Page 4 of Conner's Luna

"OK, oh my goodness, um... do you... do you need help?" I take a step into the closet. It is pitch black. Even with the light from the hallway, I can barely see anything past four feet. I hold the newly-stitched straps of my messenger bag tightly. (My old backpack doesn't fit everything I need, so I carry both). I take two more steps, skimming my hand on the wall for a light switch. Finding nothing, I pull my phone out and fiddle with it until I give up on finding the flashlight app. I know it's on here, but the glow from the screen will have to do.

"Hello?" I ask again as I shine my phone deeper into the space. This is an abnormally large supply closet. No wonder it's so popular for students to sneak off to.

I see a mop, a huge bucket, and shelves upon shelves of carefully labeled boxes. I travel deeper, past the shelf of paper towels and protective glasses, and finally, I see the mass of a human body. I almost drop my phone when he (or she) groans again.

"Oh, God, do you need help?" I dumbly repeat my last question as I hurry over and fall to my knees next to the person curled into the fetal position at the back of the closet. From what I can see in the dim light of my phone, his head is turned toward the floor, so I can't see his face. All I can tell is that he is definitely a ‘he.’ His hands are clutching his stomach, and as I watch, they clench tightly, too tightly, on the flesh underneath his black t-shirt.

"Stop, you'll hurt yourself," I tell him, placing my hands over his.

His hands jerk away to cradle his head, and I peel up his shirt and tentatively brush my fingertips over his stomach. Deep purple and black bruising coat his skin, and I swallow reflexively. "OK, just stay still. I'm going to go get help," I whisper, horror-struck. These bruises are awful. I can tell even blind in the dark that this boy must be in awful pain.

I start to stand when a hand lashes out, grabbing my wrist. One tug and my palm hits his stomach. I look up, startled out of my mind with how fast this man is, only to be greeted with a familiar face.

"Conner?" I say in disbelief. In the sparse light, his eyes look black and creepy as heck. His entire body shudders, the muscles tensing as he gnashes his teeth. My morals suck.

"Don't leave," he rasps out. His hand is firm on my wrist, keeping my hand touching his warm abdomen. I start to blush when I realize that I am touching the bare skin of the best abs at Caluna University. I hadn't even realized how muscled they were in the distraction of his bruises. He's all hard lines and ridges. Oh, my goodness.

When he groans again in pain, I let my knees fold so that I'm sitting down next to him. His hand tightens on my wrist, and I wince, knowing that his grip will bruise.

"Conner, please, you need help."

"You are helping," he mutters. He slowly shifts out of the fetal position to lay on his back, his t-shirt riding up to expose more skin. "Keep your palm here," he orders. The skin under my palm is hot as if Conner is fevered. My mind immediately starts to calculate possible causes, leukemia being the worst. The least concerning medical problem still includes infection... or Conner dying from stubbornness. I want to ask him about it but bite my tongue. Conner is just too unfriendly.

We sit in silence for a minute, then another, and another. I hear the pounding of feet walking in the corridor, the chatter of voices, interspersed with quiet. No one comes into the laboratory and Conner doesn't break the silence between us with any more dog-like noises of pain.

I concentrate on thinking of other things, my classes, Dad's plans for buying a new house, my master’s degree possibilities... anything but the skittish feeling of nerves. My mind starts to wander to Trey and Lydia.

My mouth suddenly feels as though I've been sucking on cotton and my heart feels heavy.

"Talk to me," Conner orders.

I jump a little at the harsh command. I can feel him tensing up under my hand. This man scares me. Not wanting him to grow angry at me, I blurt out the first thing I can think of, "um, about hobbies?" He doesn't answer and I start to talk. "I really like robotics. My dream is to one day be able to combine robotics and biological engineering. Have you heard of androids? Of course, you have. They would be the perfect combination of both biology and machine. It's utterly fascinating to think that we may see it in our lifetime. Otherwise, I want to study viruses and viral mutations. I think nanotech is underappreciated in the pharma field right now. I took Organic Chem already, and it was harder than I expected, but I need to take it for my degrees in Biology Science and Chemical Engineering. My favorite class this semester is Advanced Applied Statistics. It's really fascinating, and I can't stop calculating statistics with... well, everything."

He slings one arm over my waist and nuzzles my thigh. I nearly choke on my tongue and my hands spring away from him. A soft moan makes my word vomit re-commence. "Hobbies!" I say in a hurry as I gently place my palm against his stomach again. "I like hobbies. I… um... love 3-D puzzles. It's super-dorky, I know, but there's something so satisfying about building something with your own hands, even if it's just a puzzle. You know what I really love?" my voice rises in pitch, "when there are missing pieces. I know, I know, it's typically so annoying, but it's such a challenge to try and make everything fit together when you only have some of the pieces. Lego sets are the same way. I love making substitutes. We had this huge bin of them. I couldn't even lift it. It was so heavy." I pause for a moment, remembering. "We gave it away when we moved. There wasn't room in the apartment."

Sorrow hits me like a punch to the gut. I feel alone here. Without friends, without my family, without my mother. I take a shaky breath and hear Conner make another soft snarling noise, either of encouragement or dissatisfaction, I can't tell. "Maybe a lullaby?" I ask him. I start to sing softly.

Five minutes later, the halls are silent again when Conner forces himself to his feet. I stand with him, my song stopping abruptly, my hands falling away from him. He is so incredibly tall. He smells like sweat and faintly of blood. He really, really needs to go to the hospital. I open my mouth to tell him, and he grumbles, shutting me up. Towering over me, he leans in and whispers, "tell no one of this, understand?"

"Y-yes," I shrink away from him, my arms crossing over my own abdomen. Was he abused? Bullied? Sick? Ugh, I hate my curiosity.

His eyes drop to my stomach before his jaw tightens and he changes the subject. "Class time, princess, let's go." He walks out of the closet without a glance backward.

By the time I stumble out of the closet myself, Conner Grim has disappeared. I race to the door of the lab, but he's not in sight. A few people in the hallway see me emerge from the classroom and snicker. I hear the word 'freak' and keep my vision fixed on the cream-colored cement-block wall running along the corridor. The Bio Lab is still empty right now. I'm going to hang out here until my next class. At least I know the monster in the closet is gone.

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Conner

I walk as fast as I can back to my truck. I can't believe I just holed up in aclosetlike a damn pussy. There was nothing else I could do, though. Sarj is in forensics class across campus, and Sean is home in ClearHowl until tonight. I was caught unaware, alone, unprepared for the onslaught of pain.

Dad warned me about this. The pain increases the closer I am to Lydia. If I stayed at Caluna, I would have been a little better off.

Screw that. I'm not a coward.

I slide into the truck and rest my head on the headrest. Everything aches, but the pain in my abdomen is slicing deep. Breathing in steadily through my nose, I blow out through my mouth, then repeat the action until the pain is slightly more manageable.

It's not working until I force my brain to focus on Bailey's voice singing to me. Goddess, her voice alone makes me shiver. My wolf pricks his ears forward, searching for his siren's voice. When it doesn't magically materialize, he goes back to his incessant pacing.

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