Page 55 of Raised By Wolves

When I twist around in my seat, I’m completelynotsurprised to see Waylon Eugene Meloy there, grinning and looking pleased with himself. He seems to enjoy sneaking up on me. And he’s better at it than I’d like to admit.

My cheeks get hot. What doIknow about what being normal means?

“Well, if I think about the kids at school,” I say, “it means eating junk food all the time and being obsessed with video games and cell phones. And taking self-portraits constantly, and watching nonstop Knock Knock videos—”

Waylon bursts out laughing. “Let me stop you before you say anything else ridiculous. For one thing, they’re called selfies and TikTok. Also, plenty of regular people do other things with their time. Me, I specialize in restoring motorcycles, ignoring speed limits, and being both charming and dangerous.”

His teasing grin is infectious. I can’t help smiling back.

“I don’t really think you’re regular, though,” I tell him. “I think you’re weird, too.”

He slides into the booth next to me as Lacey sets our fries down. He helps himself to the first handful. “I never said I wasn’t,” he says, shoving about twenty fries into his mouth at once. Then he holds up a hand for my brother to hit. “Freak high five,” he says.

Holo slaps his palm, giggling.

“Here,” Waylon says, digging into his pocket and handing my brother a five-dollar bill. “Go play some good songs on the jukebox.”

“On the what?” Holo says. He has no idea what Waylon’s talking about. Honestly, I don’t really, either.

“That machine with the blinky lights over there. You’ll figure it out.”

Holo stares at him for a second. Then he snatches the money and disappears.

Waylon turns to me and says, “So what are you doing tomorrow night?”

I think about this for a second. “I’m probably going to sit in the chief’s living room, staring out the window and wondering what I’m doing living in the house of the man who put me in jail.”

“Sounds like fun,” Waylon says.

I shrug. “I’ve had worse nights.” Like the time Holo and I got trapped in a snowstorm halfway down the mountain and had to spend the night in a snow cave—

“Well, I’ve got a great idea,” Waylon says. “I think you should come to the school dance with me.” He shrugs. “It’s stupid and lame, but everyone goes to it anyway.”

“If it’s stupid and lame, why do people go?” I ask. Meanwhile my mind is going:A gorgeous juvenile delinquent just asked me to a dance!

Waylon contemplatively gnaws on a fry. “Sometimes you just feel like you’resupposedto do something, even if you don’t really know why. Like maybe you do it because you know you’re supposed to have certainregular, normalhuman experiences.”

It’s annoying that he’s throwing my words back at me, but I ignore it. “What happens at a dance?”

Waylon brushes his hair off his forehead; it flops back down immediately. “Well, they play music, and people hang aroundand talk to their friends, and every once in a while they dance with each other.”

“I don’t know how to dance.” Also I don’t really have any friends.

“That makes two of us,” Waylon says. “Actually that makes the whole high school gym full of us. Those kids have no rhythm; you should see them.”

And then he gets up from the booth and starts jumping around, kicking out his legs and swinging his arms. It looks like he’s being stung by a swarm of bees.

“Is that what it’s supposed to look like, or are you just really bad?” I ask when he stops.

He looks offended. “Let’s see you try it.”

“No thank you.”

“OK,” he says. “Let’s try it together.”

I look around the diner. “Here?”

“It’s as good a place as any. Hang on.” He walks over to the jukebox, exchanges a few words with Holo, and then presses a few buttons. The diner fills with the sound of a piano, then a smooth, smoky voice.

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