“I know I’ve made you wait,” the alpha started, feeling his way around the human words a bit awkwardly. “I hope you know it’s not because I don’t find you entrancing.” He pulled in a long draft of air through his nose and I trembled, knowing he was smelling both me and my wolf. “I didn’t want to rush you,” he rumbled softly. “My wolf and I are patient and we want our first time to feel as good for you as it will for us. We will soar,” he promised. Then, counterintuitively, the man took a solid step backwards, leaving only cold air between us. My body swayed to follow Wolfie’s, but the alpha just kept his gaze fixed on mine and his hands in his pockets. “Your wolf is ready, and so are we, but we can wait if you need time,” he finished.
The words felt like a challenge, and I ached to give in to Wolfie, to drag him down the hall, lock the door, and see what a joining of four souls would feel like. Yes, now, my wolf agreed. But that was the worst idea I’d heard all night, assuming I planned to betray the alpha tomorrow.
“I’m not ready,” I coughed out, the words hanging up in my throat so I could barely force them through my lips. I turned away, and my wolf-enhanced senses told me that Wolfie had walked forward, that he had his hand an inch from my shoulder. If he touched me, I knew I’d give in, forget Keith tomorrow and save my own happiness instead.
We stood, suspended, forever. Then Wolfie breathed out through his nose and retreated to the door.
“I’ll see you tomorrow,” he promised. By the time I turned around, there was only a pile of clothes in the doorway, and Wolfie was gone.
***
I knew that running with the pack was a bad idea, but I was itching to change forms. The days I’d spent in Wolfie’s presence had reminded me that being a wolf didn’t have to mean any danger to those around me. In fact, being a canine could offer a freedom and simplicity that was difficult to achieve in my current two-footed form, with the potential to silence the racing thoughts that flowed frantically through my mind. I felt constipated by humanity.
I wouldn’t run up the mountain, I told myself, just around the yard. Simply rolling on my back in the grass would feel good in fur form, the itch that seemed to perpetually coat my human skin disappearing for a few minutes at least. My wolf had been so ready to take over when Wolfie was present, I knew I’d be able to make the shift, and afterwards I could go into the challenge of tomorrow confident in myself, no longer a shiftless wolf.
So after the alpha left, I padded outside onto the concrete patio beyond the back door and watched the full moon bathe the lawn in its glow. Looking up at the house, I noticed that Dale’s light was off—my brother-in-law had gone to bed, if not to sleep, on the night before his son’s fate would be decided. I was safely alone, the nearest neighbor half a mile distant down a long winding driveway and across the highway.
I climbed to the top of the picnic table, the rough wood feeling good beneath my hands and feet, then I slipped off my pajamas and stood naked under the moon. Despite stories to the contrary, the full moon has nothing to do with a werewolf’s shift, but the light did seem to caress my bare skin. I could imagine how much better it would feel to leap four-footed off the picnic table, the height giving my jump added momentum. We will soar, Wolfie had said, and I could imagine a more simple, but equally fulfilling, soaring as my wolf took flight from this aerie.
Over the last week, Wolfie and I had been playing as much as learning during my “lessons,” but the alpha had still managed to transform the way I perceived the werewolf’s shift. Unlike the shifts I was familiar with from my youth, neither the man nor the wolf dominated when Wolfie changed form. Instead, both aspects of his personality were present together, the alpha merging the two to take on the shape that best suited the situation. In fact, much of the time I wasn’t entirely sure Wolfie could have told you which form he was wearing that day, just like I might have failed the test if asked to report on my sock color without looking down. To the bloodling, his physical form had as little significance as my clothing choice.
Although I understood the notion intellectually, I knew I needed to feel it in my bones if I hoped to replicate Wolfie’s simple shifts. So I crouched on my hands and knees on the picnic table, moving my body through simple yoga poses to fully anchor myself in place. Cat then cow, my back arched up and then my belly sank down. I breathed in deeply, smelling the night air, and then I opened my eyes wide to simulate the wolf’s keener vision.
The time had come to move on to the mental side of my shift, and I closed my eyes to turn my focus inwards. The stairs that led down to my wolf’s cell had changed over the past week as my wolf and I together re-envisioned our internal landscape. Now, I was walking downhill through an ancient forest, deep moss indenting beneath my bare feet and regal fir trees soaring up on either side. Traveling toward my wolf’s lair had turned into a refreshing stroll instead of a terrifying journey through the dark.