I followed her gaze to discover Poopsie pissing on the newspaper where it had landed, in the corner on top of my picture album.
I screamed. He dropped his leg but pissed a stream across the wood floor as he squatted and whined his way back to Nana.
An hour later, with Nana sulking in her room and the dog in one of the cages in the storm cellar, I’d dried the pictures in danger and removed all the unharmed pages. I’d get another binder; this one had to go. After scrubbing the corner of the living room twice, I promptly went for a drive. She had been here less than twenty-four hours and had already managed to drive me from my own home in search of serenity.
There were a few scenic fields I knew of. A bridge over a fast stream. A woodland grove—the leaves were crimson and burnt gold and palest yellow, their branches full of the season’s glorious color. A few more weeks, and those same branches would be bare. By the time I’d seen all that, I’d made it nearly back into the civilized world. I saw a gas station and stopped.
I pulled the Waterhouse day planner from my purse and flipped to the back, where I kept phone numbers. I knew I should join the twenty-first century and get a cell phone, but I was resisting. I knew if I got one, it’d be a ball and chain—and a bill—I’d never be rid of. Besides, where I lived, it wouldn’t get much of a signal.
A Post-it note was stuck to the page. It read: School Brunch and had this Saturday’s date under it. Had it been six months already? In high school, Olivia, Betsy, Nancy, and I had been the “not-so-in” crowd. Afterward, Nancy had stayed in Halesville—which was weird, because she was the most intellectual one. The rest of us had parted for separate colleges and separate lives. We all ended up within a few hours’ drive of one another so, twice a year, we got together in the central location of Columbus for a brunch or dinner. We chatted on the phone from time to time when there was a problem among us that I, of course, was needed to fix, but lately I couldn’t help feeling as if the separate directions we’d all grown in had left us on different life maps. Having nothing in common anymore made for tedious gatherings. Keeping in touch had become a vain attempt to hold on to the past. There was very little in my past I thought was worth that much effort. Hell, it was too much trouble just keeping the present in line.
I moved the Post-it and searched the list for the name “Johnny.” A last name wasn’t necessary to clarify this guy. There was only one Johnny. I kept the numbers of all the wærewolves who kenneled at my place for full moons, though I’d never yet needed to announce a change in plans.
I put quarters into the pay phone and dialed Johnny’s number. It rang twice.
“’Lo?”
“Johnny, it’s Persephone Alcmedi. I—”
“Hey, Red.”
That threw me. My hair’s dark, dark brown. I tried going blond in my late teens. A week later, all the prissy cheerleaders at school started saying things like, “Your Greek roots are showing.” I dyed it back to brown; blond hadn’t been me anyway. I was a darkling. “Red?” I asked.
“I’ve decided I’m going to call you Red from now on.”
“All right. I’ll bite—no pun intended. Why?”
He snickered in a very masculine way and lowered his voice. “’Cause I like the idea of the big bad wolf visiting you and Grandma.”
I laughed so hard, people pumping gas turned to stare at me. Johnny’s sigh made me imagine the satisfied smile he surely wore. He loved attention.
“I knew you’d call me eventually,” he said.
“Sorry to disappoint you, but this isn’t what you think it is.”
“Damn.” He breathed the word more than said it.
Quickly, I asked, “Busy tomorrow?”
“Never too busy for you, Red.”
“Stop it. And don’t read into the words.” On full moons, the wæres let themselves into my storm cellar and locked themselves into the cages they wanted with whomever they wanted to share them with—an important choice, since these caged animals passed the time by mating, and furious mating by the sounds of it. (Wæres differed from natural wolves in that they didn’t have to be in heat for such activity.) When I went to unlock the cages at dawn, Johnny was always alone. He teased me and howled at me—the pack clown, so to speak.
“Aw, c’mon, Red. Go out with me just once. I won’t bite. I won’t even lick if you don’t want me to.”
I grinned, but softly said, “No.”
He sighed. “Hey…you know about Lorrie, right?” His voice had gone soft too, and serious.
“Yeah,” I said. A heavy, sad silence filled the line between us. I wanted to say something else, but everything that came to mind was a statement of the obvious. And I couldn’t say, Don’t worry, I’m taking care of it. “I don’t know what to say.”
“I hope they get the bastard.” Johnny knew better than most what a crock the justice system was to wæres. Maybe he didn’t know what to say either.
“Me too.” I paused, then asked, “Um…Busy or not?”
“I said I wasn’t.”
“Perfect. Would you please go to Cleveland and pick up something for me in, uh, well…your stage clothes.” He fronted an awesome techno-metal-Goth band. My friend Celia was now married to Erik, who was the drummer.
“In daylight hours?”
“Mm-hmmm. At four o’clock.”
“Awesome. I love scaring the white-collared types. What’m I picking up?”
“Probably a briefcase or something like that.”
He paused. “You don’t know?”
“Long story.”
“Sounds like perfect dinner conversation to me.”
I rolled my eyes. “Johnny.”
“Okay, okay. Where?”
“From the manager of a coffee shop near the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. On East Ninth.”
“No way! The place they roast their own beans?”
I had to smile. His enthusiasm never waned. I didn’t mean to be cruel, but if any man would make a good wærewolf, as in cousin to man’s best friend, it was Johnny. He had the personality of a tail-wagging leg-humper that had just gotten its treat. “Yep.”
“Cool. Wait—what’s in it for me?”
Going with the thought I’d just had, I said, “Treats.”
“Oooo baby.”
“Not those kinds of treats, Johnny. I’m talking steaks.”
“Don’t blame me for trying, do ya?”
“Never.” I had to admit, his interest in me was flattering—and his voice seemed sexier to me on the phone than it ever had in person—but my personal rule was direct: don’t flirt with the wæres you kennel. Kind of like no office dating. Of course I’d only adopted that rule after he started flirting with me. But I couldn’t date him. He…he had these tattoos that were just…ominous.
“So…” he drew it out. “Am I keeping this briefcase or whatever until the moonrise, or do I get to make a special trip to see you and Grandma?”
In a mocking, childlike voice, I teased, “What big ideas you have.”
He growled low. “I got other things bigger than my ideas, little girl.”
My cheeks flushed red enough to suit the nickname. Johnny was different. The other wæres, in human form, were just people. Johnny had such presence!
I’d always thought he just flat-out scared me, but talking to him now—more than we ever talked when he kenneled—I had to wonder. He was funny. He was witty. Was it different now because I needed him to do something for me? Was I that shallow?
No, it had to be because this was the first time I was on the phone with him…hearing him without seeing him.
I realized it was all about his appearance. That made me feel bad. I didn’t judge people on looks. Not usually, anyway. And though I’d not thought Johnny was a bad person based on his looks, I’d definitely judged him as “not boyfriend material” because of them.