CHAPTER ONE: NIGHT RUN
Boston was not from Massachusetts. In fact, he wasn’t sure where the nickname originated. Maybe because he had one of those faces, a sort of slack jawed, relaxed look that allowed him to acquire a moniker that had no relation to who, or where, he was? Boston was an accountant. Or at least that’s what he told people. Not because he was into some next level dark net covert government engagements or some organization where they use euphemisms like “wet work” and where accidents happened on a global scale just so gas prices could remain “average.” No, Boston just did not care to talk about what he did, and he had plenty of scars and not enough friends to seem legit. It wasn’t that he accepted the nickname or dissuaded his coworkers or friends or the occasional girlfriend -- not that he kept romantic entanglements entangled too long -- from using the nickname. Fuck, his cousin had been calling him Boston since they were both in grade school. Now they were gray-headed dudes who were too old, but young enough, to care.
Boston stepped out of his revelry. He was headed to Lucy’s house, and he wanted to get the words right. He wanted to be clear, but something was in the air, the faint reek of skunk that mixed in with the fog. The wet slap of his feet on the pavement; the hiss of air brakes or rumble of tires from the nearby overpass. He shook his head; he’d be with Lucy soon, and this idea, he thought, would push him through the wet night.
CHAPTER TWO: DRAGON TALE
Lucy looked out her window. A streetlight flickered, cutting through the fog. She held herself despite the heat being on. She didn’t know what she was looking for; what she was expecting to emerge from the fog. When she was younger, and still impressionable, her sister, Dana, would tell her stories about werewolves and dragons and unicorns and the great knights who saved princesses, but then Dana went to college and something changed. Of course, Lucy changed, too. She didn’t want to hear about dragons or ghosts or castles anymore. Then Dana killed herself -- a summer night that Lucy can’t ever recall what she had been doing. She might have been watching TV or Netflix and her phone buzzed, saw the message pop up, shrugged her shoulders, it’s mom again, and went back to watching her show. She might have been binge watching “Merlin” at the time if she really wants to think about it, but she doesn’t.
Lucy turned away from the window and went to check on her mother, Wilma. After Dana’s suicide, Wilma was not the same. She became a mother though Lucy was a fully capable adult and college graduate. Dana never spoke about her college experiences, but perhaps the clearest memories Lucy had of Dana were these: Dana never spoke of her college experiences -- never talked about papers or syllabi or the SUB or frisbee golf. It was only now, after having attended college, did Lucy find her sister’s reticence strange.
Wilma was snoring louder than the CPAP could keep up, so Lucy closed her door leaving a slight gap. She didn’t feel comfortable closing the door on her mother and went back to the window. There was a howl, which made her jump, but still nothing but that streetlight in the fog.
CHAPTER THREE: BOSTON MASSACRE (YOU KNEW THAT WAS COMING)
Boston lit a cigarette and took a drag. He let the smoke fill his lungs and warm his drenched body. The air bit into his exposed skin and his body shook as he expelled the smoke into the night, which made him cough worse. He had passed the overpass and the webs of nostalgia and guilt. He was nearly there, but then he heard a howl.
CHAPTER FOUR: ONCE BITTEN
“It’s not the scratches that get you,” the Doctor said, “but the bite.” The screen “blinked” and then the same doctor had a puppet on his hand. The puppet, a wolf, had large, red eyes and comically overstated felt triangles for fangs. In a gruff voice the doctor pleaded that the audience be careful or “that’s all folks.” The camera then zoomed into the gaping maw of the wolf puppet as though the viewer was being swallowed by the wolf. This was perhaps archive footage of life before. Dana wasn’t sure. She’d watched this video and the other three so many times they began to blend together. Sometimes, when she could sleep, she dreamed of that wolf puppet, its ungainly felt teeth about to pierce through her flesh. She needed to get laid. She also wondered about Lucy and her mother, but these were not her concerns at the moment.
CHAPTER FIVE: THAT’S AMORE
Running at night was never a good idea, but most people knew this. Boston especially knew this, but he had to see Lucy. He could not wait for the day. He would have to get through the workday with that strange nervousness that gives you strength, but is also somehow enervating. The fog had lifted, but it was still cold. He had heard a howl, but he could not tell from which direction. He wanted to sleep, but his desire to see Lucy kept him moving.
CHAPTER SIX: QUESTIONS
Lucy pulled the Afghan blanket around her. Everyone knew that one howl was not bad. That it -- the howl -- could just be a wolf and not the Wolf. Of course, no one was sure what to believe. Was the Wolf a government conspiracy? Was the Wolf what they said he was, that is, a man cursed with lycanthropy who roamed the streets at night killing? There had been mutilations and footprints. The government had put out videos and commercials. A slogan DOWN WITH THE WOLF had been adopted and people wore these buttons for a little while, but the slogans and campaigns and ads and propaganda, if you want to call it that, never stopped any of the killings; never stopped the howls at night or what Lucy imagined followed those howls as some poor bastard, who was dumb enough to be out at night, was ripped to pieces by the Wolf. Where is he, she thought and laid her head on the pillow. It was not long for sleep to take her.
CHAPTER SEVEN: DREAM A LITTLE DREAM
Dana woke up covered in sweat. It took her a moment to reorient herself. She had been dreaming of Penelope Cruz. This was not a sexual dream. In the dream, Penelope had given Dana a hard drive which contained all the people she loved. They’re saved, Penelope had said. This was one big dad joke, or it could be a message. Maybe something Dana had missed in her research. She did know there was no possible cure; there was no way to help the infected -- other than killing them. Perhaps this was what the dream meant?
She had thought, at one time, especially in the beginning, that the government of these United States had just taken people and placed them all in some computer simulation a la The Matrix. She had followed William Gibson on Twitter for a while, but then gave up social media as her investigation deepened. She had not meant to hurt her mother or Lucy or anybody, but it was for their protection or so she thought. In the end it doesn’t matter, she thought and hoped. “It will all be over soon,” she said, and then opened the door.
CHAPTER EIGHT: RUMOR MILL
Some reports said it was the President’s dog that had been exposed to alien spores during a tour of Area 51. Many confirmed this by hacking into the flight logs for Air Force One, and when those people “disappeared,” it gave further credence to this idea.
“I was never convinced,” Dana said and took her coffee from the confused barista.
Javen did not say anything. He knew this lady, who always ordered a coffee, black, gave generous tips. She would sit in the corner, drink her coffee, and stare out the window. He did wonder what she was looking, or waiting, for.
Of course, most of the news networks did not run this story. It was too fringe -- no credible sources. There were other sources -- possible government plants -- who came out against something so preposterous as alien spores, sentient shrubs, or presidential fidos being infected. But where’d it come from? This was the question everyone and no one was asking. “Certainly, it wasn’t a bio-weapon,” the networks stated, and they brought in all sorts of military leaders: Joint Chiefs of Staff, General this or that, Admiral so-and-so, retired military who were paid consultants, government officials who ran certain departments. They even had the Director of Idaho’s Fish and Game Department on air. It worked, though.
This ain’t no wolf. Dana had seen that on an abandoned warehouse. It was a bit faded, but whomever had tagged that building hadn’t bought into the hysteria. She liked to think she hadn’t either, but that’s what the disease does to you. When you are human you are human, but when you are wolf you do not lose your humanity. It is more like a dream state. There is an electricity Dana feels in her fur -- not only as she is changing, though, like sex, the first change is painful, but then you crave it; you look forward to the next moon -- but also in the whole process. When she is the Wolf she has never been more alive. A blessing and a curse as they say. She would love to tell Lucy and her mother, but she knows it is too dangerous. She knows she could never expose them. Her precious Lucy. She laughs into her coffee and remembers when she used to tell Lucy that she could just eat her up. This is what she fears. Not being exposed as the Wolf, she’s covered her tracks, tried to stay out of major cities, choked down animals rather than people, but hurting her mother or sister would be the last straw for her.
CHAPTER NINE: WE OWN THE NIGHT
Boston spat blood. He did not want to tense up in the moment, but let his body relax until the beating was over.
“We don’t take kindly to people running around at night.”
“You know who I am.”
“No, we don’t, but you know the rules. You know the price that was to be paid; show him, Sawmill.”
Sawmill walked up to Boston out of the shadows. He was tall like a wall of darkness that could smile. It was the smile of a person who had found their niche; a satisfied smile from a solid day’s work. Before the Wolf, Boston had worked with Sawmill at Leggett and Platt. He had never seen Sawmill this happy, then the blows came.
***
Boston crawled to the edge of the road. Sawmill had given him his best, which made Boston proud, but also nostalgic for those days on the line at L & P. Watching Sawmill work was like a work of art. It was a thing of beauty. Boston coughed and spat blood into the street. He’d like to tell himself this was simply a short detour -- a yield sign, if you will -- before he got to see Lucy, but it seemed as if Fate was conspiring against him. Boston had made this trip multiple times before, and all with no problems. He stood up, coughed, and started limp-running. “Lucy, I’m coming,” he exhaled into the still night.
CHAPTER TEN: BONES
Somewhere he’s out there, Lucy thought. She had that feeling; it was in her joints or bones. Some old saying her grandmother and mother used to say or still did, but she had stopped listening. Maybe Dana had said something like it? Good ol’ Dana, but what good are those feelings now, sis? How can you help me now that you are gone? Lucy wanted to run out into the night and scream at those howling wolves wherever they may be -- just grab them and shriek down their throats until they were obliterated from the planet. She looked down at the tiny fists she had made. Her hands were still shaking. What did she know of violence? She wiped her hands on her robe hoping it would calm her nerves. He’s out there and he’s headed this way and maybe he’ll make it this time. Perhaps he’ll make it if she believes?
Timothy O. Davis has a Masters of Fine Arts in fiction from Boise State University. Although born in Alabama, he grew up in North Carolina. In 2001, after serving honorably in the Army, he moved to Idaho with his family. His writing has appeared in Shotgun Honey, Flash: The International Short-Story Magazine, Flash Frontier, and The Slag Review. Timothy currently is a Clinical Instructor with the College of Technology at Idaho State University; he lives in Idaho Falls, Idaho.
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