Moon Shadows

by Neena Jaydon

  "Sorry." He eased his car into a clear space in front of Theo's house, finally letting the traffic behind him move on. "I don't normally lose control like that. I didn't mean to draw you here."

  Well. She sniffed. One can't ignore disturbances these days. They've gotten through twice already.

  "Pardon?" Max turned as he pulled up the emergency brake and found her already gone. After a moment he shook his head, grabbed the sweater, and got out of the car. He ran his hand through his hair, relieved to find his fingers no longer trembling. She must be from the neighbourhood. Normally spirits don't come that fast when I get angry.

  Max hurried up the steps, then blinked in surprise as the door opened before he got to it. A cluster of young men and women looked at him in equal surprise through the screen door as they hitched up purse straps or zipped up jackets.

  "Hi. I'm Max. Is Theo here?"

  "Yeah," one of the men said, stepping out of the way and holding the door open. "Go on in. Theo's in the kitchen."

  "Uh, thanks." He sidled past the four strangers, all of whom sported a college dorm look they were too old for. He smiled reflexively at the two women who were giving him measuring looks.

  "Did I interrupt something?"

  "Just Worldhammer," one of the women said bluntly. "No worries. We're all heading out anyways." To his relief, they did, clearing out the cramped hallway. He heard the screen door close, and then some hushed laughter he suspected had to do with him. Max grimaced and swung the door shut.

  What the hell is Worldhammer?

  "Hello?" Max went down the hall and peered around the corner, feeling the intruder.

  Slouched in a computer chair, Theo had his hair tied into a ridiculous little topknot. There were dots of paint on his worn-out T-shirt. He was squinting through his glasses at the very small statue of a chariot in his hand. Then he visibly stiffened, tiny paintbrush hovering in midair.

  "Hi," Max said. Amusement and embarrassment warred within him, but he tried to keep his tone normal. "Sorry. You forgot this." He held up the sweater. "Your friends said to come in."

  "Oh." Theo set down the miniature chariot. "Thanks. Just, uh—" He pointed with the end of his paintbrush to an empty chair.

  Max sat down and saw by the startled flutter of Theo's lashes that the chair had been intended for the sweater, not him. That made him perversely want to stay.

  "So, what are you doing?" he asked.

  "Worldhammer. It's an RPG. You can use miniatures for it." Theo laid aside the paintbrush and rubbed his hands against his jeans. "D-did you want some coffee?"

  "Sure." Max watched Theo get up and move to his coffee maker. Theo's baggy jeans didn't quite hide the length of his legs and the curves of his butt. When Theo turned back to set a mug of coffee in front of him, Max saw the strong column of his neck, how it sloped out to his shoulders, and pressed his lips together. What a waste.

  Theo began to tidy up, hands deftly putting little glass bottles of paint into a plastic storage box. They were big hands, yet not clunky, with long, agile fingers.

  "You think it's weird." It hadn't been a question, and he almost hadn't heard it.

  "What? No." Max handed Theo a stray paintbrush, a laugh escaping him. "Yeah, a little. I'm sorry."

  Theo shrugged stiffly. "Not everybody has to be into the same, uh, things."

  "That's true. You're right. I shouldn't judge." Max felt something inside him relax. He leaned on the table, looking into his coffee mug. "Most of my friends think I'm just playing around, being a dog trainer. To them it doesn't sound like a real job."

  "Yeah," Theo said, dipping paintbrushes into clear liquid. "I get that all the time." Finally turning his head, he looked at Max sidelong. That conspiratorial look made Max's heart beat faster. Then Theo turned away, going to the sink.

  Damn. Did we just have a moment? Max gave himself a stern mental slap. Don't go misreading straight guys.

  "I'd better get going," he said. "Thanks for the coffee."

  "No problem." Theo dried his hands on a towel and followed him out to the entryway. "Thanks for dropping off my sweater."

  "I'm sorry it took me so long to remember to do it. I've been driving around with it for days now."

  "You could've, y'know, uh, called me to pick it up."

  "No way," Max said. He tasted his coffee and found it milky and sweet: just as he'd asked for it the last time. "I owe you way more than that." His words sent Theo's gaze downward, hair falling forward over his eyes. "I know that doesn't exactly make you comfortable, Theo, but my family really appreciates everything you've done for us. You ever need a hand with anything, just ask." He bumped Theo's arm with his fist. "Except with Worldhammer. I still have no clue what that is." He laughed, but Theo only nodded solemnly. "See you around."

  As he stepped out into the cooling evening air, not looking back, Max shook his head.

  I swear there's a really good-looking man in there. I wish he'd let him out.

  *~*~*

  "I don't know why they even bother. If you're going to make a movie about pouting, scrawny Hollywood drones, don't pretend they're supposed to be superheroes!" His friend Frankie was holding court, as usual. Theo shoved his hands in his coat pockets and snorted amusement at the loud voices of his friends. Marnie and Whitney flanked Frankie, offering their own critiques. Theo walked at the back of the pack so he could measure if he was walking too quickly.

  They were cutting through an unpaved alley to get back from the movie theatre to where Theo had parked on the street. Theo heard muffled music and frowned; they were two streets over from the nearest bar, and even on Fridays the bars weren't usually that loud. The back door to a nearby building opened and spilled the music into the night.

  Wincing, Theo turned away from the light escorting the sound. Then he stopped, caught by a new scent: poplar trees and hayfields and dog kennels and warmly spiced aftershave. His eyes widened as he turned in time to see two men head past him. They walked very close together, giving Theo and his friends no notice.

  Max nuzzled the other man's cheek and murmured something to him, then spotted Theo. His step hitched as he turned to look fully over his shoulder at Theo, but although his mouth formed the beginnings of a word, he didn't speak it. Instead, he quickly looked away. When his companion gave him a curious look, Max initiated an aggressive kiss. They continued on ahead.

  Theo's friends had fallen quiet. Whitney glanced back, then came to a stop himself as he looked at Theo in concern. Marnie hastened back to look up into Theo's face, a hand coming to rest on his elbow.

  "Hey," she said softly. The streetlights reflected off her thick glasses as her wide, green eyes examined his face.

  "I-it's nothing." Theo's voice came out weakly. He still felt like he'd been mule-kicked in the chest.

  "Like hell," Frankie said too loudly, making them all wince. "C'mon, what's wrong?"

  "You know them?" Whitney, in contrast, tended to speak too quietly. His words occasionally carried a hint of a faded Jamaican accent.

  "Just one."

  "Is that the guy we ran into at your place?" Marnie asked.

  "What did he do to you?" Frankie asked.

  "Nothing." Theo shook his head and rubbed his face. "It's really nothing. We just met. It was all…all on my side." He tried to laugh and failed. "Didn't even know he was gay."

  "That's rough." Marnie patted his back. "Come on. Let's go get some coffee and forget about him."

  "Y-yeah." It was difficult to put down slow step after slow step, surrounded by his protective friends. His instincts told him to run and run until he was out of breath — until he could no longer smell Max.

  What did you expect? His chest ached, and his face felt stiff and tight. He pushed his hair back as he walked, feeling the night breeze against his forehead. The sensation felt naked and lonely. A normal, preppy guy like Max isn't for you.

  CHAPTER THREE

  "You're the TV man!"

  Theo, just about to bite into garlic toa
st, froze. Seated opposite him, Frankie nearly choked on his cheeseburger. Theo creaked around to look at the small girl peering over top of the booth.

  "Ruthie!" The girl's mother sounded mortified.

  Feeling his neck grow warm, Theo listened to Frankie start to chortle. He stared into the girl's large, brown eyes. She stuck a finger into the corner of her mouth and apparently waited for him to take the reins of the conversation.

  "She must have seen you on the news," Frankie wheezed.

  "Oh, so you are the one who saved that woman in the river," her mother said, eyes widening. "I wasn't sure."

  "Uh, yeah," Theo said, feeling the heat reach his cheeks.

  "That was really heroic of you. Really brave." She picked up her purse and began rummaging. "Would you mind signing this for Ruthie? Honey, pass this to the nice man." Ruthie took the pen and memo pad, then presented them to Theo, who couldn't look at anyone as he signed his name.

  "There you go," he said.

  Ruthie took the pen and pad back, looking at them in bemusement as she slid back out of sight.

  "Thank you so much," her mother said. "I think she's really going to appreciate that when she's older."

  "Y-you're welcome," Theo said, before gratefully turning back around. He narrowed his eyes at Frankie, who was bright red with mirth behind the hand pressed over his mouth. Rubbing at the back of his hot neck, Theo turned his glare on his plate. Then he took his feelings out on his garlic toast, ripping off a chunk with his teeth. "What's so funny?"

  "You, dude." Frankie snorted. "Who else would go tomato-red because someone asked for his autograph? You've got to accept that you're a good guy who did an amazing thing."

  "It's not that simple," Theo muttered.

  "It kind of is."

  "It didn't really feel like me doing it. I just sort of went on auto-pilot. I don't feel like I did something other people wouldn't." Although maybe they couldn't. I can never tell what normal people can really do.

  "That just proves you're a good guy. It didn't occur to you that you could've not jumped in, did it?"

  "No," Theo said, "it didn't." It had felt like breathing, like the instinct to chase: something his body did without checking with him first. "Look, I'm not ashamed of what I did, I just…" I've spent my whole life trying to avoid getting noticed. Now people here have seen me on TV. What else could they find out about me?

  "Don't like attention." Frankie waggled a disapproving French fry. "Get over it."

  "You're probably right." Theo sighed. "I have to call a magazine reporter back this afternoon. Another one."

  "It'll be fine."

  "Yeah," Theo said, picking up his spoon. "Oh, hey, there's Whitney."

  "Where you been? You're never late," Frankie complained as Whitney slid into the booth. "These Thursday lunches were your idea to begin with."

  "I'm sorry, guys." Whitney rubbed at his forehead, his gaze distant. "It's been kind of a rough day."

  "What's going on?" Theo lost interest in his chili at the obvious worry on Whitney's lean face. Frankie picked up on it enough to quiet down too.

  "Marnie's sister is in the hospital. In a coma."

  Whitney waved away the waitress who offered him a menu. The uncharacteristic abruptness of the gesture spoke volumes about his stress level.

  "Jesus, what happened?" Frankie set down his cheeseburger, eyes wide.

  "Nobody knows. They found her by her car last night. Marnie's freaked out, of course." Whitney twisted up a napkin, shaking his head.

  "Is there anything we can do?" Theo asked.

  "Marnie's hanging out at the hospital. Maybe go see her? She kicked me out so I could go back to work." Whitney smiled sheepishly. "She might not tell you what to do."

  "We'll go for sure," Frankie said.

  Theo nodded, stirring his chili aimlessly. His mind lingered on the idea of healthy young women abruptly driving off of empty highways or falling down in random comas. Fort Rivers was supposed to be a boring place; he didn't like this kind of excitement.

  *~*~*

  Theo hated hospitals. Not only were the scents overpowering, but his family had always painted hospitals as fearful places. They featured in childhood nightmares of being locked up and used in sinister experiments. No, a hospital was no place for his kind. He didn't like how grateful he felt that Whitney had returned to the hospital after his shift, meaning Marnie had support and he could leave. That didn't mean he didn't take advantage of the chance to escape.

  Outside, the pulp mill-scented air seemed delicious in comparison to the antiseptic breath of the hospital. Theo slouched toward his car. A familiar scent stopped him, and he turned.

  "Theo?" Anastasia, wrapped in a long coat, hurried across the parking lot toward him.

  "Uh, hi." He cleared his throat as she came right up to him. "Are you okay?" There were tension lines around her mouth and she was looking over her shoulder.

  "Hm?"

  "Are you, y'know, all right?" Theo jerked his head toward the hospital building.

  "Oh. Oh, yeah. I'm here for a couple of follow-up tests." She tucked her hair behind her ears, squeezed her eyes shut for a moment, then looked up at him. "I just heard some awful news."

  "R-really?" His heart leapt into his throat.

  "I ran into a client. Her husband's Louis Wilson, used to run the ambulance service. Do you know him?"

  "No." I try not to know very many people.

  "Sorry, I know it's not that small a town." She bit her lip. "She found Louis on their property, collapsed. He's been slipping in and out of consciousness ever since."

  The hairs on Theo's nape lifted. He felt his face stiffen, and Anastasia gave him a startled look. "What's wrong?"

  "N-nothing. Really. You were, uh, saying?"

  "Well, that was it, really. I mean, it looks like he's going to be okay, but there was no warning, I guess." She crossed her arms over her stomach and looked at the ground. "It's strange."

  "Yeah. Strange." Theo slowly inhaled through his nose, sampling the air. He got nothing but the usual mix of pulp mill, trucks, and pine trees. Of course, just because he couldn't smell it didn't mean there wasn't a problem.

  "Anyways, I'd better go. I'll be late." She touched his elbow lightly. "Come over for dinner again sometime, okay?"

  "Uh, yeah. Sure." He watched her make her way across the parking lot, then turned toward his car again. He shook himself, as if that could shake off his unease. I might not be the weirdest thing in Fort Rivers anymore.

  *~*~*

  Work came in spurts, and Theo had just come to the end of a rush. He often got restless after a busy period, but he couldn't remember it being this bad before. He paced continuously, unable to bear even looking at a game. Books or TV didn't hold his attention, either.

  Some of it was probably due to the hospital visit yesterday, but Theo didn't want to consider how much of it might be Max. To keep himself from replaying the image of Max dressed for clubbing and wrapped around another man, Theo decided to see what he could find out about the other thing bothering him: the people randomly collapsing in town. He started with Louis Wilson.

  A bit of prying revealed that Louis lived outside of town, in the same rural area as Max. Theo doubted that meant anything, yet he couldn't help but notice how much of the route was the same as he drove down the dark highway. The last thing he wanted to do was disturb the Wilson family, so he parked up the road and walked the rest of the way. He heard dogs barking in the distance.

  Idiots. Better try to stay downwind.

  Fortunately, the Wilson family dog was indoors. He heard its high-pitched bark as he slid past the house, but it was soon silenced. Theo didn't bother with the house itself; even if he could investigate undiscovered, there'd be too many scent trails inside to do him any good. He didn't know what he was looking for, which meant he needed as little interference as possible.

  He found it behind the house, agonizingly faint and days old.

  It was a peculiar, inky sce
nt, unfamiliar and metallic around the edges. He crouched down, running his fingertips over the grass to stir up scent. A noseful of fertilizer and lawnmower made him shake his head sharply, his eyes watering. This lush grass, cropped to a uniform height, was likely Louis' baby. It painted a picture of a man probably wholly unremarkable, yet with a distinct life of his own.

  Being unremarkable had often been Theo's dearest wish.

  He snorted to clear his nostrils and found the dark smell again, leading toward the back of the largely uncleared acreage. The trees provided welcome cover.

  The scent led him first to the river, then ended, making him circle back. He picked it up leading away from the house in another direction after wandering nervously behind the Wilson house for some time. Not even the most obsessive gamer could match his concentration and persistence, which made him very good at his job and relentlessly kept him on the trail. Grandmother had not only told him that their kind were stubborn, she'd demonstrated it on many occasions herself. Even Ma, who could get hard-headed, had often given up when it came to Grandmother. When things got bad at the end for Ma, she'd even joked about how Grandmother's stubbornness might have saved her from the cancer.

  Theo hastily forced down such memories. Losing his mother had been the worst thing that had ever happened to him. Grandmother had made it to old age and seemed content to go; Ma had been far too young, the cancer far too sudden. He could think about their deaths clearly now, but never without pain.

  We don't live that long, Theofanis. Grandmother's words. The moon, she wears us out.

  He could always feel the moon. She hadn't waxed large enough to bother him yet; tonight she was just a glowing presence above, no more, no less. After cutting through bush, pasture, and someone's personal car graveyard, Theo found the trail curving south. It led him out into the moon's view.

  Theo stopped, inhaling cool air deep into his lungs. The scent had abruptly thickened. It was fresher here, but that wasn't the only thing that he noticed. He was standing on the edge of a shorn hayfield. The road was a few acres away to his right; between him and it lay a yellow house with outbuildings large and small, and kennels he could clearly smell.