Still Life with Shape-shifter (7 page)

BOOK: Still Life with Shape-shifter
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“Sure,” I said, since it seemed unlikely she would remember this plan by morning.

She lowered her voice to a theatrical whisper. “We won’t take your father. It’ll be a girls’ day out.”

“Sounds great.”

After the meal I saw her go into the living room, where my father was sprawled on the couch watching TV. She snuggled up next to him and began kissing his cheek, murmuring something that made him burst out laughing. After a moment, he reached for the remote and turned the television off.

I picked up a magazine and headed outside.

Not intending to, I fell asleep before the sun had even gone down and woke up a few hours later, chilly and a little disoriented. Oh yes—outside, waiting on midnight, waiting on moonrise, waiting on a mysterious visitor who might never return. I slipped inside briefly to use the bathroom, grab a sweater, and gather my usual supplies, then I was back on the deck, shutting the door behind me. I’d left the kitchen light on, and its warm yellow glow spilled out onto the wood of the deck, picking out all the warped boards and the route of June bugs waddling by.

Stepping out into the grass, I stared toward the back of the property, where nighttime and braided shadows made it impossible to see. Yet there was movement there, some stirring of leaf or branch as a creature moved soundlessly through the dark, and I didn’t think it was just my longing and my imagination that created the illusion. Deliberate motion—a shape taking on mass and substance—something approaching me from the back of the lawn.

He came just close enough for his silhouette to be visible in the reflected light from the house, then waited. I knew that hesitancy, I knew that limp, I recognized that soul.

But it was not a wolf who had materialized out of the darkness. It was a man.

CHAPTER FIVE

MELANIE

G
od help me, Ann is in love.

It’s the second thing I learn as we sit cross-legged on the couch, eating ice cream and talking late into the night.

The first is that she’s alive. And healthy, too, by her own account, though I think her face is drawn, and she’s painfully thin. Other than that, she looks good. She must have arrived a few moments after Brody and I left because she’s had time to shower and change into some old clothes I keep on hand for her. She’s even applied a little makeup, borrowing my rouge and mascara, so she looks flushed and vibrant. And happy, oh my God, so happy. I feel myself fill up on that happiness, refuel in a way I wouldn’t have thought possible even half an hour ago. I was weary and sad. Now I feel like I could run a marathon or dance through the night.

“In
love
,” I repeat. “So tell me about him! What’s his name? What’s he like? Where did you meet him?”

“His name is William Romano. I met him out at Elephant Rocks a few months ago, and we’ve been together practically every minute since, except when I was visiting you.”

Elephant Rocks is a state park some distance southwest of Dagmar. As you might expect, it features a tumble of humongous boulders that look like elephants if you’re not too much of a stickler. “Met him in the park? Like, at a campsite? He borrowed matches or something?”

Her laugh trills out. “No—silly. We were in animal shape, and we recognized each other.”

It takes me a moment to digest this. “You can recognize other shape-shifters just by looking at them?”

“Not when I’m human, but when I’ve changed, and they’ve changed, yeah, I can. It doesn’t happen very often.”

“So—” I’m not sure how to ask the question. I’ve just spent an evening with a dangerously attractive man, doing that careful dance of invitation and rebuff; even using the tools of language and visual interpretation, I couldn’t swear I’d taken an accurate measure of his personality. How do you perform the courtship ritual with a man when you can’t even speak to him or read his expressions? “How does that work exactly? How do you get to know each other when you’re both dogs?” I feel my expression change. “Or—well—
is
he a dog?”

Surely no one else on the planet who’s asked her sister about a new romantic interest has ever been forced to pose that question.

Ann laughs again, the sound so light and merry it echoes through the room like a wind chime. “Most of the time. A golden setter. Sometimes he’s a wolf or some other creature.”

Ann has never taken any shape other than that of a white husky. My first reaction is surprise that this William has multiple alter egos. My second reaction is that I don’t know much about shape-changing in general, and there might be as many varieties of it as there are practitioners. “Really? He can be more than one kind of animal? Is that common?”

She shrugs, not interested. “I don’t know. I’ve only met a few others.”

Something to explore on another day. “So. William,” I prompt her. “What’s he like?”

“He’s quiet, and he seems shy, but he’s really not. He just doesn’t like people very much. He stays in animal shape most of the time unless he’s visiting his brother and his niece. He’s so smart. He knows all the parks in the St. Louis area, he knows where you can always find food and where you can find a protected area to spend the winter and how to earn money doing odd jobs if you
need
money and—well, that doesn’t explain it very well. He’s just—I feel
safe
with him. I feel like nothing will go wrong when he’s around.”

I admit, the first items on her list of virtues don’t impress me much, but those last few sentences win me over. I’m an enthusiastic supporter of anyone who can keep Ann safe. “Is he cute?”

She giggles. “
I
think so. You’d probably think he was raggedy. You know, his hair’s long and he doesn’t shave very often and he looks kind of—I mean, I don’t think he’s had an easy life. And it shows.” She puts her hands to her chest in a mock swoon. “But I love his eyes. And I love his face. And I love his smile.”

“You’ve got it bad,” I say, shaking my head. “So tell me more about him—how you met and how you got to know him and all that.”

She resettles herself on the couch to get more comfortable. “Well, I was in the park late last fall. And I got injured.” She gives me a fleeting look and decides to gloss over this part. “It wasn’t serious. But it slowed me down. And I was digging through trash one afternoon, trying to find something to eat, but I couldn’t find much, and my ribs hurt, and I was hungry, and I was about to give up for the night. And then William showed up.”

She pauses as if to remember the scene. “He’s bigger than me, in animal shape, and you never know about wild dogs because they can be mean. So I backed away from the trash, in case he wanted it, but he just kind of watched me. After a moment, I realized he was human, and he wasn’t going to fight me, so I let him come close enough to sniff me.”

I make a strangled noise and her laughter peals out again. “It just sounds so ridiculous!” I exclaim. “And a little creepy! He
sniffed
you!”

“And he saw the wound in my side and he investigated that and then he let me know I should settle down and wait for him for a while—”

“How? How did he let you know that?”

She makes a helpless gesture. “I can’t explain it. I just knew. So I curled up under one of the picnic tables and waited for him. And pretty soon he came back with a squirrel he’d caught, and we had a meal.”

“So—your very first date and he takes you out to dinner,” I say, though part of me wants to gag.

She smiles. “I guess so. And then over the next couple of days we hunted together—and played together—and explored the park—and—I don’t know how to explain it. We just got along.”

“Without words. Without faces.”

“Well, we had faces. Just furry ones.”

“My mistake.”

“But my side was still bothering me, and it was getting really cold, so William wanted me to spend a few nights someplace more protected than the park. So he took me to Maria’s house.”

I’m bewildered. “Who’s Maria?”

“His brother’s girlfriend. Actually, they’re married now.”

“Is she a shape-shifter, too?”

“No, but his brother is.”

I try to make the question sound casual. “Why didn’t you just come here if you needed some R&R?”

Her smile is mischievous. “I wasn’t sure I was ready to let you meet him yet. But I was
dying
to meet his family.”

“What did William tell them about you?”

She shakes her head. “I don’t think he told Maria anything. I just showed up at her door and she put out a blanket and some food, and I spent a few nights there until I felt stronger, then I left.”

“So she just thought you were a stray dog she was taking in?”

“I guess so. But—” She makes a face. “She talked to me like I was a person. Like she knew I could understand her. So I think she suspected. Well, she’s been around William’s family for ten or fifteen years, so she understands about shape-shifters.”

“Gee, maybe I should meet her,” I say, my voice dry. “I’d love to know an ordinary person who understands about shape-shifters.”

Ann looks intrigued. “Maybe you could. William says she’s really easy to talk to, and he doesn’t usually find people easy to talk to.”

“And of course I’d love to meet
William
one day. Even before I meet Maria,” I say.

“Yeah, I want you to, but—I know you’ll think he’s odd.”

I reach over to flick the tip of her nose. Small and cute and upturned and human. When she’s in canine form, it’s small and cute and black and inhuman. “I think
you’re
odd, and I like you,” I say.

“You have to like me,” she says. “You’re my sister.”

“But back to William. When did you both decide the time was finally right to take human shape and get to know each other that way? And was that weird? Like, you seemed different than you thought you’d be?”

She thinks that over. “I guess we’d known each other two months before we took human shape together. He can change at will, like I can—which isn’t the case all the time, apparently. He said his brother never had a choice about changing—just one day he could feel the pressure in him, and he’d have to shift. That’d be hard, I think.”

“Yes, yes, but get to the good part. So you became human—”

Her face is wreathed in smiles. “And he was cute. And we talked. And we held hands. And we kissed. And—” She hesitates, but her smile grows wider. “And stuff. And it was like I’d already known him half my life.”

“It didn’t seem strange? No awkward moments? I’d think it would be like meeting a pen pal for the first time. You
think
you know him, but then it turns out you don’t like the tone of his voice or the way he laughs or he’s shorter than you thought he’d be. Or something.”

“Yeah, I guess it might happen that way but—it didn’t.” She shrugs again. “We already knew each other.”

I’ve tried not to let myself think about what she meant when she said they kissed
and stuff
, but the girl is twenty years old. An adult, and a most adventurous one at that. “So you’ve had sex with him,” I say, keeping my voice composed. “I hope you remembered to use a condom.”

She laughs so much that it’s a minute before she can answer me. “Melanie, we had sex when we were animals, too, and we weren’t using a condom then.”

I put my hands over my face as if I can block out the images. “Ugh! No! Gross, don’t tell me that, I don’t want those pictures in my head—la-la-la, I can’t hear you—”

She’s laughing again, even harder. “Well, you’re the one who brought it up!”

“I was just trying to be the responsible older sister—” A sudden thought stops me midjustification. “Wait. If you’re having sex without protection—could you get pregnant? Oh God, if you’re pregnant when you’re a husky, will you have—will you have
puppies
? This is too weird. I can’t get my mind around it. Of course, I’ll help you, I’ll do whatever I can but—I mean, if I have to raise a litter of half-human puppies, I don’t think I can move far enough out into the country to keep people from wondering.”

Now the tears are streaming down her face as she gives in to hysteria. Me, I’m so flummoxed at this new notion that I can’t bother to be amused
or
horrified. I’m just stunned. What on Earth will I
do
?

“Shape-shifters obviously manage to get pregnant and have babies,” she finally says when she has herself back under control, though she’s hiccuping a little. “Or there’d never be any more shape-shifters. But I won’t get pregnant.”

“If you’re having sex—”

“William had a vasectomy last summer after his sister had a little girl. He figured they didn’t need any more kids in the family. So we don’t have to worry about it.”

“He
told
you he had a vasectomy,” I correct her darkly. Some men will say anything to convince a girl to sleep with them.

“I believe him.”

But then my attention is caught by what she just said. “His sister had a baby? Is his sister a shape-shifter? Is the baby?”

“The baby—they don’t know yet. The sister was, but she’s dead.”

“What happened to her?”

“William doesn’t talk about it. I think she was killed in an accident or something.”

“So who’s raising the little girl? The dad? Is
he
a shape-shifter?”

“The dad doesn’t seem to be in the picture. William’s brother and sister-in-law—”

“Maria?”

“Right. They’ve got the baby. I haven’t met her yet. I haven’t met anyone but Maria—and it wasn’t like she actually realized she was meeting me.”

“So his family members don’t know about you?”

“They know he’s spending time with me. We just haven’t bothered with formal introductions.”

I take a deep breath. “Well. I would love to meet William anytime you want to bring him by the house. Or—whatever. I could meet you both at a park somewhere if he’d be more comfortable in that environment.” I hear a certain doubt creep into my voice. “Of course, I’d prefer to meet him in human shape, since I don’t have the ability to communicate with animals, but if that’s too difficult for him—”

She giggles again. “Yes, I think it would be best if he was a man when I introduced you. I’ll see what he says. I’d like you to get to know him.”

“Good. Looking forward to it.” And then I remember. “God—no—wait, it might not be safe for him to come to the house!”

Her eyes widen. “What? Why? What’s wrong with the house?”

I rub my forehead and glance at the clock. Impossible, but it’s just past 11 p.m. I feel like I have lived through a hundred lifetimes in this single day, and it’s not even midnight yet. “There’s this—guy. He showed up today. He’s a reporter, he wants to write a book about shape-shifters. He’s somehow gotten it into his head that they exist—and he thinks you’re one of them.”

“Cool!” she exclaims.

I can’t have heard her right. “Cool? It’s terrifying!”

She shrugs. “Why? So someone finds out I’m a shape-shifter. So what?”

Am I crazy? All these years have I poured every ounce of my energy into protecting Ann, concealing Ann, trying to keep the world from discovering her glorious, impossible secret—but for no reason? Is there really no danger? Is there really no worry? “I’m afraid of what people will do to you if they find out,” I say quietly. “We live in a world where people are murdered simply for being gay, and I’m willing to bet there are a lot more homosexuals than shape-shifters. Even if you weren’t rounded up by the government for being some kind of alien life-form, I think your friends and neighbors would make your life a living hell.”

She shrugs again and stretches her legs out. She looks nonchalant, even sleepy. “I don’t really have friends and neighbors. If people are mean to me, I’ll just go away.”

I feel a chill bloom around my heart and blow frost along the curved inner planes of my ribs. But maybe she doesn’t mean what I think she means. “You haven’t been human much lately,” I say casually. “Are you finding it more comfortable to stay in animal shape?”

BOOK: Still Life with Shape-shifter
8.25Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
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