Beasts and BFFs

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“I can’t believe you’re making me do this,” I grumbled as I bent to double knot my sneakers. A leaf whisked by, skittering along the sidewalk by my feet before it chattered and took flight, red against a graying sky. Fall had arrived too soon in Junction. I zipped my jacket up against the prodding of the occasional breeze.

Amy laughed. “It’s not like I’m making you
really
run. Just a jog, Jessie. I’m totally going easy on you.”

“Besides, you’re in good shape, Jessica. A jog should be no trouble,” Sarah said as she joined us.

The look Amy gave me was unmistakable.

The look she gave
Sarah
was one that didn’t miss a stitch of her immaculate pink outfit. If Gucci made sweatsuits their brand would have been boldly stitched across Sarah’s boobs and butt. Money might as well have been Sarah Luxom’s middle name.

“A jog should be no trouble,” Amy repeated, slicing each word away from the others so they hung in the air alone.

Amy hated Sarah.
Hated
her. And firmly believed I should too. And I’d invited her along. I shrugged. Well, it wasn’t like Sarah had anyone else to hang out with now. Maybe Amy could learn some compassion when it came to her. Or even just tolerance.            

Yeah. I’d settle for tolerance.

Amy cleared her throat. Or growled. I wasn’t quite sure which.

“I guess we’re all here.” I fought to keep my nerves from pulling my lips into an unnatural grin. And failed.

“Yee-aaah.” Amy shook her head and tugged her flashing copper hair into an impromptu ponytail.

Sarah did the same, sweeping back strands of blonde that varied from platinum to honey and somehow found sunlight no matter where she stood.

Between them I was utterly unremarkable as I put a rubber band in my own brown hair. Not chestnut-colored, not sienna, not chocolate. Just brown.

“Amy,” Sarah greeted. Her tone mirrored Amy’s stony expression. Both were equally unimpressed by the other’s company.

Excellent. This was bound to be about as much fun as shin splints.

“So.” I slapped my hands together. “Let’s jog!”

“Did you stretch?” Amy asked.

“I tied my sneakers.”

She rolled her eyes. “Let’s go.” The pace she set as we headed out told me two things: first, Amy was thrilled to go just fast enough to keep Sarah firmly behind us. And second? She was evidently willing to kill me in the process.

We ran beside the river, marking our progress by the stations of the recently added fitness trail. Mulch cushioned our rhythmic footsteps, the occasional crunch of an already dried leaf crisply accenting the sound of my own breath in my ears.

We started up a small incline, turning toward the new park’s wilder center and I felt the tingle and pinch in my legs shift as I engaged another set of muscles.

I totally understood why Amy would choose a place like this to run. A sort of solitude soaked in even when you weren’t alone. Your mind could wander. You could think about anything—imagine the future, concentrate on the present or…

…examine the past.

If you dared.

I swallowed, deciding my time was best spent remembering to breathe. The slope grew steeper and the air rasped in my throat as I pushed to match Amy’s stride. We entered the most thickly wooded part of the park and the moody sunlight was squeezed from the sky by the heavy entwining of branches. Vines crawled along the foot of the path and climbed, knotting together berry canes and wild rose bushes, making a nearly impenetrable net of vegetation on either side of the trail. Birdsong trilled around us, bouncing over our heads as wings flickered in the dappled sunlight and spotty shadows.

Amy had started talking and I struggled to balance my focus between paying attention to whatever Amy was saying and not dying on the uphill.

“…so she’s moving in. Can you believe it?”

So much for quiet time and introspection.

“What?” Sarah asked behind us. “Who’s moving in?”

Amy shouldered closer to me, forcing Sarah out of the conversation I was barely involved in. “Well? What do you think about that?” Expectation sparkled in her eyes. Or maybe it was challenge.

“What? You expect me to talk now, too?”  I gasped.

Her smile tilted at one end. “Talking helps regulate your breathing,” she said matter-of-factly. “You should start running with me.”

“Isn’t that what I’m doing?”

“I mean regularly. Go out for winter track since cross country’s almost over.”

“There’s a reason I ride horses. They run for me.”

“Smart alec.” Amy’s stride shortened by half and she looked at me.  “What--” She slowed to a walk, her eyes searching the path’s high perimeter of brambles and branches. “Did you hear that?” she asked, voice low.

I stopped dead, bent over and panting. “Was it the sound of my heart exploding?”

“Shhh.”

Sarah’s hand settled on my back and she whispered, “You need to keep walking or you’ll get sidestitches.”

“Sidestitches are the only things holding my guts in right now,” I hissed.

“Shut up!” Amy shouted, clamping her hands over her mouth as soon as the words flew out.

Above our heads a blue jay shrieked a warning and the rest of the birds sucked back their songs, leaving the woods a grim place.

And I heard it. A rustling deep in the foliage. Branches popped and snapped as something bullied its way through the matted vegetation. I straightened and looked at my friends. Silent, we turned toward the noise.

It grew louder, coming our way.

“It’s probably just somebody’s dog.” I shrugged. “Maybe it’s lost.” Crouching, I peered into the tangle of thorns and vines and saw nothing but darkness. “Here boy--”

“Don’t you dare!” Amy grabbed my wrist and yanked me up straight.

“What?”

“That’s way bigger than one of your dogs, Jessie,” Amy confided. “Way. Bigger.”

Sarah nodded. “It sounds bigger than any dog I know of,” she agreed.

Agreed.
With Amy.

“The only dogs you probably know of are those purebred monsters that live in people’s purses and can’t even breathe right they’re so inbred,” Amy replied.

“Whoa. Amy. Tell us what you
really
think,” I fired back, eyebrows raised so high my forehead ached.

“Fine. I will.” Hands on her hips, Amy faced us both.

The mysterious beast in the briars suddenly seemed a lesser threat.

“I think it absolutely sucks that you brought
her
along on our run,” Amy admitted. “I think you’re cutting her too much slack. I think you need to tell her the truth--”

“Wait,” Sarah interjected weakly. “What truth?”

But Amy rattled on, “--about everything because a friendship can’t possibly last with a girl like
that
. I think--”

The jay screamed again.

“
I think
we’re in trouble,” Sarah whispered, eyes sliding back to the thicket lining our path.

My lips pressed together and I wrenched my gaze from Amy’s enraged face. My sneakers ground into the hard packed dirt as I turned toward the trembling bushes.

Beside me Amy’s sneakers scratched as she echoed my move.

The thing in the bushes growled—a sound my body noted with a tremble.

Amy’s lips formed a slow
Oh
. They pursed.
My
. Opened.
God.

“What
is
that?” Sarah asked me. “You live on a farm—what sort of animal sounds like that?”

“Whatever it is, I certainly don’t raise
them
,” I muttered. “I think we should--”

“Run?” Amy asked.

I glanced down the path. A hundred yards ahead the vibrant, living tunnel opened back up, hardpacked dirt yielding once more to mulch. Another fifty yards beyond and the mulch path dumped out at the parking lot. It wasn’t forever away but… Part of me wondered if Amy wasn’t considering the old horror movie standby as an option.  You didn’t have to be the fastest runner to escape doom in those flicks—you just had to outrun the slowest runner.

Sarah.

“No,” I urged. Besides, running would put our backs to whatever it was, leaving us at a distinct disadvantage. “No. Just back up slowly. Keep your eyes on the bushes.”

“What if it’s dominance-driven?” Sarah asked.

“What?” Amy and I raised the question in unison.

“Like a lion? Something that gets angrier if you stare at it because it believes you’re trying to establish dominance?”

I knew Amy was preparing to tell Sarah not to be so frikkin’ stupid, so I raised a hand. I wanted quiet. Maybe something else in the park’s untamed heart would catch the animal’s attention. The birds had stopped singing. Even the jay had gone mute.

Fabulous.

“A lion in Junction?” Amy blew out an exasperated breath.

So much for us being quiet.

“--or a wolf,” Sarah suggested.

My stomach dropped. Lions in Junction were an impossibility. But wolves…

Amy snorted.

“There were wolves in Farthington.”

The color drained from Amy’s face. “Those weren’t normal wolves.”

“Keep backing toward the parking lot.”  My heel struck a rock embedded in the path and I stumbled before catching myself.

Amy and Sarah stared at me, fear finally strangling the words in their throats. Eyes glued to the brambles, I dug out the rock with the toe of my sneaker, briefly bending to snatch it up.

If something came for us I’d at least try and wing it.

For every step we got closer to the safety of the open parking lot, the thing in the bushes matched us, stalking along a parallel path. I managed to get Sarah and Amy a little behind me. Amy stooped over, reaching for her shoe.

“What are you--”

“You have a rock,” she mentioned, “I just figured I’d--”

“Whack it with your shoe?”  

She yanked it free, holding the sneaker like she’d used it as a weapon before. Knowing Amy, she probably had.

Together, we took another step backwards.

“Should I--?” Sarah asked.

“Your shoes are all about fashion, not function,” Amy sniped.

Frustrated, words slipped out. “If you think
your
sneakers were designed for running
and
beast bashing--”

“Point taken,” Amy muttered. Her hand came to rest on my left shoulder.

Sarah’s hand gripped my right and we took another long, careful step back.

The honk of a car horn made us jump.

“Marvin!” Amy squealed in recognition, turning toward the lot just as the creature broke cover and darted across the path, brutally ripping its way into the brush on the other side and disappearing once more.

Sarah and I gawked at each other, jaws loose. “That was huge,” I said.

“
Gargantuan
,” she agreed.

“What? What was it?” Amy asked, staring at the hole in the underbrush. “What did it look like?”

“A collie,” Sarah said.

I snorted, relief flooding through me as the noise of the thing ripping through the bushes grew softer—more distant. “Lassie was a collie. And that thing was no Lassie.” I laughed.

I was grabbed from both sides and smooshed between Amy and Sarah in a huge hug. My heart fell out of my throat and resumed a nearly normal rhythm. Until Amy and Sarah realized they were actually touching and both slipped away as fast as… Well, as fast as something
really
fast.

The creature was gone—no branch waved or berry cane crackled in its wake. “Let’s go,” I suggested, grabbing their wrists.

“Should we tell somebody?” Sarah asked. Our strides lengthened and I felt a burn in my legs as we ran the last hundred and fifty yards to the parking lot.

Marvin’s sleek silver convertible was illegally parked—for his convenience—and it appeared he was having a quick chat with local law enforcement about it. A police officer stood by his window, his hands quick and expressive.

“We could tell that police officer what we saw,” Sarah suggested.  

Marvin flashed something at the cop—his license? He pointed to one section of it.

“Oh, God,” Amy said. “He’s doing it again. Pointing out his address like it means something.” From the tone of her voice I could tell it meant something to
her
.

The officer waved his arms in the air and I heard him snap something about stupid kids feeling they were entitled.

So much for telling a cop.

As he moved away, heading further down the parking lot, I noticed someone else standing by the front of the car.

Derek.

Shirtless.

My brain disengaged as my heart sped up. One of the only perks of Amy dating Marvin was Marvin’s occasional chat with my longtime crush. Derek.

Derek of the soft-blond-slightly-tousled-curls-and-dimpling-smile. Derek, Junction’s most promising football player.

“Hey, Derek,” Amy said as she slipped between them and leaned over for a kiss from  Marvin.

“Hey,” he nodded. He glanced at Sarah and me and turned back to Marvin. “See ya tonight?”

“Wouldn’t miss it,” Marvin said. Derek jogged away, sunlight sparkling across his damp back. “Pile in, ladies,” Marvin said with a wave of his hand.

Amy cleared her throat.

I was still standing at the car’s side, staring after Derek. Everyone else was already in the car.

“Stalk much?” Amy teased.

My cheeks burning, I slid into the backseat beside Sarah and buckled up.

“So,” Marvin said as he turned the key and started the car. “Football practice starts in twenty minutes.”  He located me in the rearview mirror and looked at me meaningfully.

I shrugged.

“Come on. You know you want to watch him,” Amy said.

“Everyone knows that.” Sarah giggled.

“Nah.” I forced my lips together and shook my head, still acutely aware of Derek’s location in the parking lot. “I--

Sarah giggled again. “Seriously.”

“Seriously,” I said.

“What are you planning to do?”

“Study,” Sarah suggested.

I nodded. Perhaps a little too vigorously to be convincing. “Ms. Ashton wants us to be through Act I of
Romeo and Juliet
by tomorrow. I should review it.”