Walking through the park with her pack, though, Misty realized Grampa had been the same age she was now. He’d been just as scrawny, just as frightened about making a fool of himself, and just as aware of how pitifully he stacked up against the world’s meanness. Because of all that, Misty’s feelings swelled past pride into awe.
As they approached the pond in the center of the park, the ducks started quacking, pulling Misty back into the present. She and her pack started tossing them bits of bread. Val got down on her haunches to feed them by hand. In seconds, the waddling mob had swarmed, fighting over the bread. Val went down, covering her head from flapping wings and nipping bills.
“Help!”
Eric, perched on a bench beside Marc, shook his head. “Pm not getting down there.”
“Help!”
“Sorry. You’re on your own.”
Val managed to get to her feet. She declared the two large, squawking geese bullies but fed them, anyway. She made sure the ducklings, toddling little puff balls, got some too.
“That’s it. See?” Misty showed the ducks the empty bread bag. “No more. Seriously.”
Daniel and Marc flung their last pieces into the pond and watched the ducks dive after them. The pack crowded onto the bench and spent a while trying to shove one another off. Then Daniel and Misty left the others.
An installation dedicated to the movement, two black walls, rose on either side of the park’s flagstone path. Police dogs lunged out of their inner surfaces, forcing visitors to squeeze past the welded-steel snarls. Finding shelter from the rain under the animals, Daniel and Misty daydreamed about Florence and Istanbul.
When their conversation lulled, Daniel lifted his face to the drizzle and said, “You were right. This is a perfect day.”
“Told you.”
“So, is something going on between you and Val?”
“No. Just crap from work.” Even though she and Val had both apologized since their blow-up, things had still felt edgy between them all day. That would fade, though. But now Daniel had reminded her of all the questions Val had brought up. With a nervous lump in her throat, Misty ventured, “So what about when we get back from seeing the world? Any plans?”
Daniel shrugged. “Think Ilie would hire me?”
“C’mon. You’re, like, the smartest guy in school. You take all those advanced placement classes. But whenever anyone even mentions college, you change the subject. You really don’t have any clue what you want to do?”
Daniel shrugged. “I know what my parents want me to do. I know what everybody says is the smart thing to do. But, no, I really don’t know what I want to do. I wish I did.”
He ran his fingers through his hair while he spoke. Thin frustration lines formed between his eyebrows. Misty watched him and was sure Val had been wrong. There was no dark secret. Daniel was just as confused about the rest of his life as Misty was.
“Well, you should at least think about college,” she said. “You’d be really good at it, and you wouldn’t have any problem getting in.”
Daniel nodded, still staring at the ground. “So what about you? What do you want to do?”
“I don’t know.” She shifted on the grass. The damp was soaking through her pants, making her itch. “I’d suck at college, but … during the summers, when there are lots of forest fires, they hire people to go out and help the firefighters. I want to do something like that.”
“You want to fight forest fires?”
“I don’t know. I don’t care what job I have. But I want to be brave.”
Daniel laughed out loud. “You’re a werewolf. That’s not brave enough for you?”
“Yeah, but …” Wolves were brave, but only as long as they stuck to their pack, as long as they stuck to their territory, a few square miles of badlands that nobody else wanted. Since Daniel had come, Misty had started having dreams bigger than Southside. She didn’t know if she had the guts to follow them, though.
Misty turned to watch an elementary school class file into the Civil Rights Institute. She imagined her grampa marching across the park, over the border of the black section of town and into the world.
Finally, she asked, “I told you Grampa was part of the movement, right?”
“No. Was he?”
She nodded. “Got arrested, almost got expelled. He’s still got this kind of dent in his forehead where some cop hit him with an ashtray.”
“An ashtray?”
“One of those big glass ones. They were processing him at the jail, and Grampa said something smart, and the cop grabbed an ashtray and smashed him over the head with it until it broke.”
“Fuck.”
“Yeah. But my point is, Grampa wasn’t a wolf. I mean, it’s easy to be brave when you’ve got inch-long fangs. Without Amanita, though, how does somebody stand up like that?” Misty rested her chin on her knee. “I want to be brave even when I’m not in wolf shape. Even if I quit doing the ritual altogether.”
His struggle to figure out if he could ever truly become a wolf had consumed so much of Daniel. Daniel had been so distracted, wondering if he could become a wolf, he hadn’t noticed Misty beginning to wonder if she could become anything else. Daniel told her he thought she was that brave already. Misty smiled, kissed him, then turned away without answering.
They listened to the drowsy rhythm of the rain and the sharp laughter of the rest of the pack. They sat with their bodies pressed together, their thoughts still worlds away.
CHAPTER 13
Daniel walked with Misty to government class. They passed a pair of swallows chirping on the window ledge outside. Halting in the crowded hall, Misty’s eyes followed the birds as they hopped across the concrete. “I hate this place,” she said.
Daniel put an arm around her shoulder. Apart from the humans filling it, the school building itself had begun making him feel anxious and boxed in. The air that settled in the hallways smelled stale. He didn’t trust the florescent light. The first few weeks he’d been a wolf, Daniel kept planning to go to debate practices and student rep meetings, then changing his mind at the last minute. He couldn’t stand being in that building any longer than he had to.
They left the swallows and started walking again. “I hate this place and absolutely nothing could make it any better,” Misty went on. “Except a piggyback ride.”
Daniel snickered. “Nothing else at all?”
Pressing her lips white to keep from smiling, Misty shook her head ruefully.
Daniel took his backpack off, and Misty hopped on. “And watch your hands. I’m a lady, you sonofabitch.”
Bouncing up and down as Daniel wove through the crowd, Misty laughed like a child. She goaded him up the stairs and to pick up the pace. “C’mon, bailer! Let’s see that McCammon Falcon hustle!”
He made it through Mrs. MacKaye’s door before his legs buckled. Daniel and Misty tumbled over each other and hit the floor, but neither of them cared. Misty lay on her back, laughing too hard to notice her skirt had ridden up to her thighs. “Ow!” She rubbed her head. “I bonked my—”
“Get up! What’s the matter with you two?”
Daniel and Misty saw Mrs. MacKaye standing over them, the class staring at them, and remembered where they were. Climbing to their feet, they crossed the classroom to take their seats, their teacher’s shrill voice following them.
“Are you in kindergarten? You’re seniors. You don’t know how to behave in school yet?”
They sat with their shoulders hunched, their faces passive. Wolves weathering a storm.
“Nobody cares what you do at home? Fine. But you’re not going to act like stray animals in my class.”
“Don’t talk about my home,” Misty said quietly, plainly.
Without responding, Mrs. MacKaye turned and walked toward the front of the class. She showed Daniel and Misty her back, signaling they were nothing worth worrying over. The insult only infuriated Misty more. Suddenly, she was on her feet.
“Don’t call me a stray
! Don’t ever insult my family, bitch!” Misty flipped her desk over. It crashed to the floor, making the entire class jump and Mrs. MacKaye whip around.
Daniel saw the teacher cringe from Misty’s snarl. Her eyes were as wide as a frightened rabbit’s. The prey-fear only lasted a moment, though, and it was the only satisfaction Misty would get from the fight.
Mrs. MacKaye remembered this classroom was her territory, and her mouth tightened into a wire-thin line. “Let’s go.”
Misty glanced over her shoulder at Daniel, still frozen in his seat. When he didn’t do anything, she walked out of the class, headed to the main office. Mrs. MacKaye followed her. Just before the teacher disappeared through the doorway, she snapped, “Daniel, fix her desk.”
As soon as they were gone, the entire class turned toward Daniel, watching to see if he would go berserk too. Daniel sat with every muscle tensed. He wished it was night. He wished he was hidden under wolf skin; then he could have chased after Misty, defended her, comforted her.
It was daylight, though, and he was the shooting star. He stood up quietly and tipped Misty’s desk back onto its feet.
• • •
Mr. Fine grilled Misty on what had happened, if she’d called Mrs. MacKaye “b-word.” Misty answered with grunts and shrugs.
Months ago, Angie had insulted Misty, but Misty had kept Marc and Daniel from doing anything about it. It was getting harder to restrain the wolf inside her. Now Misty watched how soft and gray the aging vice-principal was, how sluggishly he moved.
“Glare at me all day. See if I care,” Mr. Fine said. Then he sighed and squeezed the bridge of his nose. “Misty, you just—you can’t throw a fit every time somebody makes you mad. Okay? I talked to Mrs. MacKaye. Is this because she mentioned your home?”
“No.”
Mr. Fine waited for more of an answer. He didn’t get one. “Is your mom still working two jobs?”
Misty studied the carpet and didn’t say anything. She was a wolf. She was strong enough to bear the hate of every slow, stupid hand-licker in this school. But the pity in Mr. Fine’s voice humiliated her. It struck a precise resonance, making Misty’s chin tremble like a wineglass about to shatter.
“I know that’s got to be hard on you and Marc. I know it—”
“You don’t know anything! You think you know everything. Everybody around here thinks they know everything, but they don’t.” She slumped back down in the chair. “Just give me ISS already. Jesus.”
“All right, we’ll do it the hard way. Once again.” He pulled a pad of blue discipline forms from his desk. “You’ve still got two months until graduation. We can spend it making each other miserable, or we can try to stay out of each other’s way. It’s up to you, Misty.”
While he filled out the form, Misty quickly wiped a tear from her eye. Never let anyone see you cry except family.
At lunch, Daniel told the pack what had happened. When Misty sat down with her tray, she just said, “Five days ISS,” and started picking the lettuce out of her taco.
The others seethed. But Misty, her fury already spent, only sulked. Daniel hugged her, told dumb jokes, and tried to make her smile. Misty worried her lip ring and mumbled, “Mom’s going to kill me.”
“Look,” Daniel said. “Sorry I didn’t stand up for you or anything. I should have.”
Misty gave him a sour look, but turned away without saying anything.
When school let out, Misty felt a little better but still didn’t want to face her mom yet. They decided to hang out at Val’s house before the girls went to work. Walking toward the parking lot, Daniel’s phone vibrated in his backpack. It was his mom.
“Where are you?”
“Out with some friends.” Daniel stepped away from his pack, walking into the chattering crowd so they couldn’t overhear. “We’re going to go play some ball. I’ll probably go to Samford from there. Grab something to eat on the way.”
“I talked to Dr. Byrd today.”
Daniel asked, “Who?” Then he remembered Dr. Byrd was his sociology professor. “Oh.”
“You need to get home. Now.” His mom was so mad, she wasn’t even yelling.
“Yeah, okay.” Daniel hung up and jogged back toward the pack. He made up one more lie on the spot, telling them he needed to go babysit his brothers because his dad was working late. Nobody doubted him. Even though he’d let her down a few hours before, Misty gave him two kisses, one for him and the other for Mack.
When he walked through the front door, his mom came out of the kitchen. She started to say something, but Daniel cut her off. “So you’re checking up on me at school too?”
“I called your teachers to see how you were doing and if there was anything we could do to help. And don’t you dare act like I’m Mommy Dearest; you haven’t been going to class!” She smacked him on the side of the head, hard enough to sting. “Do you know how much tuition costs? Or books? Where the hell have you been?”
“Out.”
She smacked him again. “This is a real dumb time to act smart. Out where?”
Daniel sighed. “Mostly down at the Florence Deli.”
She spread her hands in bewilderment. “Why?”
“Because Misty works there.”
She started pacing the living room. “Do you have any idea of the chances you’ve been given? Any idea of the kind of man you can become?”
“Yes.”
“Roll your eyes again, I swear I’ll slap them straight.” His mom lectured him for a solid hour, until his dad got home and took over.
“Do you know how much weVe spent on tuition? And books?”
“Yes,” he growled.
“Daniel, you have gotten where you are by the grace of God and years of busting your ass. And now you’ve decided to chuck it all out the window for what? To hit on some hot little juvenile delinquent?”
That finally made Daniel snap back. “No. I decided to chuck it because I was fucking sick of jumping through hoops for you! I got into fucking Cornell. What the hell else is it going to take to make you happy?” Spit flew from his mouth. His dad saw trashing Misty had stirred something inside Daniel. He didn’t know what that something was, but it still frightened him.
“This isn’t about jumping through hoops, Daniel,” his mom said from the sidelines. “The first day you’re at Cornell, they’ll expect you to carry yourself a certain way. You’re going to have responsibilities you don’t have in high school. So you can go to college and learn how to act like a college student. Or you can hang out at a fast-food joint and learn how to flip burgers. Those are your two choices, and you don’t get to pick the second one.” She glanced at her watch. “Now get your books and get to school. And when you get home, I want to see notes from each class.”
“I’ll try to take notes, but it’s hard to concentrate sometimes.” Daniel shook his head sadly, then pinned his mom with a glare. “You know, because of this ADHD thing I’ve got.”
His parents’ anger went cold, and their hurt expressions made him happy.
Upstairs, Daniel dug through piles of clothes to find his textbooks. When he came back down, his mom was in the kitchen, making him a sandwich.
“Here, take it with you.”
Daniel pushed the sandwich away and walked out.
Driving through town, he played angry music, stylized threats barking over stripped-down beats. Samford’s campus was over the mountain in Homewood. Daniel got as far as the rock cut Val had tagged two months ago. Black against the brick-colored stone, the wolf heads were just visible high above the expressway lights.
Daniel pulled to the shoulder of the road. His stereo still snarling, he stared at the signs marking the border of the pack’s territory. He tried to imagine going to Misty, confessing everything, and telling her he was ready become a true wolf. But Daniel had been lying to himself all these months just as much as he’d been lying to the pack.
Supposedly, time slows down during a wreck. The instant it takes for a tire to blow ou
t and one car to hurl into another becomes an eye-blink eternity. People emerge with vivid memories of glass shattering, metal crumpling, and watching helplessly as the well-ordered universe explodes all around them. Daniel remembered the year his dad got laid off from Pfizer in the same terrifying detail.
His parents were mad all the time. They had to borrow money from Uncle Josh to keep the lights on. Daniel remembered his dad thanking Uncle Josh for the loan, then asking him to not say anything to Daniel’s grandparents. He remembered when the refrigerator broke. Before, it would be a problem cured with a little cussing and pulling out the checkbook. With the bills already piling up, though, it was what made his dad finally break. Daniel remembered taking Fischer outside to play so they could pretend not to hear him crying.
When his dad got a job with GSK, things started getting better. But his parents emerged from that car-crash year with a new determination. The world would never spin out of their sons’ control like it had theirs.
At the hospital, Daniel’s mom emptied bed pans and changed wound dressings for him. His dad spent days on the road and slept in his car for him. They still didn’t know how they were going to pay for Cornell except that extra shifts and years off their own lives meant nothing if their children escaped the rot-eater god.
Daniel kicked the underpanel of his dash. He kept kicking until his boot smashed a hole in it. He kept kicking as chunks of plastic fell to the floorboard and kept kicking until he was exhausted enough to actually think.
He thought about Misty’s troubled home and Eric, whose brother was dead. They knew as well as Daniel how easily life could go freewheeling. The only difference was they couldn’t depend on the shooting star’s charm, talent, and miraculous luck to get them through.
They had nothing to grasp on to except their pride and their pack. They had to be strong enough to defend both, day after day after day.
Unleashed Page 14
