Starfall

by Michael Griffo

  Laughter and hugs and a few tears come next, which is normal when people enter new phases of their lives. Louis and Arla gave us a home when we didn’t have one, and I will be eternally grateful to them for their kindness.

  But now it’s time for us to build a home together—Barnaby, our mother, and me—in the home we shared all too briefly and the home that I’m now reluctant to leave.

  “I’ve made a decision, Caleb,” I say. “And don’t yell at me.”

  We’re sitting on my bed, a fresh coat of pink paint on the wall facing it, so I can wake up every morning and see my favorite color.

  “Do I ever yell?” he asks. “What’ve you decided?”

  “I’m putting off college for a year,” I announce.

  I scrunch up my face, waiting for the yell to come from Mr. Academician. It never does.

  “I think that’s a great idea,” he says, fiddling with the string bracelet he still wears around his wrist. “You need time to reconnect with your mom.”

  “How’d you know that was the reason?” I ask.

  He stops playing with the string and looks at me quizzically, his hands folded in his lap. “Because I never stop thinking about you, Domgirl.”

  He hasn’t touched me, and yet I still feel myself blush.

  “Before I open my eyes, you’re the first face I see,” he says without a hint of embarrassment. “And when I go to bed at night, you’re the last image I see before I fall off to sleep. You’re with me, Dominy, always.”

  I feel the same way about Caleb. It came over me unexpectedly, a bit sneakily, but lately, maybe since my life is much calmer than it’s been in years, only the good stuff rises to the surface. And there’s nothing gooder than Caleb.

  “And if I have anything to say about it, Domgirl,” he states, “that’s the way it’s going to be for the rest of my life.”

  Did he just propose? He isn’t even out of college yet. And then there’s med school. Or maybe I’m just getting ahead of myself.

  “But for right now you just enjoy a year of reconnecting with your mother and Barnaby,” he says, throwing his arm around my shoulder. “Relearn what it’s like to be a family.”

  I plan on doing just that.

  Most girls can’t wait to graduate high school and go off to college to get away from their mother and little brother. But not me. I guess it really is true what they say: One person’s curse is another person’s blessing.

  Epilogue

  Ten Years Later

  “Winter!”

  When my shriek doesn’t garner a reply, I walk into the living room.

  “Winter, didn’t I tell you not to color on the floor?”

  My son looks up at me, his three-year-old eyes lacking a hint of shame or guilt or remorse. Only logic.

  “But I ran out of paper, Mommy.”

  “There are five coloring books right there in the corner.”

  “But I wanted to draw a picture of a horse,” he replies. “And none of them have horse pictures.”

  “What do they have pictures of?” I ask.

  “Dinosaurs and cars and flowers,” he replies.

  “Do you think you could color one of those until I can find some paper for you?”

  He tilts his head to the side, his long black bangs falling into his eyes, to ponder my request. “Okay, I think I can do that for you.”

  “You’re too good to me, Mr. Winter Bettany.”

  My son skips to the other side of the living room to collect a coloring book, and in a voice too old for his body replies, “That’s what I’ve always told ya.”

  “Mommy!”

  This voice comes from the kitchen, but I’m not alarmed at the shriek. After three years I know how to separate my kids’ cries into categories, and this one is definitely excited.

  “Yes, Jessica,” I reply. “I’m right here.”

  “Is Grand-mère coming over tonight to babysit?” my daughter asks.

  “Yes, she is,” I answer, scooping her up in my arms. I swing her around, and she does what she always does when we’re this close; she grabs my hair and connects it to hers so it’s one super-long strand of red meeting jet-black.

  “It’s yours and Daddy’s ’versary?” she asks.

  “Yes, sweetie,” I reply, turning the swing into a bounce. “Your daddy and I have been married five years today, and we’re going away for the night to celebrate.”

  “That’s not fair,” Winter proclaims.

  “Why?” I ask. “Can’t we celebrate a happy occasion?”

  “Of course,” he replies. “But you have to swing me too!”

  Luckily, my wolf-strength hasn’t abandoned me after all these years, and I lift my son up in my other arm like he is a half-full bag of groceries. The three of us bounce and swing and jump around the room, gigglaughs and cackles filling it.

  I stare at my twins, the children Caleb and I adopted in order to create the family we always dreamed about having, and I marvel at how lucky I am. Although I have my lycanthropy under control—as much as a wild beast can be controlled—neither Caleb nor I felt comfortable taking the chance on my giving birth to a child who might inherit my mutation. We almost gave up during the lengthy adoption process, but persevered, and when I held Winter and Jessica in my arms the first time, I knew we had made the right decision.

  In a few hours, my mother will come over and spend a couple days with my twins, coloring with them, teaching them how to make croissants, introducing them to some new French words, so Caleb and I can have a romantic dinner and then spend the night at one of the new casinos in Lincoln. Neither of us likes to gamble, but the place is half casino and half resort, so we can get massages and I can treat myself to a facial while he beats some stranger at racquetball. It’s only an overnight trip since he can’t take that much time away from his practice. Since he is Weeping Water’s resident general practitioner, the town relies on his services.

  As for me, my job can wait a day or two until I get back. As editor-in-chief of The Weeping Water Weekly, I can make my own hours. Plus, now that the Jaffes are no longer in town and the Full Moon Killer is part of town folklore, I doubt there’s going to be a newsworthy event while I’m away.

  When I was younger I always assumed I would stay close to Weeping Water, but, when Lars Svenson’s will was read and he left me his paper, that cinched it. A lot of people in town questioned why I became heir to the town’s long-running paper, and I simply assumed it was because I graduated with degrees in English and journalism and had written a few articles for the paper while studying at Big Red. Turns out I was wrong. Mr. Svenson left me an envelope to be opened a year after he died, which contained the most infamous issue of the Three W ever published, the one with the one-word headline: WEREWOLF? I will never know if he knew the truth about me or somehow had his suspicions. If he did, it wouldn’t surprise me. Nothing ever does.

  Not even when I turned on the TV a few years ago and saw Gwenevere Schültzenhoggen, rechristened Gwen Hogen, starring in her own sitcom. She plays a recently jilted lesbian woman, who is forced to move back home and live with her divorced mother and her widowed grandmother. It’s called The Lesbian, the Divorcee, and the Widow, shortened, of course, to LDW.

  Right after high school she broke up with Barnaby and stunned everyone by declaring that she was moving to Hollywood to become an actress. Sure, she had glammed up, but no one expected her to turn her dream into a career. She proved us wrong.

  The only time I was really surprised was when Barnaby asked to have dinner with Caleb and me one night after we first got married. He said he wanted to introduce us to his new girlfriend, who I was sure would be the latest in a line of interchangeable faces belonging to an endless stream of girlfriends he introduced us to all throughout college and the years after. When Arla walked through the door I almost fainted.

  She was beaming and shy at the same time. Even though she often worked with Caleb when they were both surgical interns at Memorial Hospital, he knew nothing
about Barnaby and Arla’s courtship, so Caleb was just as shocked as I was. Naturally, shock quickly segued to thrill, and they were married a year later. Louis may have lost a stepson, but he gained a son-in-law. As well as a lovely girlfriend named Darlene, whom he brought to the wedding and who, incidentally, just moved in with him.

  Despite my curse, my life has turned out pretty darn subarashi. There’ve been a few low points, like when we heard that Archie had moved to Alaska after spending several years in New York. The town gossip has him working on the pipeline up there, but I can’t be sure. I think of my friend every day. The letter he left for me after he ran away is in my green metal box with my other precious mementos, and I pray that he knows he is loved and can one day find his own inner strength to return home. After I pray, I remind myself, however, that everyone has their own journey, and it can’t be steered by anyone else but them. No matter how powerful those people think they may be.

  I know that Luba and Nadine and her son, Hunter, are out there somewhere, probably watching me and waiting for the perfect moment to strike again. But I refuse to live my life thinking about them and dwelling on this curse. It’s my lot in life, end of story. Yes, at one time they had power over me, but I took that power back to make it my own, and I will never relinquish it again.

  Standing on my front porch, I see Caleb pull into the driveway, and I can hear my kids laughing in the background. Golden sunshine is pouring down on my face, and I open my eyes to it; I see Jess’s face before me, and I capture the moment. Something flies by me then, and the idyllic scene is disrupted. Hovering in the space between me and all that’s good in my life is a bee, buzzing quietly, wondering which way to fly. Involuntarily, I think of Nadine, of all she’s done to me, and all she can still do.

  Then Caleb swats the air, and the bee flies away. My husband kisses me hello, but I keep my eyes open and see the bee has returned and is watching me from a distance. No, I won’t give in to those thoughts; I will not give energy to those fears. Instead, I will cling to what I’ve always known and what helped me survive during the worst of it all.

  I will remember that I am, and always will be, blessed.

  K TEEN BOOKS are published by

  Kensington Publishing Corp.

  119 West 40th Street

  New York, NY 10018

  Copyright © 2014 by Michael Griffo

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without the prior written consent of the Publisher, excepting brief quotes used in reviews.

  Kensington and the K Teen logo Reg. U.S. Pat. & TM Off.

  ISBN: 978-0-7582-8076-3

  eISBN-13: 978-0-7582-8077-0

  eISBN-10: 0-7582-8077-7

  First Kensington Electronic Edition: May 2014