Hitchhikers (21 page)

I land in the melted snow and mud, slip and
try to catch my breath as pain flares in my shoulder. The scent is
strong, and I follow.

“Daad!” Zeke screams, his voice deafening me.
He’s back in his room. I vaguely remember rushing past him, a
Zeke-colored blur.

I sprint after that black wolf, who is now so
far ahead I can’t see him. I wish I’d been able to hurt him, just a
little, before this. He’s perfectly healthy, well-rested, well-fed.
Who knows, maybe if I wasn’t injured and had eaten more than bread
and jerky for the past week I still wouldn’t be able to catch him.
But I might have had a chance.

A few miles in, the adrenaline wears off. I
begin limping. The scent is getting harder and harder to
follow.

Panting, I slow to a stop, wanting nothing
more than to collapse in exhaustion.

The black wolf is gone, and with him any hope
of finding Kayla.

My options are to keep going, maybe after I
lie down and take a nap, or go back to the Whittemore farm, after I
take a nap. I imagine showing up, naked and bleeding, and watching
the realization dawn on Mr. Whittemore’s face when he matches the
gunshot wound on my shoulder with the wolf he shot. I imagine
slinking back and getting in my clothes and trying to hide my new
injury, and my true self.

I decide to take a nap.

Crawling under the snowy branches of an
evergreen tree, into the cozy, quiet, warm area created there, I
fall asleep.

In my dream, time slows down as I run past
Zeke in his bedroom. Instead of focusing only on the escaping black
wolf, I notice the blood pouring down the front of his shirt, dark
red against bright white. His pale face follows my movements as I
go by, one hand clamped on his neck.

I can smell his blood.

It smells of pine and sweat and milk, pure
and clean except for a sharp edge to it. A wet dog edge, too clean
or maybe dirty underneath the clean. It confuses me, this smell on
Zeke, as I’d never noticed it before. So confusing that for half a
slow-motion step, I turn toward him.

That’s when he peels his hand away from his
neck like a band-aid on a gunshot wound, and I see the ragged edges
of the bite.

Birds call to each other when my eyes snap
open, telling each other to watch out for the strange creature in
the evergreen tree. What is it? they ask, hopping on the branches
they hope are out of my reach. A wolf but not a wolf, one says. A
human but not a human.

I yawn, surprised when my jaw opens wider
than I expect. I’m still in wolf form. I test my muscles – sleeping
on the snow must have helped to numb some of my injuries, although
the stitches in my side still feel pretty sharp. I roll my
shoulder, feel nothing. There’s blood in the snow and my fur is
matted and sticky, but no pain. When I lick the blood away, there’s
nothing. Like I never got shot. I guess I overreacted last night,
the bullet just grazed me or something.

(I flew backwards off my feet definitely got
shot how did it heal so fast?)

The sun shines like the high beams of a car
when I emerge from the shade of the evergreen. My own scent hangs
heavy from last night, a trail back to the Whittemores.

If only I hadn’t had that dream about Zeke.
If only I could spurn all that Zeke and his dad have done for
me.

Following my own scent back through the
forest, I try to remember what Kayla told me about werewolves. Did
she mention anything about biting, or am I confusing it with some
movie I saw when I was younger – much younger – I haven’t seen a
movie in the past three years. Maybe something I read, although I
don’t read horror.

It doesn’t matter. Zeke got bit, and whether
it has an effect or not, he’s hurt, and Mr. Whittemore might be
too.

The morning is overcast and threatening snow.
My shoulder might have felt good when I woke, but a few miles of
steady trotting makes it sore again. The shoulder is the least of
my worries. I begin to feel a tickle in my chest and cough a few
times before noticing the blood spray I’ve coughed up onto the
snow. There is something seriously wrong there.

(a punctured lung)

Definitely something that will be a problem
if I don’t do something about it. Of course, I can’t just waltz
into a hospital, no health insurance, covered in my own sloppy
stitches, and a werewolf gene in my blood.

I smell the Whittemore farm long before I see
it. Death hangs heavy over the entire place. It’s too quiet. I can
sense the restlessness of the farm animals. They can smell the
death too. And the fear. The animals aren’t used to being neglected
in the morning, and after what they heard last night, they fear for
their safety.

No, there’s another fear tainting the
air.

Zeke

The fear amplifies his scent, the one I’d
grown used to over the weeks, the woodsmoke and onions and milk and
manure that’s engrained in his pores being pushed out through his
sweat. My shoulder’s on fire and my back leg feels like the
stitches are ready to pop out, but I break into a run and head
straight for the house.

The carcasses strewn about the yard are those
of wolves, torn to pieces. One body lies whole amid broken glass.
His neck is at an odd angle, likely paralyzed. When I approach him,
one dying gray eye rolls toward me, seeking mercy. I grant him that
much.

From the open window I smell Zeke and Mr.
Whittemore and two other wolves inside, the coppery aroma of blood,
lots of blood. Gunpowder stings my nose, and underneath the
pungencies of shit and urine.

I hear breathing. One creature inside is
alive.

There is no way I can leap through the
shattered window like I did last night, and besides, If Mr.
Whittemore is still alive in there with Zeke, I’d be smart not to
show up as a wolf.

The change to human takes my breath away. I
gasp sharply as my leg swells out and pulls the stitches, forcing
me to use the house as a brace.

Inside, the living soul hears me.

He sounds almost like Zeke, smells almost
like him. He moves when he hears me, readies himself.

“Zeke,” I say when I can manage. “It’s me,
Dan.”

I open the door and head inside.

Zeke’s fear has not abated. In fact, it fills
the air. I hesitate, confused. “Zeke?”

A scrabbling sound. He still hasn’t answered.
I listen for what he is doing. Dragging something, closing a door.
Hiding something. I saw the dead wolves last night. And it smells
like Mr. Whittemore is dead too, although that must have occurred
after I chased the black wolf.

Slowly, I make my way down the hall, taking
care not to slip in one of the many puddles of blood. I note the
dark stain on the wall where I was shot, the nearly black puddle on
the floor there.

“Zeke, it’s only me. Daniel.”

Then I smell it –

wolf

and I connect my dream to reality. “Zeke, I
know you were bitten. You’re probably confused right now. But I can
help you. You don’t need to be afraid.” I reach for the
doorknob.

The room inside is dark, the curtains drawn
over the broken window. A pair of legs, heavy workboots laced on
the feet, stick out from under the bed. I don’t see Zeke but I
sense him, waiting, in the closet. I keep my face half-turned in
that direction as I edge toward the body.

I know Mr. Whittemore is dead, but what I
still can’t understand is why Zeke would hide his body. And so I
need to see it. Pulling him out nearly pulls out my stitches, but
then I see.

“Oh, Zeke.”

Mr. Whittemore’s face is half-eaten, and it
looks fresh, blood dripping, no flies yet. His nose and one cheek
are entirely gone, leaving slick white bits of bone showing, his
teeth forever in a bare grimace.

“I killed him.” Zeke’s voice is guttural,
nearly unintelligible. “I couldn’t help it.” A choked bark.

“Zeke…”

What can I say to make him feel better, when
I murdered my own father? When I killed and ate a toddler?

“I’m a monster!”

I look at the closed closet door. “Zeke, come
out.”

“Nooo…” But the knob turns, and my friend
emerges.

His face belongs in a freak show, his nose
black, his mouth stretched wider than is human, his teeth sharp.
Pointy wolf ears poke out from under his mop of dirty blond hair.
His hands are huge, the fingers ending in black claws.

(have I ever looked like this?)

“I didn’t mean to kill him,” Zeke yelps, and
covers his face with his paws.

I explain to Zeke about werewolves, what
little I know. I try to talk him through the change

(try to get him back to human)

and I transform several times to give him the
image he can use to visualize the process for himself. Nothing
works.

“Kayla didn’t tell me people can become
werewolves by being bitten. I guess it’s different than if you’re
born a werewolf.”

Zeke, who at this point is beyond frustrated,
punches his hand through the wall. “Why, why, why?” he howls.

“I don’t know, but look, everything will be
okay. We can find Kayla, and she can help us.”

“Nothing’s okay!” Another hole in the wall.
“Why did you have to come here? Why did you have to ruin
everything?”

There’s no answer for that. I hang my head.
Stare at the destruction around me. All my fault. Yes. All mine. I
brought this mess here.

“I’m sorry,” I say hoarsely.

Easy to slip down into that black hole of
everything’s my fault, I’m a monster, everyone I know dies. Much
harder to swallow and continue. “We need to go. Pack some clothes
and food, let the animals go. We need to leave before night
falls.”

“Go? Go where?” Zeke demands.

“Just get ready.”

I trudge out to the barn and open the stalls.
The animals cower inside – they can smell what I am. I leave the
barn doors open. Eventually they will look for food. Better they be
attacked by some wild animal than starve to death in their
stalls.

Using one of Mr. Whittemore’s rucksacks, I
fill it with bread, cheese, and salted meat. Get dressed and wait
for Zeke, who has shut himself in his room. He is crying in
there.

I knock. “Zeke, let’s go.”

“I can’t go out there like this,” he sobs. “I
look like a monster.”

“Come on, we’ll figure something out.”

I find him a big red checkered hunting cap
with ear flaps, some mittens, and a big scarf that I arrange to
cover the wolfish half of his face.

“We’ll be fine as long as we don’t get too
close to people,” I tell him. It’s not quite a lie.

Zeke leads us to the roads. It’s about three
miles of dirt road before we hit pavement, another three before we
see any kind of sign.

“Cottonwood Lake,” I read. “Where’s
that?”

Zeke shrugs.

“I mean, like, what state are we in?”

He stares at me before answering.
“Nebraska.”

Still in Nebraska. Shit.

“What’s the closest town?”

“We usually go down to Hyannis. It’s not real
big, though.”

“And the nearest highway?”

“We’re on it, Route 61.”

Scanning the empty road, I feel my heart
sink. We won’t get a ride on this road. We should’ve taken Mr.
Whittemore’s truck, if only I knew how to drive it.

“Route 2 runs through Hyannis. It don’t look
much different than this one, but lots more people drive on
it.”

“How far to Hyannis, then?”

Zeke burrows his nose into his scarf. “About
thirty miles.”

The walking sucks, with the snow drifts piled
up on the side of the highway and the frost heaves and pot holes
that make even the road treacherous for walking.

We won’t make it to Hyannis today. Maybe not
even tomorrow. And when we do get there, we’ll still be walking.
Unless…

(you don’t know how to drive but maybe Zeke
does)

I think on this as I gather wood for a fire.
Most of the wood is wet from the snow, but luckily I packed a box
of matches. Instead of helping, Zeke sits in the one dry spot in
the clearing and stares at the area where I’m piling kindling and
brush. With his hat pulled down over his brows and the scarf up
over his nose, his facial expression is completely hidden.

My stomach is growling by the time I get the
fire going

by myself

and I sit next to Zeke, not too close, and
open the backpack. He doesn’t move as I turn the bread, cheese, and
meat into a sandwich.

I’d love to tear into it and devour the whole
thing myself.

Instead, I hold out half to him. “You want
some?”

He stares into the flames.

“Come on, you have to eat. You haven’t eaten
all day.”

No response.

If Zeke is going to have an attitude, fine.
Zeke hasn’t been eating jailhouse rations for the past two weeks. I
take as big a bite as my jaws will allow.

“So,” I say after I’ve eaten, “the best way
to stay warm is to use each other’s body heat.” I clear my throat.
“I mean, we don’t have to spoon or anything… but it will make
sleeping easier. If we’re warm, I mean.”

Zeke’s eyes slide in my direction. Maybe it’s
the fire reflecting there, but I can guess what he’s thinking.

“Or, we can just be cold,” I sigh.

I create myself a sort of shelter from the
wind, using some fallen trees and branches and packing snow and
dead leaves against it. The last I see of Zeke before I close my
eyes he is still sitting there, staring at the dying fire.

In my dream I am back in the forest, running
after the scent of that black wolf. More and more I can smell the
lilacs over the black wolf, but even the lilacs begin to fade. I
try to run faster – I’m still injured, and it hurts to run faster –
yet the scent grows weaker and weaker, even as my body grows weaker
and it’s a colossal effort to lift my paws, and the snow seems to
be thicker, as high as my chest. I have to find Kayla. I have to
find her.