Liar. Part 28

I remember having friends in preschool and then in grade school. I remember jump-rope contests. I remember hide 'n' seek. Learning how to juggle. Spelling bees and red rover and dodgeball. I remember not hiding how fast I could run. I remember having tiny secrets that didn't matter-like knowing that Janey liked Cal, that Keisha still had a blankie, and how babies are made.

Before the family illness started showing itself, before Dad and the Greats told me what it was, before I became a wolf.

I remember not being a freak.

Mom and me and Jordan-no, not Jordan, I made him up-being a family without scary family secrets. Without the wolf being at the center of everything we thought and did.

I liked those days. I wish they could come back. I wish-often I wish-that I was not what I am, not who I am. That my father's family were just a bunch of weirdo rednecks. Anything but what they really are.

I liked having a future.

I want it back.

BEFORE.

The last time I saw Zach? Like I said, it wasn't up the cypress tree.

It was the Tuesday before he died. I'd felt p.i.s.sed all day. p.i.s.sed with him, with school, with my parents, with the world.

Turns out that's another symptom. One the Greats never mentioned: the feeling that nerves are grinding on nerves, that everything is at right angles and can never work again. I spent the whole day wanting to scream. Definitely a symptom that the change was on its way, but also the way I feel on most days of my existence. It didn't warn me.

"Wanna hang with me late Sat.u.r.day night?" Zach asked.

I wanted to snarl a reply at him. Instead I said, "Dunno."

He was already telling me the details, where and when. I was full of venom and bile thinking, He's not listening. I said, "Dunno," not "Yes." He thinks I am so easy that I will do whatever he wants. Before I could open my mouth to tell him, he'd moved away, making sure no one'd seen us talking.

That's the last time I saw Zach alive.

Not very romantic, was it? I didn't linger for a last look or s.n.a.t.c.h a final kiss.

I stomped my way into the library. I had a study period. I opened up my bio textbook-straight onto a picture of a wolf-and slammed it shut.

"Micah!" Jennifer the librarian said.

"Sorry," I muttered, shoving my book back into my backpack and hauling out of there. Out of school, too. Couldn't stand it another second. My skin didn't fit. My head hurt. My eyes. Everyone was driving me crazy.

I was deep into my run in Central Park when my spine began to elongate. I staggered, bent double, saw my hairy wrists sticking out of my sleeves, and realized I'd forgotten my pill. It was too late to make it home. I was way up north in the park, practically in Harlem. I sprinted farther north, ran every step of the way to Inwood. By the time I burst into the park I was on all fours and had a tail.

f.u.c.k.

I came out of it-naked and b.l.o.o.d.y-with no clue where my backpack was, I washed myself as best I could with river water, then went on the prowl for clothes. I was lucky it was the early hours and dark and the streets were empty. I was lucky, too, I was in Inwood, one of the few parts of the island that still has a few houses and backyards and clotheslines.

I stole clothes from one, dressed, and then went to Zach's apartment building and up his fire escape, through his kitchen window-left open specially for me-and into his room.

Only Zach wasn't there.

I lay on his bed, waiting. I fell asleep. Woke up. 3:00 a.m. and he still wasn't there. Slept again.

4:00 a.m. s.h.i.+t. Weren't his parents coming home that morning? I called his cell from his landline. No answer. Thought about leaving a message. Thought about Sarah finding it.

Then I was out on the streets again. Running all the way to Central Park barefoot.

Yes, when it was closed. I'd done it before. 1:00 a.m. to 6:00 a.m. Those are the best hours to run. I'd even done it with Zach. You have to stick to the less trafficked paths, away from the night patrols. I thought he might be running, and even if he wasn't I needed to stretch out, get rid of all the pent-up waiting energy. Also, I wasn't ready to go home and face my parents. I'd never gone missing before. They'd know what happened. They'd be . . . well, I didn't want to think about how they'd be.

Which is where I found him. It.

Now I know it was him, but I didn't think so then. I didn't even realize it was a body.

Not a human one.

Certainly not Zach's.

I smelled it first. Blood smells salty, thick and metallic, but I didn't only smell blood-it was like a toilet had exploded. Awful, filling my nostrils, making my stomach churn.

I slowed my pace, then I slipped-didn't fall, just skidded a little-stopped running.

There was a lot of blood. It was dark, but light enough to see that and the mangled bits of . . . flesh? Nothing recognizably human. Nothing recognizably anything. There was no face. How can you recognize someone when their face is gone?

I thought I was going to be sick. I slipped again as I turned and ran away. Blood on my bare feet. I wiped them in the gra.s.s as I ran.

You want to know why I didn't tell anyone, don't you?

What did I have to tell? I didn't know it was a person. I didn't know what it was. Dumped meat from a restaurant? No, the blood was too fresh. The remains of some freaks' sacrifice of a pig or goat?

Someone else would find it and report it during the hours the park was actually open.

That's what I told myself. Besides, I'm a liar, remember?

I am often in trouble. Mostly for things I have not done.

I can't expect to be believed. I am the girl who cried wolf.

My parents wouldn't believe me. Or if they did, they would think I'd done it.

The cops would believe me.

They'd want to know what was I doing there. I found the body around 4:30 a.m. The blood smelled fresh. They'd want to know that. It meant he hadn't been dead long. I could have helped their investigation.

They'd want to know what I was doing in the park after hours. How I came to find the body. Me, who knew him. Me, who was his after-hours girlfriend. Such a coincidence! They would think I had something to do with it.

Nothing I could say would convince them otherwise.

But you mean after, don't you? Why didn't I report it when I found out Zach was dead and realized what I'd seen?

But I didn't realize. I didn't know it was him until Tayshawn told me about the dogs. When it was too late. When the police already had the autopsy report.

It never once occurred to me to think that mess had once been a person.

That it had once been Zach.

HISTORY OF ME.

You want to know why I didn't smell him? Why I didn't realize it was Zach? I told you I smelled the blood well enough to know it was fresh. So why didn't I know it was Zach's body?

You're right. I'm a wolf. My sense of smell is excellent. Even when I'm human.

But not when I've just changed back. The wiring's all wrong. This way and that. Sometimes I hear with my fingers. Smell with my ears. That kind of weirdness. Takes hours, sometimes a day, to be normal again.

I'd only just changed back. I got the basics: blood, innards. But not a lot more.

And the memory of the smell didn't stay with me. (Thank G.o.d.) That's why I didn't know.

AFTER.

"I did something to you? What do you mean?" I scream at the white boy as we near the bottom of the hill. We keep running. I don't know why I'm not confronting him, wrestling him to the ground, pinning his arms, dragging him to my parents. See? Here's your killer, not me.

"You're the same as me," the boy says. He has a strange accent. Not New York. Or maybe it's a speech impediment. He doesn't talk right, whatever it is. "You're just me."

I have an urge to tell him, no, I don't reek. But it's true. We're both wolves. He's not breathing heavy the way Zach would be by now. His stride is too short and his arms are flopping all over the place, but he keeps pace easily.

"It happened after I saw you. Running like me. You did magic on me. Made me into an animal."

He doesn't know what he is?

"It hurt. Your magic hurt so bad. Why'd you do that? You could've warned me."

What do I say? I concentrate on the swing of my arms, on keeping my shoulders down and my knees high.

My head hurts. What about his family? Why haven't they told him what he is?

"Why'd you do it?" he asks.

"I didn't," I say. "The wolf's already in you. Your parents should've told you."

"Got no parents," he says. "Wolf? Is that the animal you magicked me into? Huh. Thought I was a bear."

"I didn't do it to you. There's no magic." No parents? How could he have no parents? "What about your other family?" I ask. "Brothers? Sisters? Grandparents? Aunts?"

"No family. You made me a wolf? I like wolfs."

"Wolves," I say.

In the distance there's a patrol car. I jump the fence and head deeper into the park where cars can't go, enjoying gra.s.s under my shoes. Springy, more give. The boy follows, not missing a beat. He's not sweating any more than I am. Just as well. I can't imagine how much worse he'd smell.

"I didn't make you into anything," I repeat, though it's not entirely true. "You were born that way. Comes from your family. Mine are all wolves. That's why I'm one, too."

"That mean you're my family then?"

"Maybe," I say, hoping not.

"You're black. Can't be family."

I groan. I'm starting to think he's simple. How can I explain anything to him? "How old are you?"

"Dunno. Thirteen? Maybe fourteen."

"How can you not know how old you are?" This is impossible. "When you turned into a wolf you killed someone. Did you know that?"

The boy grunts. I'm not sure if it's a yes or a no.

"You killed someone."

"Yeah. Your boy."

I turn my head to watch him. He looks as bad as he smells. Not just dirty. His skin is uneven, blotchy, pocked, sprinkled with zits and blackheads, large-pored. There are scars on his forehead and under his right eye. Maybe his left, too, but I can only see his profile. His teeth are so crowded and crooked they threaten to overwhelm his mouth. They're green.

"My belly hurt," he continues. "It was all angry and hungry. Smelled him first. Knew him 'cause he was with you all the time. I've been following you. I ate him," he says. Some snot dribbles out of his left nostril. "Didn't know I could till I did it."

I lurch to halt and punch the boy in the face with all my might. My hand explodes. "Ow. f.u.c.k."

The boy goes down onto the gra.s.s. I kick him hard in the ribs and then again and again. He makes no sound. Like he's been beaten before and knows to keep quiet. I stop. "f.u.c.k."

The look he gives me is wounded but unsurprised. His left eye reddens. It will be black before long. I don't know what he was expecting from me but this wasn't it. I pace in front of him, my hands curled into fists. "You killed my boyfriend. What did you think I was going to do? Kiss you?"

The boy doesn't say anything. He sinks lower, preparing himself for more violence. It makes me wince.

"You live on the streets, don't you?"

He's homeless. A street kid. He's poor. Poorer than poor. He doesn't have anything. He's as much poorer than me as I am poorer than Sarah. He has no family. I don't think he's been to school. Or if he has, it was a long time ago. He had no idea he was a wolf until I forgot to take my pill.

This is my fault.

"I hate you," I tell him. "You killed Zach and I will never forgive you for it. Why couldn't you eat a f.u.c.king squirrel? A cat or a dog? h.e.l.l, even a tourist would have been better. Why'd you have to kill Zach?"

"He smelled good."

No more violence, I tell myself. The Greats will take care of him. I just have to get him upstate. But the white boy didn't know. He didn't know anything. He still doesn't know anything. How can I take him to his death?

f.u.c.k.

He killed Zach. He knew Zach was human and he killed him. This boy has no moral sense. He'll kill again. Taking him to the Greats is a mercy killing.

What's his life worth now? No home, no family, no friends, no nothing.

"Didn't mean it," the boy says. "If I knew how mad you'd get I wouldn't've done it."

I think I'm going to scream. I pace faster.