I’d never admit it to anyone, but this place is not so bad. We have everything we need, and though Harmon isn’t exactly Prince Charming, he’s not terrible company. It’s a hell of a lot better than being alone.
“You said you eat this with your hands?” he asks, looking doubtful. I know he doesn’t like to eat in front of me, that it embarrasses him. Before tonight, we’ve never eaten together at the table. He eats under the ladder, turning his back to me so I can’t see his clumsiness.
“Yes,” I say, reaching into the basket and carefully lifting it out. It’s still on the cardboard backing that frozen pizza comes on, the one that goes in the oven with the pizza. Aside from that, nothing. No forks or plates, and no knives, not even a plastic one.
“Normally, you’d have it sliced in triangles,” I say. “But I guess we’re just going to have to tear it apart with our hands.” I rip off an uneven piece and, seeing Harmon’s expression, I hand it across to him. He takes it without a word. When I’ve sat down opposite him, I take a big bite, thinking I’ll let some cheese hang down my chin or something, so he doesn’t feel too bad eating in front of me. But as soon as I take a bite, I forget all about Harmon.
I’m at a pool party in sixth grade, everyone running out of the pool when the girl’s mom pushed open the screen door and came out back carrying a stack of pizza boxes. I’m at Mrs. Nguyen’s, sitting on the couch beside her, watching TV and pushing cats away with my feet while I hold a slice of pizza and try to tear through the overdone crust with my teeth. I’m at a movie with Emmy and her boyfriend, giggling at my pepperoni burps while she shushes me because she wants her boyfriend to think she’s mature. We’re alone at my house the last summer we had together, picking bits of brown cheese off a blackened crust, trying to salvage whatever edible parts we could.
“This is your favorite food?” Harmon asks as I reach to rip off another hunk of it. He’s only eaten half of his. At least I didn’t have to pretend to be messy to make him feel better. I just scarfed down pizza faster than a boy. And I totally don’t care.
“Yup,” I say through a mouthful of my next piece.
“It’s kind of like this is my last meal,” Harmon says, staring down at his slice.
“You know what a last meal is, but you don’t know what pizza is.”
“I know what it is,” he corrects me again.
“And?”
“It’s okay.”
“Okay?” I ask, then slump in my chair, chewing slowly. “Yeah, you’re right. Tepid pizza from a box isn’t the same. When we get out of here, we’ll get a real pizza.”
He sets down his pizza and forces his eyes to mine. “Stella, listen…”
“We’re getting out,” I say. “And if your people won’t have you for a leader, I’ll take you with me. It’s kind of crappy that they haven’t come to get you, don’t you think? I mean, even if you are injured and you can’t be their leader, they could at least negotiate to get you back. Or do they have some policy about bargaining with kidnappers?”
“Everyone is doing what’s right for the pack,” he says, picking up his pizza again. “The pack’s second-in-command will make sure of it. Our job isn’t to question that. It’s to think of what’s best for everyone, regardless of our selfish whims.”
“Well, I’m not a wolf,” I remind him. “I still have selfish whims. Speaking of, don’t you think it’s a little weird that we were talking about this literally yesterday, and today pizza shows up in our dinner bucket?”
Harmon drops his half-eaten slice, and his eyes fix on the window above. A shudder goes through his body like a wave, and he braces his hands on the table until it’s gone. “I’m going to go lie down,” he says quietly, staring at his hand as if he can will it to turn human again.
“Oh—okay.”
He stumbles from his chair, draws his human leg under him, and lurches towards the tunnel.
“Do you need anything?” I ask as he steps inside, his tail disappearing behind him.
“No,” he calls back sharply.
The pizza is not nearly as appetizing once the memories dissipate and my taste buds adjust to this new, old taste. Now it’s just lame, cardboard-flavored pizza with rubbery cheese on top. I nibble at the crust a while, managing to finish my piece. Then I wrap up the leftovers. Dad was a cold-pizza-for-breakfast guy, but I never saw the appeal. Still, it’s a change from the healthy, homecooked meals. Sometimes, you just need junk food.
Outside, twilight is falling. I read for a few minutes, until the light filtering through the window is too dim. Thunder rumbles somewhere across the mountains. Glancing at both doors to make sure I’m alone, I push the chair over to the bookshelf, the one with games and random junk on it. Above it, the wedge of freedom beckons. I don’t care if rain comes in and everything gets wet.
I want to smell that clean, wet air that comes up from the earth when it rains, as if the forest, the world, is breathing. I want to reach my arms out the window, let the raindrops run down my skin, soaking me until my shirt clings to me the way it only does in the rain. I want to let my fingertips dance with raindrops, with the wind and the tiny white petals I see plastered to the windowpanes in the morning.
And oddly, I want to go and get Harmon, to make him stand up in the chair next to me, to reach his fingers towards freedom with me.
I climb down and duck into the tunnel. It’s completely dark inside, and I have to feel my way along. For a second, I think he’s locked me out. But when I give the door a healthy shove, it creaks open. Harmon is lying under the ladder, like usual. I sneak a quick peek at the vegetable bin, but the lid is still down. I don’t know how I’m going to have a conversation with Mrs. Nguyen while Harmon lies right here.
But who cares if he hears us plotting? By then, he’ll know I was lying, that I never intended to join his pack. If she has a way out, I’ll take it. I’ll be free tomorrow, and he’ll be left in this dungeon alone.
It isn’t so bad here, I remind myself. He’ll be fine.
“There’s a storm blowing in,” I say, taking a step closer to him. It feels wrong not to say goodbye. It’s not like he’s ever going to replace Emmy, but we’re not enemies anymore, either.
His eyes roll up towards me, and all I see is the animal in him. A scared puppy.
I take a step closer. “Are you okay?”
“No,” he says. “This is it, Stella. What if I can’t do it?”
“You can,” I say, moving to join him now that I know he’s not going to go all savage wolf again, like he did the first day. I kneel beside him, sitting back on my heels. “You will. You’ve been working hard. You’re strong.”
He grimaces, and we both turn towards the window, where flickers of lightning have begun to show as it grows dark outside. When I turn back, he has that dazed look in his eyes, like he’s concentrating very hard on something.
“It’s not working,” he whispers.
“Give it time,” I say. “You have all night.”
“Will you stay with me?” The arrogant boy is gone, the proud Alpha, the angry wolf who throws tantrums, all the airs he puts on, that everyone puts on. It’s just him, the real him, and it breaks my heart.
It breaks my heart that he trusts me so much, that he would show me himself at his most vulnerable, when I don’t deserve that trust. When I’m using him at best, deserting him at worst. So I take his hand, and I do the kindest thing I can think of. I lie.
“For a while,” I say, linking my fingers through his. The fur between his fingers is softer than I’d imagined, downy and white. He closes his eyes, and I watch the room grow darker, darker, and the lightning flash brighter, so frequent it’s like a strobe light outside. Thunder rumbles distantly, but the bin stays closed.
Another shudder goes through Harmon’s body, this one stronger, and I think for a second he’s dry heaving. His fingers tighten around mine, his body tense. Something wet snaps inside his body, and I want to heave, too. But he lets out a hoarse cry of pain, and then I
forget about being disgusted by what’s happening to him, by how his human leg is so long and thick and naked, and his wolf body is so doglike, and his face is so unnatural and bizarre. I stroke his hand, and I tell him he’s going to get through this and everything will be okay.
“What if I don’t?” he asks, his voice muffled by his blanket, where he’s buried his face.
“You will,” I say. “You won’t die from transitioning.” In truth, I have no idea if he could or not. I only know that he’s in pain, and it’s my job to give him hope.
“What if this is the curse?” he asks. “Dr. Golden said a witch laid a curse on me but she couldn’t tell me what it would do. What if it kills me when I transition?”
“It won’t.”
He doesn’t answer, too caught up in the pain of his body rearranging itself. I stroke his fur and try to be strong, to swallow my tears.
“Talk to me,” he says when that round of shudders subsides. “Tell me something.”
“About what?”
“It doesn’t matter,” he says. “Just talk. Please.”
So I tell him more about life in Oklahoma City. I talk about my teachers, about school and selfies and the bands I liked. I talk until my voice is wearing thin, and the thunder is closer, louder. Rain begins to fall. Something rustles in the onion bin.
Why didn’t we come up with a signal, a way for me to tell Mrs. Nguyen it’s safe?
She must figure it out herself, because the lid doesn’t open. I keep talking. I tell Harmon about getting left in Bricktown by Emmy’s boyfriend and having to call our parents to rescue us. About middle school dances, and sleepovers, and movie theaters, and fashion magazines. “It’s silly,” I say. “I wanted to be a model.” I’ve never told anyone that except him. And each time I tell him, it seems sillier, farther removed from reality.
Harmon’s voice is raspy and dreamlike. “You should be a model.”
“You should get some sleep,” I say.
“You should, too.” He’s still now, not seizing up every few minutes, and I haven’t heard any bones rearranging inside him for a while. His head rests in my lap, and my fingers absently stroke his silky, pointed ear, his soft forehead, the thick coat on the back of his neck. It’s past midnight, and the rain has slowed to an occasional drip off the roof onto the ground outside the window, where I can hear the wet plunk as each drop falls into the puddles under the eaves. The thunder is gone, the lightning with it. I can’t see anything in the darkness. But I know whatever magic he was hoping for didn’t happen tonight.
12
At last, Harmon goes still in my lap. Once in a while, an involuntary shiver wracks his body as he sleeps, but it’s more like nerves firing than his joints and ligaments popping. I’m so tired I don’t know how I’m still upright, too tired to even lie down and go to sleep.
I startle to alertness when the lid to the onion bin lifts with a groan. “Stella?” Mrs. Nguyen whispers.
“I’m here.”
“Is he a wolf?”
“No. Why?”
“Because it’s harder to get past a wolf than a human,” she says. I hear her groaning and grunting, and onions shifting in the bin.
Harmon stirs in his sleep, nestling against my belly.
“I’m not going.”
The movement stops. An onion rolls against the side of the bin, thumping against the wood. “What?” Mrs. Nguyen asks.
Harmon growls in his sleep.
“Let me put a sleep charm on him,” she whispers, crouching beside him. She places a hand on his side, and I feel his fur bristle. Rushing to get the words out, she lays the spell on before he can wake completely.
“May this creature stay asleep
Slumbering in the deep.
His eyes will close, he will not wake
Until this spell the caster breaks.”
She draws her hand back and stands. “He won’t wake now,” she says gleefully. “Stop this nonsense and let’s get going. Your father is waiting.”
“I’m not going without Harmon.”
“What are you talking about? This is your chances. Are you really going to be so stupid as to stay in prison because of that…that thing?”
I stroke the soft fur on Harmon’s forehead and ears, down to the thicker, coarser fur on his back. “He’s not a thing,” I say. “He’s still the same person. And if he had a chance to get out of here, he’d take me with him.”
“You want us to carry him out the front door? Do you think they’d let us do that?”
“Then we’ll wait until he’s well enough to do the projecting thing, too. You said anyone can do it, even an ordinary human. Which means he can.”
“It could take years to teach him,” she says. “You’ve already done it.”
“I don’t remember how,” I say. “It could take me years to remember.”
“Don’t be a fool,” she scolds. “I have been a fool for love, and you know how it ended? Living in this saggy old lard-bag half the time.”
“I’m not in love.”
She scoffs. “You’re not? Then why aren’t you coming with me?”
“Because…because I can’t just leave him here. He’s alone, and he’s going to be…” I can’t even describe how he’s going to be tomorrow. Devastated doesn’t cover it. When he finds out he can’t switch back, he’s going to need me. I touch his cheek, run my finger across his very human lips.
No, that’s stupid. He doesn’t need me. In fact, it will be easier for him to go home without me. Suddenly, a cold chill creeps up my spine. At the eclipse, the shifters were butchering the wolves. Who knows if Harmon even has anyone left to go back to. What if they haven’t negotiated for our freedom because there’s no one left in the pack? I can’t just leave Harmon here alone, with no hope.
My sisters once told me a story of a werewolf who couldn’t transition, so he ate poison. What’s to stop Harmon from doing the same? He’s not just a werewolf, he’s a monster. A monster who has lost a lot more than the ability to change from a human to a wolf. He’s lost who he was when he was healthy and good-looking. The boy with all the promise in the world in front of him. He could have Chosen any girl, and she would have been over the moon. He was going to lead his pack, do great things.
Now he’s grateful for the company of a plain human. And up until this moment, I’ve been kind of awful to him.
Mrs. Nguyen waits quietly while I figure things out. At last, I shake my head. “I can’t do it.”
“What about your father?” she asks. “Don’t you want to see him?”
“Of course I do,” I say. “Where is he?”
“He’s at home,” she says again.
I swallow hard, my resolve to stay with Harmon crumbling. “In Oklahoma?”
“No, silly, he’s at his house in the shifter valley. And you’ll never see him as long as you stay here with this brute,” she says. “If you don’t come, you’ll regret it. Things are not always what they seem. You know this by now, my dear. How many more times do you have to learn that lesson the hard way before you take it to heart? This boy may seem pitiful to you, but he’s here by choice. He could have married my daughter. He could have united the Three Valleys, but he chose not to. He could do many things differently.”
“Are you leaving?” I ask, afraid of the finality in her voice.
“I told your father I would come for you, and I have. But now you’re choosing to stay with that animal, and if I can’t convince you otherwise, you have no need for me.”
Panic tightens my chest. If she leaves, I’m stuck here. She’s my ticket out—alone.
“I do need you,” I whisper.
“In truth, Stella, I hate being this disgusting old dead thing. But I did it for your father. Now it’s time for me to let go of these old bones for good. You’re sixteen now. If you’re old enough to choose not to listen to me, then you’re old enough to take care of yourself.”
I want to laugh at that, to tell her she’s crazy. What do I know?
I’ve been living in an attic for years, perpetually stuck at the age I was when I arrived and my life became suspended, waiting for freedom. Three years have passed, but if anything, I’m less able to take care of myself than I was when I arrived. Since then, I’ve been broken.
“But I’m not,” I protest. “Please don’t leave.”
“You don’t need me,” she says. “You have him.”
“Don’t make me choose between you.”
“I think you’ve already chosen, dear.”
“No,” I say. “It’s not like that. I’ll come find you as soon as we get out. Where are you going? How will I find you?”
She strokes my hair, her face turned down towards me in the darkness. “Look around you, child. Open your eyes, but don’t believe everything they show you. Listen. But don’t believe every word you hear, especially from the lips of those who tell you what you wish to hear. Above all, feel. When something doesn’t feel quite right, it’s because it isn’t. If you can remember all that, I’ve done my duty.”
With that, she turns and steps back to the onion bin and climbs inside.
“Wait,” I say. “What about Dad?”
“Your father is fine,” she says, shaking her head. “He’s always been a survivor.”
Dad? Seriously? Does she know my dad? He can’t survive a week without football, a day without comfortable socks, or a dinner without a beer.
“But is he okay?”
With an affirming nod, Mrs. Nguyen lies down in the onion bin and drops the lid. “Keep your eyes open,” she says, her voice echoing inside the wooden box. “I’m not going to do the work for you. If you wanted that, you would have come with me. Now you’re on your own. Figure it out.”
Stung, I turn back to Harmon. Did I just give up my chance to leave for this creature, this mutant? My chance for freedom, to see my father and get some straight answers? I bury my fingers in his thick black fur and tug. He makes a sound somewhere between a growl and a groan, but it doesn’t sound angry. It sounds like someone who doesn’t want to wake up. Curling my fingers into his fur, I pull harder.
Beastly Beauty: A Fairy Tale Retelling (Girl Among Wolves Book 2) Page 8
