Holiday Wolf Pack

by Bridget Essex

I smell another werewolf.

  I swipe the cups of espresso, four in total, from the counter, cradling three of them in my arms and taking a quick sip from the one in my hand, promptly scalding the roof of my mouth as I glance toward the exit.

  Wolves have great senses of smell, so it's no surprise that werewolves do, too, even when we're in our human forms. But werewolves aren't the same as our animal counterparts in every respect. For example, wolves and dogs greet each other by smelling, well...butts.

  I'm glad to say that werewolves have evolved past that social custom.

  But we are expected to greet one another—with a “hello” rather than an invasive sniff. I haven't had my morning coffee yet, though, and, frankly? Yeah, I'm being kind of an antisocial jerk, but I'm not in the mood to make pleasant conversation with some stranger just because they happen to share my species.

  You know that feeling: when you spot an acquaintance in the grocery store, and you know you should say hi, should ask them how their partner/kids/cats are doing...but you feel awful, you're wearing ratty sweatpants and a sweatshirt with the stains of last night's burrito on it, and you are seriously not into the whole small-talk thing?

  I'm having that feeling.

  I'm exhausted, have been driving for hours. I just want to get to my mother's house so that she can hug me and feed me and promptly put me to work for her fundraiser.

  Besides that, I've got caffeine to drink, dammit.

  So, embracing my antisocialness, I aim for the back exit, the door that lets out where the tractor trailers are idling—until I hear something that makes me stop in my tracks.

  A voice that I haven't heard in a very, very long time.

  And that voice is saying my name.

  “...Georgia?”

  My back stiffens, and for a moment, I'm not standing here in the rest stop, clutching my four cups of espresso (and wearing old sweatpants). I've gone back in time...about fifteen years ago.

  I turn with difficulty, as if I'm stuck in an enormous pot of honey, every part of me moving in slow motion, until finally I face her.

  Carol.

  She's standing there with her long golden hair spilling over the shoulders of her spotless black velvet pea coat. She's wearing heels, tall, tall heels that taper down to such fine points that I don't understand how she's able to balance on them. There's a skirt underneath her coat—there has to be—but I can't see the hem of it because the coat is short, and her legs are long, sheathed in sheer black stockings that look as if they've been painted, shimmering, onto her.

  My eyes can't restrain themselves: they travel up, up from the shiny black heels, over her shapely legs—legs I remember, the shape of them, the heat of them—and I'm already blushing when I meet her gaze.

  Carol's brows are raised, and her soft lips, painted a rich shade of jeweled magenta, tilt slightly to one side. The sight of her is...startling beneath these drab fluorescent lights. The only word I can think of is “bright,” as if the rest of the world is ridiculously gray, washed out, like a black-and-white movie, and she’s the first pop of color in The Wizard of Oz. There's snow on the ground outside; the leaves have all fallen... The world is monochrome, and here Carol stands, brilliant, alive, real.

  Is this real?

  I pinch myself, just to make sure I'm awake. That's when I realize that my mouth is hanging open, and I shut it with a snap. My face is so hot that I feel feverish.

  “Um. Hi, Carol,” I say, taking a deep breath and standing a little straighter as I lift my chin. I may not look my best right now, but I figure my only option is to pretend that I have on my favorite pair of sexy jeans—rather than my gym clothes.

  I swallow, and I stare at Carol.

  She hasn't said anything, aside from my name.

  And when she said my name, goosebumps rose over my skin. Instantaneously.

  All she had to say was my name.

  Even after all these years.

  We watch one another in what is a really dramatic moment in my life—ruined by the fact that the Grinch song is being pumped through the overhead speakers. You’re a mean one, fate, for forcing a word like “nauseate” into this soundtrack of my and Carol's reunion.

  Carol lifts her gaze upward, as if she, too, finds the Universe’s choice of music unfortunate, but then she’s crossing her arms in front of her chest, and she’s pinning me in her sights…

  And it’s as if fifteen years haven't passed at all.

  Because I’m sad to report that she still seems to be just as unhappy with me as she was a decade and a half ago.

  “Georgia,” she repeats, frowning. Is this the sort of greeting past lovers should give one another: flippant, bitter, short? I chew on my lip and try to figure out what to say, but I don’t get the chance to speak.

  Carol takes another step forward, and another—very quickly. We werewolves can move fast, don’t get me wrong, but she’s approaching me right now as if I’m a bunny and she’s the only wolf in this scenario.

  Anger emanates off of her in almost-visible waves.

  “I’ve been wanting to give you a piece of my mind for fifteen years,” she begins.

  I inhale, startled: she still smells like vanilla and spices, cinnamon and clove, warmth and everything I’ve ever wanted.

  Carol used to wear this lip balm when we first started going out as teenagers. It tasted like vanilla cake, tasted like she smells now.

  I stare at her mouth; we’re close enough to one another to kiss, and I think she’s realizing that, too, because she takes a step backward, heels clicking on the tiled floor.

  “Yeah, I’m sorry we kept…missing each other,” I murmur, wincing at how blatantly made-up that “apology” sounds. Avoiding your ex in the small town you grew up in each Christmas when you return home…it’s hard. But not impossible.

  I managed to do it for fifteen years, after all.

  And she knows it. She knows that I've purposefully evaded her, as she stands there with her nostrils flaring (prettily), her teeth gritted together, her hands closing into fists at her sides.

  “You’ve been avoiding me,” she says then, straightening her shoulders, breathing out, trying to calm herself down, something she’s apparently an expert at, because while there’s still poison in her tone, her eyes have softened from mad to sad.

  “Yeah. Well…it was…a bad parting.” I wince again.

  Because our parting was all my fault. And, like many people, I was born with the gene of Not-Enjoying-Taking-the-Blame.

  But, to my surprise, Carol doesn’t point out my responsibility in our breakup, doesn't get antagonistic at all. Instead, she pins me to the spot with her crackling blue eyes, and she simply says, “You broke my heart.”

  Oof.

  I would have rather been slapped. I would have rather she'd made an enormous scene in this holly-jolly rest stop full of holly-jolly people. I would have rather she'd screamed at me, would have rather had someone record our argument and put it on YouTube. The video would go viral with the title “Jerk Ex-Girlfriend Gets What’s Coming to Her.”

  Yeah. I could have dealt with that.

  But this… This is a knife to the heart, twisting, twisting, twisting.

  I stare at her, clutching my ridiculous collection of coffee cups, not knowing what the hell to say, grappling for words that won't come, and after a minute passes of me staring stupidly at her, tongue tied, Carol nods tersely, turning on her heel.

  “Goodbye, Georgia,” she says over her shoulder.

  And there is genuine regret in her voice.

  “Wait… Carol, wait,” I stammer then, and I’m following after her for two steps, but her legs are longer than mine, and she’s faster than me. She's always been faster than me.

  “I didn’t know you were here. If I had...” Carol leaves the sentence unfinished, waving her hand in agitation. She’s wearing nail polish in the same magenta as her lipstick, a detail I notice now because I’m staring at her hand, at her long, pretty fingers, feeling lost,
swallowing the lump in my throat.

  She’s more gorgeous in person than her social media pictures led me to believe…and her social media pictures are drop-dead gorgeous. Not that I’ve drunk-stalked her online at three a.m. or anything.

  “Carol, please wait,” I say again—and, to my surprise, Carol turns around on her right heel, pirouetting like a ballerina inside of a jewelry box.

  But her expression is no longer a little sad, a little poignant.

  No.

  Carol’s pissed.

  “Look,” she says, cutting off the word sharply, “like I said, I didn’t know you were here. There were too many people around to…” She’s about to say “scent you,” but she stops herself, glaring at all of the humans surrounding us, humans who could potentially overhear her.

  Carol clears her throat, lifting her chin, holding her shoulders rigid. “You, very clearly, want nothing to do with me, and I’m going to respect that. So, if you’ll excuse me, I’ll be heading out—”

  “Carol, just…” I trail off helplessly, because what she said is true. I have been avoiding her. I've been going out of my way ever since we broke up to make sure that our paths never cross.

  But it’s not because I didn’t want to see her…

  She’s haunted my dreams for fifteen years, after all.

  The truth of the matter is...I still feel like shit about what happened between us. And I have no idea how to make that better. It’s too painful, and it’s too big. I can’t erase the fact that fifteen years have come and gone. I can’t erase the fact that she stayed, and I could have stayed, too.

  But I didn't.

  I just...left.

  “Georgia,” says Carol now, her voice and body tense. I’m causing that. I’m causing her pain. I’ve caused her pain for years, and this is something I have to live with every day, for the rest of my life.

  The woman I loved the most is the one I hurt the most.

  And that…that’s rough to know.

  “Hey.” Frustrated, I juggle the espresso cups in my arms because I can’t reach out across the gap between us and brush my fingers against her elbow, even though that’s what I want to do. It’s an absurdly intimate move, one I have absolutely no right to take.

  But…even after all this time, my body recalls the old patterns, the muscle memories, as if Carol and I parted ways only yesterday.

  Before I can do anything stupid, however, Carol raises her magenta lip into a silent snarl, taking such a quick step backward that she almost runs into this poor guy staggering past her carrying three children—one of the kids is clinging to his back like a monkey, staring at the both of us with round, sleep-deprived eyes.

  Sidestepping the family, Carol casts me one last look, pain clearly etched on her face, and then she buries her hands in the pockets of her coat, and she turns, stalking toward the door.

  Leaving me with what feels like a very pathetic look on my face. I'm standing alone in the center of the rest stop, holding my four cups of espresso as if they’re all that matters to me.

  And they really, really aren't.

  I drink down the contents of the first cup and throw it in the trash, then the second, and the third and the fourth. I can’t follow after her. She doesn’t want me to; she doesn’t want—or deserve—my flimsy excuses. She deserves better than what I can give her.

  God, I spent so much time avoiding her that, eventually, she just never wanted to see me again.

  Guilt makes you do stupid things. I didn’t have a chance to tell her that. I didn’t have a chance to tell her that I’ve been an idiot and a coward, avoiding her.

  I didn’t even get to tell her that I was sorry.

  I am sorry.

  But it would be selfish to pursue her, selfish to force my apology on her. At this point, the damage has already been done. An apology would only serve to make me feel better.

  And I haven't earned the right to feel better.

  Because fate continues to be a cruel bastard, the loudspeakers are blasting a sad holiday song about how it’s going to be a blue Christmas without you. The happy travelers around me don't seem to notice the melancholy tune, but I hear it, and it twists that knife in my heart just a little deeper.

  Well, I can spend the rest of the day standing in this rest stop, feeling like an asshole, or I can drive to my mother’s and eat about three of her pumpkin pies while pouring my heart out to her and having her tell me that she told me so. Which is annoying, but I'd rather hear it from Mom than anyone else, and, hell, maybe she’ll have an idea as to what her ridiculous daughter can do to fix this colossal, fifteen-year-old mistake.

  Okay. Chin up. Keep going; you can do this.

  I consider heading back to the coffee shop kiosk and ordering eleven more espresso shots, but I force myself to march straight out of the exit. I'd had such a good head start; I don’t want to be late. Maybe if I focus on how busy I'll be over the holiday break, I'll forget about my terrible encounter with Carol entirely.

  Yeah.

  Right.

  I shove my hands into my hoodie’s pocket, point my nose to the ground, and I make my way over the sidewalk, aiming for the rest stop parking lot—

  Werewolf.

  I stop on a dime, my nose turned up into the chill air, sniffing—and then I blanch..and blush.

  God, I don’t smell just any werewolf.

  I scented Carol.

  She’s still here. There. Standing in the middle of the parking lot and staring at an old red van that’s beached sideways across two parking spaces. Carol’s hands are planted on her hips, and her shoulders are curved forward in apparent frustration.

  Frustration which, at least at the moment, is not being directed at me.

  The hood of the van stands propped open, and from the engine rises the kind of smell that usually denotes bad news. A thin wisp of smoke is curling up into the winter air like a question mark.

  “Fuck,” Carol mutters, a low, angry growl.

  Carol’s not the swearing type (that was always my realm of expertise), so she's clearly reached a breaking point. I want to give her space, but there’s that terrible, helpful, practical side to me, too.

  So I wander over, because I’m a total glutton for punishment.

  “Um…” I say, shoving my hands deeper into my pockets. I clear my throat when she doesn’t turn toward me, and then I say, a little louder, “Engine trouble?” I wince when I hear myself sounding so damn casual.

  It’s very, very cold out. Last night, the temperature dropped to just above zero, perfect weather for a snowstorm, and there’s been one brewing on the radar to the east, so the air right now is sharp with the silver scent of metal and frost.

  Carol glances over her shoulder at me, the blue brightness of her eyes glinting harder than steel. The wind whips her blonde hair as we stand, separated by several feet of frozen pavement and fifteen years of unresolved heartache.

  “Sorry,” I whisper, taking a step back, shifting my shoulders forward and lowering my gaze.

  I’m telling her sorry for intruding, but there’s a lot of history behind that word; it lingers like a ghost between us.

  When I glance up, Carol seems to relax a little. “Yes.” She enunciates the word clearly, her breath visible in the cold. “Engine trouble.” She rubs her hands together in their black velvet gloves and arches a dark blonde brow at me.

  And the corner of her mouth turns up. Just slightly.

  A rueful smile.

  But, hey, you know what? I’ll take it. She’s not shooting eye-daggers in my direction, and that's an improvement.

  I watch as she crosses her arms, shifting her weight to the side, curving her right hip outward. She runs a gloved hand over her hair, patting the waves into place, even as the wind teases them away from her again—a losing battle.

  “It’s an old clunker,” Carol mutters, kicking the snow-covered wheel well with her high-heeled toe. “I spent yesterday in Boston, picking up gift baskets for the raffle, and the van
wasn’t running great, but I assumed I could make it back home…” Sounding defeated, she trails off and sighs, fishing around in her slim black purse. “Everyone’s on the roads because of the holiday. I'll call a tow truck, but I'm going to have to wait here forever.”

  She’s intent on finding her phone, digging past lipsticks, a compact, several receipts…

  And then I open my big, dumb mouth.

  “Gift baskets?” I ask, and she stares at me, still as a statue.

  “For your mother’s fundraiser,” she says curtly, as if I should have guessed. She draws her phone out of the purse, bringing up the call screen.

  Ah, yes. Over the past few years, my mother has reminded me about eleven thousand times that she’s been working with Carol on her fundraisers. According to her, Carol is a “lifesaver!” and a “Godsend!” and “What would I do without her?!” and “Are you sure you don’t want to talk to that nice girl, why are you being so damn stubborn,” etc., etc. I think she might have mentioned something about Carol on the phone call this morning, actually, but I was pre-coffee and couldn't comprehend all that much. I was so tired that I'm lucky I got out of my apartment with my shoes on the right feet.

  I clear my throat, and before I can stop myself, before I can rethink it or even think it through just once, I hear myself saying, “If you need to get up to Pine Springs, I can give you a lift. I mean, it’s where I’m headed, too.” I pause, consider tacking on some stupid joke, but then I’m shutting my mouth, because Carol is gaping at me.

  Presumably in shock at my offer, she blinks and drops her phone right over a pile of snow, but I step forward, moving fast…

  And I catch the phone in my hand.

  I know I don’t look heroic or dashing. What I look is sheepish as I hold the cell, palm flat and open, as if I’m about to feed an animal with pointy teeth and I'm hoping not to lose a finger in the process.

  Carol’s staring at me suspiciously now, one brow arched high; she crosses her arms over her stomach as if she’s protecting herself. She doesn’t take the phone from me.

  “Why do you want to help me, Georgia?” she asks, her voice low, a growl. There’s an accusatory note in it, the “what’s in it for you?” question heavily implied.