Her eyes sparkled. “We should be study partners.”
“Ah, sure. Whenever you like.”
“How about today? Do you have a car?”
I blinked. “No, I—”
“That makes it easy, then. I’ll take you to my house, and I’ll drop you home whenever you like. Deal?”
I grinned. “Deal.”
I don’t remember anything else that happened the rest of the day. I walked through my classes like a zombie. By the time I got into Shop, however, the shock had worn off. While Mr. Conklin droned on about the proper use of a circular saw, I told Maxwell and Lonnie what happened.
“Brittany.” Lonnie nodded. “She’s hot.”
“Seriously,” said Maxwell. “She’s double hot.”
“So what’s your issue?” Lonnie asked.
I frowned. The issue was I was a werewolf and couldn’t afford to let Brittany get too close. Then another problem occurred to me. “My uncle picks me up after school. Only I can’t reach him to tell him what’s going on. I’ve got no bars on my cell.”
Maxwell shrugged. “Take a leak.”
I frowned. “What?”
“No one gets bars in school,” Lonnie said. “They’ve got like a cell phone blocker or something.”
“Only the block doesn’t work so well in the boys’ bathroom nearest the office.” Maxwell gave an exaggerated wink. “Go up and get a bathroom pass.”
“It has to be an emergency, though,” Lonnie said, “so walk kind of hunched over.”
I looked at Mr. Conklin and sighed. “Here goes nothing.”
Maxwell gave me a little shove.
I swallowed my smile, hunched my shoulders, and walked to the front of the room with short, hurried steps. “Excuse me, sir, but I need—”
Without looking at me, Mr. Conklin tore a pass from a tablet and handed it over. Just like that, I was down the hall and into the bathroom next to the office.
I called my uncle.
His muffled answer sounded like I woke him. “Nyello.”
“Uncle Bob, this is Cody.”
I could almost see him sit up in bed. “Another fight?”
“No. I’m okay. I just wanted to let you know I’m going to a friend’s house after school, so don’t pick me up.”
“That’s fine.”
“And don’t hold dinner for me.”
There was a long pause. A frown crept into his voice. “Are you planning to be back before dark?”
Cripes. How could I have forgotten? Tonight was the night after the full moon. I would still feel the fever. “Yes, sir, I will.”
“All right, then.” He hung up.
I leaned against a stall, a smile spreading. I was going to be with Brittany.
NINE
When classes ended, I rushed out of school and into the student parking lot. Part of me braced for a letdown, and when I saw Brittany leaning casually against her lime green Beetle, at first I couldn’t believe she’d showed. She smiled at me, and the day lit up like sunlight couldn’t wait to touch her.
I stood mesmerized by her face, pale and perfect beneath her spiky black hair. Her lips shone bright pink today. She wore a sweater that clung to every curve, a short black skirt, and tights with pink peace signs on them. There was a hole at her knee. The memory of bruises and scrapes on her leg dampened my mood.
She broke the spell by walking around to the driver’s side. I climbed into the passenger seat. The car’s interior was faded beige, but only the roof and the seats remained that way. Bumper stickers covered the doors and the entire dashboard. Friends help you move, real friends help you move bodies. All generalizations are false, including this one. If you are telepathic, think HONK. Suburbia: Where they tear out the trees and then name streets after them. They layered one another, cut out around gauges and door handles. The effect was like a steamer trunk my mother bought once. Decoupage, she called it.
Brittany started the car; music rattled the speakers. I recognized The Pink Spiders, although I didn’t usually listen to them.
“Seatbelts,” she said as she buckled her own.
I hurried to comply. “Nice car.”
“Thanks. It’s old, but I love it.” She looked behind as she pulled out of the parking spot. “My dad got it for my sixteenth birthday. Sort of a peace offering, I guess. I don’t see him much.”
“He doesn’t live with you?”
“He lives in Georgia, thank the maker. That’s where I’m from. Only been in Florida a few years. My mother, my little brother, and I live with my dad’s father. Grandpa Earle. You’ll meet him. He’s cool.”
I nodded, trying not to stare. I couldn’t believe I was in the car sitting next to her. Her scent rolled over me. I smelled her skin, her breath, her hair gel, and the fabric softener on her sweater. She smelled great.
The Pink Spiders turned into Death Cab for Cutie. I relaxed, bobbing with the music. I resisted the urge to hang my head out the open window and catch the breeze. I’d never been happier.
We stopped at a light.
“There’s that new tattoo parlor everyone’s talking about.” She motioned with her chin. “As if we needed another.”
“You don’t like tattoos?”
“They’re fine. On other people. As an art form, they can be amazing. I saw a tat of a girl’s boyfriend once, and you could recognize him. But they’re just so permanent. I might get one, and two months later, I might not be that person anymore. I can’t be restricted like that.”
“You don’t have to get someone’s face.” I couldn’t bring myself to repeat the word boyfriend.
“Same difference. Say I got a butterfly with green wings.”
She emphasized the word green, and with a start, I realized she had green eyes.
“Two months down the road, I decide my favorite color is purple. Green and purple don’t go.” The light changed, and she made a left turn. “Butterflies are lame, anyway.”
I chuckled, although I wasn’t sure she was joking. I could hear my uncle say what girl doesn’t like butterflies. After a moment, I surprised myself by asking, “What about piercings?”
She flashed a smile. “Body piercings are all about other people’s pleasure. Think about it. That’s all they’re for. And I’m just not into making everyone else happy. I’m still trying to figure out me.”
“Me, too,” I murmured.
She smiled again. I sighed, memorizing her lips and the curve of her nose.
“You like Drop Dead, Gorgeous?” she asked.
“They’re all right.” I tried to get my mind back into the conversation. “I prefer Lamb of God. Green Day.”
“Tool?” she asked.
I nodded, and she pressed seek on her XM until she found the station. All Tool all the time.
Moments later, we were out of the city. I saw stables and barns. And a sign that read Sunspot Naturist Resort.
I kind of yelped. “You live at a nudist colony?” Embarrassment coursed through me. I couldn’t take my clothes off in front of her. Not unless she did it first.
“We live next to it.” She leaned forward as she pulled onto a narrow dirt road. “Grandpa Earle sold them some land a while back. He wasn’t too happy about it. But what can you do?”
Through the trees, I saw a white, two-story house with an overhanging roof and a screened-in porch. In the shaded yard, a man sat on a lawn chair.
Brittany pulled around the side to a carport and parked next to an old camper. Its tires were flat, and it was coated with dust.
“You like camping?” I asked.
“Never been. Grandpa Earle took my brother a couple times when we first moved down. But being the butt crack he is, he wore that out right quick.” She hopped out and stepped to the front of the Beetle to retrieve her books from the trunk. “I keep saying I’m going to get a backpack for all this.”
“My uncle got me one with Scooby Doo on the front,” I blurted, and then wished I hadn’t. She laughed, and I shrugged. “Well, who doesn’t like Scooby
Doo?”
She laughed again. “Where are your books, now?”
“I finished everything in school.”
“You’re quick,” she said. “Come on. I’ll introduce you.”
We came around to the front of the house. Brittany dropped her books at the steps. A dog squeezed out from under the porch. A beagle mix.
Brittany slapped her leg. “Come on, Haff. Here, boy.”
The dog whined, but didn’t come closer.
“Haff?” I asked.
“Short for half-breed.” She frowned. “I don’t get it. He’s usually so friendly.”
The dog scrambled back into his hidey-hole. I felt self-conscious, knowing exactly why the dog didn’t want to meet me.
We walked toward the man beneath the trees. The yard was big, and the grass was skimpy under all the shade. I smelled oranges, and I looked up to see some of the trees still had fruit in them, too high to pick.
We approached the man, who held a rifle in his lap. Brittany seemed to take that in stride. “Grandpa Earle,” she said, “this is Cody. Cody, this is Grandpa Earle.”
“How do you do, sir?” I shook with him, aware of the wrinkles on his hand.
“You live around here, boy?” he asked.
“Yes, sir, I do.”
“He lives with the Fix-It Guy,” Brittany said.
I noticed she raised her voice when speaking to him.
“Ah.” Grandpa Earle nodded. “Good man. Good worker.”
“Yes, sir,” I said.
“’Course, he ain’t been around as long as me. I been here since 1963. Okeechobee Boulevard was one lane. I remember when MacArthur Dairy would come down that road there and deliver the milk. Butter, too, if you had a hankering. Now you got to go into town and get your own milk. Can you imagine that? And then you got to pump your own gas in order to get back.”
Brittany’s cheeks sucked in. She looked like she was stifling a smile. “Times change, Grandpa.” She put her hand on his shoulder.
He patted her fingers, smiling at her. “Praise the Lord for my two little pleasures.”
The scene made me uncomfortable. I didn’t have grandparents, and I wasn’t used to talking to senior citizens. But watching Brittany with him, I realized she didn’t care about his rumpled clothing or his trips down memory lane. She was fine with him the way he was.
My senses prickled. I smelled people approaching. A man and a woman stepped out of the surrounding trees. They were completely naked, shining white in a patch of sunlight.
“Gerk.” I stared, unable to think of anything more intelligent to say.
In an instant, Grandpa Earl whipped up his rifle and shot at the couple.
I jumped at the sound. They jumped, too. A puff of dust exploded from a tree trunk near their heads. Turning tail, they ran, their behinds quivering.
Grandpa Earle let out a whoop.
Brittany shouted, “We talked about this.”
He waved a hand. “Ain’t no law against shooting albino deer.”
I covered my mouth, wanting so bad to laugh but figuring it would fuel Brittany’s outrage. I’d never seen naked people in person before. These two were kind of sagging and dimpled, not like in magazines at all.
Brittany held out a hand to her grandfather. “Give it to me.”
“No,” he said. “I need it. You know how many snakes we got around here.”
“But you aren’t shooting the snakes.”
He hugged the rifle, looking stubborn.
She jammed her fingers into her hair, making it stand straight up, and then closed her eyes as if composing herself. “Did Butt Crack get home all right?”
“He’s here,” said Grandpa Earle. “I told him to do his homework before he saw his friends.”
“He’d better.”
“You’re too hard on the boy. He’s a good kid.”
“I know. And I want him to stay that way.”
A car rattled up the driveway. It was Sheriff Brad. Apprehension seized my stomach. I glanced at Brittany. If anything, she looked bored.
The sheriff climbed out of his patrol car and slammed the door. He walked toward us, pockets jingling.
“Hello, Sheriff.” I tried to sound nonchalant.
He ignored me. “Now Earle, you can’t be shooting at people with that pellet gun of yours. We’re getting complaints.”
Grandpa Earle scowled. “I ain’t hit none of them.”
The sheriff nodded. “Well, I appreciate that.”
“Come on,” Brittany whispered. She took hold of my arm.
I tingled where she touched me. As we walked to the house, I struggled for something to say. “That happen a lot?”
“The sheriff showing up?” She shrugged. “They’re friends.”
“No, I mean the naked people.”
“Oh.” She chuckled. “The Sunspot has nature trails running along our property. Sometimes folks get off the trail and wind up in our yard.”
“So your grandfather shoots them.”
“Been at it all day, by the look of him.” She glanced over her shoulder. “He never did want to sell that tract of land.”
We got to the porch steps. I picked up her books and noticed she was reading To Kill a Mockingbird. I’d read that last year at my old school. This year it would have been The Catcher in the Rye.
She held the door so I could enter. The porch was larger than my uncle’s living room. It had white wicker furniture and a variety of potted plants. Ceiling fans chugged, wobbling as they spun.
Brittany ushered me into her house. The blinds in the living room were drawn, making the room feel cool. I smelled dinner cooking. Something spicy. Music played above us.
“Just drop the books on a chair.” Brittany tossed her purse down as well.
I stacked the books and followed her to the kitchen. I blinked at the brightness. Everything was yellow. The walls. The curtains. Even the air seemed yellow after the dimness of the living room.
Brittany took the lid off a large slow cooker and stirred the contents. “Ham hocks and white beans. I hope you’re hungry. She made too much, as usual.”
“Who? Your mother?”
She nodded. “She puts dinner on before she goes to work in the morning. She has two jobs, so she doesn’t get home until after midnight. I only see her on Sundays, and then she’s so worn out, she hardly talks to me.” She tapped the spoon and carried it to the sink to rinse. Then she shouted, “Butt Crack, get down here.”
Thunder rolled down the stairs, and a kid appeared in the kitchen doorway. He was small, even shorter than Brittany, and his hair hung like a mop over his eyes.
“What?” he asked.
She faced him. “You have been home for half an hour and there are breakfast dishes in the sink.”
“I’ll do them when I get back.”
“Back from where? You aren’t going anywhere.”
“Yeah, the guys are waiting.”
“This is a school night.”
“I got to go. Volleyball.” He grabbed an apple on his way out the door. “I’ll be home early. Promise.”
“I don’t appreciate your slackitude,” she called after him. Then she shook her head. “That kid.”
“He plays volleyball?” I asked.
“He watches volleyball. Spying from the bushes.”
I must have looked baffled because she laughed.
“Every winter, the Sunspot hosts a festival. People come from all over the country. It’s a big thing. They have arts and crafts, and weenie roasts. Skin cancer seminars. And volleyball competitions.”
“Nude volleyball?”
“Conjures an interesting picture, doesn’t it?”
I burst out laughing. “No wonder he’s in a hurry.”
“I hope he doesn’t get caught. They’ve already called the sheriff on us once today.” She motioned across the room. “Have a seat. I’ll get the book.” To my stunned expression, she said, “World History. Remember?”
My face warmed
. I crossed to a breakfast nook and sat at a table with a ruffled yellow tablecloth.
Brittany set her book before me. “So what’s your secret for memorizing events?”
“I make a song out of them.”
“You mean, just make everything rhyme?”
“Yes, but tune is important, too. I don’t know about you, but when I try to remember a song, it’s the melody that triggers the lyrics.”
Outside, Sheriff Brad’s car pulled away. Grandpa Earle came into the house. He sat in the living room and turned on Judge Judy full blast.
Brittany rolled her eyes. In spite of the noise, we spent the better part of an hour making up ridiculous and somewhat raunchy songs about Napoleon. I loved watching her laugh. I wanted to touch her face and stare. I wanted to kiss her.
Then I caught a newsbreak from the other room. “Coming up at five. The body of a young woman was found this afternoon along North Road, the victim of an apparent animal attack. But in an alarming twist, authorities now suspect a person or persons unknown armed with a jawbone and a razor.”
Another murder? My stomach clenched, and my thoughts whirled. It wasn’t me. I remembered everything I did the night before, and it wasn’t me.
Was it?
TEN
I glanced around Brittany’s yellow kitchen as if looking for an escape. The words of the newscaster rang in my ears—body of a young woman…person or persons unknown.
“Are you all right?” Brittany asked.
I thought I was going to be sick. Sweat trickled down my neck. My hands shook. I was losing control. If I didn’t get out of there, I would turn into a wolf in front of her.
“I didn’t realize it was so late,” I murmured, unable to keep the alarm out of my voice. “I have to go.”
“Can’t you stay for dinner? I’m making beer biscuits to go with the beans.”
“No, really. I promised I’d be back before dark.”
She stood as if offended. “All right.”
Without looking at me, she left the kitchen. I hurried after. In the living room, Grandpa Earle sat sound asleep in front of the blaring television.
Brittany skipped down the porch steps and across the yard. The sun was low, and gold light glinted through the trees. My vision swam, and I could have kicked myself. What was I thinking, going to her house the day after a full moon?
The Amazing Wolf Boy Page 8
