Brute, Part 4

I don't know what happens when other people suggest to their friends that they should kill their werewolf fiances with silver bullets, but Lea didn't react in a very happy way. I mean, I really wasn't serious. Of course not, that would be cruel. But Leandra didn't really get that part, so her reaction was that of a person being told to coldly create puree out of the love of her life. Oops.

Leandra was so shocked by the suggestion that she didn't even look at me. She looked past me, at a little aberration in the tile on the wall of the kitchen. I know this because I turned around, saw it, too, and stepped in front of it. Leandra blinked.

"Lea. Joking. We're not going to kill him," I said. She nodded dumbly. I picked up my glass and started to lift it to my lips, silently searching for a less bloody solution. I had no idea what to do. Usually in the stories this was the part when some expert werewolf hunter or crazy-cool vampire turned up to help the heroines out. Inadvertently, I glanced around the small room, and then smiled when I realized I was waiting for the door to slam open to reveal the black trench coat and rakish hat of someone not unlike Van Helsing.

Nothing happened. I'm pretty sure nothing happened for a while, because suddenly I blinked and Leandra wasn't standing in front of me anymore. And she wasn't outside with Jeremiah. Crap. Where...?

Something crashed down the small hallway, and I bounded (as literally as possible) around the corner. Leandra was extricating herself out of the tiny guest bedroom, which serves double duty as a storage area. She had changed into a white longsleeve shirt that probably was her fiance's, and she was carrying a couple of golf clubs. Oh, and she was wearing a monstrous silver chain -- the kind usually used in industrial zones -- around her shoulders like a scarf.

"What?" she said when she saw my face. "It's cold outside." I opened my mouth without realizing it and tried to say something that wasn't stupid. What the heck were they doing with a chain like that in the hall closet?

By the time I got around to verbally reacting to her appearance, all that came out was, "A little." Leandra stopped in front of me and stood up straight so she could adjust the chain.

"OK, here's what's going to happen. We're going to convince him he's a wolf. And then go from there. Yes?"

"Uh...yes?"

"No, you can't question the 'yes'! It's either a solid 'yes' or no 'yes' at all!"

"Ah," I said, not feeling entirely sure about the whole thing, especially since she felt it necessary to bring out the clubs. My golf lessons had involved tiny white balls, not wolves. Nevertheless, I held out my hand and she placed one of the clubs in it. I hefted it like I would a tennis racket, trying to figure out what exactly I was going to be using it for. The idea of hitting anything in the face with it was making me a tad queasy.

"I'll try first," Leandra said. She moved past me, holding her club casually in front of her, and exited through the back door. Should I stop her? I thought. Ha, was my answer. She wasn't going to be stopped. At least, not by me or anything else in the immediate vicinity. Her tennis shoes squeaked on the metal threshold and I winced at the sharp sound. It was a moment before I reminded myself that we didn't need the element of surprise. No matter what, Jeremiah was gonna be really surprised in the next few moments.

Holding my club just below the rubbery grip, I went to stand in the doorway. A cool night breeze blew my hair into my face and I choked again on the smell of bunny blood. Leandra only looked at me once more, just before she crouched down and reached out her hand toward Jeremiah's head. Her fingers clenched almost before they had a grip on the fur around his neck, at least, it looked that way from my point of view. I knew she had a good grip on him because Jeremiah flinched.

"Ow!" He said. "Hey!"

"Sorry, babe," Leandra said. "But you have to listen to me. You turned into a dog...wolf...thing. You didn't cook that rabbit; you killed a bunny with your teeth."

Jeremiah looked back at me. I screwed up my lips and nodded. He put his head back down and sighed, "But I don't feel like a wolf." He paused and looked down at himself, moving his paws experimentally. "I look fine to me."

"Jer," I said as I stepped down onto the cement step. "You really did, and you are. You just...can't tell." A cricket chirped happily. The blood was getting to me, I could feel more than see my vision going black, since it was already so dark. Leandra still had her hand on Jeremiah's neck. Suddenly, he jumped up, baring his teeth at us and growling. If I'd had any more water in me, I totally would have peed my pants.

"I don't believe you, you girls are crazy!" he yelled, breaking into a low growl and baring his teeth at us. I bent my knees, preparing for some sort of attack. "Why are you saying this?" he snarled. Leandra and I exchanged looks, speechless.

"Look at the steps, Jeremiah! There's blood all over them! How do you explain that?" Jeremiah took the tiniest of steps forward so he could see the concrete, which was indeed stained with bright blood like venomous nail polish. I blinked, trying and failing to figure out where that comparison came from. I don't even own red polish. Weird... Blinking again, I yanked myself back to the present, where Leandra and Jeremiah were yelling at one another. Every thing Leandra used to prove Jeremiah was a werewolf of sorts, Jeremiah scoffed at.

"I'm not!" He screamed with a note of finality and, with a grace usually attributed to panthers and other great cats, Jeremiah turned on his fuzzy doggy legs and leaped over the fence. He landed soundlessly on the other side and even though I knew we couldn't get to the fence fast enough to stop him, I sprinted after him and ended up slamming into the fence. Leandra tried jumping the fence but she was too short to get anywhere, and we looked at one another dumbly.

"Now what?" I asked. Leandra bit her nail and stared at the ground, looking like she didn't want to say what she was thinking because she knew I would make her do it. The downcast angle of her eyes told me that asking again wasn't going to make her talk sooner, so I turned back and partially climbed one of the trees in the yard. Obviously I was hoping to see the retreating form of the doggy fiance, but no luck. It was so dark that even lightly colored objects were a pain to keep track of. I got back down and stood with my arms crossed. Lea suddenly nodded.

"Ok. I know what we're going to do," she said. I waited. She hesitated. I raised my eyebrows and tried to look in her face; she looked away. And then she bit her lip just before saying, "Iknowyou'regoingtohatemebutwehavetogotalktoAvel."

I took half a step backwards and dropped the head of my golf club to the ground. It thumped dully and seemed to perfectly explain how I felt about the situation. Avel? She would say that we had to go see him. Idiot. When I think of Avel, the little voice in my head says, "Freeekimpher grumbleassolpher stupid Avel." There are several variations; that just happens to be my favorite.

Avel is...Avel. He was the last, well, involvement I had. Not quite boyfriend, not quite friend, that sort of thing. It had lasted far too long, and sometimes when I heard his name my stomach would vault into butterfly somersaults before I remembered that I hated his guts. I grimaced and looked at Leandra, begging her with my eyes to take it back even while knowing that she was right. Avel was the only one who would be able to talk to Jeremiah without causing terrible things to happen.

They were, after all, twin brothers.

Brute, Part 3

Hold it. Whoa, yeah, OK, so in case you didn't notice, this is PART 3. That means you may have missed the other two installments of "Brute". I'll give you a few minutes to catch up. You're welcome. -m
Brute, Part 1
Brute, Part 2

Leandra and Jeremiah were in the backyard talking, and I watched them from inside the house with an eyebrow raised . I had left the glass door open so as to avoid any comedic accidents in the event that Jeremiah went berserk again.

The sun was gone now, leaving only a few pinkish remnants of light over the mountains. If I stood on the very edge of the threshold I could see the orange moon rising higher in the sky. Now that Jeremiah was sitting there being all canine-like, I made a face at the moon, feeling ridiculous for thinking it was somehow responsible for all this.

Bouncing on my toes, I watched Leandra pat her new dog on the head, smile, and say something in his ear. I didn't really feel like venturing out there, so I stood on the brink of inside and outside, waiting. The first thing I had done when I'd gone inside was grab my phone out of my bag on the couch. I was flipping it over and over in my hand; it was strangely reassuring to hear the plastic smack against my palm. The time for helping my sister move out was way past; I had already texted her and explained things. Sort of. I hadn't been very specific.

Leandra suddenly stood and came toward me. I moved aside and she brushed past me as she wiped her cheek with her hand. The look I gave her must have been sufficiently quizzical, because she made a face as she got some water from the kitchen.

"He licked me," she said as she wiped her hand on her jeans. I couldn't help it -- I started laughing. She glared at me. "It's not funny."

"No, of course not. I'm sorry," I said. I tossed my head to get my hair out of my eyes and straightened up a little, trying to look the very image of seriousness. But then the thought of Jeremiah slapping a wet doggy kiss on my friend's face made the smile come back.

"Stop it!" Leandra said, whacking me on the arm. She sipped at the cool water and hesitated a moment more before saying, "What are we going to do?"

I shrugged. "I dunno. What do you wanna do?"

"I...I don't know." She looked out to the yard and grimaced when she saw Jeremiah scratching his neck with his back foot.

"Well, what do you want me to do? Should I stay? We could call someone..." I looked at her from the corner of my eye, gauging her reaction. Leandra simply shrugged at everything I said and stayed silent. I leaned back against the door. If she wasn't going to want to call the police or animal control or something, there really wasn't much I could do. I looked at Jeremiah, who was sitting silently outside. "What's he doing?"

"He said the stars were really pretty and told me to go grab some blankets so we could lay out and look at them," Leandra said. She sounded pretty miserable. I hid a smile by focusing on my confusion.

"Oh," was all I said that time. This was followed by an eloquent, "Ummm." Leandra looked me in the eyes and then patted me on the arm.

"You should go home," she said. I raised my eyebrows, thinking she was just trying to be nice.

"You're sure?" She nodded and looked out at Jeremiah, who was still waiting.

"He won't hurt me or anything. We'll just stargaze a while and then I'll go home, too," she said. I pursed my lips, thought for a sec, and then decided to do as she suggested.

"Call if you need me, lady," I said as I walked out the front door. I didn't hear her answer.

---

Teia was amused my my late arrival, as she proved when she bounded into me when I got home. I barely had time to keep my keys from stabbing her in the stomach.

"You deserted me!" she said dramatically, throwing her head to one side and pretending to be distressed.

"Hardly," I said, struggling to breathe in Teia's death grasp. "Leandra had some problems. Problems worse than you being physically unable to throw away junk." Teia dropped her arms and grinned mischievously.

"Junk you gave me," she said as I moved past her into the kitchen. Natalie , the other little sister, was standing in front of a mixing bowl holding a whisk in one hand and a spatula in the other.

"Because you asked for it!" I yelled. Teia laughed and I heard her thunder up the stairs to her room. It was probably mostly empty by now, and I did feel a slight twinge of guilt as I plopped into a chair by the counter, watching Natalie navigate a recipe. Just as she was leaning past me to grab an egg sitting in the spoon holder by the sink, she made a face.

"You smell weird," she said.

"Gee, thanks."

"And you're covered with black hairs. Stop leaning on the table!" she added suddenly when I put my elbows up. "Out! Out of my kitchen! You're going to get fur in everything!" I stuck my tongue out at her and went to flop on the couch in the living room, but I only made it to the floor.

Laying there on my back, I stared blankly at the vaulted ceiling and decided that stretching would feel really good. I straightened out and lifted both of my feet, keeping my legs straight as long as possible. When my feet were nearly touching the floor behind my head, I held them there and marveled at how wonderful it felt. Teia came pounding down the stairs.

"That looks comfy," she said sarcastically and giggled.

"Shut up and try it yourself before you judge me," I said. "I am comfortable." She shook her head and went into the kitchen for a moment. I heard the fridge door open and close, and then she was back, but moving toward the front door.

"Meeting Isaac," she said. I dropped my legs and rolled over, mouth open to question her, but the door slammed shut and she was gone. I rolled again so I could see Nat and I propped myself up on my elbows.

"Do we know Isaac?" I asked, though I knew the answer. Natalie shrugged and shook her head. "Didn't think so."

I had just made it back down to my room when I heard my phone start to ring. Every happy thought inside of me that had been thinking about reading and then going to bed jumped off a cliff when I glanced at the caller ID. Leandra. I knew I shouldn't be rolling my eyes at a time like this, but hey, I was tired, and, I remembered at that moment, I hadn't eaten dinner.

"Hey," I said as I flipped the phone open. "What's up?"

"Oh, god, Meli, you have to come back," Leandra said. I immediately ran back up the stairs. That was real terror in her voice.

"What? What's wrong? What happened?" I scrambled to find my keys. Where had I put them? The table? No, not on the table. Crap. Maybe in my...no. Shoot. OK, keys, call to me, I thought.

"I...I don't know! One minute we were just lying there, talking, and the next....oh, Meli." I found the keys were they always are -- on the hook in the front closet.

"What?!?" I yelled. Leandra was obviously not thinking very quickly. She was speaking quickly, but only in groups of three or four words at a time. And then she just stopped like that, and everyone knows that when someone stops before telling you something that made them call you with horror haunting their words, well, you just know it's not gonna be good.

"He killed a bunny!" I stopped suddenly on my way out the door, my fingers on the handle. I thought for a few seconds, sure that Leandra had said something else. My phone had to have messed that one up. Either way, I was much calmer and prone to patience, and since I couldn't come up with anything else that she might have said (Killed the money? What? No.), I asked her to repeat what she'd said.

"We were on the grass, and I had my hand on his back, and then...and then....he jumped up and he killed a little baby bunny!" I almost dropped the phone I was laughing so hard. Needless to say, it's a good thing she couldn't see me at that moment, because, oh man, did I lose it. Completely.

"Did he save some for you?" I asked. I heard her gasp.

"Meli! That's disgusting!"

"Hey, now, I'm just sayin'....if the man wants to put food on the table...." I said.

"Could you come over? Please? It's getting worse."

"What do you mean?" I asked, swallowing my laughter as I heard her new, quieter tone. I used her pause to yell at Natalie that I was leaving again and shut the door.

"Can you just come?" I nodded even though she couldn't see or sense it and started my car.

"Ten minutes," I said. Leandra thanked me and I flipped the phone shut and dropped it in my cup holder between the front seats. I don't usually speed too terribly, but I shortened the ten minute drive to Jeremiah's place to about six minutes, which is impressive, I think. Just as I pulled up, I mused that maybe by "come over" Leandra had meant to her place, but I shook my head at that one, because of course she wouldn't have left him yet. I got out of my car and found myself walking very, very slowly up to the door.

Leandra met me there; her hair was running loose and looked a little static-y, and the free strands made her wide open eyes look profoundly stricken. Without a word she led me through the small home and to the back yard where, illuminated gently by the moonlight, I could see tufts of white fur scattered all over the grass. Jeremiah was lounging in doggy form against the step, and he was gnawing on something.

The smell of blood suddenly hit me, and I dry retched a little. When my second grade class had gone on a field trip to the Natural History Museum downtown to watch a lamb's heart dissection, I had swooned -- yes, swooned -- and barely made it out the door before fainting full out on the disgustingly decorated, unpadded carpet of the Hall of Life. Blood and I aren't friends.

Jeremiah heard me (probably smelled me, too) and looked up at me, grinning with teeth covered in baby bunny blood. "Hey, Meli," he said. Weird to hear your name coming from the murderous fangs of your friend's fiance.

"Hi, Jer. Uh... whatcha got there?"

"Dinner. Cooked up some rabbit." I glanced at Leandra with my eyes squinted, hoping for an explanation. She looked at me with a look along the lines of "I told you so" and then motioned for me to pay attention. As if I wanted to miss any of this.

Leandra knelt down near his head, so that he still had to look back at us a little, and said, "Jer? Honey? Is your fur keeping you warm enough?" Jeremiah looked at her with so much confusion brimming in his eyes that my jaw dropped as I began to comprehend.

"Fur? Oh, you mean my jacket? Sure, it's fine. Still pretty warm out." Leandra stood and looked me in the eyes. The light from the kitchen door swathed her face in a slightly yellow glow that almost made her brown eyes look gold. I doubt she could see me very well. I stared at Jeremiah for a second, trying to piece things together, and then I shot my hand out and yanked Leandra inside with me. I pulled her into the kitchen and made a lot of noise by pulling a cup out of the cupboard and turning on the sink for water.

"He doesn't know he's a monstrous, furry brute of a fanged killer thing!" I hissed, trying to get all of my feelings into one sentence. I think I succeeded. I didn't even hesitate before adding, "He killed a baby bunny!" Oh, yes, I said it. And without laughing, too.

"I know!" Leandra said. "What did you think I meant?" I took a few big gulps of water, trying to calm myself by filling my belly. I stared out the window.

"How can you not know that your body popped itself out of human mode and into wolf mode? How? It's not possible, I tell you! It's not!" Leandra put her hand on my arm, and I stuck my nose in my glass again, briefly wishing that Jeremiah believed in liquid stronger than caffeinated coffee.

"SShhhh! He'll hear you!" Leandra said, throwing a glance toward the back door.

"'Oh, you mean my jacket?'" I mumbled, imitating Jeremiah's voice. "Oh, it's very warm. Hi, guys, I'm a black-eyed killer from your nightmares, if you don't mind please would you set the bunnies loose?" I flexed my fingers in front of Leandra's face and made wild hand motions to emphasize key points of my tiny monologue, but she ignored me. At least, she pretended to.

"Shut up! We have to figure out what to do," Leandra said. She pinched my arm and I snapped out of my little reaction just in time to stave of the hyperventilating. I put the glass down and lowered my arms at the same time, as though pressing my irrationality into the nether regions of the house.

"Well," I said, weighing my words. "Do you have any silver bullets?"

Brute, Part 2

(Better read "Brute, Part 1", otherwise you're going to be so totally confused.)

Leandra and I had almost not looked at one another during the two minutes we had been on the ground next to Jeremiah. I had been able to hear her alternately sobbing and screaming, but I hadn’t looked at her face. So I took this moment of calm to glance into her eyes. I’m pretty sure that I looked like a bug with eyes wider than my oversized sunglasses, but I couldn’t have looked more terrified than Leandra looked at that moment. The sick person came out in me again as I bet she was trying to figure out how to beg her way out of paying for the rest of her wedding dress.

Leandra’s eyes were open so far that for a second, I thought that my brain was playing tricks on me. I could see so much of the white of her eyes that I immediately thought of a spooked horse. Her makeup was almost nonexistent now, not that she had been wearing a lot to begin with, but now, instead of being around her eyes, it was smeared on her cheekbones and the front of her shirt.

“Is he…?” Leandra said, leaving the sentence half-alive in a forgotten mind-attic. I looked back at Jeremiah, shaking my head. His chest was still moving; it was moving so obviously that in a normal situation I would have teased my friend for not noticing, but I didn’t even think of doing so.

“I wonder if we should move him?” I said as I stretched out my hand to touch his arm. The neighborhood was quiet except for some cars driving down the street and the mumbled conversations of people a few houses down. How no one had heard the screaming and joint cracking, I have no idea. I guess people just don’t like to get involved. Jer’s arm moved when I poked it, but nothing else happened. Leandra, seeing that I could touch him sans probleme, reached out her own hand and placed it on his chest. She looked up at me and grinned, her brown eyes alight with hope.

“I can feel his heart!” she said. I just nodded, still slowly trying to decide what to do. No one had come to help. It was the two of us and a broken, unconscious body.

“Jeremiah?” I asked. I leaned above his face and spoke a little louder than I usually do, which is probably too loud anyhow. Leandra copied me, adding a “Honey?” to her query. “Jer?” I repeated. And then, suddenly, he groaned, and I could have sworn that I saw his lips move. I leaned closer, so that my face was just above his, and tapped his face with my palm. Leandra finally seemed to wake up; she raised herself up a little and moved to the other side of Jeremiah’s body by throwing one leg and then the other over his very, very quiet form.

I began to doubt whether I had seen him move or not. Leandra took my place above his face, yelling at him, moving his head, and covering his face with kisses. Yeah, definitely not an approach I would have undertaken. Everything that had been moving so quickly was suddenly still….too still. I looked up into the sky, noticing for the first time that it was evening, and a couple of stars were out, laughing and twinkling. Allowing myself a very short sigh, I looked over my shoulder. I don’t know what I was hoping to see. Maybe a firefighter or policeman or, at the very least, a walking, talking staple gun to prove that I truly had gone insane.

But the only thing I saw was the moon, slightly orange and hidden behind some clouds. Nothing interesting. I looked back at Jeremiah and Leandra. The soft light made everything look like it was spun out of springtime, and I was waiting for the baby bunnies to hop out of the corner of the yard, from under that aspen tree with its pristine, creamy bark.

Sighing, I heaved myself back into position. “Lea…maybe we should call someone?” I asked. Finally my brain was working quickly enough to come up with that solution. But to my surprise, she shook her head.

"No,” she said. “He’ll be alright. He’ll be up in a second.”“Leandra—“

“It’s OK, I’ve got him,” she said, and for the first time I wished I had kicked her out of the yard. This was probably worse than traumatizing. What could be worse than watching your fiancé die? I couldn’t come up with anything.

“Here, let me,” I said as I slid my arm under Jeremiah's shoulders. Leandra was trying to pull him up by tugging on either side of his shirt. His arms were splayed, and because every joint was out of place he had become a horror film version of Gumby, bendable in every way. Jeremiah’s head lolled sickly backwards, making me think of a million Catholic crucifixes full of broken figurines. With my arm just below his head, at least it didn’t look like it was going to fall off.

As I was pulling him up, grimacing because I could feel him sagging down and I knew it was because nothing in his body was truly connected, Leandra squeaked. My eyes darted up, searching her face.

“What?”

“He moved! I felt it! He’s OK!” I didn’t really react to what she said; I just sort of looked back into Jeremiah’s face, which was oh-so-terribly-close, and wondered, yet again, what the heck was happening.

That’s when his entire body snapped together, throwing itself out of our arms like a rubber band. We both screamed. The force of the movement of Jeremiah’s body tossed us to the ground like dishrags; I felt my ankle crack, and my head hit the grass with a dull thump that was, without question, going to hurt for a long time. Leandra was on the ground nursing her right arm. She had been forced back so that it almost looked like she was purposefully reclining on the soft grass. I stared at her for a millionth of a second, then turned to Jeremiah’s body a few feet away.

It shouldn’t have surprised me that something weird had happened. I mean, seriously, he was writhing on the grass and his joints burst from his bones. Was I really expecting him to flutter his eyelashes and wake up, smiling, to us slapping his face?

Either way, I so was not prepared to find myself on my butt in my friend’s future back yard, staring at her fiancé, who was baring his teeth at me and growling. In the one split second that it took for his joints to heal and pull together, he had grown paws, a fine layer of brownish-black fur, and the build of the crazy child of a Rottweiler and a wolf.

That said, you can imagine my further surprise when Jeremiah, as impaired as he was by rippling black lips and razor canines, lifted an eyebrow and asked, “What in the world is wrong with you people?”