“What did you tell Mr. Fine?” Val demanded.
“Nothing.”
“Bullshit,” Marc spat. “Everything you’ve said has been bullshit.”
“No, it hasn’t. It’s just-”
“He didn’t give us up.” Glancing at the crowd, Misty hissed between her teeth. “You’re going to give us up acting psycho in front of school. Get out of here.”
They backed off. Marc and Eric headed toward the parking lot. Val tugged on Misty’s hand to follow. For months, Misty had refused to ask Daniel, or herself, certain questions. When Val tried asking them for her, Misty had blown up. Now, she hugged her best friend, whispering, “Wait for me. I’ll explain everything, okay?”
As soon as Val left, Daniel looked at Misty and sucked in a ragged breath. “I’m so sorry. I should have told you. I should have told you a hundred different times. But I was worried you’d just see that one thing about me, that I’m going to some stupid college, and decide that’s all I was. I was scared, okay? I was scared because you were the most amazing person I’d ever met. Before this wolf shit, this pack shit, you were amazing.”
“Quit! Just quit. I was a gutterfuck.”
“No. Misty, you weren’t.”
“Yes, I was!” More humiliating than any of it was that part of her still loved him. Part of her was still desperate to believe the brightest, most beautiful boy in school could really love her. Misty wanted that part dead. “Tell me the truth just once, Daniel. Tell me I was a gutterfuck. I was a stupid, gullible slut you could hump and dump once you went on to better things.”
Daniel stood shaking his head, saying, “No, no.” Little gaggles of hand-lickers watched them.
Taking a step closer to Daniel, Misty dropped her voice again. “Go to Cornell. Go back to your jock friends. Go back to Angie, for all I care. But keep your mouth shut. Stay out of our business, and well stay out of yours.”
“Misty, please—”
Turning before he could lie to her again, Misty rushed up the sidewalk toward the safety of the pack.
CHAPTER 17
Daniel hadn’t shown up at lunch, either too scared to face them, or maybe, after his secret was out, he just didn’t care enough to explain. The pack had panicked, though, certain he’d spilled everything to Mr. Fine. Even after Misty told them the police weren’t about to swoop in, they still felt betrayed.
“I told you he wasn’t like us.” Eric’s face was dusky red. Tendons bulged from his neck. “But the pouty basketball star winks, and you get all stupid. ’Oh, of course we can trust him, look how pretty his hair is.’”
“Screw you!” Misty snapped back. “I wasn’t the only one who got stupid over him, was I? ’Gee, Daniel, thanks for saving my butt in the school. Let’s have a big, manly hug now.’” Turning, she hit Marc. “And quit nodding along with him. You’re wearing the same damn body spray as Daniel, dumbass.”
Marc rubbed his arm without answering. Eric punched the roof of Val’s car, but he didn’t say anything else.
Misty could almost smell the boys’ admiration curdle. Daniel was quick-thinking and confident. Everything seemed effortless for him. They’d all let themselves pretend they could be a little like him.
Daniel had never been part of the pack, though, just slumming. Once the game lost its thrill, he’d intended to leave them and their grimy city behind.
Misty had never felt more trapped by her crappy job than she did that day. Her world might be collapsing, but people still needed their panini Italianos and smoked turkey breast on ryes. All afternoon Misty punched the wrong buttons on the cash register and gave the wrong change.
One woman became personally offended when Misty didn’t take the cheese off her vegetarian pizza. She hovered around the counter after Misty ordered up a new one. She’d told Misty she didn’t want any cheese. She was lactose intolerant and couldn’t eat cheese. She’d told Misty that.
Misty cracked. “Okay! I’m sorry, but I’m not trying to poison you.”
Ilie took her off the register, sticking her in the back doing prep work. But she started thinking again while slicing up tomatoes, dropping them in a dirty bucket with half an inch of jalapeno pepper juice still in the bottom. Ilie, who usually bore her goofing off with Eastern Bloc stoicism, noticed the eye-watering smell, and it was his turn to crack.
“Throw this out, start over, do one thing right!” He stormed off, shouting, “I hope your mother dies on your birthday!”
Misty threw the bucket against the wall. Pulp splattered everywhere. Val and another deli drone froze, staring at Misty with wide eyes. Watching tomato slices ooze down the cinder blocks, Misty considered kicking in Ilie’s office door, cussing him out, and quitting. Instead, she leaned against the prep table, burying her face in her arms. Without a word, Val got a towel and started washing off the wall.
Somehow, Misty stumbled through two more hours of slicing, stocking, and cleaning without collapsing into a sobbing heap. By eight, there was only one couple in the deli. Older, they were new to each other. She listened to them laugh. When the man finished his potato chips, the woman shared hers. Misty wanted to hit them. Instead, she finished scraping the brown gunk off the soda fountains, then went to poke her head in Ilie’s office.
“Need anything else?”
Ilie was making changes to the week’s schedule. Iron Maiden played on the little stereo on his desk. Shaking his head, he said, “Remember to clock out.”
“All right.” She lingered in the doorway. “Hey. Sorry about everything tonight.”
“You got problems outside? So does everybody, okay? But in here, I pay you to work, okay?”
“Okay. Good night.”
She turned to leave, but Ilie called her back. “Misty?”
“Yeah?”
“You’re very pretty today.”
“Huh?”
“You never come in without the dead girl eyes anymore. You’re very pretty today.”
Misty washed her eyeliner before coming to work, afraid she’d start crying again. Ilie told her she was pretty in the same hurried tone he told her to mop the floor. Still, it made her smile for the first time that night.
“Thanks. You’re looking good yourself.”
He let out the soft grunt that meant he couldn’t tell if she was making fun of him or not. “Don’t worry about Softhead. You’ll find a new boy, no problem. And that thing about hoping your mother dies, I didn’t mean.” He shrugged. “It sounds funnier in Russian.”
“Forget it. Good night, Ilie.”
“Good night.”
Val was already outside waiting on the sidewalk. Misty raced up to her. “Ilie just gave me a compliment.”
“What?”
“He goes, You’re very pretty today.’” Misty mimicked Ilie’s gruff accent. “Then he apologized for wishing Mom would die.”
“The nicest thing he’s ever said to me is, ’At least you don’t steal.’”
“How pathetic am I that Ilie feels sorry for me?”
Val hugged her. Misty rested her chin on Val’s shoulder. “Did I really throw a bucket of tomatoes?”
“Just a small one.”
Misty laughed, then Val said, “Hey. Let’s go prowl.”
“No.” Misty pulled away. “The guys are ready to maul Daniel.”
“Well, maybe not maul him. But we could make sure he knows you’re not just sitting around feeling sorry for yourself.”
Misty grinned but shook her head. “Come on, Val. We have to be at school in twelve hours.”
“You’re going to be in ISS. You need a full night’s rest for that?”
“Or a shower?”
“So you’ll stink. After everything else, you really care?”
Misty had wanted to quit prowling altogether. But if she went home, she’d lay awake all night in the empty apartment. Through the dark hours, the way Daniel smiled, the way he touched her and spoke her name would crush Misty. The wolf, though, would shake those fragments of dreams off like d
roplets of water. Misty couldn’t escape who she really was.
“Screw it,” she said. “Call Eric and see if he’s up for it.”
I was a gutterfuck.
Daniel stared at a blank page in his notebook. He’d tried to explain at school, but Misty had been too furious to listen. As soon as he’d gotten home, Daniel locked himself in his room to write her a letter. He couldn’t let Misty think she’d been nothing but a piece of tail.
He started a line, scratched through it, started over, tore the page out, and started over again. The sun sank through an orange-and-purple sky. Fischer called him to dinner from the foot of the stairs. Daniel ignored him. Darkness fell before he got past the second sentence. He stared at the debate medal hanging on the wall above his desk, remembered it was for persuasive speaking, and sneered at himself.
Daniel paced the room. He started talking to an imaginary Misty. He tried opening with apologies, then with compliments. He told her she was beautiful, so full of heat and life, he’d felt more alive being near her. He could never forget her, but this was his one chance to become someone great. He had to take it.
Misty never said anything except, I was a gutterfuck. That silent answer smashed every pretty, spun-glass phrase Daniel came up with. Yanking the debate medal off the wall, he whipped it across the room.
Finally, hours after his parents and brothers had gone to bed, Daniel had nothing left except the sickening realization that Misty had been right.
She was full of heat and life, and Daniel had fed off her like a tick. He’d loved watching her build castles in the air but had no plans to stick around once they came crashing down. He would be taking his place among the real towers of Cornell by then. Misty had opened herself to him, revealing wonders and gentle enchantments, but Daniel had been too cowardly and obsessed with his own hungers to appreciate them.
“You weren’t anything but a gutterfuck to me,” he whispered. It was the most vile sin Daniel had ever confessed.
He unbuckled his boots. Leather straps and black rubber stripped away, his feet seemed fragile. Daniel studied them for a long time, then finished getting ready for bed. He was reaching for the light switch when howls pierced the quiet.
Daniel had never invited Misty to his house, but she knew he lived below Vulcan Park. Standing in his underwear, Daniel pushed back the window blind. Nothing moved on the street outside.
The unseen wolves let their pitches rise, then drop sharply. It was an instinctual trick, making it sound like Daniel was surrounded by dozens of hunters instead of four.
He forced himself to stay calm. If the pack had come to hurt him, they would have kept as silent as shadows. They only wanted to rattle him, have a little fun. Still, Daniel crept barefoot through the dark house, into bedrooms, and past his sleeping parents and brothers. He made sure every window was latched and both doors were bolted.
For close to an hour, he sat listening to Misty’s mournful baying in chorus with the others. They wanted him to know, We are still here. Our pack is still strong. You’ve made your choice. You don’t belong on our streets anymore.
CHAPTER 18
The days grew hotter. At school, smooth skin—arms, calves, and bare toes—appeared along with the buttercups. Before first bell, the pack hunched around their picnic table, watching over one another’s shoulders.
One morning, Marc grumbled, “Let’s just go.”
“No,” Misty said.
“I’m not putting up with this bullshit anymore. Let’s just go.”
Marc didn’t want to skip class. He wanted to leave school for good. Misty imagined how free it would feel to just stand up and walk away, but she shook her head. “Mom wants you to graduate.”
“So?”
“So she’s put up with your whiny ass for eighteen years. So you’re gonna put up with this for a few more weeks. So be quiet already.”
Their mom had never finished high school, and she dreamed of seeing Misty and Marc in caps and gowns. Misty once overheard her praying for them to graduate. It was a stupid thing to pray for, a piece of paper saying Misty had jumped through the hoops like a good little hand-licker. But their mom had broken her body for her and Marc. Misty could bear school a while longer.
Marc turned to Eric. “Let’ s just go.”
Eric didn’t bother looking at him. “It’s less hassle just to go than it would be to drop out.”
Suddenly, Val lifted her head. Eric and Marc turned too. The three wolves followed Daniel as he trudged past them up the sidewalk. Only Misty pretended not to notice him, studying the chipped edge of the cement picnic table.
Misty knew he was watching her from the corner of his eye. With her pack bristling around her, she risked a glance. Even ragged and worn thin, Daniel was still gorgeous. He’d shed his boots for white sneakers again, but he hadn’t gone back to his letterman friends like Misty assumed he would. Instead, Daniel Morning, the prince of McCammon High, had spent the last two weeks scuttling along its walls like a rat.
He’d tried talking to her since their breakup. He kept leaving messages on her phone, but Misty erased them before giving in to the temptation of listening. She wasn’t strong enough to hear Daniel’s voice, to remember everything she couldn’t have.
Misty couldn’t stand hurting anymore. She let the pack tighten around her and keep Daniel away. She let hate cover her too-tender heart the way the wolf’s tough hide enveloped her weak human shape.
The pack relaxed as Daniel slipped out of sight again among the crowd. “Little bitch,” Eric muttered. “Little over-the-mountain-wannabe.”
Misty gave a sneering laugh and rested her chin on her arms.
Workers pieced the school back together. Glass reappeared in windows, and classrooms reopened with fresh coats of paint. The police left without making any arrests. But most of the teachers still seemed to at least suspect it had been Daniel and the pack who’d broken into the school.
The day Misty got out of ISS, Daniel had gone up to her in Mrs. MacKaye’s class and tried telling her about the things he’d been thinking about.
“Misty-”
“Leave me alone.” Misty scribbled across the cover of her notebook, creating a dense black spiral.
“I’m sorry, okay?”
“I don’t care what you are. Leave me alone.”
“Daniel,” Mrs. MacKaye snapped, pointing to a seat across the room. “Go sit behind Devynn.”
“Class hasn’t even started yet.”
Walking up to them, the teacher hissed, “Give me a reason to get you two out of my class.”
Afraid of landing Misty back in ISS and making things even worse, Daniel moved behind Devynn. Since then, he spent his days staying as unnoticeable as possible.
Sometimes Misty would glance at him across the classroom or before school. Daniel knew how deeply he’d hurt her. Every time he tried to apologize, though, she hunkered behind the pack and that damn pride he’d once loved.
He avoided the cafeteria and usually went to the library during lunch. Sneaking bites of a granola bar one day, Daniel overheard a couple girls talking about Keith throwing a party. Stealing his cousin’s girlfriend had been good for Keith’s self-esteem. Whenever Daniel saw him now, his hand rested on the small of Angie’s back. He stood taller, and his laugh even seemed louder. Daniel remembered when he used to feel like that.
At home, he spent most of his time studying. Besides ditching his extracurriculars, Daniel had let his grades fall so badly, he might fail if he crapped out on his finals. It seemed surreal that, at the beginning of the semester, he’d been within grasping distance of valedictorian.
One day he came down to forage for food just as his mom walked in from the front porch with two iced-tea glasses.
“Your aunt Leslie was just here,” she said. “You going to this party of Keith’s?”
“Huh? No.”
“Leslie and Josh were going to buy him a new car for
graduation. Now, he wants the money for some huge
party instead.”
Daniel ripped open a package of string cheese. “I don’t know anything about it.”
“Well, listen. We need to get up to Boaz soon while winter clothes are still on sale.”
“I already have a coat.”
“No, you have a jacket. You’re heading up to New York, Daniel. People die from the cold up there.”
“They do not.”
“Do you know what hypothermia is? Frostbite?”
“It’s not the Arctic, Mom.”
She sighed, sick of arguing with him all the time. “Fine. When your fingers fall off and you need somebody to unzip your fly for you, you tell them I warned you.”
She turned, started walking away, and then Daniel mumbled, “Misty found out I’m going to Cornell.”
“What?”
He said it again. He felt pitiful confiding in his mom, especially after the way he’d been acting, but he didn’t have anybody else to talk to.
“You just got around to telling her you were leaving?”
“Yes.” He rolled his eyes. “Actually, no. She kind of found out by accide—”
Tea splashed his face. Jumping backward, Daniel yelped, “Mom!”
“What is wrong with you? Having fun with girls you don’t plan on marrying is one thing. Outright lying to them is another. I didn’t raise you like that.”
“I know.” Fishing an ice cube out of his shirt, he tossed it in the sink. “I didn’t exactly mean not to tell her, it just—”
“It just what? Slipped your mind for four months? Daniel, that’s enough time for a girl to get so wrapped around a boy, she doesn’t know which way’s up anymore. Then she learns you’re leaving? How do you think she feels, Daniel?”
“She pretty much wants to kick my head in.”
“I’d hold you down while she did.”
“Okay! I screwed up, I get it. But what do I do now?”
“Honey, there’s not much you can do.” She started to pat his hair, then pulled back and wiped her damp hand on her jeans. “Misty feels played and angry and … Why didn’t you just tell her when you started dating?”
“It’s complicated. I didn’t mean to get as involved as I did. I didn’t mean to end up liking her as much as I did. As I do.”
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