“You want this straight?”
He seemed to consider it for a moment, but Richard was not a hard liquor kind of guy.
“Better put some coke with it.”
I handed over the drink and took a seat opposite Richard while he launched into what proved to be one of the most unusual stories I’d heard in a while.
“Remember me telling you several weeks ago how weird things were getting at work?”
I nodded.
“Well, they’ve gotten worse. First of all, Mallory is one crazy ass bitch,” he said vehemently.
Richard wasn’t a saint, but for him to use that kind of language showed just how upset he really was. In regards to Mallory, it was understandable. Mallory was about six feet tall with a strong chin, manly voice, plain-Jane greasy hair, and built like a line backer. Unfortunately, her personality wasn’t any more appealing than the rest of her.
“What’s going on?”
“Your guess is as good as mine.”
“Why don’t you start from the beginning? When did this, whatever it is, all start?”
“Well, it started a few months ago, at least that’s when I noticed it. Mallory has always been really unpleasant. Well, you’ve met her.”
“Yeah.” I grinned. “And that’s putting it mildly.”
“So anyway, she gets worse, right? Then the next thing I know I start catching the brunt of her frustration.”
That pissed me off. I thought of Richard as an older brother and was very protective of him.
“Why, what did she do?”
“Well, I can’t directly prove she’s done anything except be nastier than usual and, unfortunately, that’s not a crime. But, rumors have been flying about me lately and I’m so sick of it I could throw up.”
“Rumors?”
He leaned forward and I could see small veins becoming visible across his left temple. “They’re saying I’m fucking my students!” he hissed.
“What? That’s outrageous!”
“Tell me about it. You haven’t even heard the worst of it yet. Apparently the last time we took a field trip we were all having an orgy on a nude beach!”
I choked on my ice water.
“Oh, wait! It gets better,” he said nastily.
“You remember Lisa, right?”
Lisa was a friend of Richard’s. She was a former student that was now teaching biology at my old high school. Some of the instructors where Richard worked had done everything within their power to keep Lisa from completing her teaching degree. Lisa was an attractive African American female and it had been the most blatant case of racism I’d ever seen. Of course that had all been brilliantly covered up by the people in charge, but people like Richard knew the truth. People who knew the truth had a way of disappearing. Like another professor who had been forced into an early retirement when he tried to make the issue public.
Mallory Monroe had been one of the people who did her best to keep a diploma from ever reaching Lisa Johnson. Lisa had already been through two schools where they tried their best to ruin her reputation among the other teachers before she even began work before finding her way to the quiet little school where she was currently teaching.
“Sure, I remember Lisa,” I answered.
“Well, I have it from a very reliable source that Mallory is spreading that I’m having an affair with Lisa!” his voice kept rising in pitch.
I didn’t know what to say to that, so I just stared at him open mouthed.
“Yeah, that’s right,” he continued. “I’m doing all my students and my former students, too.”
“Richard, I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. Just being able to get this all off my chest is a big help,” he said this just before taking a massive gulp of his coke and rum.
“You might want something stronger than that,” he pointed at my water.
“Why?”
“Because now they’re saying that I’m sleeping with you, too.”
“What?”
I could hear my heart pounding in my ears as my pulse raced with the injustice of it all.
“It’s not enough that these simple minded bastards around here are saying I’m screwing everyone that I speak to? Now some jackass has to start something like this!” I roared.
I began to pace beside the kitchen table. If there was anything I hated more than ignorant people, it was ignorant people who didn’t know how to shut their mouths. I had never liked Mallory Monroe. Indeed, I didn’t like anyone Richard worked with, from the moron in charge, to the slutty secretary that was banging the entire faculty except Richard.
My blood pressure’s upward climb halted for a second when I looked back at Richard. He had gone a deathly shade of pale and his eyes were wide.
“What’s wrong? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
“It ... a ... your, um ... your eyes. It’s your ... your eyes,”
he stammered.
In the six years I had known Richard Stacey it had never occurred to me that he hadn’t seen me change. Although my transformation was only partial, it was still frightening to someone who was not used to seeing anything along those lines.
“I’m sorry,” I turned my head and made an effort to slow my heartbeat. I felt the burning behind my eyes begin to cool before I faced him again.
“I didn’t mean to frighten you,” I whispered.
“You didn’t, I mean ... well, yeah you did. But that’s ok,”
he added the last part quickly. “I knew about ... everything ...
I just.... “He gulped.
“It’s alright, Richard. I’m not going to eat you,” I tried to keep the bitterness out of my voice.
“I’m not afraid of you,” his voice sounded stronger and very clear.
I looked him in the eye.
“I’m a monster, Richard. What do you think of that?”
“I think I work with the real monsters. You’re just Lilith to me.”
“You really mean that?”
“Of course. How long have we known each other? I knew what had happened to you. It’s just ... this was the first time I’ve ever seen wolf eyes in your face. I didn’t grow up with a dad who hunted werewolves, remember?”
He had a very good point.
“I’m sorry. Under the circumstances, I’d say you handled that quite well. But the question is, do you want to see something really scary?”
He gulped again. “Like what?”
Richard was both a scientist and a self confessed comic book nerd. I knew if anyone would appreciate the unusualness of my situation, it would be him.
“You’re a scientist, what do you make of this?”
As I stretched my right hand across the table toward Richard, I let my claws extend to their full length. They were at least six inches long, straight, and sharp as a razor.
“That’s incredible,” he breathed.
I could see that he wanted to touch them. He reached out, but then pulled his hand back. Another professor he knew was a werewolf, so I assumed he was afraid of infection.
“It’s alright. I’m not contagious.”
“That’s right. I remember you saying that you weren’t actually a carrier of the disease.”
As Richard turned my hand back and forth, examining the claws I repeated for him what Alfred had said about my body mutating the virus.
“And this has never happened to anyone else?” he asked.
“It’s completely unprecedented. Besides, they gave up on the cure years ago. Nearly everyone who was vaccinated turned. No one had the reaction I did. It could have been the fact that the vaccine was injected into my system so soon after my attack. I guess it was just too late.”
“Wait a minute.”
Richard’s eyes lit up. I loved to watch him work. He was a scientist to the core, always coming up with fascinating theories about complicated or obscure things that most people just overlooked.
“If almost everyone who was vaccinated changed, that means two
things. First, the ones who didn’t turn had a natural immunity. That’s not that weird.”
“What’s the second thing?”
“Well, most people did change because of the vaccination.
You had that shit injected directly into your blood stream less than thirty minutes after being brutally attacked. From the way you described the attack to me, I’d say a fair amount of werewolf DNA was already coursing through your veins.”
“What are you trying to say?”
“You were infected twice.”
His face said clearly that he understood the significance of this, but I did not.
“Some times people are attacked by multiple werewolves.
Wouldn’t that count as being infected with each individual bite? That doesn’t make sense, Richard.”
“Yes, it does, and no that doesn’t count as a multiple infection. See, you were infected first by a werewolf, the animal itself. Then you were injected with a synthetic version of almost the same virus, meant to fight off the disease. You were infected separately with two different versions of the same poison, so to speak.”
“So what does that make me?”
“I don’t really know ... a mutant of some sort?”
“Gee thanks, Richard. You really know how to boost a girl’s self confidence.”
“It’s not an insult,” he insisted. “It’s a miracle. What happened to you should have killed you.”
“That might be true, but would it have killed a wizard?”
I then explained to Richard about my great, great, grandfather.
“When did you find this out?” he asked at the end of my story.
“A few months ago.”
He sat back and ran a hand through his prematurely gray hair and finished his drink.
“I don’t know what to tell you, Lilith. My knowledge of wizards is very limited. I didn’t even know of their existence until I met you.”
“Yeah, and I’m no expert.”
“I didn’t mean it that way. It’s just that you don’t know that much about them either, and I only know as much as you know. I’m really not sure if their actual genetic makeup is different enough to cause a mutation like that, or....”
“Or what?”
“Or, if it’s magic.”
“I love good fiction, Richard. But I just don’t know....”
“You don’t believe in things that you can’t see and touch? I know better than that. You believe in God, and love. What else would you call love but magic of some sort?”
“True enough, but you can feel both of those things.”
“You can feel God?”
“Of course. What else would you call a comforting touch when you’re in need but the hand of God?”
“I should never argue religion with a poet. You’re right, though. I hadn’t thought of it quite that way.”
I poured Richard another coke and rum, got myself a beer out of the fridge, and located a bag of pretzels.
“So what will you do?” I asked after a while.
“I don’t know. There’s really not much I can do. I don’t have any proof that she started those rumors.”
“That’s just wrong. There has to be someone you can complain to.”
“Na, they all believe it.”
“Shit,” I said hotly.
“What it all amounts to is, my ass is chapped and they’ve cornered the market on Chap Stick.”
I laughed. “Nothing like standard issue sandpaper underwear.”
For the first time since he’d arrived I saw Richard smile.
“So what have you been up to?”
“Ah, not a whole lot,” I sort of stuttered.
“Oh, Lilith,” he sounded so disappointed, but I knew Richard couldn’t read my mind. “You’ve been toasting marshmallows haven’t you?”
I laughed. One of Richard’s favorite expressions was, “Don’t toast marshmallows over the fire that will most likely consume you.” I didn’t even bother denying that he was right.
I just didn’t offer any further explanation.
Richard stayed until late that afternoon. By the time I watched him drive away, he had calmed down significantly from when he’d first knocked on my door. At least he was in a better mood. It did me good to see him, but a few minutes after he left I started to feel more depressed than angry about all of the rumors that were circulating. I just couldn’t imagine why people would say such terrible things about such a nice man. Richard was a sweet guy, but he was truly oblivious to a lot of what went on around him. He paid attention to certain people, like me. But that was only because we’d been friends for so long and he was interested to know what was going on with me.
If a student was interested in him, they’d have to show up naked at his office for him to take the hint. Subtlety did not work well with him. He just didn’t pay close enough attention.
Richard was very much focused on his work. He loved science. That was his thing and he did it well. He and Alfred were very similar creatures, but to have pointed that out to either of them would piss them off.
What bothered me even more was the fact that I was now a part of the whole sordid mess. I had never so much as thought of having any kind of sexual contact with Richard. He was like a brother to me. What was really insulting was the fact that people didn’t think either one of us was capable of just being friends with someone of the opposite sex. As I walked through the house and turned off the lights I came to the conclusion that I could worry about it as much as I liked, but it wouldn’t change a damn thing. It simply wasn’t worth shortening my life span over.
I walked upstairs and decided a bubble bath was just what I needed.
—
Bubbles were floating so close to the rim I was afraid that when I got in it might splash over the sides. I put a CD of some of my favorite R & B music in the small player that sat on my vanity and began to strip.
After lighting the vanilla candles spaced throughout the room, I placed the tip of my toes tentatively in the water. It was just right. I had just stepped in when my heard a beeping noise. I stepped back out of the tub and went over to the toilet where the noise was coming from. It was my communicator. I must have dropped it there when I’d been so sick a few nights ago. Normally I didn’t answer any calls when I was about to take a bath, but I was afraid it might be important.
I quickly covered myself with a towel and pressed the button.
Chapter Five
Marco appeared before me looking concerned. I’m not sure who I had been expecting to see, but it wasn’t him. Just seeing his handsome face made my heart jump almost painfully. He was lounging casually in the large overstuffed chair I’d seen in his apartment. From the angle of his image, he’d placed the communicator on the ottoman in front of him.
For the first time I was truly appreciative of the fact that my communicator was capable of receiving color images. Marco sat before me in his red silk pajamas with the matching robe open to reveal his torso. I watched for a few moments as the ridged muscles of his stomach expanded and contracted with every breath. His hologram wasn’t as good as the real thing, but it was close.
“Are you alright?” he asked.
Something must have been wrong for him to skip his usual flirtatious greeting.
“I’m fine,” I answered the miniature image of Marco that stood on my vanity.
He looked at me for a moment as if he were sizing me up before smiling slightly.
“So, what are you doing?”
“We’re going to have a conversation now?” I teased.
“Might as well. There aren’t too many other options for you and I.” He winked.
“I was just about to take a bath.”
“Please, don’t let me stop you.”
I carried the communicator, along with the smiling hologram of Marco and placed it on the rim of the tub. While I did this I said, “I thought you didn’t have a communicator anymore.”
“And what did you think I did w
ith it?”
“Well, I just assumed that you’d destroyed it. I mean, can’t they trace your calls?”
“Not if I know how to jam the signal.”
I almost asked him to close his eyes while I got in the tub, but felt it would be pointless. Besides, he’d already seen this show. As soon as the thought crossed my mind I could hear Marco saying, “sometimes re-runs aren’t so bad.”
As I lowered myself into the hot water my skin tingled slightly. It was hotter than I normally liked it, but I needed to relax. My muscles had been tense ever since I’d had that awful vision of Marco’s injury. I curled up and rested my forehead against my knees.
“You sure you’re alright?” Marco’s voice was soft and concerned.
I looked up at him and answered, “I was sick a few nights ago.”
“But you’re fine now?”
“Yes. So, you can jam their signal?” I changed the subject.
I didn’t want to share with Marco what my father had told me about his attack.
“Yes. But I still use this type of communication sparingly.”
“And this was an emergency?” I inquired.
“Yes, it was. I had to see that you were alright. A few nights ago when you say you were sick ... you were suddenly screaming through my head. I didn’t exactly hear your voice, I felt you. You were calling out to me in a way I’d never felt before. So, my question to you is, why did you call?”
I rested my forehead against my knees. I couldn’t look at Marco and lie to him. “It must have been something I ate,” I mumbled.
“Is that really what you’re telling yourself, or just what you’re telling me?”
I groaned.
“Come on, Red. That was a good bit more than bad sushi.”
Finally I responded, “I had a bad dream ... a haunted vision. It would disturb you if I shared it and it’s something that I’d rather not re-live.”
His image grew very still for a moment and his brow knit in concentration.
“Of the past or of the future?”
“The past,” I whispered.
“I guess you’ll tell me when you’re ready.”
“I’m sorry, Marco. I just don’t want that in my head again.”
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