknob move as Nessa turned it and yanked the door open. Bree gasped.
“Oh. My. God.”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Bree was too stunned to scream.
In a flash of movement, Nessa pulled her friend inside and slammed the door shut behind her. As her eyes became accustomed to the dim light, Bree saw that Nessa had changed into a gray tank top and shorts. And suddenly the baggy black race outfit made horrifying sense. Nessa was covered in a beautiful silver-white fur. The long hairs had an opal sheen that seemed to capture and reflect the light. Nessa’s arms, her legs, her chest, and the backs of her hands were covered in it.
The two friends locked eyes. Nessa’s were filled with tears.
Nessa’s face looked the same: her strong jaw, straight nose, and full lips. Her piercing blue eyes rimmed by thick lashes. But Bree wasn’t looking at Nessa’s eyes. She was looking at the line of fuzz across Nessa’s cheeks. She was looking at her hairline, which seemed to be descending down her forehead in a point of darker silver. Nessa was standing straight-backed, like someone trying to be brave, her eyes focused on a point above Bree’s left shoulder.
Nessa held her breath while she waited for Bree to do the obvious—run, screaming.
But Bree stayed.
Yes, she was collapsed against the wall like she had lost the ability to stand. Yes, she wasn’t looking Nessa right in the eye. But she was here.
“What…what happened to you?” Bree said. Her voice was shaking, but she sounded pretty sure that Nessa had an explanation.
“Remember the wolf bite?” Nessa asked.
Bree nodded.
“You know how it healed faster than Dr. Kalish expected?” Nessa asked. “Much faster?”
Bree nodded again, wide-eyed.
“After the bite healed, everything began to change. I can see without my contacts. I can smell…everything. I can hear my mom buttering toast when I’m in the garage. And I’m running faster.”
Bree didn’t know what to say.
“Gabe! I remember when you heard Gabe from upstairs during our study group!” Bree whispered.
“It all got stronger as the moon grew full,” Nessa said quietly. “Day by day. A few days ago the…hair…started to appear. But it washed off. Or I could rub it off, at any rate.”
Nessa took a deep breath, and Bree thought it sounded more like an animal than a human.
“And then today I woke up, and, well, you can see for yourself.”
“Nessa, I can’t believe this,” Bree said. She felt many things but number one was sympathy for her friend. “Are you okay?”
Nessa let out a barking laugh. “No,” she said, sighing again. It was good to have Bree here.
Bree’s mind was spinning. “Does anyone else know?”
Nessa shook her head. She wasn’t used to putting her problems on other people. And this was more than a problem. This was…what?
“I don’t know what to do,” Nessa said. She had to stifle a sob. Several long seconds passed.
For once, Bree had nothing to say.
“Have you thought about going to the doctor?”
Nessa shook her head. “I don’t think doctors are really going to know what to do with this.”
“Yeah,” said Bree. “But Selena might.”
“Selena? Your mom’s friend from work?”
Bree nodded. Nessa took a deep breath and let it out slowly, the way you might if you felt really, really nauseated but were trying not to throw up.
Bree’s mom worked in an insurance claims processing office in the industrial park south of the town center. Selena worked there too. She was the one who got Bree’s mom into native healing practices. They took it very seriously and even had a study group.
“Is it okay if I try her?” Bree asked in a hushed voice, pointing at her cell phone.
“Listen, I’ve turned into a wolf. I haven’t been in a friggin’ car accident,” Nessa said. “You can talk in a normal voice.”
Bree was already punching numbers into her cell phone. When Selena picked up, Bree described what was happening, and answered a few questions—where the fur was, how long it had lasted, and where they were right that minute, and hung up. “She’s on her way. She says she knows a shaman you need to see right away.”
“Leave it to Selena to act as if turning into a werewolf was an everyday sort of thing, with a shaman to match,” Nessa said glumly. Which made them both laugh.
The next half hour lasted forever. Bree tried to look at one of Delphine’s magazines. Nessa tried not to pace like a wolf.
She didn’t know what the most frightening part of it all was, that it was happening—that there was fur all over her body—or that it kept getting worse. The fur was even thicker now than it had been that morning, and it was forming on her face, on the tops of her feet, on the ba
ck of her hands. Her joints ached just like when she’d had her last growth spurt: her elbows and knees especially, but also her shoulders and hips.
Nessa had started to pant like a wolf. She was trying to keep it under control, but sitting on the edge of her bed, her newly misshapen hands hidden between her knees, Nessa found it was getting harder and harder to breathe like a normal human being: through the nose. It took all of Nessa’s self-control to keep her lips closed.
“Look,” she said, showing Bree her hands. The swelling and puffiness was exaggerated by the thickness of the fur, but still, you could see they were rounder and blockier than they’d been even that morning. Opening the door to let Bree into the room, Nessa had looked at her hand on the knob—seen how it was difficult to grasp. Her knuckles seemed gnarled, like her grandma’s had been when she was having arthritis flare-ups.
Bree shook her head, looked away. She didn’t know how to help Nessa. “Selena will know what to do,” she kept repeating. “This must be a thing, it must have happened before.”
“God, I hope so,” Nessa murmured. She shook her head. Nessa didn’t have much faith that a shaman would help. She imagined a man who would be middle-aged like Selena, peaceful, “wise,” with shelves of jars and herbal supplements, and a beard and faded jeans—one of those sad, alternative-lifestyle people who drone on about finding your personal power but seem to have very little themselves.
But when Selena arrived, she looked less middle-aged and frumpy than Nessa remembered—she was wearing tight jeans, a long-sleeved black tee shirt, and sunglasses pushed up into her short salt-and-pepper hair. Her car keys were still in her hand when she stopped short at the sight of Nessa and said, “Oh,” then, “Yeah.” She looked Nessa in the eye. “You need to see Chay.”
“Okay,” Nessa agreed.
“First, you should cover up,” Selena ordered. She pulled the discarded track pants off the floor, grabbed the Peterbilt hat from the closet doorknob, and threw an oversized plaid shirt around Nessa’s shoulders. “Better. Let’s get going. I don’t know much about this. Shape-shifting is esoteric teaching. But the sooner Chay sees you, the better. I know that.”
As they were loading up into her Subaru plastered with bumper stickers with slogans like “Be the Peace You Want to See in the World,” Nessa looked back at her house. On the one hand, she was deeply glad her mom was out of town, visiting Aunt Jane for her fortieth birthday with Nate and Delphine. On the other hand, she also irrationally wished that Vivian were home to save her and make all of this go away.
Nessa climbed into the backseat, and Selena said to Bree, “Get in the back with her.”
“Why?” said Bree, her voice high and light. “What could happen?”
“I have no idea,” said Selena. “But if I were her, I’d be scared out of my mind, and I am guessing she is too.”
Nessa choked back a sob.
Then Selena pulled out of the drive and down the street quickly, like they couldn’t get to where they were going fast enough.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
In the back seat of Selena’s car, Nessa’s phone buzzed. Bree picked it up for her and showed her the text. It was from Coach Hoffman.
What happened? Where are you? Everything okay? I have a trophy for you. You broke the course record! Call me ASAP.
“I can’t talk to him!” Nessa said, shout-whispering as if he might be able to hear.
“You have to sooner or later,” Bree said.
“Just text back that I’m okay. Tell him I had a stomachache.”
Bree typed the message and pressed send. Not ten seconds later, there was a response.
Drink lots of fluids. Call me please.
Using the one finger that she could still move, Nessa powered off her phone.
“If you don’t talk to him, he’s going to really worry. You’ve got to, or he’s going to think something’s wrong with you,” hissed Bree.
“Something is wrong with me,” Nessa answered.
Coach knew her. She couldn’t get on the phone with him and not have him know something was going on. He would be able to tell. She looked at the frown lines of worry on Bree’s forehead. “I’ll call later,” Nessa said. “I promise.”
Selena’s shaman friend lived on the side of town where the railroad station used to be, back when Tether had a railroad station. That was 50 years ago—even Vivian didn’t remember when the train lines were in operation. The old depot had become a grain and feed store for farmers, with the surrounding warehouses repurposed as businesses that never lasted very long.
Selena pulled into a small mechanic’s repair shop behind the old depot and stopped the car.
“Mike’s” was painted over an old Exxon sign, its logo still visible.
“The shaman is Mike?”
“No, Mike’s his friend. Mike’s a guy who works on cars and rents out rooms in the back to his friends. It’s kind of like a clubhouse for guys in their group.”
It didn’t look like a clubhouse. It didn’t even look like a place you’d want to take your car. The asphalt was patched and pocked with holes, the gas pumps had been removed, though you could see the concrete block where they had once stood, and two ancient Buicks with $3,200 written on their windshields in soap were parked off to the side.
The only thing in the place that looked new or well cared for was a single motorcycle—a gleaming Harley with shining chrome and high handlebars and black leather saddlebags that looked like they’d been recently oiled.
Nessa wasn’t moving. She didn’t like the looks of this at all. She could see Bree didn’t either.
“The shaman lives here?” Bree said.
“Not permanently. He’s been traveling. He’s got some personal stuff he’s working out,” Selena replied. “Follow me.”
“Okaaaay,” Nessa said, opening the back door of the car and taking a deep breath before standing. She pulled the hat down lower over her face, the shirt closer around her body. She felt like every pair of eyeballs in the universe was focused right on her, even though the parking lot appeared to be deserted.
Through two open garage bays, Nessa could see an antique Porsche of some kind up on a hydraulic lift with a guy working underneath. What was that doing here? She heard the clink of tools, the tightening of a ratchet, a radio playing hard rock. Selena made her way toward the guy working on the car. He was heavy, dressed in a filthy jumpsuit and big boots, curly dark hair trailing down his back and dirty hands. “Can I help you?” he said.
Nessa kept her eyes focused on the ground, her hat brim pulled low, her hands hidden behind her back. She hunched her shoulders to provide an extra aura of protection.
“Chayton’s in the back,” the big man grunted, recognizing Selena.
From the corner of her eye, Nessa saw him toss his wrench into a wooden box of tools, then take a long draw on a beer that he seemed to have stowed in one of the pockets of his coveralls. Finally, he pulled on a welder’s helmet, flipped down the visor, and fired up his torch.
“Nice. Operating heavy machinery while drinking,” Bree muttered sarcastically under her breath, as Nessa smelled burning metal. Was the shaman—Chayton?—going to be like Mike?
“Follow me,” Selena told the two girls, leading the way through a door in the back of the garage. Nessa followed, checking back quickly to make sure Bree was behind her. Bree gave her an eyebrows-raised, I’m-just-as-clueless-as-you-are-but-I’ve-got-your-back look of reassurance.
They entered a little apartment behind the garage. Its door opened to a living room, man-cave style. It was dark and carpeted in brown high plush, with wood paneling on the walls, a nasty brown velour sectional sofa, and a bar with stools. A man was standing at the bar with his back to them, a laptop open on the bar. Because he had his shirt off and his arms braced on either side of the computer, Nessa could see two things about him right away. The first was that he was cut. Rippling muscles stood out in relief across his broad-shouldered back.
But what caused Nessa to st
op was the man’s tattoo.
Blue and gray ink stretched across his back and shoulder blades depicting a lake, pine trees, a moon, a wolf. Something about it seemed specific and familiar, like she’d seen it before. She almost felt she could name the lake.
The man straightened, flexing his back muscles, but didn’t turn to face them. Nessa got the feeling—she wasn’t sure where it came from—that he was waiting for her to make a move. Or to make a mistake.
“Chayton,” Selena said in greeting, and finally, the man pushed up off the counter and turned around. His eyes were large and his skin was clear—it seemed almost to glow with health and life. Then he reached down to the bar stool and pulled a shirt on over his head. Even in that gesture, he exuded so much power, Nessa felt herself preparing for danger the way she did in the presence of a Rottweiler at the vet’s. Selena walked up to him to kiss him on the cheek. “This is Nessa. The girl I was telling you about on the phone. The one who—” Even Selena sounded a little flustered in his presence.
Suddenly, Nessa felt it was important that she speak for herself.
“I was bitten by a wolf,” Nessa said, feeling his eyes move onto hers. He looked at her steadily, and then, like he had all the time in the world, he smiled a slow, in-joke, smile.
“Yeah,” he said. “I can see that.” Then he looked Nessa up and down like she was for sale and scowled. “You’re the white girl who’s shifting.”
If he’d pushed her, Nessa could not have been more confused by him. What did being a white girl have to do with any of this?
“After the bite,” Nessa went on, her eyes traveling to Bree’s and Selena’s, then back to Chayton, who had not stopped staring at her in a way that was making her blush, “stuff started happening.”
Chayton nodded, crossed his arms, listening.
“First it was my hearing,” Nessa went on, determined not to let him intimidate her.
“And she can see better,” Bree piped in.
“I can see without my contacts. I smell everything.”