Gordo smiled sadly. “I figured he did. When he came to see you?”
I shook my head. “The day after I met him. When he was ten. I didn’t know what it meant. They said I had a choice.”
And there it was. That look on his face. That fear.
He said, “Even then?”
I said, “Even then,” and of course, “Gordo. Gordo,” because a realization struck me and I was so fucking blind.
“Yeah, Ox.”
“Did…?” I almost stopped. But then, “Mark did. Didn’t he? Gave you his wolf.”
The tattoos on his arms flared briefly as he hung his head.
I rubbed my hand through his hair. It was getting long. I needed to remind him to get it cut. He’d forget so many things if I didn’t tell him.
He said, “Yeah. Yes.” He coughed. “He did. And I gave it back.”
WE WERE running at the full moon.
The wolves surrounded me as the trees whipped by.
They whined and yipped and lived and laughed.
Joe kept crowding me closer and closer. He was almost as big as Mark now. When he became the Alpha, he’d be the size of Thomas.
We came to our clearing. The others spread out ahead, chasing each other. Nipping at paws and tails.
Joe didn’t leave my side.
He told me once that when the wolf took over, all human rationality left. He could understand and he could remember, but it was on a baser level, all animal and instinct.
He was still Joe, but he was a wolf.
Who apparently decided I didn’t smell enough like him.
He rubbed his torso over my legs and thighs.
He pressed his head and snout against my chest and neck, dragging his nose across my skin.
Carter and Kelly approached, wanting to play.
Joe growled at them, a rumble that came out as a warning. Stay away, it said.
They cocked their heads at him and lay down flat.
He turned back to me and whuffed in my ear and neck.
Carter and Kelly scooted forward slowly.
Joe ignored them because he’d found something interesting to sniff behind my ear.
They inched closer.
Joe touched his nose to my forehead.
They scooted closer.
Joe turned to glare at them.
Carter yawned, as if bored.
Kelly put his head on his paws.
Joe turned back to me.
“You’re being dumb,” I told him.
He bared his teeth at me, shiny and sharp.
I batted him across the snout.
I said, “I’m not scared of you.”
Carter and Kelly sprang forward, rubbing up against me on either side.
Joe snarled at the both of them, eyes flashing.
They just laughed at him.
Later, they hunted.
I lay on my back, watching the moon overhead.
The air was warm and I was happy.
HE KILLED a doe and dragged it out of the woods to lay before me.
Its tongue hung out of its mouth, eyes wide and unseeing.
I said, “Seriously?”
He preened, muzzle caked with blood and grime.
“Seriously,” I sighed.
HE SAID, “When I found you, I thought you were the entire world.”
He said, “I gave you my wolf because it was made for you.”
He said, “When Jessie came, it broke my heart.”
He said, “I tried to like her. I promise. And I do. I did.”
He said, “But I hated her. I hated her so much.”
He said, “When you broke up, I ran into the forest and howled at the moon.”
He said, “And then I smelled men on you.”
He said, “I smelled them on you and I had to stop myself from tearing you apart.”
He said, “I wanted to tell you to wait.”
He said, “I wanted to tell you that you needed to wait for me.”
He said, “But I couldn’t. Because it wasn’t fair to you.”
He said, “And then Frankie came and I… I don’t know. I never thought….”
He said, “You confuse me. You aggravate me. You’re amazing and beautiful, and sometimes, I want to put my teeth in you just to watch you bleed. I want to know what you taste like. I want to leave my marks on your skin. I want to cover you until all you smell like is me. I don’t want anyone to touch you ever again. I want you. Every part of you. I want to tell you to break the bond with Gordo because it burns that you are tethered to someone besides me. I want to tell you I can be a good person. I want you to know that I’m not. I want to turn you. I want you to be a wolf so we can run in the trees. I want you to stay human so you never lose that part of yourself. If something were to happen to you, if you were about to die, I would turn you because I can never lose you. I can never let you leave me. I can’t let anything take you from me.”
He said, “Richard told me things. Terrible things.”
MY BREATH caught in my chest. My hand froze in his hair.
Stars shone overhead. The grass felt cool at my back. Joe’s head was heavy on my stomach. I looked down at him. His eyes glittered back up at me, dark and more feral than I’d ever seen them.
I could have said, “Hush. We don’t need to talk about him.”
I could have said, “It doesn’t matter anymore. He can’t touch you.”
I could have said, “I’ll find him and kill him for you. Tell me where he is.”
What I said was “Did he?”
I didn’t know if that was the right thing to say.
Joe let out a shuddery breath. “Yeah.”
“Okay.”
“Ox.”
“Yeah?” I managed to say through the rage and murder in my heart.
“It’s okay.”
Of course he could smell it. I wonder what scent anger had. I thought it probably burned.
So I said, “Okay.”
“You need to know. Before.”
“Before?”
He turned his head slightly and rubbed his nose against my side, along a rib. “So you know. Everything.”
“You’re not broken.”
He said, “You don’t know that.”
I said, “I do. You’re alive. If you can take another breath, if you can take another step, then you’re not broken. Battered, maybe. Bruised. Cracked. But never broken.”
He said, “Richard told me that my family didn’t want me anymore, that they’d given me to him and wanted me to bleed.”
I had to stop myself from howling a song of despair.
He said, “Richard said that it was my fault that it was happening. That if only I’d been a better son, if only I’d been a better boy, none of this would have happened. He said that they hated me because I wasn’t the Alpha they wanted. That I was too small. That I wasn’t a good wolf. That I didn’t deserve to be Alpha because I would cause the pack to break apart and everyone would die. And it would be my burden to carry.”
He sighed. “I don’t know if I can explain it, really. That feeling inside. The Alpha. I’m not one yet, but it’s close. It bubbles just below the surface. There are times when all I can think of is marking you so everyone knows who you belong to. To carve my name into your skin so you never forget me. To hide my family away so no one can ever hurt them. I have to protect what’s mine. Richard tried to take that away from me, and I think it made it worse. I don’t think he knew that he was making it worse.”
I said, “It’s not bad,” though I wasn’t sure if that was exactly right.
His eyes flashed at me in the dark, orange with flecks of red. His voice was a growl when he said, “I want your blood on my tongue. I want to break you open and crawl inside of you. I am a monster because of the things I could do to you that you wouldn’t be able to stop me from doing.” He looked away and took a calming breath. Another. And then another. When he spoke again, his voice was quieter. “Dad knows this. Mom does too. It’
s why I go with him. To the middle of the woods. To learn control. For myself. For them. For you. Because he broke something in me. He made me this way. He made me want to be a monster, and I don’t always think I can stop it.”
I brushed a strand of hair off his forehead. “I’m not scared of you. I never have been.”
“Maybe you should be.”
“Joe.” A hint of annoyance edged my voice.
“I would kill for you,” he said harshly. “If anyone tried to hurt you. I would kill them.”
I said, “I know,” and I said, “Because I would do the same for you.”
He laughed, and it was tinged with wolf, all snap and snarls. “I see him. Sometimes. When I close my eyes.”
“I know.”
“I don’t know if that’ll ever go away.”
“I know that too.”
“And you still said yes?”
I said, “Yes,” and moved my hand in his hair again.
He sighed.
We watched the stars.
They were so much bigger than we could ever hope to be.
Someone told me once that the light we see from them is hundreds of thousands of years old. That the star could already be dead and we’d never know it because it still looked alive. I thought that was a terrible thing. That the stars could lie.
I said, “Are you scared?”
“Yes,” he said immediately. Then, “Of what?”
“Becoming the Alpha.”
“Maybe. Sometimes. I think I’ll do good, you know? And then I think that I won’t.”
“You’ll do good.”
“Yeah?”
“I’ll help.” Because I would.
He was quiet for a while. “I didn’t think we’d get here.”
That hurt to hear. For the both of us. “I’m sorry.”
He shook his head. “Don’t be. You have a choice. You’re human.”
I said, “And you? Do you have a choice?”
He said, “It’s you. I would always choose you. I don’t care if it’s a biological imperative. I don’t care if it’s some destiny. I don’t care if you were made specifically for me. It doesn’t matter. Because I would choose you regardless.”
I thought of kissing him then. I thought on it quite a bit.
But I didn’t. I should have.
Instead, I said, “You’re not a monster,” and touched his cheek. His ears. His lips. “You’re not. I promise you. I swear to you. You’re not.”
And he said, “Ox. Ox. Ox.” And he shook and broke and I crumbled right along with him.
I think we both cried a little then.
Because we weren’t yet men.
get you a bear/hurt you
SOMETIMES I drove home in the old truck Gordo had bought me.
Most times, I walked home because I knew Joe would be there.
I could count on it. It didn’t need any explanation. It just was.
So of course he was there, days later. Standing in the shadow of an old elm tree, the sunlight filtering through the leaves and dancing on his arms and neck. He’d been small, before. That first day. The runt of the pack. The little tornado.
But not anymore. Part of it was genetics. Part of it was him becoming an Alpha. He’d grown into himself, and I know he heard the moment my heart tripped all over itself, because he smiled at it like it pleased him.
“Hey, Joe.”
“Hi. Hi, Ox.”
I stopped in front of him, unsure. It’d only been a week since this… thing. This thing had started. This… thing between us.
“Hi,” I said lamely, words drying up on my tongue.
We stared at each other.
It was stupid.
So I said, “This is weird,” and at the same time, Joe said, “I want to take you on a date.”
I choked on my tongue. And coughed. And finally said, “Yeah. Sure. Okay. Yeah. Sounds great. When. Now? We could go now.”
His eyes went wide. “Right now?”
I said, “No! No. I didn’t mean. You know. We could.”
“Oh. Well. Maybe? We could… go. Someplace.”
“Are you going to bring me more dead animals or mini muffins?” I blurted out. Then cringed. “You… ah. Don’t have to.” I didn’t even get to have any mini muffins because the guys at the shop had eaten them all. Except for Gordo. Gordo had just glared at them.
He looked at me strangely. “Do you want more animals? I can go hunt right now! I’ll get you another deer. Or a bear. I’ll get you a bear!”
Then he started taking off his clothes, so I said, “You’re getting naked?” Because of all the skin.
His shirt was already off when he said, “What?”
I grasped onto the only thing that made sense. “You’re seventeen!”
“Not for too much longer,” he said and his voice was deep. Because he was leering.
Instead of focusing on that, I said, “I don’t need a bear.”
“Deer?” he asked.
I shook my head because the idea of him dragging a dead deer out of the forest and leaving it on the front lawn made me queasy.
“You should put your shirt back on,” I said.
He squinted at me. “Why?”
“Because of… you know. All of that.” I waved my hand at his entire being.
Then he grinned. And it was evil. “All of this?” He flexed his chest. Unfairly.
I managed to say, “Yes. To all of that.”
He took a step toward me. “We could… ah. You know.” He waggled his eyebrows at me and I thought, fuck.
I took a step back. “Or we could wait until you’re eighteen.”
Now he glared. There was a bit of wolf in it. “That’s not how this works.”
“Yeah, because you know how this works. With all the courting you’ve done.”
“I can’t wait until I’m Alpha so I can tell you what to do all the time.”
“I’m going to tell your dad you only want to be Alpha so you can get in my pants.”
He groaned. “Don’t talk about my dad while I’m trying to seduce you.”
“Stop talking,” I begged him. “Please.”
And then, of course, Carter and Kelly appeared, on their run.
They stopped and stared at us.
We stared back. I felt guilty. Because their underage brother was shirtless and it probably smelled like a whorehouse where we stood.
Kelly said, “This is awkward.”
I said, “Nothing happened!”
Carter said, “Oh my god, it stinks like sex.”
Joe said, “I’m going to kill him a bear.”
There was more staring.
Kelly said, “I am so uncomfortable right now.”
I said, “Put your clothes back on.”
Carter said, “It’s like I’m drowning in pheromones and boners.”
Joe said, “Or maybe a deer.”
All the staring.
Kelly said, “I hope you both know you’ve ruined life for me.”
I said, “Your shirt, Joe. Put on your shirt.”
And then, just because he was a dick, Carter said, “It’s a good thing I popped Ox’s gay kissing cherry like years ago. You’re welcome.”
Joe roared and Carter laughed and took off, Joe’s shirt falling to the ground and his shorts tearing as he shifted into his wolf. They took off through the trees, Joe snarling and howling in anger.
Kelly and I stood on the dirt road.
“So,” I said.
“Yeah,” Kelly said.
“Is he really going to kill a bear?”
Kelly snorted. “Probably. Now that you’ve made out with Carter.”
“I didn’t make out with Carter!”
“But you kissed him?”
“He kissed me.”
“I really don’t see the difference.”
“He’s straight.”
Kelly arched an eyebrow at me. “I don’t know if werewolves identify as anything but fluid.”
&nbs
p; “But… he said… he told me—”
Kelly rolled his eyes.
“I don’t know anything about werewolves,” I muttered.
Kelly huffed as he heard Joe’s angry roar echo through the forest. “Pretty sure we’re listening to fratricide,” he said.
“I don’t know what that is.”
Kelly said, “Joe’s gonna kill Carter.”
“Seriously?”
Kelly shrugged. “Probably. It certainly sounds like he wants to.”
“You don’t seem too worried about that.”
“Eh,” Kelly said. “What can you do? I haven’t had sex with either a guy or a girl yet.”
“Uh. Thank you for sharing?”
“Thought about it,” he said.
“Okay.”
“Seems like a lot of work,” he said with a frown as some wolf got thrown into a tree by the sound of it.
“It is,” I assured him.
“I made out with a guy, though,” he said.
“What? When?”
“At this… thing. I don’t even know. Then there was this girl. I don’t know if that counted, though. She just… put her tongue on my face. Like, near my nose.”
“Okay?”
“Is it bad to be twenty-one and not have had sex?”
“Uh… no? Why are you asking me?”
He stared at me. “You’re the future mate of the future Alpha. You have to answer questions like this.”
“I do?”
“Yeah. It’s, like, your job.”
“Oh. No one told me?”
“What did you think you’d be doing?”
“Honestly? I’m not really sure. This was all kind of… sudden.”
“When you got a boner for Joe?” he asked sympathetically.
“Oh my god.”
“So you have to give advice and stuff. Help the pack when we have problems. It’s what Mom does. It’s what she did too. When the pack was bigger.”
“I’m not your mom.”
He dismissed that with a wave of his hand. “Might as well be.” His mouth twitched. “Or something like it. Dad?”
“I will make sure you never get laid.”
He shrugged. “I’m sure it’ll happen when I’m ready.”
I nodded. “And not a day before. Don’t let anyone pressure you into anything.”