Annie gushes on about how much fun running is going to be. We're behind a garden shed on their property. Stripping off our clothes, we hang them on hooks designed for this purpose. My skin prickles with goose bumps in the cold spring air.
Annie asks, "All right, besides getting pissed at Brady, what else makes you shift?"
"Anxiety and--" “Good God, my world revolves around sex these days.” Brady's voice chuckles in my head.
I communicate back to him. “Aren't you supposed to be at work? Turn off our inner phone and go away.”
Annie figures out what I didn't say. "Right, think about the physical signs of those emotions and try to recreate them. The idea is to find what you can use to shift into a bear the way you use deep breathing to keep yourself from shifting.”
"Is that what you do?"
"Kind of. I've been doing it so long I just know how to do it. But I had to get mad to make it happen when I first changed." She smiles. "Brady was my focus back then. Using your litter mates is pretty common among teen werebear."
"How do I stay shifted?"
"Once you shift, you stay until you decide to shift back. You'll trigger it by the deep breathing and imagining your human skin sucking up the bear."
I decide to imagine people finding me naked right now. I pace thinking about strangers staring at my breasts, and for some reason Ray pops into my mind. The memory of the day he pissed me off enough to tattoo myself is making me agitated, and I feel my skin prickle and the familiar ache in my hands as I begin to shift.
Amazingly it’s pain free, and when I'm done, I look over and see Annie has shifted too. She's beautiful with her black fur and shimmering onyx eyes. I wish I could tell her. She nods her head and starts to run. I follow. The sensation of my four paws pounding in a rhythm is amazing, and I wonder how it is my body knows what to do.
Annie picks up the pace, and I urge my muscles on to keep up. We moving faster than I thought possible, and air is flowing through my fur. Muscles from my hips down to my feet surge with power, and I let out a roar. She roars back as we crash through the woods. “This is amazing.”
Annie stops short. Her voice is in my head. “Can you hear me?”
I reply. “Yes.”
“Holy shit! Only the alpha and your mate can speak in your head. You're not my mate, so you must have alpha abilities. Wait until Brady finds out.”
“Um, does that mean you'll hear what Brady and I talk about?”
If a bear could frown, she would. “No, only when you want me to. Brady can control it, or else hundreds of people would hear his thoughts.”
“I'll have to work on that.” I don’t think bears can blush, but I want to cringe wondering if I’m sharing my thoughts with people when Brady and I have sex.
Annie nods. “Ready for a swim? I know where the fish are.”
She doesn't wait for an answer and takes off. We run to a ledge that drops to a roaring stream. Annie jumps off and dives in. I don't think about it and do the same. Water surrounds me when I land, but it isn't cold. I hardly feel wet, and it must be because my fur is coated with oil. The water seems to bead up and roll off instead of penetrating through.
I’m amazed that swimming as a large animal feels so graceful, and I paddle through with powerful strokes. A current this strong would probably drown the human me, but as a bear, I'm moving effortlessly.
Annie takes me to a shallow section by a small waterfall. Standing on two legs, she swipes at the water and pulls out fish. When she throws me one, I open my mouth and catch it. With a quick chew I swallow it down. The flavor is fishy, but my bear self finds it as appealing as the bacon this morning, and I swish my paw through the water to find my own.
My reflexes are so fast I barely realize I've caught one on my second try. I would squeal, but a roar comes out instead. “You were right, this is so much fun.”
“You're good at fishing. It's going to be fun to have a playmate like you.” We both stop and look at each other. I throw her the fish I just caught, and she catches it in her mouth.
“I'm glad you’re my sister-in-law. I didn't have brothers or sisters, and I think I'm going to like this.”
“Me too, I always wanted a sister, and now I have one.”
After a few more fish we venture back into the stream and swim some more. It's almost noon, and the sun is high in the sky. Annie climbs onto a big rock and lies down. I lie next to her and let heat from the granite seep into my body.
Voices carry down to us, and I spy people on a ledge. A young girl says, "Momma, look at the pretty bears."
Her mother replies, "They are beautiful, but remember we don't get anywhere near them, okay?"
I think about being beautiful to people in a completely different way. One that has nothing to do with my body shape and everything to do with the attractiveness of the kind of animal I am.
I look over at Annie, my new sister and friend. “I'm sorry you can't have children. That must have been hard to find out.”
“It was, but then my mate died, and I'm not sure I would have wanted to have to raise them alone.”