“I didn’t want to do it, but I knew I’d have to someday,” he said mournfully.
“How can you be both a man and a wolf? Are you cursed?” Her eyes filled with tears again. No, it couldn’t be. Her Cyrus was a good person, a man of God. He went to church. He was wearing the cross she’d given him. How could this happen?
“We’re not cursed, Elizabeth! It’s happening all over. Men and women who can turn into wolves, into bears, into mountain lions. We’re the same people that we once were. We can’t help what happened to us.” He took a deep breath. “It makes us stronger, Elizabeth. We can protect our family from Indian attack, from wild animals, we can hunt down game to feed our families…”
He looked at her fearfully. “I’m still me. I promise. Will you still marry me, Elizabeth?”
She turned and looked back, meeting his eyes. It was her Cyrus. It was still her Cyrus. He was the boy she loved. He’d grow up to be a fine man and a loving father, she knew it.
She took a deep breath and let it out slowly, her head spinning with amazement.
“Yes, Cyrus, I will still marry you.” And she realized he’d been holding his breath too, until she gave her answer.
*
Blue Moon Junction, 2014
The police scanner crackled to life, and Coral Colby, who’d been sitting at a scarred wooden desk typing up obituaries, paused and looked up hopefully.
“Calling all units, there is a cow at the intersection of Main and 11th. Repeat, there is a cow at the intersection of Main and 11th,” a female voice with a Southern twang announced, with no sense of urgency whatsoever. “Also, could someone please stop by the Donut Hole and pick us up half a dozen crullers and two lattes? We’re dyin’ here, folks.”
Coral slumped back in her chair. It was all she could do not to shift into wolf form and howl with disappointment.
It was her third day interning at the tiny newspaper, and she was struggling not to sink into despair. The only way she’d ever catch the attention of a big city newspaper would be if she stumbled upon a huge front-page worthy news story. Unfortunately, she was in Blue Moon Junction, Florida, a town of several thousand humans and shifters, where the sidewalks rolled up at 5 p.m. and the escaped cow might very well make the front page of tomorrow’s paper.
Odds were not in her favor.
“Ha,” news photographer Frederick Eberhardt smirked at her. Like Coral, he was at the Tattler for a summer internship after graduating from college. He’d come from Los Angeles with a photojournalism degree, she from New York with a degree in mass media. With the journalism industry reeling from the bad economy, competition was fierce for the more plum jobs at the larger newspapers, so they were both working at the Tattler in hopes of beefing up their resumes.
“Ha, yourself,” she grumbled. “The day is still young.” She hadn’t completely given up hope of stumbling on a real story way out here in booney-ville. It could happen.
Frederick, a skinny, sarcastic coyote shifter with a big mop of brown hair, snorted with contempt. He held no such illusions.
Then he looked over at Coral with a leer.
“So, you’re bored,” he said. “I know a way to pass the time. I’m renting an apartment right around the corner.”
“No,” she said firmly, deliberately swiveling her chair so her back was to him. Blech. Frederick hit on everything female with a pulse.
“You have no idea what you’re missing. Hey, you know that meteor shower that’s coming up next week? You, me, a blanket under the stars, us under the blanket-”
William Brewster, owner of the newspaper, stuck his head out of his office door and yelled “Frederick, did you hear that? Get a move on!”
“Yeah, did you hear that?” Coral smirked back at him. “News is happening! Get a move on before they catch that cow.” Frederick shot her a martyred look, rolled his eyes, and grabbed his camera from the desk. He picked up a wadded ball of paper and threw it at her head as he loped past her, headed towards the street.
The paper stuck in Coral’s hair, and she plucked it out and tossed it into the garbage bin next to her desk. On top of everything else, the swampy Florida heat turned her naturally curly red hair into a giant frizz bomb. In New York, with copious applications of hair gloss, she was able to tame the red curls into flowing waves. Here, she sported a big scarlet ‘fro on her head. Oh, she was loving Blue Moon Junction, just loving it.