Chapter Text
in a sense, it’s about trying to hide the wildest parts of yourself. you learn to file down your fangs the same way you learn to hide your blushing around the boy next door and the way your hands flap when you get excited. you stay away from full moons and gay clubs and people that embody what a real man should be.
you come home from school bloody and bruised and your mother wipes your tears and strokes your hair and scratches behind the ears in the spot you like when you’re in the form only she gets to see, and you tell yourself you will never feel this loved by anyone else.
you join the agency and tell yourself you can do some good in this world, you can make up for who you are by fighting for the people who hate you on principle, and you find the kind of man you never thought you’d get to have. he has long, mangy, scraggly hair that rivals your own fur, and a sharp laugh to rival your teeth, and even though you come home some nights covered in blood, he never seems to mind, because he’s usually bloodier than you are.
he is cautious and tamed in the way you have tried your whole life to be, except. except. sometimes, he gets this look in his eyes when you set out on a mission together. he tells you to set the timer, and you set it for a minute shorter than he tells you to, and when he learns, he looks at you with adoration in his eyes, brighter than any moonlight you’ve ever seen, and you feel yourself grow wild at the sight of it. once a month, once a month you could handle, but this- this is a lifetime endeavor. you will never turn back after this. you will never be human again.
you have never cared less.
you kiss him carefully, terrified of turning him, but he tells you he doesn’t care. so you kiss and kiss and kiss, and on the day your teeth finally break his skin, you watch him fall. and, like the wild creature that you are, you run. you run before you can see him get up again.
you lay under the night sky and drink and drink and drink until you’re too drunk to do anything with your claws but dig them into yourself, and you tell yourself that you are finally tame. you tell yourself that it is better that way. you tell yourself that you are human, but something inside of you scratches and claws and howls into the night, waiting for its mate to howl back the way he does in your dreams, when he holds you like he used to.
finally, you can’t stand it anymore. you make the call. you are a spy again. you are a proper spy, this time. you are what your father must have wanted you to be. you shy away from moonlight, and flirt with pretty russians, and straighten your tie, and still, the wolf howls for more.
it howls and howls no matter how often you mess up, no matter how deeply you fall, no matter how many people die because of you. you wonder why you never learned how to be anything more than a killer.
(the wolf wonders why you always assume it is a killer. the wolf does not want to sink its teeth into the fawn. the wolf does not want to run wild. the wolf wants to settle down in the midst of a deep, dark forest and curl close to its mate, feeling him nuzzle it behind the ears, in that spot that it likes.)
(the wolf has always been more like a dog, in truth. it may be wild, but it was still a wild thing raised in the 1930s, and animals bred in captivity will always long for the humans that scorned them, rather than others like them.)
eventually, like always, your fangs begin to show. it is inevitable. you are ready to be scorned. you are used to it. this world and its people have given you more scars than you have ever given them. and yet, she takes your secrets in stride and hugs you tight, and when she smiles at you, you do not see moonlight, but you see the slightest hint of stars. she joins you in gathering the rest of a crew, and for the first time in years, you drink with joy, and a part of your heart that you have not listened to in a very long time whispers pack, pack, pack.
and yes, when you see him again, maybe you want to claw and snarl and bare your teeth at him, and maybe you want to wag your tail and lick at his wounds and paw at him until he smiles. maybe he lunges at you before you get the chance to do either. maybe the moon in his eyes is gone, replaced with an unrelenting darkness. maybe you know what you have to do to save the rest of your pack. maybe it means killing the one you used to have.
(maybe you’re the one to kill, and the wolf is the one to cry.)
maybe it hurts like a wound that will never heal, but maybe you’ve still got people worth protecting. maybe you’ll be okay. and honestly, maybe you should listen to them when they tell you it’s time to settle down and come home.
but, maybe some creatures can never be tamed properly.
deep down, some part of you knows that you were always meant to be wild. some people were never meant for the quiet kind of life.
(that doesn’t mean you don’t long for it, still.)