by Peter Moore
“I have to get this DVD, and it’s not something I want anyone I know to see me buy.”
“So download it.”
“I don’t want traces of it on my computer. I have to buy it, and I need to be totally anonymous. I figure a million people go through the Kray-Mart every day, so nobody would remember me.”
“Yeah, but to go all the way there for it?” She pulls on her burgundy beret and studies me. “Okay. I know you’re not talking about porn.”
“It’s not porn. I need to get Faces of Change.”
“What? Haven’t you seen it a hundred times, like everyone else on the planet? Why do you need to see it again?”
I grimace. “Because I’m not watching it for entertainment this time. I’m watching it to see my future.”
Being in any other girl’s bedroom would’ve been the thrill of my life, but being in Claire’s is no big deal. I’ve been here at least half a million times, and I think of her like another sister, except not spoiled or snotty or shallow.
Claire puts the DVD in the player. “You want to watch the medical section?” She means all the computer-generated stuff, the MRIs, X-rays, and CAT scans. “Or go right to the action scenes?”
“Skip that. I just want the MTD film—it’s the only part not shot in a lab or with the wulf sedated or something. That’s what I need to see.”
She advances to a freeze-frame at the beginning of the famous clip. It’s an overhead shot of Michael Thomas Delaney, alone and naked in a small concrete cellar, his hands gripping his head. What a way to become famous.
“You sure you want to watch this?” Claire asks.
“No, I’m not sure I want to. But I need to. Go.”
She hits play. The narrator says: “The viewer is warned that the following segments contain graphic images that may be disturbing, especially for children. Viewer discretion is advised.”
The clip is of worse quality than the rest of the show. It was filmed more than fifty years ago. Somehow, it never struck me before how bare the room seems, how lonely, as MTD paces in tight circles, as far as the heavy black chain cuffed to his wrist and attached to the cement wall allows.
The narrator continues. “Michael Thomas Delaney, twenty-six years of age, a native of Cleveland, Ohio, goes through the Change.”
MTD drops to his knees and curls forward like he’s praying. The camera zooms to the bumps of his spine getting bigger and wider.
A minute later the hair on his body grows thick. I feel itchy.
The shot switches to a close-up of his face. His eyes are squeezed shut. There’s the sound of bone cracking. A ripple runs across his cheeks as the bones move. His nose and jaw start to push out.
I’m getting dizzy.
And that spray of blood from the corners of his mouth where his lips split and rip…
A different angle shows his hands curling, changing shape, joints bulging. Another angle shows the same thing happening to his feet.
Back to his face. More crunching of bone, and his brow flattens.
And then the scream, that scream that little boys playing vampyres vs. werewulves always try to imitate.
It starts as a human wail of pain, then gets scratchy and guttural, taking on an animal pitch, a sound that humans can’t duplicate. It’s the howl of misery. The agony of the Change.
In nineteen days, that’ll be me.
As soon as I get in Jessica’s car, I tear off the disposable Sol-Blok suit Claire gave me, ball it up, and throw it into the backseat. Jess sets her jaw and hits the gearshift hard, her coveralls making a crinkly sound. “My car is not your garbage can. Don’t even think about leaving that there.”
“Fine. Whatever.”
She puts the car into gear and heads off down the street. “And you’re welcome for the ride home,” she says. “It’s no problem.”
“I’m guessing that Mom made you come get me. But thanks anyway.” I look out the Sol-Blok-treated passenger window. The sun is starting to rise. That DVD really shook me up.
I hear the crinkle of her SB suit and I can figure that she’s turned to look at me. “What’s wrong with you?” she asks.
“Nothing. Just tired.”
She drives for a while without saying anything. Then, “So Alexis told me something interesting.” I wait for it. “She said she saw you with this girl in school. A girl with brown hair, a human girl, she thought. She told me it seemed like you and this girl were…together.” She takes her hands off the steering wheel to make air quotes around the word together.
“Yeah? And?”
Jess shrugs. “You were telling the truth the other night. You do have a little girlfriend. And even though she’s a human, according to Alexis, this ‘Juliet’ was actually pretty normal. Decent looking, even.”
“I’m so relieved that your friend gave Juliet a good report. I don’t know what I would’ve done if she hadn’t.” I look back out my window.
“So,” she says. “Dante Gray has a girlfriend. Amazing. I’m stunned. I’ll have to talk to this girl and make sure she doesn’t corrupt my baby brother.”
“Don’t even think of talking to her. Ever. About anything.”
She looks at me. “Awww. That’s so cute.” She turns her attention back to the road but reaches over with her right hand to pinch my cheek.
I slap her hand away. “Don’t think I won’t punch you in the arm,” I say.
She laughs at me. “Ooh, touchy touchy. Is someone in love? Is my baby brother becoming a man?”
If she only knew what I’m really becoming. In less than three weeks.
I figure I might as well hit the homework. I fire up the computer and open the paper I’m writing for history. On the news feed, they’re doing the monthly tallies from the compounds.
“Compound W5-188-M in Bakersfield, Wisconsin, had the highest number of casualties this month, with a whopping twenty-eight confirmed. D8-402-M in Newark, T9-498-M in Oakland, and K4-296-F outside El Paso all come in second place with twenty-four confirmed. Rounding out the top five is M3-042-M in the Bronx, New York, with twenty-three confirmed. That’s the forty-fifth consecutive week that M3-042-M has been in the top five. Federal inspectors are investigating the high mortality rate.” This is all reported with the visuals of body bags being loaded into trucks, and a lineup of more trucks waiting for the compound gates to open. Then, of course, there’s the “art shot” of the full moon glowing behind a guard tower.
That’s a lot of dead wulves. They don’t even bother counting the injured.
“Once again, this is outrageous and unacceptable,” says Huey Seele. As usual, his head is shaved to show off all his bumps and cranial misalignments. No beard, either, because he wants his jagged cheekbones, flattened nose, and crooked jaw to be on display. He’s always on the news, getting arrested at some rally or protest. Mom isn’t the only person who thinks he’s a loudmouth “agitator.” Most vamps can’t stand him. “The conditions at the compounds are deplorable,” he shouts into a microphone, spit flying. “Not to mention the fact that this imprisonment of wulves—American citizens, mind you—is a complete violation of our civil rights. I don’t care about the twenty-second amendment, executive orders, or any of that legislation. They’re all unconstitutional and need to be repealed. This is fascism, pure and simple.”
I can see why he’d be mad about the compounds and what he calls “illegal internment.” But I’m not sure what else could be done. I mean, during the Change, wulves become feral. They’re dangerous.
I guess I shouldn’t be saying they anymore. More accurate to say we.
Then there’s the whole thing that happened to Craig. What if he’d never made it out of the compound—if he was one of the casualties I just heard about on the news?
And there’s other stuff everyone hears. Like about guards throwing the werewulves into pits and having “wulf fights,” betting on who will win. I’ve heard about torture and medical experiments. Of course the LPCB claims the rumors are unfounded and that the c
ompounds are strictly monitored for safety and humane conditions.
There’s a knock on my door, and after I call yeah, Mom and Troy come in. He closes the door slowly.
Uh-oh. This can’t be good.
“Dante,” Mom begins. “We know there’s something going on that you’re not telling us.”
“What?” No. I’ve been too careful. Nothing on my computer, no texts on my phone, no slips when talking around them.
“Come on, sport,” Troy says. “We’d like to help. Whatever it is, you can tell us. We won’t be upset.”
That’s what you think. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
He looks at Mom, then puts his hands behind his back and leans against the wall. Mom looks at the image on my window monitor for a few seconds. It’s a dark and cloudy day. There’s fog in the nature preserve.
“You didn’t swallow something the wrong way at dinner,” she says. “You were nauseated.”
“No. I wasn’t—”
She holds her palm out to me, eyes closed. “Please. I know what I saw. You were ashen, and with your complexion, going pallid is not a sign of perfect health. Your Thirst seems odd. You’ve been irritable, argumentative with your sisters.”
“We’re always argumentative.”
“I’m not a fool. Something is wrong and I want to know what it is. Are you doing illegal drugs? Coumidex?”
Troy stands up and puts his hands on his hips. “Dan. Straight and true: are you hooked in?”
I can’t help but laugh, but I make myself get serious. This conversation could head into dangerous territory. “Look. I swear to you that I’m not doing any drugs.”
“Well, be that as it may, I’m making an appointment with the doctor. There is something wrong and I won’t leave it untreated.”
The doctor. That’ll mean a complete physical. And blood tests. “I’m not sick, Mom. If I were, I’d tell you.”
“Well, considering that you don’t have a medical license and aren’t qualified to make that determination, I think we’ll just leave it to an expert. I’ll schedule an appointment for tomorrow night after school.”
“Mom—”
“I’ll tell you what time as soon as I know.”
After they leave I lock my bedroom door and wait to hear them settle in to watch TV. I dial Dad on my cell phone.
“How you doing?” he asks. I can hear hammering and power tools. He’s on a job.
“Getting by, I guess.”
“Hang on, I can’t hear you.” The construction noises fade as he goes somewhere quieter. “Okay. What were you saying?”
“I said I’m getting by. But we have to do something about Mom.”
“Something like what?” he says.
“We have to tell her. And soon.”
The girls are out shopping and Troy is in Romania on business, so it seemed like a good time to tell her. She is not taking the news well.
Mom screamed at Dad like it was his fault. He waited until she was done.
It’s been a while since I’ve seen them in the same room together. One thing I notice now is that, even though they’re about the same age, he looks ten or fifteen years older than she does. Vampyres don’t age the same way wulves and humans do.
She pours herself a drink. Nothing for him.
“Look, Kat,” he says.
“I’ve told you, I don’t go by ‘Kat’ anymore.”
“Okay, fine. Katherine. I don’t know why you’re acting like this is a total surprise.”
She ignores his comment. “Who is this so-called doctor, anyway? Maybe he’s wrong. If I had been told about this, I would have found a top-notch specialist. And that’s what I’m going to do.”
“Great idea. Your top-notch specialist is going to report Danny to the LPCB, as he’s required to do. My guy is committed to a cause. Money can’t buy everything.”
She turns my way. “So clearly this is what all that odd behavior was about.”
“Yeah. I wasn’t ready to tell you. Yet.”
“Of course not. I’m only your mother. Why shouldn’t I be left completely in the dark?”
“Lookit. Kat,” Dad says. She shoots him a look. He smiles, trying his best to seem patient. “Katherine, then. Listen. When we had kids, you knew half their genes would be mine. Twenty-three vampyre chromosomes and twenty-three wulven ones. It’s biology.”
“That’s exactly why we did the genetic treatments. On both kids. Something you agreed to, I might add.”
“Right,” Dad said. “Because I didn’t want them to suffer through the Change. Nobody would want that for their kids.”
“We also didn’t want them to grow up with the stigma. We didn’t want the children to be wulven.”
“No, Kat, you didn’t want them to be wulven. That’s your issue. I just didn’t want them to suffer.”
She glares at him. His jaw is set. He’s not giving an inch.
She turns to me. Maybe I’m imagining it, maybe I’m being too sensitive, but I would say she’s looking at me the same way she would look at a pig or a monkey that had run loose in the house and soiled her white carpet.
She turns away. “What am I supposed to tell Troy?”
“You don’t tell him one damned thing. Nothing.”
“You expect me to keep this secret from my husband?”
“Danny is your son. If word gets out, even by a slip, think of what could happen to him.”
“I can’t…I just cannot abide this.”
That really pisses me off. “So, what do you want me to do?” I ask. “Disappear? Move out? Say the word, and I’ll go live with Dad. Is that what you want?”
She stops for a couple of seconds, which is a couple of seconds too long, before she says, “No, of course not. I’m not saying that at all.”
But I saw it. That hesitation. The right answer would have been immediate. Instantaneous. A clear Absolutely not! We’ll figure out some way to make this work. You’re my son, and I love you, no matter what. Not quite the answer she gave.
Now I really want to get out of here. Not just out of the room. Out of the house. I go over to Dad and whisper to him. “Could I stay at your place for a while?”
“I was thinking the same thing.” He talks to my mother’s back. “Maybe it’s a good idea for Danny to stay with me for now.”
“I’m not sure we need to do that,” she says. “I’ll certainly be able to come up with a solution once I have a chance to think. I just need a moment.”
It takes me maybe five minutes to pack a bag and get out to his car.
I don’t say good-bye. I don’t say anything when I leave the house.
I sit on the bed and stare at the duffel I brought. Should I unpack? I mean, how long will I be here? When it comes down to it I have no idea what’s going on anymore, where I’ll be, or even what I’ll be, a few weeks from now.
I’m in the room where I slept when I used to come on the weekends years ago. Same bed, same little dresser, same blackout curtains over the window. It’s all the same, but everything feels different now. There’s a soft knock, and Dad pushes the door open. He leans against the frame.
“I’m sorry it went that way with your mother.” He squints at the door hinge and touches it like he’s checking to make sure it’s straight. I think he just doesn’t want to look at me.
“Should I go ahead and put my stuff in the dresser?”
“I guess so. No reason not to.”
I’m waiting for him to say, “Don’t worry. She’ll come around,” or something, but he just sighs.
I get up and drag the duffel over to the dresser. It’s a simple wood bureau, and the drawer squeaks when I open it. “I can’t believe she’s just going to give up on me.”
He doesn’t say anything for a while. I put my socks in the drawer. I probably should have brought more.
“Look,” he says. “You know I try not to talk bad about your mother to you. But the truth is that she can be a difficult woman at times.”
“She’s not difficult with Troy. Or Jess. Or Paige.”
“Well, I don’t know about that.”
“She’s difficult with you and sometimes with me. It’s pretty obvious why.”
“Yeah? And why’s that?”
“Um, duh? She’s got a thing against wulves.”
“I won’t argue that. But I can’t see her taking it out on you.”
“Really? What just happened an hour ago?”
“We did take her by surprise with some pretty big news.”
“It’s not just that. She wants me to be blond, she wants me to be taller, more…She wants me to be a vamp.”
“On the surface, maybe,” he says, but if he’s trying to change my mind about her, or make me feel better, it’s not working.
“Come on, Dad. Seriously. She’s disappointed that I didn’t turn out all blond and vamplike. For her, everything turned to crap when my genetic treatments didn’t work and she ended up with half a doglet.”
“No,” he says. “It wasn’t like that at all.”
I shrug. “Whatever. It doesn’t make any difference now. We have too much other stuff to worry about.”
“That’s true. But we will get through this,” he says. “That’s one thing I can promise you.”
That’s a lie. He means well, but he doesn’t know. He can’t promise. Being a wulf means a lot of things, but it doesn’t mean you can predict the future.
Ms. O’Conner is in the front of the room, holding the Shakespeare book with her finger stuck inside to keep her place. “I know all of you read the first act of King Wain last night, as assigned.” Um, no, actually. I completely forgot. “So we’re going to look at Wain’s monologue to Merinio in Act one, Scene four.” She opens her book and waits for us to find the page. When almost everyone has found it, she starts to read:
“Come, Merinio, bring my sword and dagger. Marry, I will gird myself and faithful, I will cut out their hearts. They are curs, the filthy wulves and devilish vampyres. Wherefore they doth breathe the air we breathe, walk in the light of our moon, under the heavens above man. They doth offend mine senses and spirit. Would that they had withered in their mothers’ accursed wombs, never to sully the eyes or spirit of man.”
