The Bear Shifter’s Desires

by Martha Woods

  “Remember,” Matt said, “No excuses.”

  “Oh I remember,” Shane replied, tilting his head back and swallowing the shot easily, “Make sure you do the same.”

  Sitting there and watching the two of them go, the rest of their coworkers had to admit that so far it wasn’t exactly going how they’d considered that it would. By the time that the first bottle had been finished neither of them was so much as swaying, though Shane… seemed to be more awake than ever. Something in his eyes was flashing in a way that they found slightly unnerving, like he was staring down prey rather than a challenger.

  “Feel like giving up?” Matt asked, waiting for the bartender to open up the second bottle so they could continue, “No shame in it.”

  “Why would I give up?” He replied, drumming his fingers across the bar idly while he watched the amber liquid pour into his glass, “I’m just getting started.”

  The second bottle went much the same way as the first, draining down to the drop while the two rivals tossed back glass after glass. Even Shane had to admit that his vision was starting to have a little bit of a bloom around the edges, but it was far from anything that he couldn’t handle. Holding his hand out in front of him confirmed exactly what he suspected and surprised everyone else watching; steady as a rock.

  Matt on the other hand was beginning to show signs that everything was getting to him, not just from the amount of alcohol that was sitting in his body right now, but from the fact that his opponent was seemingly unaffected by the same amount. It was far from weak whiskey, it might be a low rent town but they still had a legacy as bootleggers to protect, most of the people that had challenged him had lasted at most a bottle and a half, and by then they had to be carried out. Now, two bottles down and about to get started on the third, he was starting to come to the realization that this particular opponent wasn’t exactly going to go down easy.

  “You sure you don’t want to quit?” Shane said, leaning his elbow on the bar and tapping his fingers along an empty glass, “Just say that you had a bad night, no one’ll judge you for that. Who hasn’t had a night where they’ve underperformed right?”

  Matt scoffed, cheeks red and the heat rising along his skin. He’d always taken the little breaks between bottles for granted, he was surprised to see that he was savoring every second that he had before they had to get started again. It wasn’t fear that he was feeling, nothing so dramatic as that, but more… astonishment. Mixed with an unhealthy amount of anger. “Do you always talk this much? Or are you just trying to cover something?”

  “I was trying to cover up you losing, but now that you’ve pushed me…” Shane picked up the full glass in front of him, nodding with a smirk before he tossed his head back. “I guess we should get right back down to business huh?”

  Taking his own glasses in hand, Matt did his best to keep up, downing shot after shot as the level in the bottle got lower and lower, his fingers fumbling and dripping with liquor all as Shane sat there with an easy grin on his face, placing down empty glasses like they’d had nothing in them to begin with. He couldn’t even tell which Shane was doing it, given that there were two swimming in front of his vision with every movement that he made, and by the time the bottle sat empty in front of them and everyone was watching with bated breath to see what would happen next, he took a deep breath and placed it on the counter, knuckles white with the effort to keep him upright.

  “One… more… bottle…” He growled, fixing Shane with a glare so venomous that it was a wonder that the paint on the bar didn’t peel, “Wipe that… fucking smile off…”

  “You sure you want to do that?” Shane asked, accepting another drink from Todd that he tossed into the back of his throat without a care, “You’re not looking too good.”

  Matt stumbled forward, moving his hand off the bar to swing it into his face before he slipped on a wet patch and tumbled down to the ground, fist coming within two inches of Shane’s face as he sailed past. The hardwood ground met his cheek with a bang, echoing through the bar so loudly that the bouncer thought it was a gunshot initially, before a resounding groan echoes up from his space on the floor.

  “I think he’s had enough,” Shane said, nodding at the bouncer, “Can anyone get him home or do you just prop him up in the corner?”

  Burnie sighed, kneeling down and lifting him up and over his shoulder, “I didn’t drink too much, I can get him home. Don’t want one of my employees dying before work tomorrow. The rest of you stay here, enjoy your free drinks.”

  “Don’t think we’re gonna argue with that,” Todd laughed, already gesturing to the bartender for a refill, “We’ve got a lot of money to get paid back on.”

  With a jostle of him on his shoulder Burnie confirmed that Matt was out cold, before he walked over to Shane and leaned in, whispering, “Good work on that kid, about time that someone took his ass down. Just don’t go too hard tonight ok? We still need you up and working tomorrow while we can.”

  “Don’t worry, I’ll be there,” Shane said, holding his hand out flat, “See? Steady as a rock.”

  Burnie looked at his hand, then up at the lackadaisical smile on his face, and merely shook his head. “The hell are you made of kid?”

  Shane turned back to the bar, welcoming another drink from a smiling Todd and an equally gleeful bartender, who was making the rounds with everyone else’s drinks before returning to in front of him. He took his seat, letting his eyes close for a minute as he let the sounds surround him and bring him some level of comfort.

  It had definitely been a while since he’d felt at home somewhere, but this was approaching it.

  A few hours later and the rest of the work team was starting to make their way out of the bar, headed towards either wives or the strip club to work off some of their frustrations and throw away even more money on a night out. Todd clapped Shane on the shoulder, raising an eyebrow briefly at Shane’s easygoing, and sober, smile, before he shook his head and walked out with a laugh.

  “Looks like you really made an impression,” The bartender said, polishing a glass as she came and leaned on the bar in front of him, “You’d think you’d been drinking with them for years at this point.”

  “Just wanted to impress,” He said, shrugging as he set his glass down, “I take it I was successful?”

  “I’ve been watching Matt throw his weight around for years at this point, I started tending here when I was seventeen and he’s been pulling the same tricks with the same people for as long as I can remember. It’s nice to see someone come along and wipe the smile off his face, you know what I mean?”

  “I think I do,” He answered, holding his hand out, “I’m Shane.”

  “Holly,” She replied, accepting the hand and shaking it once, “You’re obviously not from around here, where’d you come from?”

  “Me?” The woods. “I come from all over, can’t even really remember where I was last. I was just planning on passing through but this place… kind of made an impression.”

  “You figured it was a good place to get hepatitis?” Holly looked over at the bouncer, flicking her head to confirm that the conversation was wanted. “Trust me, you’re the first person in about a year who came through here and decided to stay willingly, Cedar Grove isn’t exactly on the top of anyone’s vacation lists.”

  “I think it’s got charm,” He said, before he remembered something that had stuck out, “Wait a minute, did you say you’ve been tending here since you were seventeen? The drinking age is twenty one still, isn’t it?”

  “This is a former bootlegging town Shane, you think anyone’s really paid attention to the drinking age? Long as I didn’t go out and do anything incredibly stupid then I had basically free reign to do whatever I wanted, it’s just how it is in this town,” She laughed, “You seem a little surprised by that.”

  “Not exactly, just thinking that it makes sense why I haven’t seen any cops in town, kind of a load off my mind.”

  “Not a fan of the bad
ge?” She asked, leaning forward, “Why’s that exactly? Are you a big, bad man?”

  “Me? Noooo, I’m innocent as can be.” He grinned, accepting the drink that she slid in front of him. “Anyone I should keep an eye out for, maybe not so innocent?”

  “Well you already met Mat, that’s about the first that you have to be aware of, but given that you pretty much humiliated him tonight I don’t think you two are going to be best friends anytime soon. He’s probably not going to try and shoot you, but… maybe watch your back for a little bit.”

  “A sore loser, that’s just great.” He shrugged, taking a slow sip of his drink and glancing over at her. “And what about you? Where do you fall on this scale?”

  “Me?” She smirked, shrugging and placing the rag behind the bar. “I’m just the bartender, I’m not involved in anything.”

  He looked her over, the black hair draping across her shoulders, bare from the shirt that she’d rolled the sleeves up on. She was dressed for work, though she could clearly move fast if the muscle definition in her thighs that he could make out was any indication. Sure, you always had to move fast when you were tending bar, especially if your clients started getting more ornery than usual, but he had a feeling that she wasn’t just tending bar as her only form of exercise.

  “This the only place that you work?” He asked, “Or do you have somewhere that you moonlight?”

  “I don’t work over at the club, if that’s what you’re wondering,” She said with a smirk, “Sorry to disappoint, but that’s not really my scene.”

  “Wouldn’t have judged if it was,” He said, “Just wondering what you could be doing to be in this sort of shape, you look like you could run a three minute mile right now if I asked you to, so I’m just trying to get a good read on who you are.”

  Holly’s eyebrow pushed up her forehead, her interest compelling her to lean forward and keep her voice low, “And what do you think I could be doing?”

  “I have no idea,” He said, “But I look forward to finding out, don’t you?”

  Draining his last drink and standing up from his seat, he fished out a few bills from his wallet and placed them on the counter. “Thanks for the drinks, I’ll be back soon enough.”

  “You sure you’re alright to get home?” She asked, taking the bills and stuffing them in her pocket, “You’ve been drinking a lot, wouldn’t be a bad idea to take it easy for a couple minutes.”

  “I’m fine, don’t worry about me,” He said, holding his hand up,” See? Thanks for the concern though.”

  “Not even shaking,” She laughed, “Alright fine, get out of here before you drink the entire bar.”

  “I can take care of that tomorrow,” He said, nodding his goodbye’s to Holly and the bouncer before he stepped out into the snow, a near blizzard already on the way to shut down the streets for the night. He’d left his car back at the cabin he was renting, given that he’d elected to walk to work that day, but it wasn’t going to be much of a deal for him to handle.

  Slipping through the backstreets until he reached the outskirts, he looked around for any signs of life before he walked out into the blank whiteness, waiting until he was surrounded by trees before he got down on his hands and knees and let his now healed palms bury into the snow, feeling the skin and muscle shifting in place as he let a deep, rumbling growl drift up along the inside of his throat and push through his teeth, rapidly turning to points as his skin slowly turned to fur and the smells of the forest overtook him as his true senses returned to him.

  “It’s been too long,” He said to himself, now pushing forward in the form of a bear as he first marched then began sprinting through the trees on his way towards his temporary home, heavy footfalls echoing through the trees before being lost in the roaring of the wind.

  The journey was so short, the snow not even making an impact on him through the thick coating of fur and the whiskey resting in his stomach, the still lit up windows of the cabin calling out to his vision as he approached through the snow and slowed himself down. There was no one else around for miles, he would have been able to smell if there was, but that didn’t mean that he wanted to march right up to his front door and try to open it with the set of mighty paws that he was now sporting. With a sigh and a grunt as he rose onto his hind legs, his body shrunk down to the six foot form that he normally took as a human, brushing snow off his coat and pants as he walked the final thirty feet and unlocked the door to his home, stepping inside and letting the warmth from the roaring fire wash over him. He didn’t trust the person who rented him the cabin not to steal his money, the exact reason he either kept it on him or buried it out in the forest, but he was more than willing to slip them a few dollars every day to keep the fire going through the day. So long as they were gone before he got back, this was his own private time and he did not want it to be interrupted.

  “Alright,” He groaned, falling back into his chair and throwing his legs up onto the coffee table, “Let’s see if there’s any word about anyone we know.”

  Ever since he’d left, he’d been keeping tabs on his former home, or at least he’d been attempting to. It was hard to know what was happening to a group of people who technically didn’t exist if you were no longer a part of the group, and so far the difficulties had been obvious. But recently, within the last few months at least, there had been some small rumblings that could be dismissed as just natural phenomena, but stuck out to him as potential signs.

  “Mass hibernations in the area huh?” He clicked through the pages on his laptop, a tiny thing that he’d picked up from a pawn shop years previous that had held up to whatever punishment he could dish out. He only ever used it for this one purpose anyway, he didn’t need something top of the line when he was busying himself with moving from day job to day job. “Home’s just been getting worse and worse, hasn't it? What are you doing down there little brother?”

  His memories of the forest hadn’t exactly been good, but they were still memories that he looked back on with a fondness every now and then, not everything to do with his family had been terrible. Sure there had been that whole war that they’d gone through, but that hadn’t been any of their fault. Everyone who was at fault for that was long dead and buried anyway, who really cared why it happened in the first place?

  Tossing the laptop to the couch nearby, he got up and fell forward onto his bed, face down in the pillow and kicking his shoes off, not even bothering to pull his pants off before he spread himself across the covers and closed his eyes, ready for the next day to come ahead and meet him. Thoughts of home, brief as they often were, always managed to take the energy right out of him, and there was precious little else to do about that than just close his eyes and let the tiredness take him. There were worse ways that he could deal with it after all, but being that there wasn’t enough whiskey in the entire town to make him drunk, he figured that going to sleep would be a good enough alternative.

  “One day I’ll find out what’s happening with you,” He said with a yawn, before he rolled over onto his side, “But that can wait for another day.”

  Chapter 2

  The snow had cleared by the time the sun had risen, but the ground still had a thick coating of ice that he could feel crunching and cracking beneath his feet with every step he took. He’d driven his car down to the work site, not wanting to have to answer any questions about how he was getting home if another snow storm came through, and with a chill in the air even through the sunlight he was glad that he did so.

  The other workers looked up at him as he walked through the front door of the bucket, all of them aside from Burnie and himself sporting the particular parlor that you only ever got if you were completely and utterly hungover in the worst of ways. “Well, you all look great,” Shane said, hanging up his coat and rolling up his sleeves, preparing to sign himself in and work out which sector needed work done today, “Have a fun night?”

  “How are you ok?” Todd groaned, pinching his nose between his fingers
and leaning his head back, “You drank more than anyone, are you the Terminator or something?”

  “Or something,” He answered, nodding down at Burnie and shrugging on a thick work coat and grabbing his ax, “If anyone wants to join me I’ll be out in sector C, but you all look like you could use a few minutes to sit down.”

  “Cocky asshole,” Todd sighed, dragging himself out of his seat, “Fine, wait up and I’ll come with you, I’m not getting paid to sit around and do nothing after all…”

  “I am,” Burnie said, “But don’t let that affect your decision.”

  After a few minutes of waiting while Todd got a cup of coffee and slipped into his own work jacket, the two of them marched out into the cold toward sector C, a few trees already marked for removal with a red chalk mark, visible even through the snow and frost that had built up over the week.

  “Seriously, how are you ok?” Todd asked him, swinging his ax into the wood of the tree and grunting as the impact travelled up his arms, “I’ve never even seen Matt stumble, and you drank him under the table last night. You should be dead, or at the very least not getting out of bed till tonight.”

  “I’ve always been good at handling my drink, what can I say?” Shane swung his ax into the same spot Todd had, removing the blade so Todd could swing again. “It’s nothing special, I’ve just got a good tolerance.”

  “Your stomach is lined with lead is what it is, there’s no fooling me on that.” A few minutes of grunting and swinging and they’d made a good mark in the tree, changing positions so that they could work it in the direction they wanted it to fall. “But uh… you might want to watch out for him for the time being, he was pretty pissed off about you showing him up last night.”