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1. Someone’s at the door!
In the months since Andrew’s first full moon with Kevin and Neil, Kevin has made himself progressively less scarce around the house when Andrew comes over. It isn’t as though he’s any less recalcitrant or disparaging than he was before, but now that criticism is verbal, and delivered from the huge, ratty couch the three of them all sit on together to do homework, rather than via obnoxious sighs and slammed doors. If Andrew is being honest, which he tends to be, Kevin’s criticism is even somewhat helpful sometimes - the man tears into subpar theses with the same vigor with which the wolf tries to tear its shackles to shreds once a month. The steady climb of Andrew’s grade in his 400-level writing elective correlates directly with Kevin’s involvement in his drafting process.
The ratty living room couch is where this particular Tuesday night finds all three of them, in various states of disarray. Kevin, somehow always meticulously punctual with his assignments, splays his legs over the backrest of the couch, eyes shut and earbuds in as he listens to a podcast for an assignment that Andrew knows isn’t due for another week and a half. Neil, Kevin’s polar opposite in most ways including this one, is crunched into the opposite corner of the couch and frantically tapping away at an essay Andrew is pretty sure was due yesterday. Andrew neatly splits the difference between them, calmly but begrudgingly working his way through readings for a quiz on Friday.
They’ve all been making steady progress in their own way for a few hours when Neil’s stomach growls loudly enough that Kevin opens an eye and arches a brow.
“Should we order a pizza?” he asks, amused.
Neil’s only response is an affirmative grunt; he doesn’t even look up from his laptop screen. Kevin rolls his eyes, places a Domino’s order from his phone, and puts his earbuds back in.
Twenty-some-odd minutes later, Kevin’s eyes snap open.
“Someone’s at the door,” he says with a degree of urgency Andrew doesn’t really think that statement warrants.
“You’re just scenting the pizza guy,” Neil says distractedly, extricating a hand from the crumpled ball of stress he’s become and reaching around Andrew to give Kevin’s head a careless pat. “He hasn’t even knocked yet.”
“But someone’s at the door,” Kevin says again, pretzel-twisting himself upright on the couch, though he seems to do his best to relax at Neil’s cutting look. He reminds Andrew of the nervous terrier that had belonged to one of his foster families; the damn thing had never taken a liking to him, and yapped incessantly whenever Andrew came or went.
Kevin’s calm lasts all of five seconds, until the much-anticipated pizza guy does, in fact, knock at the door, which has Kevin sitting ruler-straight and pulling out both earbuds.
“Neil, someone’s at the door, ” he says again, louder, dripping anxiety.
“I know,” Neil says, “I know, I’m going.”
Neil slowly unfurls himself, joints clicking loudly enough to set Andrew’s teeth on edge, and meanders to the front door, fishing his wallet out of his back pocket as he goes. Kevin, meanwhile, vibrates.
“You always get this worked up about guests?” Andrew asks. Kevin glares at him, freckled cheeks red and foot tapping a frenetic, silent rhythm on the carpeted floor.
“It’s not me,” he grumbles. “This is all wolf.”
“Is the wolf not a part of you?” Andrew needles.
Kevin rolls his eyes and puts his earbuds back in, but his body seems less taut than it was before, seemingly irritated out of whatever frenzied thought loop he’d been trapped in. He doesn’t fully relax, though, until Neil returns with their pizza in hand and, presumably, the pizza delivery person removes themself from the property.
2. Roughhousing
The crash that emanates from behind the door that Andrew has just slotted his key into is almost enough to make him turn right around and drive home. He is not an easily frightened man, nor is he frightened now, but he is tired after a long week of exams, and he isn’t sure even seeing Neil will be worth whatever bullshit he’ll surely be expected to deal with as soon as he crosses the threshold. It’s too late now, though, and he knows it. Kevin would have scented him as soon as he turned his car down their cramped street.
Of course, as soon as he twists his key in the lock and opens the front door, he regrets his decision immediately. The collection of expensive-looking paintings Neil and Kevin keep hung in their mudroom in incongruously cheap frames are, save for one, shattered on the tile floor. Their shoes, usually kept at least somewhat orderly by Kevin’s obsessive neatness, are in disarray. And, to top it all off, there appears to be a fresh dent in the wall just a few feet from where Andrew stands. Though he hadn’t been worried upon first hearing the chaos within the house, the feeling has begun to gnaw unpleasantly at his chest. Whatever violence that caused the damage seems to be ongoing, based on the muffled grunts and thuds coming from the next room over.
Andrew, uncertain he’ll stand a snowball’s chance in hell against a being powerful or foolish enough to break into the home of a werewolf, draws a knife from his armbands and proceeds further into the house.
What he finds in the living room makes him wish he’d turned around and gone home all over again. Idiots.
Kevin and Neil, both shirtless and snarling, are one tense tangle of limbs on the carpeted floor. Andrew spares one final, useless moment of alarm to wonder if he should intervene before he realizes that they’re both laughing, joy hidden behind exertion and too-sharp teeth .
Kevin pins Neil’s hands to the floor above his head until Neil hooks a leg through Kevin’s and flips the taller man onto his back, knocking the coffee table crooked in the process. Neil isn’t heavy enough to maintain his position for long, though, and soon enough they’re off tumbling across the room, knocking bruisingly hard into furniture and walls as they go.
Their technique is careless, and none of their blows are meant to seriously injure, but they’re both blisteringly fast and aggressive to boot. Even in his human form, Kevin is tougher than your average man, reflexes and strength just a few shades unnatural. And despite the fact that Kevin doesn’t seem to be holding back any, Neil is easily keeping pace. Andrew wonders if that’s because Neil has simply had both reason and time to get very good at dealing with Kevin’s particular brand of roughness, or if it’s because - as Andrew suspects - Neil himself is something other than human.
Before Andrew can dedicate too much time to that line of thought, the pair come rolling to a stop with Kevin on top just shy of Andrew’s feet, one of Neil’s arms twisted awkwardly to avoid bumping into him.
Neil looks up, shock scrawled across his face like he hadn’t even realized Andrew was here, and says, “Oh, hello.”
Andrew arches one eyebrow. Kevin stands, face red as he brushes off his clothes and runs a hand through his hair, and scurries to his bedroom without so much as a glance in Andrew’s direction.
“What was that,” Andrew asks, extending an arm to Neil.
Neil’s whole face slants into a grin as he hoists himself to his feet. “Oh, y’know. Enrichment.”
3. Protective Cuddles
Andrew is spending a lazy Sunday morning at Neil’s place, sunlight filtering through the living room blinds, with Neil on the far end of the couch to his right and Kevin in the kitchen, when he finally decides he’d like some answers about whatever the hell Neil has going on. Normally he wouldn’t let curiosity get the better of him like this, but Neil hasn’t been forthcoming, and the question has been eating away at Andrew’s typically indefatigable patience for months now.
“So,” he says with all his usual finesse, poking the couch next to Neil with his toe, “what are you?”
The way Kevin crosses the room and drapes himself across both the couch and Neil’s shoulders is automatic. It’s like watching an anxious cheetah set upon by its therapy dog at the zoo.
Neil is a tactile person by nature, which Andrew knows only due to extensive experience in both observing Neil in his day to day life and in puzzling out what makes the man go flutteringly limp against his mattress. Because Neil is a martyr, he seems largely unwilling to make that anyone’s problem but his own. Kevin, as far as Andrew can tell, helps with that.
Because Kevin is perhaps the clingiest person Andrew has ever seen in his life, and as someone who spent many of his formative years sharing space with one Nicholas Hemmick, that is saying something. Though he’s militantly respectful of Andrew’s strict boundaries - whether of his own volition or due to Neil’s influence - Kevin practically hangs on Neil any chance he can get, and Neil, predictably, flourishes under the attention.
Despite his general distaste for Kevin, Andrew supposes he’s grateful that Neil isn’t totally deprived of the type of physical affection Andrew can’t provide.
Like now, for instance - though Neil had tensed instantly at Andrew’s question, he relaxes just as quickly under Kevin’s weight.
“Don’t be weird about this,” Neil says, fixing both Kevin and Andrew with a stern look that does a very poor job of hiding the anxiety beneath it.
Whatever is about to come out of Neil’s mouth is almost certainly going to be weird, so rather than make promises he can’t keep, Andrew just stares expectantly back. Kevin, meanwhile, huffs his exasperation.
Neil takes a breath, and says, “I’m a selkie.”
Well. Somehow, even going in with absolutely no expectations, Andrew is still surprised.
“Like. A seal,” he says. “You’re an aquatic mammal.”
“Semi-aquatic,” Neil corrects automatically.
“Like a platypus,” Kevin supplies.
“... Yep,” says Neil. “Just like a platypus. Thanks, Kevin.”
Kevin lifts a hand in dismissal of the praise, as if to say, That’s what I’m here for, man.
Andrew ignores them both and wracks his brain for any applicable knowledge he may have stored in the recesses of his memory.
“So, you have a whole separate skin hidden away somewhere?” Andrew asks.
Neil’s gaze sharpens immediately, and Kevin redoubles his grip, leaning his chin on the top of Neil’s head possessively.
“Yes,” says Neil. “Don’t ask me where.”
Andrew tips his head to one side, raising an eyebrow at Neil. If he’s remembering selkie lore correctly (he is), stealing one’s skin means trapping them on land with you until you decide to give it back and set them free. It’s coercive - the thought of it makes his own skin crawl. Neil should know better than to think Andrew of all people would want any part in that.
Neil seems to realize that and sighs, tension deflating from his body with his breath. “You’re right. I know you wouldn’t.”
Kevin, ever helpful, says, “Do you want to see pictures of him as a seal?”
Andrew is open about the fact that he very rarely wants anything, but he can’t deny his interest in this. It’s not every day one meets a man who can slip on a seal’s body like a jacket. He glances at Neil, who nods (though his cheeks are pink), and shrugs.
Kevin fishes out his phone and swipes through his photo library until he finds the appropriate album.
“Cute, huh?” he says teasingly, tossing the phone to Andrew before clambering over the back of the couch to lay bodily on Neil’s lap, legs dangling over the armrest.
“Cute” is not a word Andrew would have ever chosen to describe Neil Josten, even in his more vulnerable moments, but his seal skin is… Undeniably that, just by the dictionary definition. The big, dark eyes, the pattern of spots that perfectly match the scattering of splotchy freckles across Neil’s shoulders, the round, chubby body - it’s the sort of thing that would have Nicky soft-eyed and cooing in a heartbeat. The glare that Neil shoots Kevin’s way, though, is deadly enough to drive any already scant thoughts of fawning from Andrew’s mind.
Andrew, instead, passes the phone back to Kevin, face impassive.
“I speak four languages fluently,” Neil is saying. “I know more ways to kill than most people learn in a lifetime. I have five college degrees, including a doctorate.”
“Yep,” says Kevin, patting clumsily at Neil’s cheek. “You’re very impressive. And you’re also a very cute seal.”
4. Separation Anxiety/Fast Friends
“He was jealous for a while,” Neil admits one night, Kevin snoring and sprawled across his lap on the floor, the moon outside the window barely starting to wane, and the television muted. There’s a softness to the air around them, a lazy, late night comfort. “Just the two of us have been each other’s pack for a long time, now, and he gets nervous when we’re apart for too long. He was worried you would... take me away from him.”
“How codependent,” Andrew says. It’s not a question, in as many words, but Neil answers it anyway.
“Maybe,” he says mildly, though his face is carefully neutral. “Our situation, even compared to other packs, is… unique.”
Something about his weary tone of voice keeps Andrew from pushing back. Instead, he says, “He isn’t jealous anymore?”
The tight, haunted lines around Neil’s eyes dissipate in favor of a wry twist to his mouth.
“No,” he says. “You’ve passed the test, so you’re practically pack now, in his eyes. Can’t take me away if you’re part of the family.”
Andrew is struck with a moment of discomfort at the idea of being tested and completely unaware of it. His being a part of a werewolf’s pack is altogether too large a concept to even begin to tackle right now, so he focuses on what he can process in the moment.
“Test,” he echoes.
“Not anything so grave as you’re making it sound,” Neil says. “You’ve seen him on his monthly, is all, and you didn’t run. Kevin and I are a package deal, always, and he’s the scarier of the two of us, so if anyone was going to scare you away it was him. He was worried you’d either try to take me and run, or you’d just leave - either way, all of us are worse for wear - and even though I told him you weren’t the type, there wasn’t much I could do to convince him. So he kept his distance until he was sure.”
Though Neil had been right, and Andrew had not run, with Neil or without - instead seamlessly integrating with the pair’s monthly routine with the same steady determination with which he did most things - the shameless truth of Neil’s trust in him puts Andrew on his back foot. He hates the feeling of a debt unpaid, and Neil’s faith is a gift he never asked for.
“You,” he says flatly, “are an idiot.”
For the second time tonight, Neil says, “Maybe.” This time, though, there’s bite to it - as though Neil knows that Andrew himself doesn’t quite believe it. “In any event, he genuinely seems to like you now. Soon he’ll be just as attached to you as he is to me.”
“Is that really all it takes?” Andrew asks. “One show of good faith, and now I have his trust? I’m part of his family?” The last word is half-sneered, derisive.
Neil actually laughs at that, albeit softly, a small exhalation that seems more directed at Kevin than at Andrew.
“I’m not sure how much experience you have with dogs,” Neil says, “but that’s pretty typical. And wolves are just… Uh. Ugh, I can’t think of the word in English. Ac-? No, that can’t be right. Well, we’ll go with it. Acoustic... dogs.”
Andrew thinks he manages to conceal his amusement pretty effectively as disgust, but he’s proven wrong when Neil whines to “stop laughing at me, I speak, like, eight thousand languages” before dissolving into snorts loud enough to startle a disgruntled Kevin awake.
Like that, the soft bubble that had seemed to encompass the living room is popped. Andrew rolls his eyes, and turns the volume back up on Criminal Minds to the somehow soothing backdrop of Kevin’s groggy, incoherent bitching and Neil’s slowly quieting laughter.
5. Territorial
Andrew has known for a while now about Kevin’s long standing dislike for his next-door neighbor. What he hadn’t realized was just how bad it had gotten.
It began last semester, when the neighbor started parking his car in the street in front of Neil and Kevin’s house. The pair only had one car between them, so it wasn’t as if it really even mattered, but it had bothered Kevin enough that he had started a passive-aggressive sticky note campaign which ultimately deterred any further attempts at using the empty parking space in front of their house.
Apparently, Kevin knows how to hold onto a grudge with both hands.
Because when Andrew pulls up to the curb and steps out of his car, he finds Kevin taking lethal-looking garden shears to the neighbor’s magnolia tree. He’s been grumbling about the branches hanging over the dividing fence between their yards for weeks now, and has apparently finally decided to do something about it.
Jesus Christ.
Andrew doesn’t waste time or words on asking Kevin what he thinks he’s doing - he knows exactly what Kevin thinks he’s doing, and he doesn’t need to hear it from the man himself to know it’s absurd. Instead, he crosses the lawn in a few quick steps and promptly grabs Kevin by the scruff of his neck.
“You,” Andrew says, “are a goddamn menace.”
Kevin is already drooping in Andrew’s grip, looking sullen but defeated.
“It’s over our property line,” Kevin says plaintively. “I checked.”
“Tell me if I look like I give a shit,” Andrew says, marching the both of them inside.
Neil is wandering out of the steam-damp bathroom with wet hair and sweatpants slung low on his hips as they burst through the living room door, and he stops dead at the sight of them. His face, which had, for a fraction of a moment, been more relaxed than Andrew’s seen it in weeks, drops.
“This is what I get for taking a bath during the day,” he mutters, crossing the room to snatch the garden shears. “Kevin, you didn’t.”
“I didn’t,” Kevin says, sullen. “Andrew attacked me.”
“You would know if I’d attacked you,” Andrew says. “That was not it.”
“What, and I cannot stress this enough, ever.”
+1. The Wolf
“Do you have summer plans?” Kevin asks.
It’s an early spring evening, enough chill in the air still that the steadily encroaching warmth feels tenuous, and Andrew and Kevin sit alone at the kitchen table. Neil has been nursing whatever upper respiratory infection has been going around campus the past few weeks, and as such had been bullied into going to bed right after dinner, leaving Kevin and Andrew to their own devices. Though the pair have come quite a ways since their days of constant catty disagreements and stony silences, time spent alone together without Neil as a buffer is still a rarity. Andrew can’t think of a single logical reason why Kevin might be asking about his summer plans.
“I’ll be going back to my cousin’s house in Columbia,” he answers anyway. Nicky usually spends summers with his fiance in Germany, and Aaron has plans to vacation with his girlfriend’s family, so Andrew will more than likely be spending summer alone, but Kevin doesn’t need to know that.
Kevin nods thoughtfully, then says, “Do you want to take a trip with Neil and me in July?”
Andrew raises an eyebrow.
“We have a cabin up in rural Maine,” Kevin continues, and Andrew’s second eyebrow climbs his forehead to join the first.
“If you are planning on murdering me, you’re doing a poor job of hiding it,” he says. “Is this a Stephen King novel?”
Kevin glares at him - not an uncommon occurrence, all told.
“Why the fuck would we murder you now?” he asks indignantly. “If we were going to, we would’ve taken care of it last semester. We haven’t survived this long being stupid.”
“Could’ve fooled me,” Andrew mutters.
Kevin rolls his eyes - also not uncommon. “You’re so lucky Neil likes you so much,” he says. There’s less heat to it than there once might have been, but the statement isn’t entirely toothless.
Andrew rolls his eyes right back and deadpans, “Luck has nothing to do with it. I am a delight.”
“Is that what they’re calling it these days?”
“Careful, Day, you’re showing your age.”
Kevin takes several deep breaths and a sip of his coffee. He stares at the notebook in front of him long enough that Andrew thinks, with no small amount of satisfaction, that the conversation is over, and returns to his own book.
After a few minutes of silence, though, Kevin says, “We go in July during the full moon.”
Huh. Though Andrew is loath to admit it, that does capture his attention.
He glances up at Kevin, whose face is a study in irritation.
“It’s… If the wolf is allowed to run free at least once a year, it’s easier to pacify the other eleven months,” he says. “It has a territory marked out in Maine. So we take a trip there every summer.”
“And you’re inviting me,” Andrew says. Because?
“Contrary to apparently popular belief,” Kevin says, “I’m not oblivious. I know that full moons are hard on Neil, and I know you make them easier for him to handle. He’s been… doing better since you’ve started helping out.”
He isn’t wrong. Neil has a sharp mouth and a quick temper on his good days, and during the nights they spend together babysitting Kevin’s canine alter ego, those traits are turned up to eleven as he oscillates between silently distressed and downright vicious with uncharacteristic alacrity.
But he has been doing better in recent months, although Andrew had, clearly mistakenly, attributed that to the fact that Neil is taking fewer credits this semester than he had in the fall.
“You keep him grounded,” Kevin says, mouth twisting like the words taste bitter on their way out. “And he’d never ask you to come himself, even though he wants you to, because he’s stupid. So I’m asking for him.”
Well. It’s not as if Andrew hadn’t been planning on making the drive back up to Palmetto once a month anyway. And riveting though the company of his four bedroom walls may be, he’s sure to get bored of spending the summer alone eventually.
He inclines his head in something that isn’t quite a nod, and returns to his book once more.
Andrew has decided that Maine is nice. It’s slightly cooler than urban South Carolina this time of year, the greenery richer, and the population density is delightfully low. Neil had been quietly elated when Andrew asked to come along back in April, and the excitement had not abated as July rolled around. They’d left from Neil and Kevin’s house late last night and driven the eighteen hours up the coast in shifts, Neil taking the last one to get them through the rough, unmarked dirt roads that led to the ramshackle cabin, and arrived in the early afternoon the night of the full moon.
Kevin had disappeared into the woods as soon as the sun set, leaving a trail of discarded clothes behind him, while Neil and Andrew made dinner together in the dusty, quiet kitchen. Neil had delegated his pasta sauce-stirring duties to Andrew momentarily to wish Kevin well, and Andrew had taken that opportunity to adequately season said sauce. They’d eaten in companionable silence, and then stepped out into the cooling night air of the front porch so Andrew could smoke a cigarette.
Though the cabin itself is run down, it rests in a clearing surrounded on all sides by thick, lush forest. The quiet of the night should be oppressive, what with the humidity, but it’s broken pleasantly by the bright chirping of a chorus of crickets, and as he sits beside Neil in twin rocking chairs, Andrew feels more at peace than he possibly ever has in his life. Neil idly bounces a tennis ball off the rough planks of the cabin walls and the porch floor - there’s a whole bucket of them out here, as they’re Neil’s preferred method of Kevin-control during his shifts.
Andrew lights a second cigarette before curiosity that has been itching away at him since March gets the better of him.
“Kevin said,” Andrew starts, “that full moons are hard for you.”
Neil tilts his head. “Did he?”
“Yes.” Andrew looks at Neil sideways. “He was right. You’re always pissy this time of month.”
Neil barks a laugh at that.
“That’s true,” he says.
“Is it just because of Kevin?” Andrew asks. “You’d think you’d be used to that after all this time, even if he is a dick.”
“Oh, I am,” Neil says. He catches his tennis ball and rolls it between his palms.
Andrew waits.
“It’s… You know I’m technically only half selkie,” Neil explains, “because my father was human and all. What that means is that most of the time I’m straddling a really fine line between the human world and the Other. I prefer it here, mostly. I like who I am in my human skin more - maybe that’s because I’ve spent more time in it, I don’t know - but the full moon has all kinds of significance for the fae. The pull is stronger now than it is at other times. It makes me grouchy.”
Neil’s baseline tends to be what most would consider grouchy, making his explanation an understatement if Andrew’s ever heard one. Andrew is about to tell him as much, when a low growl sounds from just behind the treeline. It makes the hair on the backs of Andrew’s hands stand on end, as though the sound itself is malicious. His fingers drift to the edge of an armband.
Neil is tense, eyes narrowing as he says, “Kevin?”
He sounds dubious; Andrew knows that he and the wolf have something of an understanding, after hundreds of years together, and it typically gives the cabin a wide berth on nights like this. It seems unlikely that it would suddenly turn on him now.
The answering growl is louder, this time, and the wolf that stalks into the clearing is decidedly not Kevin, larger by several hands and a paler shade of gray. Neil rises to his feet, quick but controlled, and leans against the porch railing faux-casually. On the way, he cuts a glance at Andrew and tilts his head toward the door. Go inside. Right - that’s definitely going to happen.
Andrew unsheathes a knife, but remains where he is.
“This isn’t your territory,” Neil says, raising his voice. His tone leaves no room for argument. “You’ll want to leave before the wolf who hunts this land shows up.”
The wolf currently in their yard finds room. It twitches its ears, but does little else to indicate understanding of Neil’s warning and, almost defiantly, it presses onward toward the porch.
Andrew stands. Things are looking more and more as if they’re about to be in a fight for their lives, and he doesn’t want to be caught sitting down.
Meanwhile, Neil, drawing from his limitless wellsprings of both courage and stupidity, selects a new tennis ball from the bucket. He wastes no time in hurling it at the wolf, hitting it square in the nose and stopping it, momentarily dumbstruck, in its tracks.
“Fetch.”
The wolf blinks. Andrew blinks. Neil looks as though he’s trying very hard not to laugh at his own joke.
“Do you take pride,” Andrew asks at length, “in being the actual dumbest person I know?”
Neil looks wounded. “I’m sure I don’t know what you mean.”
And then Andrew is diving one way and Neil the other, because the werewolf - recovered from its temporary shock - has plowed directly into the front porch and bitten a chunk out of the splintery wooden floorboards both of them had been standing upon milliseconds before.
“Seriously,” Neil pants, rolling into a crouch. “Kevin’s gonna be really pissed with you when he gets here. I’m trying to do you a favor.”
The wolf doesn’t seem to take the hint, instead lunging at Neil and growling as it gets tangled up in porch furniture, maw just a few inches shy of Neil’s face.
He sighs, “Okay,” and lunges right back, driving himself up under the wolf’s ribs and forcing it up onto its hind legs - or, trying to. He’s not quite tall enough to manage it fully, and the wolf bats him to the side in irritation like he’s made of tissue paper.
Andrew hesitates only long enough to check that Neil is getting back up - albeit swearing under his breath through gritted teeth - before he rushes the wolf, both knives drawn. He isn’t quick enough, though, and the wolf finishes freeing itself from the last of the porch furniture with ample time to whirl on Andrew, jaws snapping uncomfortably close to vital organs as he backpedals.
He’s backed into a corner now, between the last of the porch railing and the cabin, the wolf’s snarling maw a few scant inches from his skull, when Neil whoops triumphantly and a large, dark shape enters Andrew’s field of vision just long enough to tackle the wolf to the ground. After a few seconds, the blur resolves into Kevin’s deep gray coat and distinctive yellow eyes. Just in time.
Neil, still breathlessly excited but sobering quickly, is at Andrew’s side within moments.
“Are you okay?” he asks, sharp eyes scanning Andrew for injuries.
“Are you?” Andrew bites back, stumbling to his feet and trying to still his jackrabbiting heart.
“Fine,” Neil says. He has a hand pressed to a bloody but quickly-closing wound on his shoulder. “Barely a scratch.”
The whole cabin shudders as Kevin and the pale wolf barrel into the side. Kevin’s distinctively harsh bark, as Neil had predicted, sounds furious.
“We should get inside,” Neil says.
The gruesome, violent noise is still clearly audible from within the cabin, and goes on for another thirty minutes before the night’s stillness resumes. The crickets chirp on, undisturbed, but the quiet is heavier now than it was before. Charged.
But when Neil beckons Andrew to the window, a small, tight smile on his face, Andrew feels something in his chest loosen.
There, in the otherwise empty clearing, sits Kevin, only moderately blood soaked. His tail twitches and his golden eyes are attentive as he keeps careful, diligent watch over the house for the rest of the night.