The Waking (The Upturned Hourglass) (3 page)

Noah slowed to a walk and stood within five feet of the girl, and still she was unaware of any danger.

Clueless,
Jack thought.

The werewolf set up a soft, guttural yipping to get her attention.  It was truly a form of greeting, but naturally she sat bolt upright in fear. The two wolves could smell her adrenaline in the air.

“See,” Jack whispered spitefully. “They fear us, smart one. We’re huge, man-sized wolves.”

Noah crept closer to the petrified girl and Jack rolled his eyes. But the girl didn’t balk any more. She sat stone still and didn’t move.

Like an animal who thinks moving will get it eaten
…

But, again, the girl surprised him, as she slowly held out her hand and began talking to the beast. “Geez you’re big,” she whispered more to herself than to the wolfish dog in front of her. Jack couldn’t smell anymore fear than the original adrenaline rush. She seemed actually calm.

“Here, boy.” She clicked with her tongue.

Jack nearly gagged as Noah came to lower himself and rest his head under the girl’s outstretched hand.

Gingerly she stroked his fur, as another shiver ran through her.  “You’re warm,” she laughed nervously.

Jack had had enough. She was stroking a werewolf like he was a common household pet. Next thing you know she’d be buying him dog kibble and a collar.

With an audible grunt, Jack retrieved Noah’s discarded clothing, jammed them under his arm, and took off to the other side of the trees. An unearthly howl escaped his lips, a cry which no human could ever reproduce—Noah had his orders.

The tan-gray wolf cocked his head to the side and with an almost apologetic look at the girl, ran toward the unseen Jack.

“Bye,” the girl whispered and watched him lope away.

When Noah reached Jack out of sight of the girl, Jack waited for him to morph back and handed the boy his clothes. Glaring, he said nothing.

“What?” Noah asked half-heartedly.

Without warning, Jack wheeled about and exploded, “No contact until
I
say! You broke every rule in the book! The Mark isn’t stupid! What if, after that little performance tonight, she’s begins to notice things, to put two and two together. Without the element of surprise on our side, things could get ugly. Is that what you want for her? Needless violence? Difficult assimilation? Think, Noah! We have to make contact as
humans.
What if she sees you now and recognizes you—sees it in your eyes? It’s happened before. We’re supposed to remain detached. You know that, Noah! You could have blown the whole operation. It’s for her own good that she doesn’t know us yet for what we are.”

The girl was right where they left her. Jack leaned against a tree with his back to Noah—still obviously exasperated. Surprisingly, Noah seemed unperturbed, after being chewed out by Jack so intensely.

“I don’t understand, Jack. I thought the whole point
was
to get to know the Mark—and that it
does
help with assimilation.”

“You get to know marks as
people
, Noah, not as wolves. We are not big puppy dogs. We are werewolves. There’s a huge difference and most human beings sense that difference, even if they can’t explain it. Appearing to a human in a wolf form is simply too risky.”  And then more to himself than to Noah, he added, “Maybe we’ll get lucky; maybe it was too dark for her to get a good look at you.”

“Jack?” 

“
What
, Noah?” Jack growled, the exasperation returning to his voice.

“I like her. I think she’s . . . interesting.
Special. And she seemed to like me, too.”

Jac
k rolled his eyes again. “Yeah. Whatever,” he huffed.

Inwardly, though, Jack suspected the boy was right. The girl was interesting to say the least.

BEGINNINGS

Valie woke just before the sun to the crying of a tenant’s baby in the downstairs apartment. She tried to muffle the sound by cramming her pillow over her head, but in the absence of ambient noise, the shriek only became more acute. In frustration, she slammed the pillow onto the floor.

A singular knock sounded at the open, bedroom door.

“I’m awake!” Valie croaked, annoyed, her voice still thick from sleep. The teenager knew Alden would stand in the doorway for a moment watching with his bleary red eyes, so she refused to open her own eyes until he left. She listened impatiently as her grandfather shuffled unsteadily back to his bedroom on the other side of the apartment, grumbling under his breath.

Stiffly, Valie untangled herself from the sheets wrapped around her and rose to dress in the usual, early-morning daze. The one luxury she’d been afforded in the too-small apartment was her own bathroom adjacent to her room. She wasn’t sure she could have taken sharing with her grandfather and waking up to the smell of last night’s bad brandy every morning.

When she’d brushed her teeth and dressed, Valie wandered to the kitchen to grab the usual five dollars waiting on the
kitchen counter. It had been the same every morning since she’d started kindergarten. Her grandfather wasn’t a touchy-feely sort of guy who made lunches in the morning, much less cooked breakfast, but, at least, the regular money meant that he thought about her everyday—it meant something—although anything else she needed she had to beg for.

Her grandfather had checked out of life a long time ago. Valie didn’t know him or understand him. Alden’s world was the couch, the television, and his alcohol. He owned this small twelve-unit apartment building—Palmetto Manor--and once a month trekked down the halls to collect the rents. Valie honestly thought that the farthest he’d ever been outside of their apartment in the last ten years was down to the corner liquor store—a little less than a block away. 

No one else in the building seemed to be awake, aside from the newlyweds downstairs whose child never slept. At the end of the hallway, the girl paused in front of the elevator doors, pushed the button and watched them open. She stared inside the empty car with longing—but then turned left, heading toward the narrow stairwell.

It was the same everyday.

Valie had never taken an elevator or been in a car without the windows down, or played hide-and-seek and hidden in the dark, confining recesses of forgotten places. She couldn’t even close the door to her own room without hyperventilating, much less get into the box-like prison of the elevator. It was out of the question.

So she always took the stairs.

The older neighborhood where Valie lived was on the west side of town, across the highway that ran through the downtown, which made its living on the summer tourist trade—a town of quaint artsy shops and bed-and-breakfast establishments for the tourists driving up the California coast. But summer was over and the town was quiet as she turned north, heading for the highway overpass. In ten minutes, she was on
Sixth Street to pick up Luci for school. The cool, October morning had most people scrambling for heavier jackets, but Valie had donned only her usual school sweatshirt. She loved Autumn, especially the shorter days; colder weather was her element.

“Vaaaal-ie!”
Luci called, waving as she walked up the street to meet her friend part way.

“Hey, Luc.”
Valie glanced at the nearby brick townhouse her friend had exited. Luci had lived there since she was born. In fact, she’d been
born
in that house (which Valie found slightly gross, but, hey, to each their own.) Give her blood, vials, needles, medications, cold stethoscopes, the works; Valie did not mind hospitals—if they were nice, big, open ones.

“Good morning!” Luci greeted a broad smile across her angular, but youthful face. Her skin looked more mocha colored in the gray of the morning. In the sunlight it almost glowed golden with her Native American heritage. It was a brilliant contrast to her short, blue-black hair that curled strangely around her features. Her parents never had figured out how she’d gotten the spiraling curls. No one in the history of their families had ever had anything but iron straight hair. Though, once she’d grown up, no one was surprised. Luci was just an oddity.

The short, bronze-skinned girl pushed her purple glasses higher on the bridge of her nose.

“Jonathan is going to be late today.
He texted me.”

“He did, did he?” Valie replied with an obvious insinuative tone. Luci blushed.

“Shut up.”

“You should ask him to the Halloween party at the Wallash’s place! You know you want to.”

Luci shook her head.

“We’re seniors now, Luc. It’s time to take a chance!”

“What if he really doesn’t like me that way? It would totally screw up the whole
Three Musketeers
thing we have going.”

“I never did finish that book…”

“Valie…you know what I mean. We have never been as close as we are now!”

“It doesn’t mean you two can’t get closer. It’s not like we’ll stop being friends, even if it doesn’t work out.”

“I don’t know…”

“It’s worth a shot,” Valie asserted, looking empathetically at her friend.

Luci rolled her eyes. “I’m getting dating advice from a girl who’s never been on a date. How sad.”

“What’s sad?” interjected an unexpected voice. Luci and Valie both jumped. The third musketeer had sneaked up behind them.

“Jonathan! I thought…I thought you were going to be late,” Luci stuttered. Valie tried not to smile as Luci flushed at Jonathan’s closeness. They had known Jonathan almost as long as they had known each other, but it was just in the last year or so that Luci had developed what she believed was a hopeless crush on the guy. Personally, Valie could not see the attraction. Jonathan was a great guy friend, but it was impossible for Valie to see him romantically. Though, to the eye, he was nice enough; a little lanky, a little awkward, but cute. She could easily see the two of them together. Besides, wouldn’t it just be a bonus to have one of your best friends as your boyfriend?

“I skipped breakfast and jogged a little,” he admitted, still a little out of breath.

Valie made a face. “I can tell. Your arm is sweaty.” She made a show of dislodging his arm from around her shoulder. Luci left the boy’s other arm in place.

Jonathan laughed his dorky laugh, which made Luci giggle. Valie remembered when the boy’s voice finally changed. It’d been a total shock to hear the squeaky unsurety change to almost guttural attractiveness—except for the slight wheezing in between. Jonathan had always had asthma. But Valie knew that his voice simply melted Luci.

Valie tried to smile, but yawned instead.

“Tired?” Jonathan asked.

“Yeah. I haven’t been sleeping well for a couple nights. Well, days.”

Jonathan snorted. “You and your insane sleep schedule.”

Valie smiled wanly. She slept in the afternoons after school for about five hours—unless she was hanging with Luci and Jonathan. By midnight she was wide awake again and did homework, housework, or whatever. Then, if she were lucky, she could sleep another couple of hours before dawn. It was inexplicable, just like the claustrophobia. She just happened to have sleeping issues. Lately, though, she wasn’t sleeping well even in the afternoon.

“I’m nocturnal, so what? The night is more fun anyway.”

“Oh yeah. I’m sure it’s
loads
of fun to be awake when no other human being is.”

Valie just shook her head. She’d never had an issue with it, though she’d never been particularly social.

“Why are you having trouble sleeping?” Luci asked concerned.

“I don’t know. My body just tells me I’m supposed to be awake—even more than usual. I know I need sleep, just nothing will cooperate.”

Luci looked thoughtfully at her friend. “Have you been eating anything to keep you up? Or feel sick or something?”

Valie rolled her eyes. “No.”

“What? They’re legitimate questions,” the small girl said defensively. She hadn’t missed the eye roll.

“Yes, they are, but are you really going to stop there?” Valie looked at Luci knowingly as the girl’s lips puckered. “I didn’t think so.”

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“You know
exactly
what I mean. What supernatural reason can you find for me being an insomniac this time?”

“There is a reason for everything.” Luci stared stubbornly at Valie’s skeptical gaze.

“And what’s the reason this time?” she pressed. Valie knew Luci would be unhappy if she wasn’t allowed to speak her thoughts, though Valie had to acknowledge the fact that her best friend’s cosmic quirks were not nearly as endearing as her curly hair.