Bad Wolf (Wild Men 4)

If I left the gang, if I moved away… if I became someone else, would I stand a chance with a girl like Gigi?

A chance with Gigi, dammit, cuz there’s no other girl like her, and now I’m shaking with cold on the wet floor and cursing.

Something’s got to give. This ain’t no life. It’s a lie I’ve been telling myself.

And what’s one more fucking lie, right? Until you realize you don’t know what is the truth anymore.

Macy, the receptionist at the nursing home, gives me a critical look. “Rough night?”

I shrug. “I’ve had worse.”

Waking up on the bathroom floor, frozen solid and covered in piss is a new fucking low. Even worse is the weight on my chest that won’t let me breathe, a weight coming from the inside, from my dark places in my mind, from the pit. Digging myself out is getting harder every time.

I’m not even sure I made it out. My skin is crawling, my thoughts are full of shifting shadows and patched-up holes.

Sometimes I’m not sure how my mind doesn’t come apart at the seams. It feels like it’s held together by a thread that’s slowly unraveling.

“Jarett?”

I blink. “What?”

Macy is glaring at me. “You spaced out. What’s the matter with you? I’m not letting you inside if you’re high.”

“What? I’m just tired.”

“You sure?” She gives me a long look, and it annoys the hell out of me.

I mean, shit, I know I look like roadkill, but I’ve been coming down here for two years. Just because I won’t fuck her, that doesn’t give her the right to keep me out.

“I’m sure,” I tell her, and head toward Mrs. Lowe’s room before Macy can try and stop me, or send the bored guard standing by the entrance after me.

Goddammit.

My knee is killing me, and my head is pounding. Today is pure misery. Which is why I need to see her face.

Mom’s face.

Even if I don’t get to call her that. Even if she’s not really my mother, or will ever be. There’s no one else who can replace her, and today I need her.

When I open the door and step inside her little room, she’s sitting at her usual place in front of the TV, and my heart gives that funny twist it always does when I spot her.

Gray hair pulled back from her face in a loose ponytail, her face more lined than it was a year ago, her kind eyes hooded. On the table beside her, there’s a plastic plate with a small cake, like every Th

ursday, brought by who knows who.

She turns them on me, and a faint smile spreads on her lips. “You came.”

It’s a moment frozen in time, a moment from the past, and I don’t wanna move in case I break it. In this stolen moment, she’s my mom, and we’re home, and everything’s fine with the world.

Then she starts trying to get up, and her gaze turns anxious. “Sebastian?”

My heartbeat falters. “No, I’m not—”

“Seb. You’re here.”

My jaw clenches, and sadness washes through me. This happens sometimes. She thinks I’m him, and today it hits me harder than ever.

“Seb. Gonna make you those meatballs you like.” She’s still trying to get up, but her motor skills are shot, and she’ll never make it up on her own.