Liar

by Justine Larbalestier

  I turn to stare at him. For once I hadn’t been thinking about Zach.

  “Yes,” Sarah says.

  I realize that the only time I haven’t missed Zach is when the three of us are together. I look at Tayshawn, legs wide, elbows resting on his knees. On the wall behind him is a framed photo of Sarah as a child. Sarah is cross-legged on the couch, bouncing her fingers on the armrest.

  “There’s no bringing him back,” Sarah says. It’s one of those sentences that’s been said a hundred times before. I don’t know what it means.

  “If we did he’d be a weird-ass zombie freak,” Tayshawn says. He’s smiling but it’s not very convincing.

  “Ha,” Sarah says. Her laugh is less convincing than his smile.

  I want to tell them about the white boy and what I have to do. I want to kiss them.

  I cross my legs the opposite way to Sarah. I should remind them that we’re supposed to be studying. I don’t want to be studying.

  Sarah and Tayshawn exchange a look and I wonder again if they are seeing each other without me. Tayshawn pushed me away when I kissed him. Maybe because they are together and he was too embarrassed to tell me. On Sunday I left first. Did they keep kissing?

  Them together is natural. They look good. It makes sense, too: Zach’s girl winding up with Zach’s best friend.

  “Nothing’s ever going to be . . .” Sarah trails off. “I miss him.”

  “We all do,” Tayshawn says.

  “Micah?” Sarah asks. “You okay?”

  “Yeah,” Tayshawn says. “You’re kind of bouncing there.”

  “Huh?” I ask, before I realize that I’m crouched down on my heels rocking back and forth. “Sorry.” I can’t say I just want us to make out again, can I? “It’s weird being here. With you two. If Zach weren’t dead I wouldn’t be. Here, I mean.”

  “It’s true,” Tayshawn says. “I’ve never been here before.”

  “You came to my birthday party last year,” Sarah says.

  “Not like this. Not the three of us alone,” he says, taking a deep breath. “Are we going to do it again? ’Cause I liked it.”

  Sarah flushes. I laugh.

  “I want to,” I say. A shiver of warmth covers my whole body.

  “Sarah?” Tayshawn says.

  She nods.

  We don’t move. We’ve all said yes, but no one’s ready to be first.

  I stand up, spring up, really. I nod toward the bedroom. “I’m game if you two are.”

  Then we’re on her king-sized bed, teddy and giraffe pushed aside.

  It’s more awkward and ashamed than it was before. I’m certain this is the last time it will happen, but I don’t care, I’m getting what I want. Some of the fire and need that has built up so large in me drains away.

  I can face the white boy. Stronger and better now. I can go upstate to the Greats, find out what to do, and then do it.

  Sarah and Tayshawn give that to me. It would be greedy to want more.

  LIE NUMBER SIX

  That didn’t happen.

  I mean, yes, I went to Sarah’s home and, yes, her apartment is crazy big. Yes, she has a whole room for her clothes. But nothing happened. We studied. We talked about Zach. Cried. Studied some more.

  The room was full of everything we didn’t do.

  We didn’t kiss. We didn’t touch.

  I wanted us to. I think Sarah and Tayshawn, I think they wanted it, too. The air between us burned. I’m not lying about that. We were all in heat.

  But Sarah and Tayshawn . . .

  I don’t know how they did it. Somehow they managed to turn it off. They made it not happen.

  No kisses, no touching, no skin. No nothing.

  The air did not ignite.

  Except here, in my dreams.

  BEFORE

  Besides the last time I saw him, up in the cypress tree, there was one other time I thought of telling Zach about the wolf inside me.

  We spent so much time together. Sure, we ran way more than we ever talked, but when we did talk the lies bent my words out of shape, created a wall between us.

  I wanted to tell him the truth: I am a wolf.

  Zach would have believed me. He knew how fast I run, how strong. He’d seen the residues of the wolf in the human. “What are you?” he’d asked me more than once.

  I thought of showing him. Though I never figured out how. Not without scaring him or killing him. I hated the idea of him watching me change.

  If Zach had lived, I would have told him.

  Eventually.

  Zach was good at keeping secrets.

  I’d like to be able to tell Tayshawn and Sarah, but there’s no way. First, I don’t know how they feel about me. Second, however they feel, I don’t think we’re going to be friends for long. Third, if I tell them the truth and they believe me they will think I killed Zach. Our friendship will be over.

  I am afraid of losing them.

  The first time I started to tell Zach, we were making out in Tompkins Square Park. I had to be home but we were elongating the good-bye, wrapped around each other on a park bench as far from the dog run as I could get. Sometimes dogs go crazy if I get too near.

  Making out in Tompkins Square was stupid of us. It’s way too close to home and there’s not exactly much cover. But it was after dark and we couldn’t keep our hands off each other.

  Zach’s hands were on my waist under my shirt, his fingers on my bare skin. Mine held his face. We were kissing deep and long, heating up. I felt a stirring inside me. Like, but not like, when I change.

  “Zach,” I said, pulling away. “I have to—”

  “Go,” he finished for me. “I know, I know. Just a little bit longer . . .”

  “No, not that. I have to tell you something.”

  “Now?” he asked, kissing me again, pulling me onto his lap.

  “Yes, now,” I said. He ran his fingers lightly along my flank. I felt it down deep inside me, where the wolf lives. “Oh,” I said.

  “Mmmm,” he murmured, kissing the side of my neck. Warmth spread from flank to neck. My lips buzzed, my toes.

  “I’m . . . ,” I started, determined to tell him. “I am . . .” I paused, thinking how to phrase it, trying not to be distracted by how warm and good and buzzing I felt. Should I say, I am a wolf? Or I am a werewolf? Which would sound less crazy? What should I say next to prove I wasn’t nuts?

  “Micah?” said a voice that sounded just like my mother’s. “Is that you?”

  I twisted on Zach’s lap. Mom and Dad. Right there in Tompkins Square Park.

  “What the hell?” my father said.

  Zach and me, we jumped up, but we were tangled, his chin hit my cheekbone, my elbow got him in the chest. I fell. He fell. We stumbled up and away from each other. He looked down. I looked at my parents standing there, glowering.

  “I don’t know who you are, young man,” my father said, “but you need to leave.”

  “It’s a public park,” I said, not sure why I was fighting them. I was busted.

  “Go,” my mother said to Zach.

  Zach nodded, his head still down. “I’m sorry, ma’am. I didn’t—we didn’t . . . I respect—”

  “Go now,” Dad said.

  Zach went, looking back at me for half a second, hand half raised. I smiled back at him.

  “Wipe that smile off your face!” Dad yelled.

  I tried not to laugh. He’d never said stuff like that before: “Young man,” “Wipe that smile off.” It was like he was quoting from a ye olden days handbook of angry parenting.

  “Are you insane?” Dad asked in a lower tone, aware now that some of the hipsters and homeless were looking at us, wryly amused. “Why would you take such a crazy risk?”

  He grabbed my arm. I didn’t shake him off despite really wanting to. Mom gave me her most powerful I-am-disappointed-and-ashamed-of-you look.

  “We’re going home. We’ll talk about this there.” Dad turned on his heel, pulling me along behind him. I kept my
eyes down, dragging my feet all the way along Seventh Street.

  Home was more haranguing. Lots of words repeated over and over: trust, dangerous, responsible, disappointed. They yelled; I listened.

  Except for when they demanded to know if we’d had sex and I insisted we hadn’t.

  That was that. I was grounded.

  Zach died the next weekend.

  LIE NUMBER SEVEN

  Me and Zach slept together. Made love. Had sex. Fucked. Explored every inch of each other’s bodies.

  Not once, many times, lots of times, all the time.

  I liked it. He liked it.

  Other than running it was what we did most.

  We couldn’t keep our hands off each other. It was like the pull of magnets, magnets that sparked when contact was made. Not sparked, exploded.

  It was worst in school. We had to avoid each other. Sit nowhere near at lunch. Opposite sides of the classroom. The only way I could not look at him was to keep my eyes down. Otherwise it was impossible.

  I burned. He burned.

  Sometimes in class—even in bio—my concentration was shot. Even when I couldn’t see him, I could smell him, which was worse.

  There were days I didn’t think I’d make it. I’d close my eyes. Imagine pulling him into the janitor’s closet. Or worse, leaping across desks, jumping on him, demonstrating the reproductive systems, then and there, in front of Yayeko and the whole class.

  Sometimes it would make me sweat, make me damp between my legs. I’d have to run to the bathroom. Stick my head under the cold water faucet. Slap my face. Do anything but think about Zach. Plug my nose with cotton balls so I couldn’t smell him.

  Every day at school I managed not to touch him, not to look his way was a triumph. It was also a lie. Other than keeping my wolfishness hidden, my biggest lie.

  I don’t understand how we got away with it for so long. How did no one notice? Except Brandon, and that was only because he saw us.

  People are blind.

  Same as you, if you believed what I said earlier, that we never made it past first base. How dumb can you be?

  About as dumb as everyone at school. When they found out they didn’t believe it.

  It was a relief to be busted. Except that Zach was dead, so there was nothing to hide.

  Now I’m not lying. I lied to my parents, but not to you.

  They can’t know because I swore to them that I hadn’t, that I wouldn’t. They were so freaked when they caught me and Zach kissing, so afraid of me fooling around. Afraid that it would unleash the wolf, afraid that I’d get pregnant and make more beasts. Afraid of me.

  So I lied. When they caught us I told them that was the only thing we’d done together: kissing, nothing more. And the only time. I told them I was curious. That I wouldn’t do it again.

  But that’s not why I lied to you. Not entirely. I mean, I was in the habit of keeping it hidden: from my parents, from everyone at school, most especially from Sarah.

  I wanted you to think that I’m a good girl. Good girls don’t kill.

  Sex is beastly, animal, out of control. The feeling I get from fucking is not so far from how I feel when I hunt, when I bring down prey. The two are too close. Too intimate. Too likely to get confused. Not by me, by you.

  I did not kill Zach.

  AFTER

  “You need to bring him here,” Grandmother says. We’re out on the porch in rocking chairs. Grandmother has a rug over her legs. Great-Aunt Dorothy is knitting something orange. I’m staring at the trees and trying not to scratch my arm where the new hair has come in. I’ve timed my visit badly. The place is overrun with wolves. The pull of so many changes is fierce: the hair starts to sprout within three hours of getting there. I can feel my heart beating faster.

  Great-Aunt nods. “Get him out of the city. Bring him here. We’ll take care of him.” The click of her needles takes on an ominous sound.

  The packet of birth control pills is in the breast pocket of my shirt. I keep them there when I’m with the Greats and don’t want to change. That way Grandmother won’t find them when she looks through my stuff. I put my hand over the pocket. Maybe the hormones will soak through the foil and cardboard and cloth into my fingertips, keep the change at bay.

  “Take care of him?” I ask, though I think I understand what they’re saying.

  Grandmother tut-tuts and presses her index finger to her bottom lip. I’m not sure if she’s shushing me or telling me not to worry.

  “It means he won’t be killing any more people,” Great-Aunt Dorothy says.

  “Not ever,” Grandmother says.

  “Because you’ll kill him?”

  Grandmother nods and Great-Aunt clicks her needles louder.

  “Good. He deserves to die. How will I get him up here?” I don’t even know how to find him.

  Grandmother laughs. It’s a weird sound. More of a bark really. I’m not sure I’ve heard her laugh before. “Ask him. He’ll follow.”

  I’m not sure I want him to. I’m relieved they haven’t told me to kill him but I’m also angry. Which emotion is stronger? I don’t know. What would it be like to kill another human being? I don’t want to know. Yet I do. Part of me wants to fuck Zach’s killer up.

  Can I just leave it to them? The Greats didn’t even know Zach and if they had, they don’t give a damn about anyone who isn’t family, who isn’t wolfish.

  “We told you,” Grandmother says, “that it’s dangerous having wolves in the city. We don’t belong. None of us belong there.”

  I don’t roll my eyes because this time they’re right: if the white boy wasn’t in the city he wouldn’t have killed Zach. He doesn’t belong there. But I’m different: I can control the change.

  “Is he Canis lupus or dirus?” Great-Aunt wants to know.

  “Lupus, I think. He’s scrawny. Not as tall as me.”

  “That doesn’t mean anything,” Grandmother objects. “How old is he?”

  “I don’t know. I think he’s my age. Maybe younger.”

  “Hasn’t hit his growth spurt then, has he?” Grandmother tuts at my stupidity. “Besides, Canis dirus isn’t much bigger than us.”

  “Teeth are,” Great-Aunt says. Her needles click to emphasize her point.

  “A bit,” Grandmother says, waving Great-Aunt Dorothy’s words aside with her hands. “They’re slower than us anyhow. Shorter legs. Doesn’t matter what size their teeth are. That’s why they’re extinct.”

  “Except as werewolves,” I say.

  Grandmother tuts at me for saying the obvious.

  “What difference does it make then?” I ask. “Whether he’s dirus or lupus?”

  Grandmother and Great-Aunt exchange looks. I’m supposed to already know, or this is information I’m not ready for, or they’re tired of talking. It’s hard to know which.

  Out in the forest one of my kin howls. The too-dense hair on my arms stands on end.

  Grandmother tuts again. “That’s where you should be,” she says. “Not sitting on a rocking chair.”

  AFTER

  I don’t change, but it’s close.

  On Sunday, my one non-wolf uncle takes me to the train station in the horse and buggy. I wear long sleeves and pull my hat down low over my eyes to hide the eyebrows that now meet in the middle, threatening to take over my face. My back is aching and my eyes hurt.

  I’m hoping that getting away from the farm, from all the wolves, will reverse the change.

  The horses shy away from me when I climb onto the seat. They take coaxing to head into town. I try not to scratch at the coarse hair all over my body. I tell myself it’s receding. My heart beats too fast. I ache.

  “Coming back in the summer?” my uncle asks.

  He’s not a talker so the question startles me. “Yes,” I say at last. “Always.”

  Neither of us mentions that if the change doesn’t slow soon we’ll have to turn the cart around and go back to the farm. He grunts and there’s no further conversation.


  It takes an hour to get to the station. Not until we’re at the fringes of the town can I be sure that the change is unwinding: my heart slows, the aches dull.

  My uncle glances at my now normal hands and lets me off at the station. He rides away without waiting to see if the train’s late. It is. It always is: on time leaving the city; late, late, late going back.

  I’m hungry but I don’t have enough money for even a candy bar out of the vending machine. What little I had went on the return ticket up here. Metro-North doesn’t come this far upstate, and Amtrak’s expensive.

  On the train, everyone around me is eating: McDonald’s, bags of chips, sushi. The old man next to me has two huge meat sandwiches wrapped in wax paper, oozing mustard and pickles. The smell is sharp in my nostrils. I press my face to the window and watch the Hudson, trying not to think about food, or the white boy, or Zach, or anything else that makes the muscles of my stomach contract. It’s not easy. I wish once again that Zach had not died, that my life was where it had been.

  By the time I’m back in the city the hair’s gone completely, my heart is normal, and the spotting has stopped. Now all I have to do is find the white boy and lure him upstate.

  I don’t think it will be as easy as the Greats say.

  AFTER

  I walk home from Penn Station. I wish I could afford to refill my MetroCard or had the energy to run. I’m starving. The train was two hours late and then it was another three back to the city. I’m finding it hard to think about anything other than food, but I force myself to look for traces of the white boy as I head home.

  The sooner I find him the sooner he’ll be taken care of.

  Taken care of. I feel like I’m Mafia. Cosa Nostra. Lupo Nostro. Or something.

  I can’t smell the boy. Will I be able to find him if he doesn’t want me to?

  The city reeks in ways the farm never does. There are so many scents it’s hard to track older odors. Not that the boy’s smell is subtle. But I’m looking in places that thousands—hundreds of thousands—of other people have been. Not to mention dogs, squirrels, rats and then closer to the park—horses, and all the smells that go with all those people and animals: urine, shit, vomit, garbage, sewage smells worming their way up from underground. There’s also bicycles, cars and taxis and trucks with their gasoline fumes, construction sites that smell of brick, mud, soldered metal, rusting metal, plastic, plaster, sand, cement.