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Hiding it was second nature.
After all, that was why groups like the Summer Society existed, to be a local pack when frat boys, finals, and girls disappearing all over campus set our teeth on edge; they didn’t want those teeth sinking into the wrong throat and drawing attention. Everyone got stressed the first time away from home, and it was nice to have people who understood the urge to slip skin and run under the starlight. Not all of them were wolves — some were kin, with the blood but no need to shift, but others married in, with stepmothers or half-sisters that gave them understanding.
There were only three important things to conceal, anyway. The change was the easiest, as long as you stuck to your one solstice moon and didn’t lope around on all fours along a crowded street. My fur didn’t blend as well as some others, but it amazed me how many humans assumed a big red wolf was someone’s uncollared German Shepard or a hunting dog run loose. Most of the time it wasn’t even a worry; who didn’t have a cousin in the ranger service or working for Fish & Wildlife to let you in the back gates of parks when it was a good night? It was a scattered family, for all the faults that could bring, but having a helping hand in every territory was how we kept under the radar. No one wanted another Valais or Beast of Gévaudan.
On the full moon weeks without a solstice, all that mattered was keeping a lid on things, muzzling the wolf so it didn’t snap its teeth. Mired in misogyny as it was, no one really questioned when a girl picked up an irritable streak for a few days out of the month, even if the offhand comments were worth a growl. With the Society, we piled into a Jeep and drove out to have a hunt, using bows and rifles to make up for the claws we couldn’t unsheathe. If the venison over the fire that night was a little raw, no one complained. The park staff loved us more than anyone else since we never left a trace behind, no scrap of burned wood or aluminum cans; I’d learned to pick up my life and run since I was a kid, playing games of predator and prey.
The allergy was the worst. Not silver, no, that was for winter-born who kept the east and north to themselves. We’d get all the media attention too if we didn’t have the sense to get out the hell out of Dodge when the witch-hunters came. I’m summer-blooded through and through, gold bound to burn as soon as it touched me. Everyone had their own explanation for why it happened — bloodlines with the sensitivity breeding too close together, some chemical in our skin that let us survive the change, even a curse on whoever carried the wolf — but no alchemist or zoologist ever pinned the truth down. Modern medicine meant it was just a note on the bottom of my medical chart, barely even a blip, since human doctors aren’t as keen as diagnosing demon possession as they used to be.
Avoiding gold was usually like avoiding mushrooms at a buffet line; I just walked past, kept my hands off, and didn’t take any side trips into jewelry stores. If I shook hands with someone who had a wedding ring, it was kind of like getting a shock from a joy buzzer, although brief contact had nothing on it being jammed in an open wound. There was the one time I made out with a girl in high school who had a couple gold crowns and my tongue went numb, but sometimes sacrifices have to be made for the greater good of kissing the prom queen. Everybody had their horror stories; it was better than being the guy who took a red eye flight to New Zealand without realizing it would be a winter solstice night when he landed. No one looks good moonstruck, especially when the cops start to wonder if you have rabies and keep a thumb on their holster. After that, I kind of crossed off ‘recreate the Lord of The Rings tour’ from my bucket list. Jet lag is no one’s friend when your wolf can’t tell what day it is.
Three simple things and I hadn’t thought about any of them in years. It was a reflex, a cycle, until I met Laura.
It wasn’t like I hadn’t had human friends before. There were old classmates, roommates, entire middle and high school hockey teams who occasionally gave me looks like they thought I might be taking steroids on the side, but Laura was different. Her smile was easy and bright, every move she made full of restless energy like sunlight bouncing across her skin. I knew what it was like not to be able to stay still, but she was curious and smart too, which was exactly the kind of girl my mother always told me to stay away from. Those are the kind that make you give up the secret without them asking, Danny. I knew that, but I couldn’t make myself pull back. It would be turning tail because I didn’t trust her — or myself — and no Lawrence would have it said she was a coward.
Still, I wasn’t ready for this.
“—and I told him there’s a plaid for every season, but it’s not like Zetas know what to do with fashion advice that doesn’t come from an Axe ad.” Laura clapped her hands together, making my spine line right up. I tried not to loom around her, but it was hard when we weren’t sitting down. “I totally forgot! I bought you something yesterday.”
A smile took over my face before I could stop it. One of those goofy ones where it feels like you’re going to break something if it gets any wider. No one needed to tell me I had it bad; I might as well have gone to the roof of the school and screamed please ask me out at the top of my lungs, with a sad addendum of but don’t let me break you in half. That part was probably better written down in a letter and shoved in the back of a drawer where no one could find it.
“What is it?” I asked.
She pulled a grey plastic bag out of her desk, wrapped tight around a little velvet box. My heart jumped up into my throat, but before I could say anything, Laura had climbed onto her bed behind me, the ancient frame creaking in protest. I could have turned around, put my back to the other bed — Carmilla had vanished like a puff of smoke after she was untied, probably pulling a Bucky Barnes with her eyeliner somewhere — but my nerves got the best of me.
Just thinking about the vampire made my jaw tighten. She didn’t have much of a scent to speak of, closer to the old books in the back shelves of the library than a walking corpse, but it permeated the room in places; the curtains, one particular drawer in the dresser, and evenunder Laura’s bed, which led to a hundred creepy conclusions. The same rage in my gut that had boiled up seeing a bat wing tied to Laura’s wrist, hearing about ‘seduction eyes’ like it was the most casual thing in the world, started to simmer again. I didn’t have hackles to raise standing on two legs, but the wolf still reared its head, blood jumping under my skin.
Then her hand brushed over the back of my neck. If I said her fingertips felt like silk, I don’t mean it in a bodice-ripper kind of way, just that werewolf senses are really heightened, and even the edge of her nails, bitten rough and uneven from anxious last-minute studying, gave a kind of scratch I could appreciate. There was a split second where the image of Laura stroking through thick red fur blazed through my thoughts, it burned—
No, that was whatever had just gone around my neck. After gulping down a breath, I fought the urge to twitch and squirm, claw up at my throat because it was itching like a hundred mosquitoes had bitten me all at once. Glancing down with wide eyes, I saw a slender gold chain hanging right down the V of my shirt, weighed down by an unadorned gold cross. The metal shone, bright and pure, and I knew I had about sixty seconds to take it off before I had what would look like the world’s worst sunburn.
“I know the whole ‘cross versus vampires’ thing isn’t something we know works yet, but it’s not like you can carry two spatulas taped together and hope for the best, right? You’re always talking about protecting me and I thought this could protect you—”
Laura’s voice tapered up in pitch as she started to babble, drawing in soft quick breaths between her words. It was adorable, pulling my attention away from the pain before I realized that for once, she was high enough to see my nape, would see the redness erupt across my skin. Turning on my heel, I wrapped my arms around her hips, hoisting her off the bed and back down to the floor. Whatever she had been saying became a squeak of surprise, eyes almost bugging out from how wide she opened them. The beat of her heart was loud enough to drum along the inside of my skull when I let go, bodies so close that heat could spread, ricochet between us like lightning.
“Um—” Laura pushed her hair back behind her shoulder, putting words back together with stammering syllables, “—I guess that’s why you’re VP of outdoor rec, huh? You could probably wrestle with a bear and win.”
I could, but that was so beside the point right now. “Laura.”
“Yes, Danny?” It wasn’t fair, the way she said my name. Neither was the fact that I was going to have to wear turtlenecks for a week.
“I love the necklace.” Love, right, dive for the L word in the most unobtrusive way possible, Lawrence. You’re not desperate. “But I really need to run right now. I have a Society meeting I spaced on and getting a club sanction would totally suck.”
“Aren’t we going to study tonight? You said—” Disappointment put a fracture into her smile; it hurt like a punch to the gut.
“I’ll be back afterwards, I promise.” Damn it, damn it, everything hurt. “I’ll bring back some takeout so we don’t have to scrounge in your fridge, okay?”
I was halfway out the door before she answered with a yes, running as fast as my feet could carry me. Even for a wolf, I had always been quick, a mercy when hammering down a flight of stairs and throwing myself out through the front entrance of the dorm. Cutting through the dean’s favorite flower garden probably was asking for a suspension — be it from school or hanging from the flagpole somewhere — but it was the easiest way to get to the Summer Society building. After bounding over an iron-wrought bench and nearly knocking over an Alchemy Club kid bent over to look at a two-headed snake in the grass, my hands touched a familiar oak frame, opening the double doors with a firm shove.
Seconds slipped by until I was bent over a porcelain sink, spitting bile into the curved bowl as agony made my mind a white, static blank. My fingers wouldn’t obey, fumbling with the clasp until I finally tugged the necklace over my head, taking a knot of hair with it as I pulled it free from the tangle. It clinked and the chain began to slide, threatening to pop right down the drain before I caught the cross with a hand already starting to blister, tossing it to the floor.
There it lay, looking perfectly harmless as I panted for breath, risking a glance up at the mirror. Strangulation by poison ivy seemed like a good description for the look, irritation straining up my throat, spreading out across my shoulders from the worst of the damage, pinks and reds and bone white. I stripped off my shirt and let it fall, turning on the faucet as hot as it would go before starting to scrub my hands; if I tried to treat the allergy with even the tiniest bit of gold on my fingers, it would ignite again, enough to burn into the blood if allowed to eat any deeper.
By the time I was done cleaning up, an hour had gone by. My phone had buzzed twice, one from LaFontaine asking if I could steal a vial of Carmilla’s ‘soy milk’ for DNA testing, the other from Laura wishing me luck at the meeting. As much as the necklace had stung, the initial flush of color was already gone, leaving behind a painful band that would take days to heal away. The shirt would be fine after a run through the community laundry, but the cross was still on the tile, chain twisted around itself.
A quick search through the closet near the bathroom produced a high-necked sweater with a bow and arrow embroidered on the front, proudly proclaiming it once belonged to a high-ranking Society alumni. Without a name or label, I guessed it would have to do, even if the width of it was stretched taut by my shoulders, the cuffs almost an inch too short. Then I grabbed a towel, trying to convince myself I wasn’t a complete idiot as I used it to guard my hand, reaching down to pick up the necklace.
Getting it back over my head was just as much of a pain as yanking it off, the tiny gold links trying to dangle against my bare throat until I got the cross to hang right, chain kept from direct contact by the thick collar of the sweater. If I pulled my hair back in a ponytail, I’d probably look like I was hawking Bibles door-to-door, but it would work for one night of frantic studying. Ignoring the urge to scratch at my neck, I took my phone out of my pocket again, scrolling to Laura’s message.
The meeting went great. I’m going to go pick up the food now.
I was hunting through my recent calls to find the number for the Chinese place when the phone buzzed with another text — LaFontaine again. Halfway expecting a treatise on hemoglobin, I flipped to the message, only for my stomach to do a flip.
Have you told Laura yet?
With a rough sigh, I punched back a reply, the digital keyboard clicking like mad. It only took her a few seconds to answer, just my luck.
It’s your call, gingerwolf. She could use some friendly weird in her life right now, though, you know what I mean?
Not yet, I chanted in my head. Just not yet.
Just tell me and Perry when you do so we can have a howling out party. Or whatever your type calls it when you come out of the fuzzy closet.
I smiled. Sure thing, LaFontaine. We dance naked under the moonlight.
When no response came, I went back to the call list, ferreting out the number for the restaurant. A man with a low voice answered, the clatter of pans in the background. I ordered two of Laura’s favorite dish, making sure the spicy sauce was on the side. She always insisted she’d try a little bit, even if most of it ended up drizzled over my rice when the inevitable chickening out happened. Maybe this time would be different.
“You need anything else?” He asked, pen scratching over a notepad.
“That’s all, thanks.” The paper tore after he cleared his throat, saying it would be about ten minutes. When the line went dead, I scrolled back over to Laura’s texts. She’d sent a long chain of smilies in reply, followed by a tiny heart.
It was worth every second of touching gold.