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The first time she breezes in the shop it’s past three in the morning on a rainy Thursday. You scarcely notice her short, green-clad figure when she stumbles through the door. Compared to some of the people you’ve seen in these parts, her far-away eyes and tall, tangled mess of peroxide blonde hair are nothing short of average.
You’ve almost forgotten she had come in when she emerges from an aisle with an armful of overpriced snacks. She’s already wrist-deep in a large pack of beef jerky, tearing into the meat like she hasn’t eaten in weeks. You silently scan her protein bars, Red Bull, and popcorn and she reluctantly slides the half-empty bag of jerky across the counter. You say nothing as you ring it up.
“Your total is twenty-eight fifty.”
She moves in slow motion like she’s just witnessed a murder, withdrawing her wallet from mud-splattered jeans and sliding her card. You watch her as she taps through the checkout process on the payment terminal, typing in her PIN as if the world is spinning in reverse.
Her receipt prints. You’re about to bag her purchases when she gathers everything in her arms and turns away. She leaves the store and you’re left holding the tiny bill out to empty air. You throw the receipt away.
About an hour after she’s left you realize she didn’t even have a car.
The second time you see her she’s wearing a hoodie and a pair of low-cut shorts that reach her knees because they’re about two sizes too big for her. Directly beneath her right kneecap you see a gnarled, ugly scar wrapping all the way around her leg and she’s limping like it’s her first time walking.
You almost want to ask her what happened. Her eyes are bloodshot, framed by lavender half-moons, and you assume she doesn’t want to talk about it. She dumps five bags of beef jerky in front of you.
“Give me a pack of Parliaments,” she breathes, staring into the scuffed counter as if it holds the answers to all of life’s questions.
“We don’t carry Parliaments.”
“Marlboro, then.”
You squint at her. “I’m going to need to see some ID.”
She lifts her smaragdine gaze to yours. “Why?”
Your brows furrow in confusion. “Because you have to be eighteen to buy cigarettes?”
She looks almost offended, but offers up her driver’s license anyway. Peridot Olivine, you note. She’s twenty-three, the same age as you, and you’re genuinely surprised but you hand the card back, spinning around to retrieve a pack of Marlboros.
“Fifty-one seventy,” you declare, making a point of bagging the items this time.
She pays quietly and you want to say something else but you don’t know what. Anything to make the weary, offbeat girl stay just a minute longer so you can look at her, figure her out.
Instead you slip the receipt in the bag and push it across the counter alongside her cigarettes. “Have a good night.”
She doesn’t reply. The bell on the door jingles and instead of walking away she stops outside, leaning against the front glass as she lights a cigarette. She coughs violently and you wonder if it's her first time smoking. You watch her with interest because you’ve never seen anyone like her; the manner with which she moves, calculated yet unsteady, and the infinite pools of her eyes, always gazing distantly.
She disappears before you know it and you almost miss her when she’s gone.
One night when the full moon is shining through the glass storefront, she limps inside coated with blood. She’s accompanied by a massive woman with vitiligo and ash blonde hair and you fear what she’s gotten herself into.
“You should do it,” the athletic woman prods, continuing a previous conversation, as they depart to the other side of the store. “I know you can.”
“I didn’t say I couldn’t, I said I don’t want to.”
You lean sideways to spy on the two of them in the snack aisle, huddled close with skin on skin. Are your ears deceiving you or did the tall one just growl?
“You could be so much more!”
“I’m fine where I am. I’m busy enough, I don’t need the added responsibility of babysitting everyone.” She looks frustrated and tired, face stony and harsh.
“Just ditch work, you don’t need that shit to survive!”
“I’m not like you, Jasper!” She bursts out, eyes alight and teeth bared.
The other woman makes a guttural, almost inhuman noise and towers over Peridot, fingers curling into tight fists. She whines and looks at the floor, nuzzling her head against Jasper’s neck. You watch, puzzled and disgusted, as Peridot sticks her tongue out and licks the blonde’s face and jaw like a puppy meeting its owner for the first time. What the fuck is going on?
Hushed words pass between the women for a long moment as Peridot stares intently at the floor. Then they abruptly move apart and begin browsing the shelves as if nothing had happened. They approach the counter with beef jerky like normal customers and you try to ignore the way the one called Jasper is eyeing you with her predatory amber gaze.
“Forty-four seventy-five,” you mutter, looking everywhere but Jasper's face as she pays with a shiny credit card.
They leave, glued to each others' sides like lovers and you don’t know what to think anymore.
It’s a month before she returns, earlier in the night than usual. She looks anxious and on-edge, hands shaking slightly. You swear she’s taller than the last time you saw her, shoulders broader and arms more toned. She staggers to the register, staring at you with panicked, blown pupils.
“I- I need, a pack of Marlboros,” she chokes out, breathing shaky.
“Are you okay?” you ask apprehensively.
“Just, p-please. The cigarettes.”
You collect the smokes and ring her up, keeping your eyes glued to her unsteady frame. She looks anxious and frustrated and terrified all at once and you wonder if it has something to do with the intimidating 'Jasper' woman. Against your better judgement, you reach across the counter and place a comforting hand on her forearm. She reacts instantly, lunging away from you like your fingertips were lit matches and baring her teeth threateningly. Your eyes widen as you catch sight of her canine teeth; they're longer and sharper than any you’ve ever seen and you stumble backwards in terror, falling against the cigarette case behind you.
“Get away from me!” she roars, eyes squinting shut and hands raking down her scrunched face. She abruptly cries out in agony, falling to her knees and writhing like she’s being exorcised.
You’re paralyzed in fear where you stand as you watch her flail violently. She fights her way to her feet, steadying herself on the counter as the bones in her hands pop unnaturally. You can see her fingers metamorphose before your eyes, nails hardening into dark, pointed claws. The light hair on her knuckles thickens exponentially, darkening into brindled grey fur and she shakes her head furiously.
“No, no, no!” she growls, panting. You witness the bone structure of her face begin to shift like tectonic plates moving within the earth.What the fuck what the fuck what the fuck- She snarls, more animal than human, and whirls around on her heel before charging at the door and shattering the glass like it were tissue paper. Body shifting, Peridot dashes into the empty parking lot. Without stopping or even slowing, she lowers her shoulders toward the pavement and begins using her hands to aid her running. She's moving at the speed of an Olympic runner but on all fours, like a dog.
Like a wolf.
She trips on a pothole and falls onto her chest, giving you a chance to stare in awe at her legs lengthening and taking a vaguely canine shape. She shoots a frenzied glance over her shoulder then, and you meet the emerald green eyes of a creature simultaneously human and beast. She, no- it, regains its footing and vanishes into the street.
You slump against the cigarette case and slide to the floor, legs crumpled beneath you. Your mind is running a mile a minute yet completely empty at the same time.
What just happened?
The very next day you take to the internet, searching the topic of werewolves. The only information you find, however, tells of superstitions and hoaxes. Weeks pass, fruitless in your search for actual evidence, before your friends begin to notice your withdrawn demeanor. An inordinate amount of pestering prompts you to admit what happened, what you saw.
Your best friend Steven blinks in clearly disbelieving confusion and his friend Amethyst claps a hand on your shoulder, whistling lowly. "Oh Lappy, you need to quit drinking on the job."
None of them believe you; they all seem to think you had some sort of hallucination or sleep-deprived delusion. You stop spending the weekends together and ignore their calls. You keep researching, finding an online forum for people who claim to have come in contact with the paranormal. You feel more peace reading others' stories, so you share your own memories of the peroxide blonde woman with the affinity for beef jerky. Strangers from across the world sympathize and reply with tales of their own similar experiences, and for a while, your restless soul calms. From there you befriend a girl named Jenny who coincidentally happens to live an hour away from you; you talk frequently not only about paranormal occurrences but also your day-to-day lives. Soon you've met in person and been introduced to her tight-knit, family-like friend group, and you call all of them your best friends.
Your friend (ex-friend would be more accurate,) Pearl swings by the shop about three months after the incident. "Lapis!" she crows all too enthusiastically. "It's been so long since we've seen you! You should come over this weekend- Steven and I are having a bingo night!"
"No thanks," you find yourself saying, "I'd prefer to play bingo with people who don't think I'm crazy."
She scoffs rudely. "Oh, are you still harping on about that werewolf nonsense?"
You smile obsequiously. "Is there something I can help you find, Pearl?"
She leaves without buying anything and the self-satisfied smile doesn't leave your face for quite some time after she's gone.
You continue working at the gas station much longer than you’d originally planned. You tell yourself it's simply the easiest option, that staying where you are is preferable to learning the ropes at a new job, but deep down you know you're just hoping Peridot will breeze back through someday.
It's fine. You have new friends now, new hobbies. You take up painting, and even though most of your works end up depicting claws and fangs and emerald green eyes, it's fine. You're fine.
Another month passes, then two, then six, then twelve. The thick, ancient books about occult superstitions you'd crammed your apartment full of gradually get touched less and less, until they are memorialized with a thick layer of dust. You sleep normally at night again instead of staying up researching supposed sightings of the supernatural. You no longer obsessively check your social media notifications for responses to your posts in which you'd asked people to let you know if they found someone that fit your description of Peridot. You've long since stopped posting Craigslist missed connections posts anyway.
You begin to think that Steven and your old friends might have been right, that maybe you really were just sleep deprived that night. It made sense; you'd seen an odd woman in the store a few times and your brain had manufactured a delusion about her. It certainly wasn't outside the realm of possibility- after all, you hadn't seen hide nor hair of her since you'd supposedly watched her turn into a wolf in front of you. Maybe Peridot never existed at all, and the entire time you'd thought you were witnessing a weird customer buy ridiculous items or lick the face of their compatriot you'd just been imagining things. Dreaming of odd occurrences that could in theory, occur in a convenience store after dark.
You go job searching again. You apply to a call center with a base salary three dollars more than the minimum wage the convenience store pays you, and you get accepted. After having drinks with Jenny, Buck, and Sour Cream to celebrate, you go into work the next evening with your name tag in your hands and your uniform folded neatly on the counter, waiting for your manager to show up so you can tell them the good news.
Suddenly, time seems to stop as a green-eyed, blonde-haired woman dressed in green plaid waltzes into the shop. Your jaw drops and you jump over the counter to get to her.
“Peridot Olivine,” you call. She pauses and turns, dark eyes softening in recognition.
Her gaze drifts to the name tag in your hand. “Lapis,” she replies simply.
“You’re real…” you state in awe.
She chuckles. “Was there ever any doubt?”
“You’re a werewolf, of course there was doubt!”
She sighs, smiling gently. “Can’t let that go, can you?”
“I- I spent so long looking for some clue that what I saw was real! My friends thought I was insane... Hell, I was starting to think that I'd made it all up when you stopped coming back.”
She rubs her neck almost sheepishly. “I got… caught up in some things.”
The silence is cloying, tension palpable. “So, beef jerky?” you ask, attempting a shaky smirk.
She smiles back at you with a playful eye roll. “You know me so well.”
You watch her walk to the snack section you first saw her visit over a year ago and it feels like you’re inside a dream. She loads her arms with jerky and walks to the register where you’re standing; she’s nearer to you than she’s ever been. It’s deliciously nerve-wracking being so close to her without the counter between you. She sets the beef jerky down and you meet eyes.
Slowly she asks, “What’s your last name?”
You don’t know why she’s asking or why the question feels so intimate. “Lazuli.”
”Lapis Lazuli,” she says as if she’s tasting a sugary candy.
You take that moment to walk behind the counter to hide your burning cheeks. You ring up her items and she pays with cash; you have to count it three times because your mind is elsewhere. You hand her the change and the receipt, unsure what to say.
She puts away her change and takes her bag. She looks at you for a long time with you staring right back. Your lips are parted but you don’t speak. The dusky light from the sunset outside is shining into the store, illuminating the dust particles in the air and making the moment you’re trapped in feel like it’s consuming you.
“Do you… want to get coffee, or something?” She’s whispering.
You gradually nod. “Y-yeah. Yeah. That’d be good.”
She moves stiffly like a claymation cartoon character as she takes a pen from a display by the register, leaning over to scribble something on the back of the receipt paper before sliding it across the counter towards you. She turns, places a hand on the door, pauses. You feel like both of you are human loading symbols, trying to conceptualize what’s just happened.
Then she turns back to you and cracks a wide grin that shows off her carnivore fangs.
“Call me.”
With that she vanishes just like she had on the first night you’d ever laid eyes on her. Long after she’s out of sight, you stare after her at the empty space she’d just been occupying. You take a moment to breathe before glancing down at the phone number before you.
And then you smile like you’ve never smiled before.