Page 16 of One Night with the Werewolf
Their text makes me smile. Arin has a deeply nurturing personality, and I should have known I couldn’t scare them off.
When their shift ends at the pizza shop, they come home on their bike as fast as possible, carrying a plastic bag full of different medicines. It’s so sweet, even though most of them will do nothing for me.
I do take the cold/flu syrup and the Pepto-Bismol, hoping it will settle my upset stomach and prevent what happened from happening again.
I’m not so lucky, though. I find myself on the floor of the bathroom again a few hours later, Arin stroking my back.
“Never seen you like this before,” they say, concerned. “Are we sure it’s the flu?”
“I don’t know what else it could be.”
Arin hums thoughtfully as they help me back to my own bed.
“When was the last time you had your period?” they ask as I dress into my pajamas. “Usually we have ours around the same time, but I didn’t notice last time.”
I guess that is one thing about living together—we’re very apprised of each other’s business. I always know when Arin’s on their period because there are fresh tampons in the trash. Tacky, I know, but that’s just life.
Fuck. Now that I think about it… I’ve been so preoccupied with my new job and with trying to divorce myself from mymemories of Roscoe that I didn’t notice. I have gone almost two entire months without a period.
“Fuckety fuck fuckfuck.” I sink down onto my bed. “There’s no possible way. No. I’m on the pill.”
But I remember the way Roscoe unleashed everything when we fucked. The worst part is that Jason and I rarely had sex leading up to the night of our breakup. It had probably been a few weeks at best. There’s only one way this happened.
All I can do is break out into sobs. This can’t be my life. This can’t be real. Not with the man who showed me out of his house that morning in so few words.
Arin rubs my back. “I’ll run to the store and get a test,” they say quickly, drying my tears before they leave on their bike again.
But I already know the answer. I am so fucked.
CHAPTER
SEVEN
ROSCOE
It’s unsettling how things simply return to normal after such a life-altering event. No one at work knows what happened with Emelia that night. None of my friends have any idea. I’ve kept it completely to myself, hoarding my secret and my memories like a dragon.
But it’s also painfully lonely, knowing that I can never tell anyone. Knowing that I’ll never get to see or taste or feel Emelia again, and what happened with her can’t escape my lips. I’ll have to take it to my grave.
I’ve dated a little since Julie and I divorced, but it’s never gone anywhere. I’ve certainly never had sex like that before, not with anyone. The way I wanted to bury my knot in Emelia and stuff her full of my cum was overwhelming in a way it hasn’t been before.
Julie never let me knot her, not after I was changed. But I never craved it with her like I did with Emelia.
Nevertheless, life proceeds. I go to work, picking up as many overtime hours as I can to keep my mind busy. I’m building a decent nest egg, and I’ve paid off the house and my car.Retirement is ten or fifteen years away, and I want to be ready when the time comes.
Then, on one chilly autumn Tuesday, I get a phone call from an unrecognized number. It’s in my area code, so I assume it isn’t spam. Maybe a client reaching out. Usually they go through the boss, but sometimes I get direct calls from contractors I’ve worked with.
“Hello, this is Roscoe Daniels,” I say as I answer the phone. But instead of a greeting, there’s a long silence on the other end. I can hear someone breathing. “Hello?”
“Hey, Roscoe.”
It’s a quiet, feminine voice, one that’s intimately familiar in my memory.
Emelia. I had deleted her number from my phone so I wouldn’t ever be tempted to call or text her. But here she is, calling me instead, when I thought we had made it clear we’d never contact each other again.
“Emelia.” It comes out stiff and harsh, because it’s opening up a gaping wound I thought I had stitched closed. “What do you want?”
I hear her choke on the other end.
