A Bite's Tale: A Furry Fable (3 page)

“Mom would totally let you off the hook for another week if you asked,” Winnie went on.

“I’m fine.” My eyes drifted to the school’s façade behind Bea. Any time we’d driven by the building years ago, I’d been captivated by its old-world charm. But now, the belfry and gargoyles seemed to stare at me, reminding me of a creepy building from a horror movie. Why they needed this mammoth, freaky building for just a few hundred students, I had no idea.

“Are you sure you’re ready?” Winnie prodded.

I blew out a breath. “I have to be.”

Her gaze fell to my hands clamped around the strap of my backpack. She gently tugged on it and my frozen fingers uncurled. “I’ll show you to our lockers,” she said.

We entered the eerily dim corridor and my eyes sifted through the crowd of students in the hall, mentally seeking the unique energy that nearly every paranormal creature emitted.

They were all around me. Most of them had very likely already marked me as a werewolf the moment I stepped out of the car.

Did any of these werewolves know about the incident years ago? Had any of them been blamed for what I’d done to Jack? Until this moment, it had never occurred to me that someone else might have paid for my crime. Now that I’d returned, would they figure out that the attacker had been me?

At the very least, the other supernaturals would smell my fear and know something was up, which increased the risk of my crime being discovered.

Fear enveloped me like a dense fog. My lungs felt like sponge as I struggled to deflate them, then fill them again. Very soon, I’d be sitting in my first class. In smaller populations and smaller classrooms, I couldn’t avoid the non-humans. I zeroed in on the main door to the school and everything else swirled in my peripheral vision.

Maybe I
wasn’t
quite ready for school. But the alternative — staying home and listening to Aunt Mina’s subtle comments hinting that I should get out of the house — didn’t seem much better. I couldn’t hide forever. Eventually, I’d have to confront my fears.

“Cydney.” Winnie grabbed my arm and pulled me into an alcove displaying an elaborately gold-framed painting of a Knight on his horse. “You sure you’re not going to… change in the middle of class? Or right here?”

Winnie’s voice soothed me and my breathing eased. “What? No. I’m okay.”

I hated being different. I hated that my aunt and cousins didn’t always understand me. At that moment, I missed Gavin even more for his quiet understanding. He’d grown up knowing all about my peculiarities, so I never had to explain anything. We rarely even talked about it. Every now and then though, he’d tease me about being a freak. But he always seemed to know where the line was and he never crossed it.

“I don’t know,” Winnie whispered. “You definitely seemed upset.”

“I’m just a little nervous, but don’t worry. That’s not enough to make me lose control. Heightened emotions can bring on the change, but there’s more to it. It’s hard to explain.”

“You can tell me.” Winnie laid a gentle hand on my arm.

We rarely talked about my alter ego, but I knew I could trust her. Winnie was that kind of person. I leaned against the wall next to the painting and swallowed the lump of fear creeping up in my throat. “Well, I can be mad, but that won’t necessarily make me need to morph. If I’m really pissed off or super frustrated, maybe.” I blew out a breath. “It’s the
active
emotions, like getting overly excited. It’s a certain feeling, but I don’t know how else to explain it.”

Winnie studied my face, contemplating what I’d said. “Like if you got jacked up on caffeine and went on a roller coaster ride?”

“Yeah, that might do it.” I smiled, grateful that Winnie at least tried to understand me, unlike Beatrice and my aunt who abided by the
Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell
rule.

I pulled the slip of paper from the side pouch of my backpack and scanned the numbers to the combination lock. I committed the sequence to memory, then stuffed the paper in the pouch and opened my locker.

“Active emotions, huh?” Winnie furrowed her brows, as she contemplated the concept, then she lowered her voice. “So what would happen if you kissed a guy and he was an amazing kisser and you really, really liked him? Could you get worked up enough to lose control and shift?”

My stomach churned and I flinched, thinking of poor Jack.

Winnie gasped. “Is that what happened to him, the boy you bit? My mom only told me you’d lost control and hurt a boy. She didn’t say how it happened.”

My eyes pooled as I remembered all the blood… his torn flesh.

“I’m so sorry,” she said. “We don’t have to talk about it. I shouldn’t have brought it up, especially today. Don’t know what I was thinking. C’mon, I’ll show you to your first class. That’s Mr. Williams. Biology, right?”

“I think so,” I replied, trying to purge the memory of Jack’s scream.

“Mr. Williams is okay.” Her words flowed quickly, like she was trying to distract me. “But he takes his class very seriously. You’ll do alright so long as he feels like you’re making an effort.”

“You must be Cydney Marsten,” a forty-something year old man said as I passed through the doorway. He had sandy blond hair and wore black wide-rimmed glasses. A light blue button-down shirt hung over khaki pants and brown loafers. He gave me a look that said he knew I wasn’t human, even though I knew his human senses couldn’t confirm that for sure. He pointed to an empty chair near the window. “You can sit there.”

I scanned the faces of the other students, automatically looking for Jack — now that he’d been brought to mind. But none of the guys resembled the boy I knew from years ago. Not even close.

Jack had been a year older than me and would’ve graduated last year. I wouldn’t see him at my school unless he’d failed a grade. Unlikely. He’d been too smart for that.

If I met him again, would I recognize him? How much had he changed? His voice would be deeper and most likely he’d filled out a bit. Would he be much taller than me? Would he recognize me?

Would he hate me?

I’d spent three summers with Jack. Every day, he’d be waiting for me in the woods, in our special place, wearing a grin. And I’d smile back.

His curly, dark hair had always been messy, but he’d worn nice clothes. I loved his face, especially his amber colored eyes. I’d frequently wondered whether his parents were Asian or black or Spanish. He looked to be a mixture of just about everything. Maybe that’s what made him so mesmerizing.

The first time I’d seen him, he’d been lying in the meadow, staring at the trees with his rolled up jacket under his head. He’d given me a startled look, obviously not expecting anyone to happen by. He’d stood and dusted off his clothes, then we made small talk for several minutes. I hadn’t wanted to part ways and, apparently, neither had he.

After a while, he’d asked me my name. Then his hands had shot up, palms out, to stop me from speaking. “Never mind. We can be whoever we want, in our own little world. Who do you want to be?”

I’d giggled and given him Gavin’s nickname for me, Cinderella, since I answered to it anyway and I didn’t have to worry about forgetting it.

He’d grimaced. “That’s a fake name, right?”

“What, you’re not into fairy tales?” I chuckled. “And what awesome name are you using?”

“Today, I’m… Jack.” He laid his arm across his body and bowed to me, before looking up with mischievous eyes. “Of bean stalk fame.”

Back home in Florida, Gavin and I hadn’t gotten out of the city much. Being the only breadwinner, my mom was usually too busy to take us anywhere. She used her vacation time for her trips to visit Aunt Mina here on Ile de Paix. Since our island getaways were all we had, it made anything I did with Jack seem especially new and exciting.

One day, it would be a stream with tiny little fish and another day he’d show me a giant gnarled oak tree to climb. Some days, we’d just talk or he’d whip out a deck of cards and we’d play rummy or war. But no matter what he suggested, I’d always shrug and say, “Sure.” I already felt too young and not nearly pretty enough to hang out with him, and had no clue why he sought me out. Didn’t he have other friends? In any case, I didn’t want him to think I was a dork, so I always contained my excitement.

A part of me wished I’d taken a picture of him, wished I’d gotten his true identity. But back then, I’d loved our pretend world. Knowing his name would’ve connected us to the real world. And when we met every day that summer in the clearing, we didn’t want to be reminded of reality. It was just the two of us, in our own little world. I’d wanted it to stay that way.

Whew. I’d learned that a few months ago at my last school. I exhaled and relaxed. “It’s an algae found in freshwater areas like lagoons and ponds.”

“That’s correct.” His eyes narrowed. He was probably trying to figure out how I knew the answer, when I’d so obviously been on another planet during his lecture.

Vowing to pay attention the rest of class, I put Jack out of my mind. What was the point in thinking of him? He’d probably been a tourist every summer, a temporary transplant like me. It would certainly explain why he didn’t seem to have any other friends. But even if he lived on the island, after what I’d done to him, he wouldn’t want to see me again. Of that, I was sure.

If he was even alive.

I remembered the terror in Jack’s eyes, just before I’d bolted to keep myself from hurting him worse. I’d regained control of myself minutes later and returned to make sure he was okay and beg his forgiveness, but he’d vanished. There was nothing left but the lingering scent of blood.

Whether someone had found him and helped him or an animal had dragged him off, I never knew. When I got home and told my mom I’d bit someone, she’d locked me up that night. I was grateful, because I couldn’t bear to hurt anyone else.

The next morning, I’d intended to look for Jack, but my mom had already arranged our flight back to the States. I never got a chance to find out what happened to him.

I refused to think that he hadn’t survived. Because that would mean I’d killed him.

Chapter Four

Cydney

The bell rang at the end of the first period. Chairs scraped across the floor as students pushed back from their desks, followed by shoes pounding on the floor as they fled Mr. Williams’ class.

“Miss Marsten, a minute of your time?” Mr. Williams growled from behind his desk.

I suspected he was about to reprimand me for not paying attention during class. I approached his desk anyway. “Yes?”

He crossed his arms over his chest. “I understand you have extenuating circumstances that may make it difficult to fully participate in class. Perhaps you’d like to take another week at home?” His words sounded concerned, but his tone said the opposite.

“Good morning, Cydney. I’m Ms. Hambry.” The woman, decades older than me, sighed. “I was so sorry to hear about your mother. I met her a couple years ago through a mutual friend. She was such a sweet woman. Car accident, right?”

I nodded and bit my lip to keep my chin from quivering. In an effort to escape the teacher’s pitying smile, my eyes searched out an available chair.

“You can sit there, sweetheart.” She pointed to the first row. Right where she could throw me sympathetic glances throughout class. Yay.

And she did. For almost an entire hour, every time her eyes strayed to me, I’d get the look.

School was supposed to take my mind off things, not suck me into them. But by the end of Ms. Hambry’s class, my throat felt swollen and my eyes burned. If they couldn’t forget, how could I? More than anything, I wanted anonymity. To live where no one remembered my mother or how she’d been tragically ripped from our lives.

A place where I wasn’t constantly reminded of what I’d done to Jack.

Maybe leaving the house wasn’t such a good idea after all.

When the lunch bell rang, I bolted to the cafeteria I’d passed by earlier that morning. I searched the huge room, but couldn’t find Winnie anywhere. My throat closed over and my eyes blurred with tears. I balled my hands into fists and inhaled deeply, desperately trying to calm down.