Page 26 of Wolf Cursed

I couldn’t wait for graduation day. However, when it came, it made me a little sad. Alex and I were close friends for three years, and tomorrow we would go our separate ways: Alex to Savannah to visit her dad, who moved there after he got divorced from Alex’s mom two years ago. And Mom and I would go to Asheville. Who knew when, or if, the two of us would see each other again.

The whole ceremony took about forty minutes, during which Mom took about a million pictures.

Excited that it was over, we took the first gulp of our freedom and, waving our caps, Alex and I rushed to her car to drive around, and then home, together, for one last time.

The moment we got into the car, Alex turned on our favorite song, and we took off singing along at the top of our voices.

* * *

My suitcase was packed, and I was ready to take off, but Mom couldn’t just leave her job. She still had a few days to work until her vacation, and after Alex left, I was all alone, waiting for another week to pass.

I spent my time mostly reading and doing some research, looking for non-fictional information on werewolves, if such existed. What I found so far was based on legends and tales, and when Finn called, I would ask him to help me sort out the truth from all I’ve learned so far.

Now I knew it was true that werewolves healed fast when injured, and they could live for more than a hundred and fifty years. But not many lived that long. Wolves were aggressive and territorial animals, and most of the deaths were the results of fights or wars between packs.

The silver bullet was a myth, it was just a bullet like any other.

Wolves could communicate with each other in wolf form, but only after being permitted access to their minds. Their human emotions were heightened, and their senses, like hearing, smell, and sight, were much stronger than normal humans, which helped them see perfectly in the dark, sense any other living beings, and track them down.

I tried to keep my questions to one at a time, so we could also talk about something else. Like us. Or normal life stuff. And he liked that too.

* * *

On June 10, Mom woke me up at eight in the morning.

After a quick breakfast, we loaded our bags in the car and hit the road.

I loved road trips, and I couldn’t wait to see Finn again. The only thing that overshadowed my happiness was the fact that there were only four days left until the full moon. Two days after my eighteenth birthday.

Seeing Finn’s wolf muffled some part of my fear of becoming an animal. But thinking of the process itself turned my blood ice-cold.

I could tell that Mom was freaking out even more than I was, but to take my mind off it, she tried her best to turn the seven-hour trip ahead of us into a little adventure.

When it was time for a lunch break, she stopped the car next to a green field and pulled a basket out of the trunk that she prepared for the picnic.

Then she decided that I needed new clothes, and she took a little detour and stopped in Charlotte for shopping.

When we were more than halfway through, and the sun was high, it became hot in the car. She pulled out a map, pointed at the lake she marked when she was planning our trip, and beaming, said, “How about we take a swim?”

She was about to take us to a fancy restaurant for dinner when I stopped her.

“Mom, this is a road trip. We’ll miss out if we don't have a normal burger in a normal diner at a gas station.”

“Normal burger coming up,” she said with enthusiasm. “And we could get some gas.”

We rolled into the next gas station, and I volunteered to fill the tank while she ordered the food.

I stuffed the nozzle into the tank and glanced up. At the car next to the pump across from mine were two guys. The one with dark curly hair was at the pump. The second one was in the driver’s seat, waiting. With his elbow resting on the open window, he ran his fingers through the wave of his blond hair and lazily looked around. A smug grin crossed his face the moment our eyes met.

I turned away.

While watching the running numbers on the pump, from the corner of my eye, I saw the guy come out of the car and start toward the shop. He was eye-catching, hard to ignore, with self-confidence in his pace.

As he leveled with me, we looked at each other. His smug grin was gone. He was slightly frowning, and his gaze was more curious now. I held the stare of his blue eyes until he passed by while a hundred thoughts buzzed in my head.

What the hell was that? That wasn’t a ‘hello there’ kinda look. Have I grown demon horns in the last few minutes?

I didn’t understand why his weird look alarmed me, but I could feel my heartbeat speed up. The guy next to the car was now tightening the fuel cap. He glanced after his friend, then got into the car and drove it to the parking lot.

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