The Mating Season: A Paranormal Shifter Romance (16 page)

“Not a problem.” Kim replied as she rose to her feet. “I might as well get back home. Keith might be worried about me. I also need to get in touch with Tony. I’ll see you tonight.”

*

Kim returned to her house after her visit with Betty. She saw Keith still on the couch sipping on a soda while playing video games. She sat down beside him and put her hand on his thigh to get his attention.

“Hey.” He greeted her without taking his eyes from the screen. “Did you have a good visit with Betty?” he asked.

“Yeah, pretty good. Gotta go back there tonight for the meeting with the girls,” she replied. “Figure with the new development I need to go through it sooner rather than later.”

Keith grunted in acknowledgment as he moved through a challenging part of his game. He really didn’t want to speak right then, since he was trying to avoid the thought of Kim’s pregnancy. He really didn’t want to deal with it, especially if the child might be Tony’s. A sharp searing pain ripped at his heart at the thought of it. He could lose her forever due to a roll of the genetic lottery.

Kim kept her hand on Keith’s thigh and tried to snuggle in. She was transfixed by the game he was playing. It was a first person shooter involving a zombie apocalypse, one of the many games of the genre. She had no interest in it so she just attempted to get some form of comfort from the man next to her.

Keith shifted his weight away from her. He knew she was trying to get sexual, but he really didn’t feel comfortable at that moment, not with a new pregnancy. He knew that a gentle romp wouldn’t hurt her when the pregnancy was further along, but the first month or so was a very delicate time.

Kim took the hint. She removed her hand from his thigh and rose from the couch. “I’m going to go bring in the rest of the ripe veggies from my garden. I’ll be busy in the kitchen. If you want to help, that would be appreciated,” she snapped. She didn’t mind him playing video games, but when it is an obvious tool of avoidance, it rankled her.

Kim grabbed the large basket from one of the bottom cupboards and marched out to the garden. She picked up a set of shears and gloves that were sitting by her back door on her way outside. After pulling on the gloves, she knelt by one of the large mounds and began harvesting her zucchini. With vicious cuts she pruned the small squash off of the vine, feeling her anger at Keith’s indifference beginning to ebb.

She realized he was coping with the uncertainty in the only way he knew how. He was withdrawing from her in case the child she was carrying belonged to Tony. The thing was, Tony didn’t even know she was pregnant yet. She snipped another zucchini from its vine and placed it in the basket. She had no idea how it would work if the child was Tony’s.

She didn’t really click with him on an emotional level. After she had dated him for a few weeks, she still only felt the basic sexual attraction to him. The emotional connection she had was a good friendship, nothing more. It was so difficult to put her finger on exactly how she felt about both men. She felt more at ease with Keith, that’s for sure. Tony’s cocky nature set her on her guard, especially after her bad history of previously abusive relationships, the latest one culminating with the murders of her parents, and the near murder of herself. Almost all the men she dated had that laissez faire cocky attitude that Tony exuded.

She startled as she was roused from her thoughts by a knock at her gate. She stood up from her work in the garden and walked towards the gate while shaking the dirt off of her gloves. “Who is it?” she called out.

“It’s me, Tony. Keith told me you were back here, I figured it would be easier to go this way instead of tromping through your house,” the voice on the other side replied.

Kim unlatched the gate and opened it to let Tony into the back yard. “Hey,” Kim greeted. “I’m just back here gardening, what’s up?”

“I’m just here to see how you’re doing,” Tony replied. “When Keith brought you back from the hospital, you were pretty wrecked.”

“I’m doing pretty well, my head doesn’t hurt anymore and the ringing in my ears has gone away. I haven’t needed to take any pain meds at all today.”

Tony smiled warmly at her, his chiseled face softened a little bit. “I’m glad you’re okay,” he said warmly as he placed a hand on her shoulder. “Really.”

Kim looked up at Tony and saw nothing but genuine love in his eyes. His tall, lean body was dressed in his police uniform. Dark blue pants with a yellow stripe up the side of each leg, a brown button up shirt underneath a black flak jacket, and a heavy utility belt with a leather holster for his 9mm pistol and multiple pouches to hold other tools of his trade. Kim was absolutely terrified to tell him about her pregnancy. What if he withdrew like Keith had? Still, he had a right to know.

“Thanks, “ Kim replied warmly. “Umm...I gotta tell you something...” Kim stammered. Tony’s warm expression evaporated and changed to one of concern. “Err...I had a phone call this morning telling me I have to stop taking my pain pills, and whatever other meds I need to take...”

Tony scowled. “Go on.”

“Well, it was from the resident OB at the hospital...she called to tell me the results of my blood work. Turns out I’m pregnant. Just a few weeks along, but I’m definitely pregnant.”

Tony’s sharp features shifted from concern, to incredulity, to joy, in a matter of seconds. The myriad of emotions he felt at the announcement broke his usual stoic nature and it was all he could do to not break down and cry. He had a few other kids running around the village, but their mother’s mates had no problems raising them. This one could very well be his and his alone.

“Yeah...we kinda had a hunch about it,” Tony said. Last night Rusty approached him and let him know about Kim’s possible state, but didn’t say it was a certainty, just that something smelled different about her and it was a similar scent to that a pregnant woman gave off.

Kim looked at Tony in disbelief. “How could you guys know?”

“Well, Rusty has a sixth sense about these things. That and you work at the general store. He noticed you didn’t buy any female supplies yet, and you’ve been here for almost two months now. The first month was understandable because, well, you could have brought some with you, second, not so much. That ol' gaffer puts his nose where it shouldn’t be sometimes.”

Kim was mortified, yet totally not surprised that Rusty kept an eye on her details. It was a very small town, after all. “Umm... I don’t know what to say to that,” Kim said, blushing furiously.

“Don’t get mad at him. He’s just doing what old folks do. Since you took over the store he’s had nothing else to do with his time. He’s just concerned for you, as well as the well being of the band. Since you’re pregnant, it means our line of shifters might continue. That’s a pretty important thing for Rusty. Junior can’t mate, no one will have him. Betty’s too old, and with each coming of age ceremony we lose a few girls, so the men are left to fend for themselves until someone wanders into town, like you did, or they go out to the world and find a mate of their own and bring her back.”

Kim finally grasped how important it was for her to stay in the small village. The fact she had grown to know and love the residents of this small town through her job at the now burnt-down general store just made her decision to stay easier to make. She felt bad for the trouble she had brought to the village in the form of Smiley, though. If she hadn’t come here, he wouldn’t have either, and they still would have their store.

“Anyway, are you going to Betty’s tonight?” Tony asked.

Kim nodded. “Yeah, I think I need to sit in on it for sure now.”

“Yeah you do. The girls need to know a bit more than the boys. Has to do with the whole baby thing. I guess mothering shifter younglings needs a special touch or something, I dunno.” Tony grinned. “Anyway, I need to get to work. The insurance claim from the fire should be coming in today and we can begin to rebuild. We all will have to pitch in to get it done before the huge fall shipment comes in that will carry us through the winter.”

Tony reached out and drew Kim into a tight hug. His flak vest was uncomfortable against her tender cheek but she dealt with it. She found comfort in his closeness and wrapped her arms around him in response. “Thank you, Tony.” Her voice quavered as she bit back her tears of uncertainty.

“It’s gonna be okay,” Tony said, choking up. “It might not seem like it now, but trust me; things will turn out for the best. We’ll build the store back up, and you’ll live happily ever after regardless of who you pick.” Or is picked for you... he thought to himself. He loved Kim fiercely and it killed him a little bit inside each time she was with Keith, and he knew Keith felt the same way when Tony was with her. This whole thing placed a huge strain on their friendship, from which it might never recover. They might be cousins by blood, but friends by choice. He didn’t want to lose his best friend over a woman, that would be stupid.

Little did she know that the choice wouldn’t be hers to make anymore. That would make it much less stressful on both Keith and Tony’s friendship. No “If you would have done this she would be yours.” Bullshit. Just a simple luck of the dice as to whose swimmer was the strongest. Tony felt a bit better over that.

Kim shook in his arms. “But...I don’t want to be pregnant,” she whispered. “I’ve never really wanted to be a mother...” Her concerns finally voiced, she felt a small weight lifted from her shoulders.

Tony lifted her chin and looked into her bright, blue eyes. “Listen, sometimes things don’t work out the way we want, and it turns out better than what we had planned. Just trust in fate, okay?”

Kim choked back her fear and nodded. “It’s not my usual thing, but looks like I have no choice. I don’t do well with uncertainty,” she said.

Tony chuckled. “I know. Hope to see you after work. I think Keith might be packing his games up after he’s done that round and will go hide in his man cave. He doesn’t deal well with it, either. Try not to be too hard on him. He always pulls away when he thinks he’s about to lose. He’s the type that will cry doom over any little thing.”

“I see,” she replied as she stepped out of Tony’s embrace. She noticed his long black hair was tied up at the nape of his neck in a loose ponytail instead of the usual braid he wore it in. “Your hair is different today.”

“Yeah, didn’t feel like braiding it. I overslept again.” Tony walked towards the tall privacy gate. “I’ll see you later.”

“Oh, mind if I text you for a walk home after? With Smiley around I don’t want to walk home by myself,” Kim asked

“Sure, if I don’t answer I might be asleep. Junior can fill in for me in that case,” Tony said with a grin.

“Yeah, that works,” Kim replied with a warm smile. She hoped that Tony would be able to make it, but if not, Junior would make sure nothing happened to her. He might be deaf and mute, but he wasn’t an idiot.

Eight o’clock rolled around and Kim made her way to Betty’s house once again. She felt nervous flutters in her stomach regarding the coming of age talk the girls were going to have. She had no idea what to expect, and it concerned her.

She was undoubtedly an outsider. The girls knew her pretty well, but not as well as they knew Betty. Would they be able to open up like they need to with her there? Would she be the one that would hinder their first transformation?

Crickets chirped in the bushes as she approached Betty’s house. She walked up the driveway and inhaled the spicy scent of the flourishing herb gardens. Rusty was at Tony’s that evening with the boys for their coming of age talk. The ceremony was slated for next week, and they will all be shifting together in one night, contrary to how it traditionally occurs.

Kim politely knocked on Betty’s front door and waited. The door slowly opened and Betty’s wizened face peeked from around the corner. “Come in, come in. We’ve been waiting on you!”

Kim smiled and stepped inside the warmly lit house. There were lace doilies on the two end tables on either side of the floral couch. A mahogany coffee table was set with a vegetable platter and a bowl full of dip for the girls to snack on during the meeting.

Kim sat down on the couch and looked around. She saw two pre-teen girls sitting on chairs, stiff with anxiety. One girl had her short dark hair cut in a pixie style, and wore a baggy hooded sweat shirt to hide her slightly overweight frame.

The other girl was slender and had long black hair which was tied in a ponytail low on her head but offset. She wore light makeup, and a tight Hello Kitty T-shirt and shredded jeans.

Kim sat nervously on the couch as the two girls shyly eyed her up. She had no idea what to say to them so she just awkwardly sat in silence, staring at her hands.

Betty came bustling in from the kitchen carrying a pitcher of iced tea. “I’m sorry I forgot to introduce you three,” she began. “Kim, this is Jennifer and Mary. They’re the two girls that will be going through their first shift next week. You need to know about the mating ceremony. Those two are tied together. Even though you won’t be shifting, you need to know about the mating ceremony,” she explained.

“I see,” Kim said, understanding as the two girls nodded in agreement.

“Now, it means I’m going to be doing most of the talking. These girls have heard most of this before from their mothers and grandmothers, so most of it won’t be new to them. It will be new to you, so feel free to ask any questions that you need to, dear.” Betty’s wizened face smiled warmly as she pushed one of her braids behind her ear.

Kim reached out and grabbed a carrot stick and dipped it into the creamy looking dip. She took a bite and was quite pleased it was onion. Her favorite.

The girls looked at Kim with thinly veiled contempt as she munched on the vegetables. She was starving since she didn’t have much to eat earlier that day. They didn’t even say a word to Kim. No greetings, anything. They were clearly uncomfortable, knowing what the subject matter would be that evening. Their discomfort transmogrified into titters as Kim dropped a gob of dip onto the front of her shirt. She scooped it up with one finger and licked it clean. The girls were clearly grossed out by the display, and giggled even harder.

Betty sat down next to Kim and cleared her throat. She grabbed a piece of broccoli, dipped it in the onion dip and bit into it. She gave the two giggling girls a sharp look to silence them. The two girls looked down at their hands, ashamed of themselves as they were silently reprimanded by the elder woman. No one messed with Betty.

“Now,” Betty began, “tonight is just an informal little gathering for me to tell you girls about your first shift. You’ve probably already have had your first periods...” She looked at both girls who were blushing furiously at such an intimate detail of their lives being revealed to a relative stranger. “Since you both are well into puberty, you need to know about the next phase, the shifting phase.”

“You see,” she continued as she reached for a carrot stick, “most girls just have to deal with their human body changing and morphing into a woman’s. A shifter’s body needs to both grow and mature in the human form, and learn to morph and control into the animal form.”

Betty took a bite of the carrot as she mulled over the next part. The two girls were still blushing and giving Kim dirty looks. “Now, both of you stop that foolishness.” Betty snapped. “Kim needs to know this stuff as well. She might not be able to shift her form, but she’s to mate soon and with mating comes younglings, and she’ll need to know this to pass on to her children.”

“So, let’s begin, shall we?” Betty continued on. “Firsts shifts are extremely dangerous. More so for girls than boys.” She noticed the two young girls staring at her with rapt attention. “We have different hormones than boys. That and our first shifts have to occur during our periods. During that time our emotions are all over the map, and we need to learn to focus on the here and now in order to come back to our human bodies. It’s incredibly difficult for young girls to keep this focus.

“Now don’t get me wrong, we women carry the power of life inside us. We’re powerful in our own rights. Just that menstruation and the reproductive hormones play havoc on our emotions and our ability to stay rational some times.

“It’s sort of difficult to stay rational when you have a vice around your insides and are bleeding like a stuck pig for five to seven days, trust me I know, I’ve been through all that for more years than I can count.” They all chuckled at that statement. Kim poured herself a glass of iced tea while Betty continued on with her monologue.

“During your first shift, your thoughts and feelings will change into that of the cougar. The Cougar chose our people to don his form so we could defend the land from those that might harm it. Due to this power, we have selected to isolate ourselves from the rest of the Cree nation. We moved far away into the Rocky Mountains, where the cougar prefers to roam. We had to fight other people to eke out our existence here, but the great Cougar Spirit would not live anywhere else. We had to be here.”

Betty poured herself a glass of iced tea as well, since the talking was drying out her throat. “With the Great Cougar Spirit leading our people to the mountains, it decided to grant one brave shaman the power of its form. It couldn’t be around all the time, but its people could. The shaman went mad for five days and five nights as the cougar spirit tried to subdue him.

“He ripped all his clothes off and ran out into the wilderness. No one knows what went on between the shaman and the Great Spirit, but when he came back, the day after the full moon, he was a changed man. He demonstrated his newfound shifting power to the rest of the village. They were in awe of the shaman’s power and wondered if the Great Spirit would grant them a similar boon.”

Kim was on the edge of her seat, finally hearing for the first time the legends of the village. Her grandfather never did tell her much about this place. She had chosen it for its isolation due to Smiley wanting to take her life. She came to the community to hide, and now she was being embraced into it fully.

“Over the course of years, the cougar spirit decided to grant more and more people of the village the ability to take its form, men and women alike. The one thing the spirit didn’t think of was the fundamental differences between the sexes. It didn’t take into consideration the ones who were two spirits in one body, now known as transgender or gender fluid. The gift of shifting was given; it was up to the person to figure out how to deal with it. The young girls had a high rate of not being able to shift back.

“For some reason they lost focus on the drums and got taken away by the Great Spirit, forever locked in their bodies. The transgendered and gender fluid children had similar difficulties, but their rates of being locked in were less than the female children, probably due to how their minds worked compared to their female counterparts. Anyway, this is where we come in.”

Mary spoke up. “I remember hearing about Mellissa Dunn, how she got stuck on her first shift a few years ago. She was all kinds of crazy, though, like, I heard she was the type to eat glue in school and had a hard time tying her shoelaces. She really had some serious problems going on upstairs.”

Betty looked at the young girl with a thoughtful expression. “Yes, she actually did get stuck in between. Part of the reason was her mother drank pretty hard when she was pregnant with her, despite us telling her not to. Was kinda difficult for her to stay happy, though. Her mate beat her mercilessly every day, and being drunk was the only way she knew how to cope. After Mellissa got stuck, Jane couldn’t take it anymore, so she shifted and went off to look for her, never to be heard from again. John, her mate, took his own life not too long after that. Was really tragic.” Betty filled in the story for Kim, who was new to the community. “Now, let’s start our focus exercise.”

Betty reached behind the sofa and pulled out a CD player. “Now, we need to practice keeping our thoughts centered, and focus on the drums. This needs to be learned and perfected before you go through your first shift. You need to remember to stay in the here and now. You two have been doing your mindfulness exercises these past few months?” she asked the two girls.

They both nodded vigorously. They knew if they slacked off even a little bit, the existence that they had known for their entire lives would end, and they would be locked into an animal body for the rest of their lives.

Betty looked at Kim. “You can participate in the exercise if you wish. It’s just basic mindfulness and meditation, you could benefit from it either way.”

Kim nodded and settled into the couch. She took a deep breath and then another. She tried to center herself, but the slight pique of anxiety that the tween girls sparked with their nervous giggling stabbed into her brain. She tried to settle, knowing they were still children; they were tackling subjects that were uncomfortable for even grown women to talk about, so their discomfort wasn’t totally directed at her, despite her being the outsider. She was just an easy target for it.

Betty hit play on the CD player, and the sound of drums and chanting filled the air. “Okay ladies, close your eyes and breathe in through your nose for three beats of the drums, then breathe out for three beats. Keep your focus on the drumming. Concentrate on your breathing and the drums. It is important that you keep your focus on the sounds of the drums because they are what will bring you back from your first transformation. Etch the sound into your brain.”

All three closed their eyes and breathed in deeply to the rhythm of the traditional drums. Kim breathed deeply with the thrum of the drums that steadily beat from the CD player. She tried to focus on the sound, but little rabbit trails of thoughts began to spring up inside her mind.

Thoughts of her pregnancy and who the father could be darted through her head. She didn’t care about staying focused that much, since her life wasn’t on the line, so she followed the trails. She didn’t have much opportunity to really think about which man she was going to mate.

She focused on Keith. His soft, chubby face and body were familiar, nonthreatening. His serious expression sometimes cracked with a shy smile when she was around. She felt instantly drawn to his earnest nature. He was withdrawing from her. She didn’t like that one bit. After she came back in from her gardening, she had found Keith gone, along with his game console.

She felt tears welling up in her eyes at the recent memory. The sting she felt at his departure still was fresh. She tried to push the emotion down so she could bring her focus back on the drums. Focus... here and now, that is all that matters, she thought to herself.

Her breath matched the beat of the drums. Deep rhythmic swaying began to take over her body as the rhythm overtook her. She breathed in and out, focusing on nothing but the sounds from the CD player. A flash of a cougar leaping sparked in her mind’s eye, she tried to shake it off, but it kept coming at more frequent intervals. She kept following the sounds of the drums and felt her hair on her body grow longer and her teeth becoming more pointed. She felt her face morphing into a more feline shape as she was taken under by the trance.

Betty looked at Kim as she was beginning to shift and slammed her hand down on the boom box, startling everyone out of their trances. Kim felt her face and body revert to normal as she was jolted out of her trance.

“OK, everyone; let’s talk about something else now,” Betty announced, visibly shaken by Kim’s near transformation.

The girls looked around, confused as to why the meditation exercise had been cut short. They looked at Betty, then to Kim and then at each other. They didn’t know what to make of it, but whatever. They wanted to get home anyway.

Betty cleared her throat and shot a sidelong glance at the confused Kim. “As I was saying, let’s talk about something else. We all know that you both have been paired with a boy.”

The two girls shifted nervously in their seats. Arranged matings were a thing in the village, it was no secret. The two girls genuinely cared about the boys they were slated to spend the rest of their lives with, so it wasn’t a problem.

“This ceremony will seal you to your chosen mate for life. There is no breaking the sacred bond. If you do, both of you revert to your wild forms, and stay like that until you die. Now, if a match hasn’t been made for you, you can freely choose a mate, such as in the case of Kim, here.”