Blood and Chocolate

"Hhhhhhmmmmmmmmm!" she moaned, hoping it sounded like an affirmative. Her arms lengthened, her muscles bulged, and she tore at her clothes as her pelt rippled over her flesh. She had never had to hide away before. What a crime to trap her beautiful body. It was all his fault.

"Look, like, give me a call tomorrow and let me know how you are. Hope you feel better."

When she was sure he had gone, Vivian quietly pulled back the bolt with short, furred fingers. She reached for the doorknob.

But what if I'm like Axel? she thought. What if I smell him as prey when I'm in fur?

She clenched her hand, withdrew her shaking fist, and curled into a tight, trembling ball on the bathroom floor. I won't go out, she promised. I won't go out. If she did, she might follow him and stalk him to his lair.

She shuddered into her final shape, raised her muzzle, and howled frustration at the porcelain tile. Her voice echoed about her like a curse.

Vivian blinked her eyes in the early-morning sun. The sound of a truck door slamming had awakened her. Esmé and Rudy were back. She sneezed, sending dust mice scurrying, and crawled, pink and naked, out from under the bed, where she'd spent most of the night. She was drained and aching from clenching her body tight against its needs.

I'll have to tell him I can't see him anymore, she thought. I can't hide from him every full moon. She tried to feel self-righteous and committed, but all she felt was a sinking feeling in her gut. He had climbed up to her window, brought her wine, thought of her when he could have been out partying. She remembered the tickle of his hair on her cheek, his breath on her neck, and shivered deliciously.

Vivian reached for her robe, which lay in a silken gray-and-blue shimmer across her desk chair, and dragged a brush through her tangled tawny hair. No, she told herself firmly. I'll leave the poor boy alone. How long before the Five bothered him because of her? How long before the pack stepped in? They wouldn't be leaderless forever. Soon there would be someone to answer to. That last thought annoyed her. Maybe she didn't want to answer to someone.>"Yeah."

"Never mind," Aiden said, kissing her ear. "When you're sprung, we'll have our own party."

He was gullible, Vivian thought. That irked her slightly. But he had no reason to distrust her; why shouldn't he believe?

Aiden didn't have to be at work until six so Vivian allowed him to drive her home. "But you can't stay long," she told him to keep up the act. "My mother will be home soon." That was true, anyway. Esmé worked the day shift around the full moon. Biting customers didn't make for good tips.

They sat on a log at the far edge of the backyard under the broccoli-headed summer trees.

"Which is your room?" Aiden asked.

Vivian pointed to the window above the screened-in back porch, and he sighed loudly to tease her.

"I'll miss you tomorrow," Aiden said. There were crinkles at the corners of his eyes when he smiled. He was a creature of warm sun and comfort.

"What made you write about werewolves?" she asked, thinking of the dark forest in his poem.

Aiden shrugged. "I like all that stuff - witches, vampires, werewolves. It's exciting."

"Why's that?"

"I don't know. I've never thought about it. Because I want to be like them, maybe? I don't want to be like everyone else." He carefully allowed an ant to crawl from his wrist to a blade of grass.

Vivian laughed. Any one of the Five would have crushed that bug. "I don't think you'd make a good werewolf."

"Sure I would." He grabbed her hand and playfully bit her fingers. His teeth set loose tiny lightning within her.

Raucous hoots filled the woods behind them, and bodies crashed through the undergrowth. She pulled her hand away.

"What's that?" Aiden asked.

"My cousins," she answered. "Damn them." They couldn't find him here with her. Not that she couldn't handle them, but she didn't want to raise any questions she couldn't answer for Aiden. And what if he blamed them for getting her grounded? Great Moon, they'd laugh.

"I've got to go in," she said. "I promised not to hang with them while I'm grounded. They've only come to screw around outside and piss off my mother."

"Some family," he said, and tried to kiss her.

She hated to push him away. "Go, go, go. They're trouble."

He glanced at the woods and she saw worry in his eyes, but his lips took on a stubborn hardness.

"Please, for my sake," she said, to save his pride.