Walking Wolf Road (Wolf Road Chronicles Book 1) (28 page)

In my better moments I tried calling Loki and Geri, but Geri usually wouldn’t answer, and Loki’s calls always descended into a long uncomfortable silence until one of us came up with some excuse to hang up. My inability to help my friends rotted inside me, feeding my dragon.  

How could Fen expect me to lead when I couldn’t even console myself? How could I? How could I find the strength to keep myself going, much less guide the others? Worthless and inadequate; Fen had wasted his dying words on an invalid. It was all so trivial now…

I needed to get out of the house, so I stepped outside and took a deep breath. Without thinking about it, I glanced down the street toward Fen’s mother’s house—I couldn’t think of it as Fen’s house anymore—and saw a moving truck parked at the curb. With a sinking feeling in my gut, I jogged down the street and knocked on the door. Fen’s mom answered, wiping her forehead with her sleeve.

“Oh, Jimmy!” she said, surprised.

“What’s all this?” I gestured toward the truck.

She sighed and stepped aside, “Come inside Jimmy.” Brown cardboard boxes were strewn across the floor behind her.

“Why didn’t you tell any of us?” I demanded, betrayal burning inside me as I looked around the half-packed living room.
“What, were you just going to sneak out of town and hope none of us noticed?

“Have a seat,” She w
aved toward the worn old thriftstore couch that Fen and I used to sit on after school. “I can’t do this Jimmy, I can’t live in the home I raised him in anymore, it’s just too… God, ‘painful’ doesn’t even come close. I die a little more inside every time I walk through the door and he’s not here.”

“Where are you going?”

“I don’t know… I’m not even sure I care; it’s not like there’s anywhere I can get away from the fact that my son is dead. My entire family Jimmy…I’ve buried them all.”

We sat in silence for a moment before she spoke again, her voice soft, “It’s not enough that I have to process his death, but now I also have to face up to the things in his life I thought I’d have years to deal with. I feel so guilty…” She shook her head.

“What do you mean?”

“After his father died, I tried, but I just couldn’t find anybody else. Fen grew up without anyone to show him how to play sports, or work on cars, or any of those things guys are supposed to know. They beat him, called him a pansy and accused him of being gay… God, I lost count of how many times he came home from school crying or bleeding. He never blamed me… but I did.

“I think that’s why I never challenged him when he started obsessing over this wolf thing. He needed some excuse for being different, something that gave him strength. It went on longer than it should have, but I just couldn’t take that away from him too.” She sighed, “Even though it was all in his head, at least it made him happy.”

I stared into space while her words
cut deep into me. Was it all just in our heads? It was hard to imagine Fen ever
not
being a wolf trapped in a boy’s body. Instead, he was just another fatherless victim, who allowed his obsession to transform him.

Something from his funeral came back to me and goosebumps crawled over my skin. His real name was James—Jim—Jimmy…

We were the
same
; two faces of the same coin, the day and the night. In my mind, I looked into a mirror and saw him reflected at me.

He
was what I would have been without John. I winced as I remembered John’s rage at the hospital; some small part of me had still hoped that he might actually care for me. Father or not, without John, it might have been my mother mourning in that tiny little box of a house in Idaho. Which reminded me…

“What are you going to do with his ashes?”

“I don’t know. The last place he belongs is a box, but I don’t know where he would want to be…”

“I might have an idea.”

“Oh?” She asked, and then glanced at the door. Then she laughed and lowered her eyes, “Sorry, I keep expecting to hear him drop his backpack on the deck and walk through the door…”

I glanced at the door too, and almost imagined the knob twisting… but it didn’t.

The air sparkled with loose crystals of snow, caught in the wind. The sky was clear and painfully bright as the remaining Pack members stood with me and looked out over the city, bundled against the biting gusts.

Fen’s
mom parked and crunched through the loose powder toward us with a white ceramic box held to her chest. Loki and Geri hugged her without realizing what—or who—was in the box.

“Okay guys,” I said, “we’re not legally allowed to disperse human remains just anywhere. But this is important, and for all anyone knows, she’s keeping him with her.”

Loki and Geri looked shocked as they realized why we were there, and the precious cargo in the white box. We passed it around, and each of us closed our eyes as we held it to our hearts and whispered our last goodbyes. Geri looked uncomfortable, and passed the box to me almost immediately.

I looked at the clean porcelain lid and closed my eyes. This was all that was left of a boy who had found the soul of the wolf inside himself, and helped us do the same. My best friend, my guide and tutor, my bitter rival, my first broken love… I said goodbye, and handed the box back to his mother.

She held it a moment, and then handed it back to me and smiled. “You do it Jimmy.” I felt Loki eyes on me, glistening with tears, but appreciative that I’d found a way to bring us all some small measure of closure.

“Goodbye my friend. May the winter’s fangs never touch you again…” I lifted the lid and threw Fen’s ashes up into a gust of wind that swept him away over the city in a sea of floating diamonds.

I hugged Fen’s mother one last time before she kissed my cheek and got into the moving van. I felt robbed. Like she’d packed up Fen’s memory and stolen him away with her. I stood beside a couple boxes of Fen’s books and movies that she’d given me, and waved as she drove down Wolf Road and turned toward the highway. The familiar worn façade of Fen’s house stood hollow and empty, while a red and black ‘For Rent’ sign replaced the lives that Fen and his mother had lived there.

Upholding my yearly custom of flipping Valentine’s Day the finger, I made a token gesture at Lupercalia instead. But even the ancient Roman werewolf festival passed cheerlessly. Everything felt like a hollow worthless ritual without Fen.

I went to sleep that night expecting a visit from Lupa since the day was associated with her favorite namesake. I hadn’t seen her since before Fen and I fought and I ached to reconnect, but restless blackness clouded everything as I slept. Rather, I tried to sleep, until my useless masochistic brain woke me up by replaying Fen’s death.

Over and over again.

I’d hoped to heal the rift I’d accidentally opened between Geri and I with Fen’s ashes. Instead, Geri drew even further away from me, and changed the subject every time I brought it up. He told me he was fine, and then acted the opposite as a miasma of guilt swam around him. It gnawed at me, but I didn’t know what to do about it.

When we returned to school, the morning was so white and frigid that the frost seemed to linger inside my bones even after I walked through the doors. In the halls, everyone pretended not to stare. A few actually had the courage to walk up to me and mutter words of condolence, though I knew few would actually mourn his loss. My stomach twisted as I neared the door to Mrs. Ashcroft’s room, a room where Fen would not be waiting for me anymore with charcoal on his fingers.

I realized I’d been standing there staring at the door when Mr. Spritari cleared his throat. He delayed the inevitable and escorted me to the counseling office instead.

Fuck my life, what now?

“I’m sorry if I worried you Jimmy,” he said as he closed the office door behind us, probably due to the look on my face, “but I didn’t want to create more drama by calling you here through the P.A. system. I’m very sorry for your loss. I would like to do what I can to help you through this, the grieving process isn’t easy.”

“What the hell would you know about it?” I snapped at him before I could stop myself.
After an awkward moment, Mr. Spritari retrieved a small framed picture from the far side of his computer monitor. He looked at it a moment, and then handed it to me.

“This was my son, Tony,” he said. I looked at the school portrait in the picture frame. The boy had his father’s narrow face, but a shy smile and wider cheekbones, with brown hair that dangled almost to his eyes. He looked to be either a sophomore or a freshman if I had to guess, but I didn’t recognize him. The picture looked several years old.

“The day after his sixteenth birthday, he was killed in a school shooting. Much like your friend, he was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. My son,” Mr. Spritari started, but his voice broke, “was a good boy, but he paid the price for someone else’s rage…”

“I’m sorry,” I muttered. As horrible as Fen’s death felt, I couldn’t even fathom what it must have been like to bury your own child. No wonder he’d been such an asshole about my record.

“No matter how much time passes, it never gets easier to talk about.” He took a deep breath and composed himself while he cleaned his blurry glasses with a tissue. “So, believe me, I am
very
familiar with the grieving process.”

We talked about the five stages of grief through the remainder of first period. I was already too well acquainted with denial and isolation, anger, bargaining, and depression. Mrs. Ashcroft had kindly forfeited the assignment I’d missed, but Mr. Spritari had collected a stack of make-up work for me from my other classes. Including five make up tests. Skippy.

At lunch, Bo caught up with me in the lunch line.

“Hey Jimmy, how’re you holding up?” he asked with an awkward smile.

“Surviving…” I muttered, and accepted a scoop of canned pears from the lunch-lady and shuffled along, “What’s up?”

“Well, not much. I was wondering if you wanted to hang out some time. Maybe jam or something?”

I raised an eyebrow at him and waited for the punch line.

“I’m serious, Jimmy. Two of my friends just got expelled—one of whom is in prison—and after I quit the football team everyone I thought were my friends stopped talking to me. They blame me and Jack for ruining their season,” he scratched his head, “and they’re not fond of you either. I know this sounds really weird, but you’re the only authentic person I know. Everyone else is dramatic, two-faced, and sometimes downright insane. You’re just… you.”

“Um, thanks?” At least it
sounded
like a compliment, “Yeah, we can hang out, I don’t mind. Why
did
you quit the team anyway?”

Bo
looked embarrassed, “I might as well tell you, it’s not like it’ll ruin my reputation at this point, but I wanted to focus on my grades. That’s all. I haven’t heard back from any of the schools I applied to yet, and I’m trying not to freak out.”

“Dude, it’s like, barely March, and you’re worried about not getting an accepted? It’ll be fine, you’re a smart guy.” I smiled at him to hide the twinge of pain I felt. Fen had been waiting for the same thing. Fen had wanted to go to college so badly, and he never would, while I’d walked away from it…

“I also uh, I’ve been thinking about what you said, about acting like Jack and Malcolm. Lately it’s become painfully clear that I don’t want to be anything like them. So, yeah… I’m also willing to bribe you with my Government notes if I have to.”

I couldn’t help but smile, “Thanks, I’m gonna need them. Mr. Spritari just gave me a mountain of make-up work.”

Bo laughed as we rounded the corner of the hallway and found Loki leaning against the wall. “Oh, uh, hey Jimmy,” she said as she eyed Bo.

“Hey, what are you doing out here?”

“I was waiting for you and Geri. I just couldn’t… uh, the art room…” Loki’s voice trailed off, “I just can’t. It was hell in there without you today.” I apologized and explained Mr. Spritari’s interception while Bo hung back, uncomfortable and quiet. Loki watched Bo out of the corner of her eye with equal parts suspicion and annoyance until she snapped. “Okay, are you going to lurk there all day? Knock off that creeper shit and either say something or go away.”

Woops, forgot that part. “Actually Loki, I was wondering if it’d be okay if Bo hangs out with us. At least until Geri gets here?”

“Why? Doesn’t Mr. Football Hero have anyone else to bother?”

“Y’know what, she’s right. I’ll leave you guys alone.” Bo muttered and turned to leave.

“Actually,” I said as I snagged his shirt to keep him from walking away, “he doesn’t. He’s more like us than them, and now they know it.” I knew Loki would be able to read between the lines and that she understood everything I didn’t say.

“Okay, fine,” Loki lifted her hands in surrender, “he can stay. We’re basically the home for misfit toys anyway…” she muttered to herself and rubbed her temples. After a moment, she sighed.

“Okay Football Hero, here are the rules,” Loki said as she crossed her arms and faced Bo. “First of all, no lurking and no creeping. It’s fine if you don’t want to talk, but if you give us the heebie-jeebies, you’re out. Second, don’t you dare try to pity us or think you can replace Fen. You can’t, and fuck you if you try. Lastly, and most important, if you try to screw any of us over or stab Jimmy in the back, I will personally kick ten colors of shit out of you. Capisce?”

“Uh, got it.” Bo muttered, he almost looked scared. I smiled at Loki’s protectiveness and picked at my food while I hid dangerous thoughts.

“Good. Now, there are about five hundred topics that we are
not
going to talk about,” Loki said, turning to me. Now it was my turn to read between the lines. The obvious subject was Fen, but anything having to do with Pack business was nixed as well. “When are we going to start the guitar lessons again? I really need to get my mind off things.”

“Hell, we could start tonight if you want.” I said, craving to have a slice of our old lives back.

Bo cleared his throat. “You know Jimmy; you’ve kept me waiting for months to jam. If it’s cool with you, I could bring my drums over?” Bo gained brownie points for directing his question to Loki. He knew she was the one he’d really have to win over. Loki narrowed her eyes at him, but I could tell she was interested.

“I know dude, but
we don’t have anywhere to set up a drum set.” I said.

“You guys could bring your stuff over to my house. My kit’s set up in the garage, and my folks would be happy to see me play again.”

I raised my eyebrow at Loki and watched her debate inside her head. “Okay, fine. But you’re not allowed to make fun of us. I only started a few months ago.”

“Yeah, and her teacher sucks.” I muttered, which earned me a backhand to the shoulder.

“Don’t worry about it. I’m probably worse than either of you right now.” Bo laughed at himself while he wrote down his address for us.

Geri never showed up, so we walked aimlessly through the halls. We shared guarded small-talk and barely picked at our food until the bell rang and we went our separate ways. I talked Loki into going over to Bo’s to jam that night, and Bo’s self-depreciating sense of humor gradually thawed her icy disposition. Of course, I should have expected the wash of jealousy that seeped into me. But I didn’t. Way to go genius. Way to go.

After that first day, the cyclic daily routine almost fell back into groove with welcome familiarity. There was still a cold vacant seat in the art room that Loki and I were painfully aware of first period, and Geri muttered everything he said. That was, of course,
if
he said anything at all to us, or even showed up. It seemed like the more Geri was absent, the more time Bo spent with us. Though, I couldn’t help but wonder if maybe it was the other way around.

Bo quickly became a bittersweet fixture at lunch and after school, which helped ease the absence of the rest of our tattered Pack. Plus, when the weather was bad, Bo drove Jacob and I home in his truck.

The world around us refused to stop, and the slow march of time seemed intent on erasing every trace that Fen had ever lived at all. After a couple weeks, a trio of twenty-something stoners moved into the house where Fen had lived.

There was a hole inside me. The love that had once been torn between Loki and Fen swelled for the raven-haired beauty that sat beside me almost every morning. Loki grew even more within my heart even as she corroded it.

I couldn’t help but wonder if the jealous burn I felt around Bo was the same thing Fen felt when I came along. Following that logic, I figured that I deserved every bit of it. I remembered what Loki had said about Fen moving too fast after her last break-up, and I didn’t want to repeat his mistake. I could tell that she had loved Fen, perhaps not romantically, but love nonetheless. So I waited, and wanted, and dreamed.  

Of course, few of those dreams were good. I realized that my subconscious was a sadistic asshole as night after night, over and over, I watched Fen die. Every time, I watched his eyes fade to gray and stare at me, expectant. Like he was waiting for me to come to him. The worst part was that I kind of wanted to. My dragon sure as hell wanted me to. But I couldn’t bear to put Loki through that again, not like Corwin did.

While I was lost inside my own head, Geri drifted further away. He’d always been a little mousy, but now he overindulged in the wholehearted pursuit of being evasive, soft-spoken, and more skittish than ever. If he showed up at all, it felt like a stranger watched Loki and me out the corner of his eye.

In the second week of March, Geri called and asked me to come over. His voice sounded strange, but we hadn’t talked in so long and I felt I owed it to him. I got directions and asked John to drive me over.

Geri lived on the other side of town, in an expensive development at the base of the foothills. Geri’s home tried to look like southwest adobe, though with the gravel yard decked out with yucca and cactus, all that really came to mind was an overpriced turd on a pile of rocks.

John watched like a hawk while I knocked on the door, and didn’t drive off until after Geri invited me inside and closed the door. Geri asked me to take off my shoes and leave them by the door. His mom reclined on a black suede couch reading a magazine, cold sterile contrast against the immaculate white living room carpet. She seemed nice enough, even though she didn’t give either of us any more attention than was absolutely necessary before returning to her article. Framed artwork and a large ornate crucifix decorated the walls, all of them mounted with almost surgical precision.

He led me back toward a hallway and my eyes lingered on the rack of rifles hanging over an unused fireplace until they disappeared behind the wall. His room was at the end of the hallway next to the bathroom. He led me in and closed the door behind us.

I took in the large, yet unremarkable, room and furnishings. The only thing that actually showed any sign of Geri’s personality was the large flat-screen TV against the wall with the plethora of video game systems and computer towers tethered to it like some tentacled monster, and another cross hung on the wall over his bed.
If I thought my Dungeon was barren when we’d moved in, this was almost as sterile as the living room.