Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The first thing Chloe heard when she rounded the corner of the girls’ wing of hallway was Liz, talking loud enough that any of the nurses would’ve been able to deduce what she’d done.

“Derek,” she announced almost triumphantly, and when Chloe stepped into the doorway, she saw the pleased, self-congratulatory look on Liz’s sun-browned face. She waved the stolen confidential folder as if it were a fan—Derek’s, if Chloe had to guess, and she was usually right. Liz had a pension for snatching things rather easily, a skill Chloe found both impressive and a little red flag-ish. “Is supposed to show up to-day!”

Without preamble, she slapped open Derek’s file, her gaze tracking across the lines of information, not even a hint of guilt over breaking and entering Dr. Gil’s office or even breaching Derek’s right to privacy. Sounded like Liz. Her desire for information as the group home’s source of gossip often had Chloe questioning how a girl could go to such lengths.

“Oh,” she said, pursing her mouth, pouting.

Tori looked up from painting her toenails, her heavy-lidded eyes assessing Liz for any distress. “Oh what?” she asked, slumping just the tiniest bit. She must’ve realized everything was fine and the adrenaline spike—however small—must’ve ebbed.

“He’s a year older than Chloe.” Liz tapped her fingertip against her lip. “So she’s still stuck with dorky Peter.” She tossed long, blonde hair out of her face. “Schizophrenia diagnosis at five. Ooh—yikes. Foster homes until he was placed with the Bae family at ten. Good God, there’s nothing juicy in here! Like, at all!” she complained.

With a loud, dramatic, drawn-out groan, Liz flopped onto her back hard enough that Tori yelped and bounced, ruining her nails, a long line of polish cutting across the flat of the top of her foot. She growled with annoyance, the sneer and furrow marred by the small curl of a smile when they bumped shoulders. A softie, only for Liz, so everyone else beware.

Tori grabbed the bottle of nail polish remover, ripped a few paper towels off the roll on Liz’s desk, and mopped at her skin, scrubbing when it was stubborn.

“Yeah, well…that’s the point.” She heaved a drawn-out sigh, a perfect match to Liz’s groan only moments before. “It’s supposed to be kind of…” Her hand teetered in a so-so motion. “…boring. So he—we don’t attract too much attention. The less, the better.”

Liz didn’t question that. Not that Chloe expected an argument, because she knew as much as they did how dangerous it was.

Every supernatural being, no matter what they were, had that drilled into their heads—the less human attention you attract, the better. It wasn’t always that way, but humans, time and time again, showed supernatural creatures what they did to things they feared or didn’t understand—ostracization and violence. After a couple hundred years of being slaughtered mindlessly, the tide shifted, and supers went into hiding, living alongside the very things that destroyed their communities, families, and species at every turn.

“Exactly. It’s not going to be James Bond’s secret agent file or Ethan Hawke’s. It’s going to raise the least amount of questions,” Chloe said, because she just couldn’t help herself. But she realized she hadn’t announced her presence, and Liz was a little oblivious sometimes—

And there it was, the bloody murder scream that Liz shrieked, and Chloe shrank back for a moment, ears ringing, senses on high alert. It made every inch of exposed skin pebble into dozens of puckered bumps and then some, and it riled up Chloe’s wolf, instincts rushing to the surface for a minute. It took even longer for her to wrangle the lupine reactions down, and her wolf only settled when her brain caught up and she realized the threat was just the assault on her ears via Liz’s astonishing lung capacity and impressive ability to scream like a bonafide horror movie scream queen.

Tori sat up and glared, eyes narrowed and face tight with annoyance. Sometimes she reminded Chloe too much of a moody cat, complete with the intense, I’m-so-angry gaze that promised retribution and pain later. Chloe looked at Liz, who was undoubtedly the golden retriever.

“Damn it, Chloe,” she hissed as she rubbed at her chest. “We need to seriously put a bell on you. I’m sick of you scaring me because you can’t seem to announce when you’re there. You just…show up.” Her eyes narrowed more. “Like Michael Myers.”

Chloe frowned. It wasn’t her fault Tori and Liz were oblivious to someone walking into their room. “Well, maybe pay attention a little more and I won’t scare you.”

She scoffed and rolled her eyes as she opened and closed her hand, mocking. “Good God, girl, do you ever take that stick out of your ass? You must be soooooo fun at parties.” A snort, her nose wrinkling, as if the idea of Chloe at a party was amusing. “With that whole doom-and-gloom thing you’ve got going on. Really helps attract friends and partners, huh?”

It didn’t, but Chloe wasn’t about to admit that out loud and ignored the jab that cut too deep into her tender insides. “But, Liz, the point is for our files to look as normal as possible. We all know the truth, but it’s safer here. Less people poking around.”

“So if he’s diagnosed with schizophrenia, he has delusions. Or at least that’s what the adults think.” Chloe glanced at Tori. She and Simon hardly ever spoke about their one-year-older brother, Derek, so he was one big enigma and mystery for everyone in Lyle House. What was the last Bae sibling like? Smart and clever like Simon or smooth and silver-tongued like Tori? Something else entirely, maybe. And it didn’t help the last new patient was probably Chloe, two years ago, with half siblings Tori and Simon being the oldest.

“What is he?” she asked finally.

Tori pursed her mouth, her jaw working, as she pulled at some lose threads on the long sleeve of her thrifted sweater. Then, muttered, looking uncomfortable, “We…really aren’t sure.” Then she twisted her mouth, a tell of hers that Chloe doubted anyone else ever noticed, but it meant she was lying.

Maybe he was something dangerous, the way Chloe skirted around telling other supernaturals what, exactly, she was. Maybe he was human with knowledge into their world. Or maybe he was something no one had ever seen.

Chloe clenched her jaw for a brief moment before relaxing forcibly, letting the flash of irritation that swept over her drip off her back like water on a duck’s feathers, cascading. Whatever the case was, she’d just have to see him face-to-face and figure it out herself. She didn’t care that Tori lied—that was a common occurrence—but it prickled at the back of her head, wedged itself under her skin.

But figuring out what he was would probably be challenging, considering she hadn’t had a lot of chances to socialize—she’d been admitted into the group home for “disturbed youths” for two years now, and before that, she’d been isolated from both other werewolves and anything else supernatural.

A slideshow of gruesome images filled her thoughts for a few moments, intricate sketches in ancient textbooks online, documentaries with firsthand eye witness sketches, all manner of ghoul, goblin, and monster out there. Derek could be anything. Her stomach summersaulted, and her throat shrank to the size of a thumbtack.

Swallowing hard to alleviate the parched throat, she said with a nod at the manila folder Liz clutched, “You do realize you’re going to have to take that back before Dr. Gil or anyone else notices it’s gone, right?”

The way Liz turned pale told Chloe the answer. Almost as much as the horrified, awestruck whisper of, “Crap, you’re right.”

As Liz rambled to herself about a hastily strewn together plan to avoid all the nurses and doctors while Tori interjected her own ideas, Chloe stood there and debated offering her help, then decided against it. This was Liz’s problem, not Chloe’s.

Her stomach rumbled painfully, telling her she needed a snack before dinner, so she turned on her heel and headed for the girls’ stairs, the sounds of frantic track covering fading away when she reached the bottom.

She started in the direction of the swinging kitchen door, the revolving kind you’d find in a movie theatre kitchen, but a voice calling out stopped her.

“Chloe!”

Glancing up, she saw Simon, Tori’s half brother, jogging his way down the mirrored boys’s stairs and waited for him with her arms folded over her chest. As she did, she examined him, took in the exertion-flushed cheeks and the sweat dampening his overgrown roots. No doubt he’d been outside playing basketball, his second passion next to being a comic artist. He certainly had the skills to do it, if he wanted.

“A little bird told me Derek’s finally made his way here,” she said and watched his bright smile fade. She hated being the one to dampen his good mood, considering the state of their pathetic little lives.

With the addition of supposed brainiac Derek, she imagined their goal hadn’t veered off course one bit: finding their dad, who’d vanished. If Derek was even half as brilliant as Simon said he was, it was only a matter of time before they came up with an escape plan and vanished into the wind.

“Does this little birdie happen to have a love of moody goth girls named Tori?” he asked with a small smile that didn’t reach the rest of his face or his eyes.

She didn’t even bother to answer the asinine question.

“Simon?” asked a voice like thunder.

They both turned, and Chloe was shocked mute. The boy descending the stairs looked nothing like she’d imagined, and when she pictured him, it’d been someone slender and lithe like Simon and Tori, lean, not…big. Really big. Really, really big. He had to be close to six foot, if not way over that, and if the way the sleeves of his sweatshirt clung to his biceps and solid belly like something out of a fantasy, muscular, too.

He was the polar opposite of Simon and Tori in every way imaginable—white, tall, broad, a hulking kind of guy that drew attention whether it was wanted or not.

A flash of heat warmed her face when she met his eyes only to find him him watching her back, staring straight at her. There was something about the way he held himself, or maybe the set of his jaw, that seemed to challenge her. Said, go one, judge me. You aren’t the first and you won’t be the last. Like he was used to people deciding what type of person he was on first appearance.

“Who’s that?” he asked Simon.

As she opened her mouth to introduce herself, he reached the bottom of the stairs and stumbled, which wouldn’t have been a problem if he didn’t lose his balance. He teetered for a second, reached out to grab the railing, missed, and pitched forward…straight into Chloe.

I’m so glad I’m a werewolf, was all she could think, imagining Derek squishing her into a Chloe-shaped pancake like an old re-run of Tom and Jerry had she been anyone else.

The press of his body was overwhelming and heavy, a solid force knocking her back a step or two, but it was easy to reach out and steady him, her hands on his chest, feeling his heart pounding beneath the fabric and the heat of his skin. How ridiculously distracting.

She glanced up at his face after she righted him without even a grunt of strain, and he stared right back at her with confused green eyes, the prettiest shade she’d ever seen on anyone. They appeared even more vibrant against his acne-pocketed face and oily black hair.

Buzzing filled her ears for a moment or two, and it was Simon’s voice that dragged her back into reality and her original mission to get snacks.

“This is Chloe,” Simon said just as her stomach cramped, and she started to back away. He caught her shoulder as she made to turn away and she swallowed down a groan, polite to the end. If there was one thing that her parents instilled in her, it was politeness.

A few heartbeats before he added, as if to help Chloe’s case, “She’s like us.”

Derek glanced around and then, after a moment, lowered his voice. Now it sounded like distant thunder. “A Super?”

“We prefer Paranormal-Americans,” she muttered, getting more and more annoyed at being sidetracked on her belly-filling quest, and Simon snorted into his hand.“Simon—”

Movement out of the corner of Chloe’s eye had her turning her head, spotting Rae coming out of the rec room. Then she caught sight of Derek, surprise flitting across her face, and she shot Chloe a look that screamed girl-what-the-hell? Chloe shook her head, gestured with a nod of her head to where Simon gripped her shoulder, and shrugged.

Rae shook off the shock, approached, and flashed a perky smile at Derek that he didn’t return.“You must be Derek, Simon and Tori the Terror’s brother. I’m Rae.”

Simon laughed at the nickname.

Anyone who met Tori knew how volatile and spiteful she could be. It only took Chloe two weeks to realize how hot-and-cold Tori ran, and more often than not, she usually steered clear unless necessary.

Unfortunately, that didn’t mean Tori didn’t butt in as much as humanely possible. Like right now, for example—the sounds of loud, dramatic gagging and fake vomiting pulled Chloe’s attention from her friend to the girls’ stairs, Tori standing at the top in heavy-duty platform boots. She stomped her way down the steps, each footfall reverberating through Chloe’s teeth and bones, thunderously loud, but that was Tori in a nutshell.

“Oh, Derek.” She sniffed disdainfully. “I see you’ve met the riffraff,” she called down as she came to a stop one step from the main floor.

Derek, unfazed in the slightest, simply snorted. “Pot meet kettle.”

“Hey!” Tori yelled, scandalized.

Rae ran her hand through her braids, her face pinched.

As far as Chloe could tell, they’d never gotten along since Rae showed up a few months after Chloe’s admittance. She couldn’t tell figure what the issue was, but it was tiring to listen and watch them fight, trading biting remarks and cutting comments like a crueler version of ‘Who’s Line Is It Anyway?’ Who had all that energy to trade verbal blows all the time? Those two, apparently.

Rae snorted a laugh and shook her head in a mocking manner. “Why don’t you lay off, Tori? Would it kill you to be a decent human being for once in your miserable life?”

Tori cursed and started in on Rae.

Simon turned away to try to mediate the fight and let go of Chloe’s shoulder. Seizing the opportunity to sneak away, she backed up as the insults being traded grew harsher and crueler and louder. The door was cold underneath her fingertips as she pushed into the kitchen and beelined for the pantry.

As she closed her hand around a sleeve of graham crackers, she heard the heavy rumble of Derek’s voice above the cacophony of arguing.

Welcome to the nut house, she thought, turned, and padded back to her room with her prize in hand, though her stomach wasn’t grumbling anymore.

⸻ • • • ⸻

Because she snuck a snack before dinner, Miss Talbot stuck Chloe on peeling duty, a cruel and unusual punishment via pure boredom. Her fingers had long since grown numb from the cold of the carrots when the back of her neck prickled and every hair stood on end. In the back of her mind, she felt her wolf, hackles raised, bracing for danger.

Brandishing the peeler as if it were a decent weapon, she watched Derek back away, hands raised, expression blank. Those keen, see-through-you eyes watched her with unnerving intensity, and her grip was sweaty and sticky, heart galloping somewhere behind her ribcage until her body pulsed with every beat.

His gaze slid away from hers to the bowl on the counter, expression unreadable, but she heard the question clear-as-day.

“Punishment,” she croaked when she found her voice, then cleared her throat of its squeaky rasp.

He attention swung back to her, but he didn’t say anything else. She couldn’t think of anything either, so she stayed quiet, turned back to the bowl and started again. Her hands trembled slightly as she focused on peeling the outer skin and not her fingers, gripping with more focus and strength than was probably called for. It was certainly less nerve-wracking than looking into Derek’s intense, hard eyes.

Her scalp prickled with the awareness that came from being watched, and her mind raced. Didn’t he have a plan to concoct with his siblings? Or a room to get settled into? Preferably away from her, not unsettling her, making her uneasy and acutely aware of herself.

As she reached for the last of the carrots, she felt him standing there, watching her. The peeler in her hand wobbled traitorously as she stared hard at her work, each stroke leaving behind a thin, curling shaving.

Her heartbeat hammered in the hollow of her throat as she shifted her weight, the only sound between them the glide of the peeler as it cut through skin and the faint rattling that came from the A/C.

As she stood there, she realized she could smell him—Axe body spray and a lingering scent of decay, like old leaves—and it saturated every inhale. Her cheeks heated, and that same heat crept up the back of her neck.

“Do you need something?” she asked finally when she got to the last carrot, the words punched out breathless and too aggressive thanks to a lack of air in her lungs. But she wasn’t going to backtrack; she needed him out, away from her.

Her pulse rushed in her ears as she turned and caught sight of him walking away. She could only stare at his rude, retreating back for a minute, throat tight and gridlocked, heat behind her eyes and burning her sinuses. The door swishing quietly in the silence was the only indication he’d been in the kitchen at all.

“Oh, harassing Chloe already? You sure didn’t waste any time,” Tori drawled as she passed Derek, that lip of hers curled in the signature sneer that seemed to be permanent. “Talbot sent me to make sure you’re finished with the carrots.” She paused as she approached, her quick gaze flicking over Chloe’s expression. What she saw, Chloe couldn’t tell, but it wasn’t enough to make a comment; instead she snagged a carrot and popped it into her mouth, chewing, still just watching.

“I’m gonna go shower,” Chloe muttered and turned away, having enough of people just staring at her. She already knew Tori had little to no manners, but Derek was an entire stranger, and she wasn’t a circus attraction.

There was no response as she made her way to the revolving door, and even on the way upstairs, she didn’t encounter a single soul. That was just as well; she didn’t want to offend anyone’s delicate sensibilities with the werewolf-heightened puberty smackdown—Tori’s accurate but brutal description, not Chloe’s.

Still, she couldn’t stop herself from glancing down the empty hallway as she stepped into the bathroom, towel draped over her arm, shower caddy in the other.

Chapter Text

A steady, torrential stream of cold, dripping water snaked Chloe’s back as she towel-dried her hair on the walk back to the room she shared with Rae. Thankfully, her shower was peaceful, save some heated argument between Liz and Miss Van Dop, who everyone hated because she was such a hard ass.

The same couldn’t be said for dinner. That was served with a side of hysterics in the form of a meltdown of epic proportions. It started the way it usually did—Tori made a snide, unnecessary comment just because she could and wanted to. Only it was Derek, not Rae, she directed venom at, who’d only stared back at her blankly, eyes hard and unfeeling, unfazed. Chloe’d seen a lot of things sharing a house with Tori but a meltdown that included throwing food at everyone and screaming at the top of her lungs because she didn’t get a reaction? Yeah, that was a lot, even for her.

Chloe, who didn’t even do anything, wasn’t spared from her violent wrath. In an instant, her eyes burned from the skim milk Tori’d thrown at her and she was covered in chunks of white meat chicken and brown rice and low-fat cheese, her jeans and T-shirt equally damp and equally clingy.

Tori’s meltdown, while semi-entertaining, ended up attracting the nurses’ attention, which meant she was going to be force-fed her pills. But while that went down, complete with the screaming and flailing Chloe expected, she looked at Derek from beneath her straight bangs. He paused mid-bite to meet her stare for a moment, eyes so green they looked like sunlit leaves in summer, then tugged his plate closer, shoveling more food. Jesus, no one’s going to take it away, she thought and pushed to her feet, taking advantage of the cacophony to sneak up to her room. Her jeans abraded her thighs and her T-shirt picked at her skin, itching and uncomfortable.

As she briskly walked down the corridor to go scrub herself clean of cheese and rice granules, she heard Derek’s mistakable rumble.

Back in their room, Rae ranted while she sat on her bed, moisturizing her long braids. “One night, that’s all I want, and what does she do?” she muttered, hands moving so fast and fervently that Chloe winced. It must’ve not hurt, though, because Rae barely reacted or flinched as she worked oil and leave-in into her hair like second nature. “She makes a big stink that, literally, didn’t need to happen. She just can’t help herself, I guess. Even when it’s her actual family.”

Still worked up, Rae’s hands were a blur as she situated her hair into what Chloe now knew as a ‘pineapple’ and efficiently tied her bonnet around it. She was deft with it, and turned away to moisturize her legs and arms, a night ritual that always made her skin glowy.

To be honest, Chloe didn’t care all that much about Tori and whatever drama trailed her like a string of bodies. She usually left Chloe alone, which was fine. Tori’s crazy was the last thing she wanted—or needed.

But Rae was her friend, ranting and stressed, so she couldn’t not say anything, so she made a loud noncommittal noise and prayed she dropped the subject or moved onto to something else. This was Rae, though, so she couldn’t just drop the subject or move on until she’d talked extensively and exhaustedly about whatever was bothering her.

“I mean,” she griped as she pumped body oil gel into her light palms, rubbed them together, and started lathering her dark skin, “doesn’t she get tired? I mean, of being such a—” She bit off the word and sighed, shoulders slumping. “She’s horrible to everyone, and I don’t understand it. I’ve never done anything to her, and neither has anyone else here. I did meet her mom.” A heartbeat. “It was only once, though.” Another pause, longer this time, before she said, “But it was enough to understand a little why she’s such a terror.”

Chloe perked up at that. Her dad and aunt traded off once-every-three-months visits, but she’d never seen or met Tori’s mom. Only Simon, who refused to say anything and would only remark how it wasn’t his place to tell. Not that she blamed him; the world didn’t need to know about Chloe’s home life either and especially not via gossip.

“What was she like?” she asked before she could think better, heartbeat in her ears, anticipation needling through her. Her hands prickled with it.

Rae’s hands slowed across her knees and her mouth thinned, her two-toned lips disappearing for a moment. Her gaze shuttered. “If that was my mom, I’d be a complete menace too, I guess.”

Her voice was low and quiet, and goosebumps prickled up and down Chloe’s bare arms. The back of her neck, the back of her skull, tingled at the words. If Tori was a pale copy of her mother…She twitched a shudder at the thought of someone far worse than Tori, an adult with wealth and power and influence at her beck-n-call.

Rae groaned. “But we haven’t done anything to her to warrant that kind of treatment.”

True, but trauma made a lot of people unwell. Not that Chloe was going to say that out loud; it’d sound like an excuse for Tori’s abhorrent behavior, her classism and snotty rich-kid attitude, dismissive. The last thing she wanted was to sound permissive or to be accused of playing the Devil’s Advocate for Tori, of all people.

“And she had the gall to be all catty about Derek. Maybe she’s one of those sisters,” Rae mused absently as she finished her legs and moved onto her arms and chest. Her legs shimmered in the low, orange light of the desk lamp, and the sweet aroma of coco butter filled the room, perfuming every inhale. There were worse things to smell, Chloe knew.

“One of those…?” Chloe echoed, even though she already knew.

“The overly invest sibling who gets jealous at the idea of anyone being into their sibling?” Rae squeezed more body oil out of the container and rubbed at her arms. “Yeah.”

Sure, Tori was pretty awful, but that? It felt a little much. “That’s a little mean.”

“And she’s a little mean,” was the rebuttal. “All she does is comment on my hair or my clothes or my weight or my boobs or something. Maybe she’s jealous of me. Jealous that, even at a lower income bracket, I’m still better dressed than her and can pull off any hair style. She can’t stand how I come out on top every time.” She flicked her hair.

It…kind of made sense, though. Tori had proudly boasted about being the most popular girl in school—before Lyle House, of course—so her losing her status and all her admirers must’ve been crushing. And here was Rae, beautiful and thriving no matter what life threw at her, and Tori just couldn’t stand it. Rae was poor and Black; she shouldn’t be thriving, and if Tori couldn’t have her cake and eat, neither could Rae. Crabs in a bucket mentality and all that. Chloe’d seen it play out plenty of times at all the private schools she’d attended, both boys and girls alike.

“But forget about her.” Rae set down her body oil and unscrewed her body balm, thumbing out a glob and rubbing it until it melted between her fingers then she started on her legs again. “What did you think about Derek?”

Intense. That was one way to describe his laser focus that made her hands shake. “He’s…not what I expected,” Chloe settled on as she turned down her covers and sat down. “I mean, I expected someone…a little more like them.”

“You mean Korean?”

Heat filled Chloe’s cheeks at the matter of factness. That hadn’t even crossed her mind. “I don’t know. Maybe? I didn’t expected—well, all that.”

“All that?” Rae mocked with a giggle-snort as she wiggled her brows suggestively, moving onto her arms now that her legs were done. “Pray tell, Chloe, what do you mean by ‘all that?’”

There was no mistaking the low, innuendo-laden tone for anything else. And the expectant, canary-fed cat smile stretching across her face.

“I mean, that boy’s giving an NFL linebacker a run for their money. What did they feed him? Nuclear waste? Missiles like he’s Mothra? And he’s a…” Chloe paused, searching for the right words to describe the overwhelmingly sharp presence of Derek. Her stomach twisted. “…a lot.”

Rae stopped rubbing her body butter into her skin and looked at Chloe sharply. “In a bad way?” Her voice was tight, and a thundercloud, angry look pinched her face. “Did he—did he hurt you? I mean—”

Chloe’s heart skipped in her chest, a heavy thud that she felt in her belly, and her pulse rushed in her ears a little. Ba-dump went her heart, galloping in her chest. “Oh! No, no.” Chloe shook her head. “He’s very intense, but he was like that with everyone. I think that’s just him, though.”

“He seemed pretty cozy with Simon,” Rae argued even as she slumped back, her expression no longer thunderous but pinched still. “I mean, maybe it’s cause that’s his brother.”

“He didn’t seem even remotely close to Tori.” Even as the words escaped, Chloe heard how ridiculous they sounded, and they shared a glance. No one, save Liz, was close to Tori. Everyone else got shredded by her claws and teeth.

“Anyway, I have a class with him. He’s in the college level placements for math and science, like me.” Rae’s ability to understand such complex formulas and equations was enviable, especially to Chloe who barely scraped past tenth grade math by the skin of her teeth. “So he’s smart. Like, really, really smart.”

“Like you,” Chloe said, flashing a smile. Rae was probably the smartest person she’d ever met. “So he’s a genius but he’s…here. With Simon and Tori. I wonder what he did…?”

Rae was quiet for a moment or two as she finished lathering her body balm and screwed the lid back on with the end of her pajama top. Then, “I could get his file.” She shrugged a shoulder when Chloe looked at her. “I mean, the incident report of why he was brought in.” She stood from her vanity and turned down her covers, sliding underneath and facing Chloe.

The idea was tempting, Chloe admitted. Really, really tempting. But that was a breach of his privacy, and she wasn’t about to do that to him. She wasn’t Liz.

“No. That’s okay. Thanks, though.”

She shrugged and snuggled deeper under her blankets, eyes already falling shut. In a few minutes, she’d be conked out, a trait Chloe envied, since it always took her hours to fall asleep. “Turn off the light, yeah? Please. Since you’re over that way.” Her eyes slid shut all the way, and any tension in her melted.

When she was quiet and still for several minutes, Chloe climbed to her feet and padded barefoot to the light switch beside the door. As she crossed the room, she thought she caught a lingering whiff of chicken casserole, but she shook her head and told herself it was just her imagination. Rae would’ve told her if she still smelled like dinner.

Ignoring the chill of the A/C that pebbled and tightened her skin, she flicked off the light and plunged the room into darkness. Her eyes, heightened compared to a human’s, still adjusted in a moment, and it was easy to walk back to her bed and climb in, luxuriating in the feel of cool sheets across her skin and the way the mattress softened under her weight.

Somewhere down the hall, someone’s snore carried down the way to her, lulling her to sleep as well as any white noise.

She closed her eyes.

Chapter Text

After that first day, it felt like all Chloe did was run into Derek again and again—in the corridor on the way to mandatory individual therapy sessions, in the kitchen when she tried to grab a snack, in the rec room when she wanted the TV to watch a movie. Every where she turned, he was there, bumping into her, running into her, their paths intersecting and crossing again.

Though not today.

Today, he was going out, a visit. While Chloe’s were once every three months, there wasn’t a limit to how many visits one could have, so three times a week, she barely saw Simon, Tori, and Derek save for when they returned or when they were leaving. Their missing father’s friend, Carson, picked them up.

Rubbing sleep from her eyes as she descended the stairs, she caught a snippet of conversation in an offshoot from the foyer—Derek’s voice, couple with an adult man’s. All the staff here were women, so it must’ve been Carson, she deduced.

The stairs barely creaked under her feet as she stopped in her tracks, straining to listen. Eavesdropping was wrong but she just couldn’t help herself; she was a little curious as to the topic at hand. Then she got her answer.

“I was wondering,” Derek said, his voice tight, “if you’d heard, well, anything. About Dad. If you’ve heard from him or if there’d been reports of—”

A long silence, then an even longer, drawn-out sigh. “You know I’d tell you three the minute I found anything. He hasn’t contacted me…or anyone else, as far as I’m aware. But don’t worry.” Carson’s nasal voice brightened considerably, but it felt forced, like a frightened adult trying their best to comfort an equally frightened child. “Kit’s clever—a lot more clever than even the three of you guys combined. He’s brilliant, so I’m sure he’s just keeping a low profile. The Edison Group’s been poking around, going through…ah, well, you know.”

What was the Edison Group? It didn’t ring any bells, but maybe it was one of those supernatural things she didn’t know about. There were a lot of gaps in her knowledge, thanks to her very human father and aunt, who still couldn’t grasp the intricacies of the delicate supernatural world.

Derek was quiet for so long, Chloe thought maybe he’d left and she just didn’t notice.

“I know,” he muttered finally.

Sensing the conversation was coming to a close, she slowly made her way down the rest of the stairs, schooling her expression so they didn’t suspect she’d heard everything.

So Kit hadn’t been found, and no one had seen hide or tail of him since he vanished without a trace. Not even his children knew where he was, and people were out there, looking for him.

But why? Why did he disappear so abruptly? Why would he leave his children behind? And why wasn’t anyone able to reach him, even allies?

She ran her hands through her hair and shook her head, forcing the thousands of answerless questions out. This wasn’t her problem; this was theirs. All she wanted was to continue her life, living under the radar, visited once every three months by the only family she had left. What a fulfilling, happy life. Not. But it was safe, and that was the most important thing to her.

A quick peek at her watch told her it was about lunch time, so she started for the kitchen, footfalls whispering across the floor. On the first floor were unused classrooms—extras, Miss Talbot had explained when Chloe asked about them when she first arrived, in case they needed them—and it was as she walked passed one that the door opened.

Surprise shot through her like a flashbang, sending her scrabbling back for a split second, lip curled, wolf going into attack mode, until she realized it was just Derek and Carson, not a threat. Heat suffused her face, no doubt clashing with her freckles and red-blonde hair, but she simply straightened and gave an awkward wave.

She’d just pretend that didn’t happen and, hopefully, they followed suit.

“Oh, hello, young lady. You must be Chloe, since I’ve yet to meet you.” Carson’s smile plumped his doughy cheeks which sported two twin spots of red like a cherub. He looked more akin to a Santa Claus caricature then a sorcerer, but then again, Chloe got mistaken for a middle schooler all the time, since she was short and built like a rectangle, so who was she to judge?

White, paunchy, with a crown of thinning brown hair, he looked like he belonged in a lecture hall, the bumbling professor that everyone loved. Except his eyes were a little piercing, like he could see all the things she hid. That gaze cut her down to the bone marrow.

“Nice to meet you, Carson,” she said with her own smile and took his outstretched hand, mindful as always of her supernatural strength, her grip sure and firm the way her dad showed her.

A flicker of something crossed Carson’s face, too fast for her to decipher or get a good enough look, but his scent spiked with fear. And he snatched his hand away, nostrils flaring, face paling.

Her stomach sank with dread at his reaction, but she knew why. He knew what she was, though she couldn’t tell how he figured it out with only a handshake. On the outside, she looked like your average baby-faced fifteen-year-old blonde, white girl. No one suspected a single thing. Who would believe that she could be a monster in human skin?

Him, apparently.

She dragged her attention from him to Derek, meeting his gaze while she ignored the discomforting squirm in her belly. And the way shame needled red-hot through her veins, burned the back of her neck like fire. The two sensations were old friends, familiar.

“It’s almost lunch time,” she mumbled, then turned away and forced herself to walk slow. The last thing she needed was to show how much Carson’s reaction wedged under her skin, reminding her that no matter what she did or how she looked, she’d always be a monster. Always.

As she pushed open the swinging kitchen door, she heard Carson’s voice. Her heart hammered and her pulse throbbed in her ears as her stomach lurched, ice replacing blood in her veins.

“Watch her.”

Derek sounded incredulous, confused even, like he misheard Carson. “What?”

“Watch. Her.” A pause. “That one’s trouble, and that’s the last thing you or your siblings need right now.”

Clenching her jaw at the sting of his words, she shoved open the door and stepped into the kitchen. She hated being seen as dangerous, like a monster. Carson was just like everyone else, then. And Derek, no doubt, would take Carson’s advice over lived experience with Chloe. Some things never change.

⸻ • • • ⸻

The rest of the day passed the way it always did—a blur of mind-numbing schooling material until three P.M., then free reign for three hours before dinner.

Chloe liked to spend her time watching movies on the TV, a pillow cradled to her chest, bundled underneath a weighted blanket that always put her to sleep.

But when she stepped into the room, she caught off guard by the fact she wasn’t alone. This was her place, where she could pretend she was just a normal teenage girl, forget everything for a few hours, immersed into characters and story arcs that took her far, far away.

But, of course, Derek had to encroach here, too. Even though he was in the corner of the room, sitting quietly at the desktop computer, staring intently at the glowing screen, she just wanted him to leave. Wanted her little slice of heaven back. As he typed, he leaned his face so close to the screen that his nose almost touched the surface.

What on Earth could he be so invested in that he’d put his face almost to the glass? It couldn’t be that interesting, but she was curious. So she padded over on silent feet and read over his shoulder, squinting at the tiny text. Half of the list of articles had already been visited, their links purple.

‘…DEAD JANITOR AT CABAL ACADEMY…’

She glanced over at him. Was that what sent him here—seeing a dead man? Her mind started whirring, bouncing from idea to idea, until it settled, finally, on necromancer. Not much was known of them, only that there were a handful left in the super world, but they were considered some of the most dangerous of the super kind. Images of armies of the undead filled her thoughts, and for a second, she couldn’t suck in enough air. Her vision swam.

Then she rasped, “Here.” She cleared her throat.

He looked over at her as she leaned closer.

“May I?” She pointed to the screen and waited patiently for consent, skin prickling under his intense scrutiny. Maybe this was a mistake. Maybe he didn’t want help. Or, at least, help from her.

Then he nodded, and she leaned down, dragging the cursor to the search bar, clicking, and typing the word that might answer any questions he had.

When she peeked at him, she was surprised to find him staring at her instead of at the word she’d typed, and heat burned her cheeks. He was probably staring because she’d butted into his private research, highjacked it.

Discreet as she could be, she ran her hands through her hair and pulled it back into a ponytail, angling her nose close to her underarms. No body odor, so she wasn’t offending his nose.

Maybe he just had a staring issue. Maybe he didn’t like her and didn’t appreciate her efforts to help. Maybe he hated not being the knowledgeable one. Who knew. She sure didn’t, and she didn’t have any plans to unearth what his problem with her was.

Satisfied with her work, she nodded and backed up, turned, and headed out of the rec room to go bother Rae, who was just returning from her individual therapy session.

⸻ • • • ⸻

Dinner, just like the previous night, was served at six P.M., consisting of homemade mashed potatoes, thick brown gravy, meatloaf and green beans from the can. Though a lot of the food was bland and healthy, this was undoubtedly Chloe’s favorite meal, and she often put away at least two plates every time they made it.

She took a sip of her skim milk to wash down the current bite of meatloaf and grimaced at the taste. She missed two percent, or, hell, even whole milk. Who cared if skim was healthier? And dessert was a joke—sherbet. Sherbet. Like they were old people in a nursing home. What she wouldn’t do for some actual ice cream or Oreos.

Patting her mouth free of the milk mustache, she examined the table. Rae and Tori were at it again, trading insults and blows like combatants; Liz was pestering Peter about what he was playing on his Gameboy; and Simon sketched while he ate absentmindedly. Only Derek seemed focused on dinner but that was probably because he ate enough to feed a village. She thought she ate a lot, but he put even her werewolf appetite to shame.

“Pill Princess, I know you aren’t talking about clothes,” Rae sneered as her lip curled, her gaze dragging down Tori’s body like a physical caress, lingering at the ruined state of Tori’s designer clothes. The only reason Chloe knew they were designer was because Tori boasted about their origin relentlessly when she first got them.

“Pill Princes!? Oh, you trashy—”

Tension bloomed behind Chloe’s eyes, an oncoming headache, and she set down her glass. Wet her lips. “Can we just have a quiet dinner? Please? Just once.”

Tori turned her venom onto Chloe, head snapping. “Oh, I’m sorry. Was I interrupting your meal? Here, have yet another piece of meatloaf. God knows you need it.” Her eyes dipped, and Chloe ignored the urge to cover up her damn-near nonexistent chest. If there was one thing Tori was good at, it was stabbing soft insecurities with alarming, terrifying accuracy. Maybe she was part bloodhound and could sniff them out.

Chloe lifted her chin regardless.

“You know what?” Simon added as he lifted his gaze from his sketchbook. “I agree with Chloe. It would be nice to have a nice, quiet dinner for once.” He flashed her that boyish smile that had girls and boys alike tripping over themselves before Lyle House, and her cheeks burned. She could stand up for herself, but it was nice having someone cover her—

Tori snorted, the sound cruel and dry, as she circled her finger across the lip of her glass. “Oh, mind your own business for once, Simon. Butt out! Here comes the White Knight to save the poor damsel Chloe from the big mean Tori.” Then, before anyone had time to blink, she threw her drink into Simon’s face, a splash of sweet tea soaking him and his T-shirt in a second flat.

Chloe couldn’t stop herself. Anger flooded her—at Tori, for behaving this way; at the nurses, for not curbing it; at her parents, who let it slide, too—but most of all for the way she treated everyone else around her like they were disposable and her playthings.

“Does it ever get tiring?” she asked as Tori smirked and sat back in her chair, empty cup now on the table. The smirk faded a moment as Tori met her gaze and scoffed.

“Does what ever get tiring?”

“Being a bitch to everyone, including your brothers.” Chloe’s heartbeat thumped in her ears as the words escaped, her heart hammering in her ribcage. It felt like her entire body vibrated with every beat, but that barely registered. She was just tired of Tori treating everyone like shit and never having her energy matched. Hello, bitch. Meet energy match. “I mean, that’s probably the reason why the only person who can stand you is Liz and that’s because she’s so forgiving, even when you don’t deserve it.”

As soon as the words landed, Tori threw her head back and cackled, a sound that raised the hair on Chloe’s arms. Foreboding dread tightened her belly, a precursor to whatever nastiness Tori was about to unleash on everyone. Maybe she shouldn’t—“Oh, I know you aren’t talking about being a bitch. Better a bitch than a monster.”

Monster.

The word clanged through Chloe’s head like echoes of a bell, louder and louder, overlapping until it was the only she could hear. Tori’s sneer of it. And suddenly she was ten again, crying and wailing, scared and confused, because Mommy was lying really, really still and there was so much blood pooling under her, its smell—

Tori’s eyes narrowed and her smug smirk grew ten times the size, stretching from ear to ear. Chloe half expected to see a big fluffy white cat in her lap for all the cruelty. “I mean, you did break someone’s back. That’s why you’re here—because you’re dangerous.”

The room spun in a blur of cheery colors that were supposed to make the kids calm, her vision doubling, heartbeat ringing in her ears. Her stomach dropped as her heart galloped painfully in her chest, skipping a couple beats in abject disbelief. Heat burned behind her eyes and in her sinuses, impending tears that she clenched her jaw against.

She didn’t reply immediately and just stared down at her hands, twisted and white-knuckled in her lap.

Liz looked at Tori for a minute, her sun-browned face white with shock, mouth open, eyes rounded. Then she shook her head and pushed away from the table.

“Liz?” Tori’s brow crinkled.

“You’re a bad friend,” was all Liz murmured quietly before she walked calmly away, and Tori just stared in the direction Liz had gone, her expression inscrutable save the smallest tremor in her chin and the wobbling of her lip like she was on the verge of tears.

Chloe didn’t feel bad for her one bit. She was still reeling from the blow, head fuzzy, spots dancing and cartwheeling in her blurry vision. Her throat, dry as a bone, shrank to the diameter of a pipe cleaner, and she could barely suck in enough air. Her stomach churned, all of her dinner sitting like lead, and she tasted the acidic burn of stomach acid clawing its way up her throat. She swallowed hard.

Really, she shouldn’t be surprised at the lengths Tori would go. She was the type to go after a girl for imaginary flirting and key the car, teepee or egg her house, threaten her, bully her. That was Tori.

But all she’d wanted was a quiet dinner. That’s all.

She stared down at her half-eaten plate, no longer hungry, cramps rampaging through her twisting and writhing stomach. Her skin pebbled underneath the pitying stares that she ignored as she pushed to her feet, the chair scraping loud across the floor, and damn near fled.

⸻ • • • ⸻

Derek found her while she was doing laundry, something to take her mind off of Tori casually airing her inciting incident. If she wanted people to know, she would’ve told them herself. How did Tori know about that boy? She must’ve snuck her file. Probably got Liz to help her.

God, what a mess…

As she crammed her dirty clothes into the washer and reached for the two-in-one detergent-softener, she heard a deep voice behind her.

“Chloe?”

“Yeah?” she muttered as she measured the correct amount and poured it into the detergent tray then closed it. But she didn’t wheel to face him.

She didn’t—couldn’t—turn around and see the pity or, worse, the fear on his face. Tori hadn’t done anything but told the truth—Chloe had broken a boy’s back. But she’d been scared and trapped under him, and her instincts flared, and she hadn’t even considered her supernatural strength when she’d shoved him with all her might. A broken back for a would-be rapist? But no one else knew the details. She didn’t need their opinions on what they would’ve done different or what she should’ve done instead of injuring a boy for life.

The floor behind her creaked, and she knew he was shuffling closer, unsure of how to approach or if he even should. Smart boy.

She wasn’t in the mood to entertain bullshit, though, so she turned on her heel and leaned back against the machine, arms crossed over her chest. “Yes, I’m okay and yes, I know Tori shouldn’t have said that.” She chewed her cheek. “But it was the truth. I did break a boy’s back.”

Then she saw his expression, those eyes staring at her like she was some sad creature, and annoyance cut through her, a lance. This was what she hadn’t wanted, what she’d avoided at all costs. She didn’t crave this—the wounded dog glances, the walking on the eggshells, the wariness he was treating her with.

For a brief moment, she screwed her eyes shut so she didn’t have to look at his expression, see the way his view of her had changed. That he, just like everyone else, thought she was a beast.

“She shouldn’t have done that.”

She unscrewed her eyes.

“She’s pretty bad, but that was nasty work. Even for her. I don’t know what’s gotten into her. Are you…” He paused, hesitating, and she felt more than saw his gaze running over her, her skin pebbling everywhere his eyes looked. “…Are you okay? I know that—”

“I’m fine,” she said. “But please, don’t bother.”

He frowned at her. “Don’t bother?” he repeated.

“Yeah. This. The whole pity thing.” She shrugged a shoulder like it wasn’t a big deal. If Tori found out how much it hurt, there wasn’t a single doubt she’d use that to hurt Chloe even more. That was just how Tori operated—once she knew it hurts you, she’d do it again just because she knew it hurt you.

“Pity? You think I’m—I’m pitying you?” He snorted a low laugh then straightened from his slouch. She’d forgotten how tall he was, but now he towered over her by a few feet, which wasn’t all that difficult considering she was five foot even on a good day. “No. I’m just trying to be—I wanted to check up on you. Make sure you were good. Not because—not because I’m trying—”

“To be nice, right?” She scoffed and didn’t wait for an answer. “That’s what they all say. In the beginning, at least. And then it’s ‘so did you really break his back?’ and ‘what happened? Give me all the details!’ But that isn’t going to work on me again. Not this time.”

When she looked up from folding her arms over her chest, she saw his tight-jawed expression, the determined furrow of his heavy-set eyebrows.

“What? You don’t want the details? You don’t wanna know how or why I broke a boy’s back? Everybody else has hounded me for them. Why not you?” She rolled her eyes. “Just…leave me alone, okay?” A sigh dredged from the depths of her soul and escaped, all of the fight leaving her in one fell swoop. She slumped back against the washing machine and scrubbed at her eyes with the heels of her hands. God, she was just so tired. Tired of Tori. Tired of hiding. Just…tired. “Just…go, please? I don’t want to talk about it.”

In an instant, his expression—his eyes—were hard like stone, resolved. Like he’d made his decision and it was set in stone.

“Maybe that’s why Tori did what she did. I’m trying to be nice and you’re just a bitch about it,” he said, and something inside of Chloe shattered at the words. Something vital and re-enforced with steel and concrete collapsed into a million pieces. Anger flooded her as the words sliced into her tender insides, already raw and bruised from Tori’s unexpected betrayal, and she felt the anger rising, a tidal wave she couldn’t stop. She couldn’t say what her face looked like in that moment, only knew that Derek backed away, face bone-white, eyes rounded.

“You’re—” he started but stopped.

She pushed off the washing machine and padded slowly closer. Somewhere in the back of her mind, she felt her wolf tugging at her, ready to take control of her out-of-control body and make this boy pay. But this was hers.

“Go ahead. Say it. I dare you.”

His gaze darted all over her face, but he stayed quiet.

“Go on. Say it.” When he didn’t, she repeated it again and again until she was almost screaming. “Say it. Go on, Derek. Say it. I know you want to. Just—”

“You’re a fucking monster.”

And Chloe’s vision turned red with rage. A levy somewhere inside her gave way, and the floodgates opened, a torrent of feral rage rushing through like never before. Her head throbbed with the intensity of it.

What did this boy know about being a monster? Nothing. None of them did. Especially him. For as long as she could remember, she hated being a werewolf. Hated being seen as something feral and savage, a wary animal that’d be put down at moments’ notice because it bit the hand that fed it. Disposable.

One moment, he was across from her, shaking his head, speaking to her even though she couldn’t hear him over the roar of blood whooshing in her ears. The next, he was on the floor on his ass and lying very, very still, and she thought she might puke. He was so still and she was catapulted back to that day when she was ten, staring down at her mother—

“Derek?” she whispered, voice breaking. “Derek, are you okay? I’m—I’m sorry.” She wet her dry lips and tasted the hot, salty tears that coursed down her face that she hadn’t noticed. Every blink stung. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to—I didn’t—it was an accident.”

She sank to her knees and crawled to him, her legs too weak to support her weight right now, and hesitated on touching him. What if he didn’t stir? What if she killed him? Oh God, it was the Albany incident again, and she was going to puke right here all over the floor, and—

Derek vaulted the minute she touched his shoulder, scrabbling to his feet, and when she looked into his face, she saw the wide eyes, the panic he couldn’t mask, the fear he couldn’t conceal. He looked horrified, and she didn’t blame him one bit. What normal fifteen-year-old girl could sling a boy double her weight with little effort? And one that wasn’t an athlete to boot.

“Der—” she tried, eyes stinging and blurry with tears, but her voice failed her. She couldn’t speak, her throat was so crowded with panic and fear and shame and disbelief. That this happened. Again. That she’d hurt another boy just as bad.

“Don’t. Tori was right. Carson was right. You are a monster.” There was such fervor in his words, in his voice, that she looked up into his eyes and saw that he believed it. Her heart broke into pieces at the sight, and she struggled to suck in a lungful, wicked pain lancing through her and shredding her insides into ribbons. She half expected to see a puddle of her blood beneath where she knelt.

“Derek,” she rasped, and the sound of her voice was like a gunshot in the quiet, ricocheting. Derek shrank back, shook his head, then turned, disappearing out the door.

She stayed on her knees like that for a very long time, until she couldn’t feel her knees anymore. In fact, she was sure she couldn’t feel anything. At all. It was on pure muscle memory—instinct—that she pushed to her feet laboriously, her loud breathing echoing back at her like a cruel joke.

The image of Derek’s petrified face played behind her eyelids every time she blinked, an after image tattooed on the backs of her retinas that remained long after he’d left. His footfalls trembled the stairs, shaking the ceiling above her.

All she could do was stand there for a moment, hands shaking, staring at the open doorway he had only stepped through moments ago. How could this have gone to hell in a matter of minutes, seconds even? How could she have screwed up things that horribly that fast?

Adrenaline stilled pumped through her, mixing with the white-hot rage that had engulfed her, but now there was pain and regret. Pain from Derek’s cruel words, the way he’d fallen into the ‘everybody hates Chloe’ category so quickly. Regret because she didn’t want to hurt anyone. When she grabbed onto him, she’d only wanted to stop him from leaving, to get him to say it to her face when he refused. He’d gone there but was too cowardly to deal the killing blow.

A little whimper sounded somewhere, growing in volume until it was full-blown sobs, and it took her an embarrassingly long time to realize the sobs were her. That hot tears were coursing down her cheeks as the emotions threatened to topple her, her heart pulverized into dust.

Frustration tipped and had her punching the wall as hard as she could, shredding her knuckles and fingers and wrist on the ragged edges of dry wall. When she pulled her fist free, she examined the raw skin and thought it made her feel better. But only marginally.

Chapter Text

When Miss Talbot pulled Chloe aside the next day, she’d already braced herself for punishment. All night, she laid awake in her bed, listening to Rae mumble and murmur in her sleep, heart hammering, stomach twisting and turning. She knew she messed up. She knew that.

“You’re not to go anywhere near that boy. Is that understood?” Miss Talbot fairly growled, and, considering she was the nicest of the three nurses, it was more than a little disconcerting. “We all saw that bruise on his arm. That is unacceptable. Maybe your mother and father—”

“Don’t bring up my mother,” Chloe interrupted and then, seeing Miss Talbot’s murderous expression, added contritely, “But I’m sorry. It was an accident, and I’ll take any punishment you think is deserved.”

A single thought echoed on repeat in her head as Miss Talbot started in on a lecture she’d heard a thousands times: Oh, you’ve made a mess of things, Chloe. And she had—spectacularly, apparently.

Yesterday had been a mistake. One big, horrible mistake that she couldn’t reverse or backtrack, so she just had to suck it up and accept the consequences.

“Are you listening, young lady? Your father would be ashamed of your behavior! Absolutely appalling, it is. And, you know, it really isn’t appropriate behavior for a young girl such as yourself. I had a niece, you know, about your age…”

As if she gave a rat’s ass about what was and wasn’t “appropriate” girl behavior.

The relentless drone of Miss Talbot’s crisp, thick British accent faded to nothing as the father remark stuck. She agreed that her dad would be ashamed…if he was home long enough to remember that he had a daughter. Surely, the automatic withdrawals to pay for her room and board here was enough of a reminder, but even that wasn’t enough to convince Chloe he did, in fact, without those withdrawals, remember her.

The door behind Chloe opened with an ominous creak, and she let her eyes fall shut. Immediately, without turning, she knew it was him because every molecule in her body sprang to attention, straining. Some puppy dog part of her panted, whispering excitedly, he’s here! It’s Derek. God, was she pathetic.

“Miss Talbot?”

His voice washed over her like a balm, but it did nothing to soothe the sting left behind by Miss Talbot’s words. Or her own horror. She still didn’t turn to look at him, scared of what she might find in his expression—hatred. Of all the things she couldn’t stand, it was hate directed solely at her.

“Why don’t you go wait in the kitchen for me?” Miss Talbot suggested, and there was a drawn-out heartbeat of silence where Chloe thought he might argue. No doubt he wanted revenge for last night, and her stomach cramped at the idea. It was an accident, but that didn’t matter to anyone else; her explanation fell on deaf ears, considering her track record. And then, finally, Derek obeyed without another word, his heavy footfalls fading the further down the hall he walked.

Miss Talbot shot Chloe a venomous, stern look before she disappeared through the door, leaving Chloe standing in the empty classroom, accompanied by a maelstrom of chaotic, tangled thoughts she had no desire to sort through.

As much as she hated Miss Talbot’s speech, something about it rang true and struck a cord deep within her. True, she’d heard it all before, and it was amusing, but Miss Talbot wasn’t wrong. Because of her temper, another person was hurt. Because she couldn’t control herself, she lashed out. Like a wild animal…only the animal didn’t know better, and she definitely did.

“Hey, girl.”

She looked up to find Rae in the doorway, her small smile fading at whatever she saw on Chloe’s face. A peek at the clock told her it Rae just finished her English lessons for today.

“I saw Talbot and Derek. What’s wrong? Did—did something happen? Between you two, I mean.” Rae came closer, so close all Chloe could smell was eucalyptus shampoo and vanilla bean perfume.

She didn’t want to tell Rae—or anyone else for that matter—the truth, but Rae was her best friend. And she didn’t have anyone else to confide in, really. Her pickings were slim to none, especially given the way she’d gone off on Tori and Liz, well, she was a little too chatty for Chloe to feel comfortable enough to open up. Simon, while sweet, would’ve just blamed her, and Peter was human.

Her eyes fell shut for a moment, fighting to keep her composure. Heat flooded behind her closed eyelids, and her nose stung as she fought back angry, hot tears.

“Yeah,” she admitted finally, reluctant to the nth degree. This was the last thing she wanted to say, but it just needed to come out, and Rae was a safe person. “I…I screwed up.”

“How bad?” Rae whispered as she crept closer, eyes round. “It can’t possibly be that bad.” A hopeful smile curled her full, two-toned mouth but wilted at whatever expression Chloe made. Chloe wasn’t entirely sure what her face said currently.

“Bad. Like, I’ve been warned to steer clear of him, and if they catch me, I might be kicked out.” Chloe’s throat tightened to the point of pain as she spoke, each word scraping.

Rae’s face went blank in a flash, and she blinked hard. “Oh.”

“Yeah. Oh. So I screwed up. What else is new? That’s all I do, it feels.”

Rae laid a hand on Chloe’s arm, curling the other arm around her back. Though she wanted nothing more than to shove away from the hug, Rae’s touch was warm and gentle and comforting, and she just couldn’t. She needed this—needed physical comfort.

“Don’t be like that.” Her breath tickled Chloe’s ear as she chided her gently, as if sensing how close to crying she was. “I’m sure—I’m sure it’s all, uh, a misunderstanding. Yeah! That’s it.”

“I wouldn’t call grabbing him and throwing him across the laundry room in a fit of black-out rage a ‘misunderstanding,’ Rae. I was pissed, but that’s no an excuse. I don’t even remember grabbing him or making the decision to do it. One minute, he was—he was saying I was a—a—well, you know, but he wouldn’t actually say it to my face like some kind of coward, and the next he’s—he was—I must’ve grabbed him. Must’ve blacked out or something, because I. Don’t. Remember. I just remember seeing him on the floor…” She bit off the next words and let the unfinished thought hang between them, a heavy anvil threatening to crush them both.

And, in spite of her best efforts, teeth cutting into her lower lip as a distraction, a few tears welled up and trailed down her cheeks, dripping off her chin. It plopped between them, but then she couldn’t stop crying, sobbing loudly into Rae’s neck.

“It’ll be okay,” she whispered over and over, rubbing Chloe’s back in soothing, sweeping circles. “It’ll be okay. I promise.”

Chloe didn’t believe her in the slightest, but it was nice that she’d lie like that to make her feel better.

⸻ • • • ⸻ 

Simon found her on Monday night, four days after the incident, in the backyard pushing the wheelbarrow towards the dilapidated shed that looked like the perfect place for a ghost. Crickets chirped noisily in the ankle-length grass as the sun dipped behind the horizon line, sky a cascade of pinks and oranges and reds.

Sweat streamed down Chloe’s back as she maneuvered the singular wheel to the shed, grass tickling her bare ankles because she’d worn shorts. A light breeze pushed against her face, soothing, but her reprieve was short-lived.

“What did you do to my brother, Chloe?” Simon demanded as he stepped directly into her path, blocking her. His arms were folded over his chest, and his face was tight and shadowed with anger, his jaw tight. He looked pissed, and she really didn’t blame him, even though she knew, deep down, that it’d really been an accident.

Not that anyone listened when she said it, but still.

She wasn’t surprised that he cornered her; she was more surprised at the fact it took more than twenty-four hours to confront her.

“Nothing,” she said and watched his expression tighten more.

“Derek came up after he went to check up on you after dinner and when he came back…” A heartbeat of hesitation, his mouth twisting, before he continued. “…he looked really, really freaked out. And Derek’s hard to freak.”

“Why don’t you go ask him?” A mosquito buzzed in her ear, and she swatted at it, crushing it. Grimacing, she wiped its bodily fluids on the hem of her tank top.

“I saw Talbot take you aside this morning. And Dr. Gil warned both of us to stay away from you. Said you were dangerous, unstable. That there’d been…an incident. That’s what she called it. So, tell me.” His gaze, darkened from nighttime shadow and anger, met hers. “What did you do to my brother? Did you hurt him?”

Chloe clenched her jaw. So she was a menace to society now, a Godzilla-level threat that no one should seek out. A monster.

She glanced back at the lit-up windows of the house behind Simon’s back then dragged her gaze back to that pissed off expression he wore, the hardness in his eyes. The last thing she wanted—or needed—was to get into trouble, again, so soon after the incident with Derek.

“Then why are you talking to me?” she asked and grabbed the handles again. “Just stay away from me, Simon.” Before I hurt you too. “I don’t want anymore trouble than I’m already in. Leave me alone.”

But he was either very stupid or stubborn—both were equally responsible—because he simply flexed his jaw and narrowed his gaze. “Chl—”

Was he stupid or something? She’d said it as plain as she could, blunt even, and he was still here, so he must be stupid. Or stubborn. One of the two.

“I said LEAVE ME ALONE!” she bellowed, the words more wolf than human, and he backed away, eyes round with fear, sparks at his fingertips. Her yell scattered birds huddled on the tree branches above them.

Pain splintered through her entire body at the sight of Simon treating her no better than a rabid dog, and she wheeled, all but fleeing to the shed.

“Chloe!” he called, but she just kept walking like she didn’t hear him.

⸻ • • • ⸻  

As an apology for her shitty behavior, Tori reluctantly asked Chloe if there was anything she wanted from the outside world. Liz’s words—something about how nice Chloe’s hair would look with red highlights, how older it would make her—came back to her, so here she was, in her bra and underwear, reading the back of the box.

She squinted at the dye in the frosted plastic bottle, which boasted a cherry-red color, but to her, it just looked black. How bad could this turn out? It was just hair. And even if she did somehow screw it up, it’d just grow out or wash out.

Separating the sections she wanted dyed, she pulled on the too big poly gloves that had come in the kit, set a towel underneath her to catch drippings, and began, her hands trembling as she applied the dye. It was cold on her scalp and her skin pebbled, but she ignored it in favor of continuing, her tongue poking out in concentration.

She was struggling to reach the back of her hair when there was a knock at the door, brisk and loud and sharp.

“Can I see?” Liz asked, and Chloe knew she was bouncing on her feet because she saw Liz’s shadow shifting underneath the gap of the bathroom door, bobbing back and forth.

“I—”

“Please? Please? Please, please, pleaseplease—”

“Jesus!” Chloe groaned, then laughed because at least Liz didn’t hate her. “Fine, fine. I’m in my undies, though.” She kept the towel underneath her as she shuffled forward, painfully conscious of the dye running down her forehead and dribbling down the back of her neck.

“That’s fine. Not like I haven’t seen it before or have the same parts.”

Trust Liz to be so blasé about near nakedness; she actually had a figure.

Reluctantly unlocking the door and stepping aside, mindful to stay behind the door lest someone get an eyeful, Chloe allowed Liz to step inside and shut the door quickly behind her, flipping the lock. A big toothy grin split Liz’s face as she turned and surveyed the damage, cocking her head like it was an impossible equation to solve.

“It doesn’t look bad,” she said, taking a seat on the edge of the bathtub, long jean-clad legs stretched out and crossed at the ankles, her body weight supported by her palms behind her.

Chloe shuffled to the toilet and sat down on the lid, picking up the towel to wrap around her shoulders. She drew her knees to her chest and picked at her chipped blue pedicure absentmindedly, just for something to do, then rested her cheek on her knee, watching Liz.

Liz was still chatting. “I think it’ll take really well, since your hair’s pretty light to begin with, so you don’t have to worry about bleaching it or anything and burning your hair off. I did that once, you know, trying to to go blue, which is my favorite color, but instead I melted my hair off. Rocked a little Karen bob for a while after that.” She went quiet for a moment, plucking the box off the counter and turning it over in her palms. “She picked a good brand.”

Chloe didn’t say anything, largely because she didn’t know what to say and also because she didn’t want to.

“She didn’t mean all those things she said.” A heartbeat. “Tori, I mean. At dinner. She didn’t mean all those things.”

Chloe had never seen Liz without a smile, and it chilled her to the bone to see her with such a serious expression and steady, solemn eyes.

“Why not?” Chloe shrugged and picked at a cuticle, ripping it off. The sting distracted her from the tidal wave of rage and hurt that rose at the reminder of last night. “It’s just the truth.”

And it was. She had broken a boy’s back, though she supposed the circumstances that led up to the confrontation didn’t really matter. Everyone looked at her and saw someone dangerous, someone deadly, a rabid beast that’d stab you in the back the minute you turned away.

Her throat shrank to a pinprick, and she had to close her eyes for a minute against the prickle of heat behind her sockets. She sniffed.

“Well, sometimes it isn’t truth if it’s used to hurt you.” Liz’s smile was sad now, melancholy almost.

They lapsed into comfortable, companionable silence, Chloe picking at both her pedicure and cuticles, Liz staring intently at the box of hair dye in her hands.

Out of everyone, Liz was the one Chloe hardly interacted with. Not out of disdain or annoyance or anything, but because she was glued at the hip with Tori and her endless energy was a lot to handle. She usually didn’t have the bandwidth for it, but this? This was nice, just the two of them, sitting in quiet. It didn’t feel terse or awkward like she’d expect, but like they were both conscience of one another while doing their own things, like two introverts hanging out.

She was jolted from her reverie by her phone alarm, signaling the end of thirty minutes, and she climbed to her feet, Liz scooting down the length of the tub to give her space to wash her hair.

“Want help?”

“Sure.”

And so Liz washed Chloe’s hair, nails scratching gently and sending her into a stratosphere of pleasure, tension leaking out of her like a cut water balloon. She couldn’t remember the last time someone helped her like this, doing it just because they wanted, not to get something.

Water sluiced down Chloe’s face as she rinsed out the conditioner until Liz said, “It’s running clear,” and laid a towel across the back of Chloe’s head, backing away to allow Chloe to get to her feet and wrap her hair.

She squeezed excess water out, mindful to not rub the towel lest she want to look like a swamp creature, and sat back on the toilet while Liz brushed through her hair, chattering the entire time about how pretty and long it was and how her hair wouldn’t hold a curl to save its life.

Her hair was largely dry by the time Liz finished, and Chloe pulled on her discarded leggings and oversized T-shirt before she examined her reflection. It looked like her, only she had red stripes in her hair now, but it was a change, a start.

Liz beamed and pulled her into a bone-crushing hug, and Chloe stared at their reflection in the mirror.

At least one of them was happy.

Chapter Text

The grandfather clock downstairs struck three A.M. as Chloe bolted awake, chest heaving while her lungs burned, starved for air. Sweat streamed down her face, hot and stinging, as she sat there, heart hammering, blood rushing in her ears.

The room was dimly-lit, soft shadows cast from Rae’s desk lamp that had been left off, and she could see Rae fast asleep on her bed, her face soft, eyelids fluttering while she dreamed.

As she sat there, she became aware of a taste in her mouth—copper. Blood, hot and salty, coasted her teeth, but she poked around with her tongue and didn’t find any cuts. And then she realized her gums hurt as though teething, pulsing and throbbing with pain. In fact, it wasn’t just her gums but her entire body that ached, so acute tears brimmed in her eyes, intense enough to choke the breath from her lungs and pinch her throat closed. Her teeth rattled and clicked together, jaw sore. Cramps clenched and relaxed her belly, her abdominal muscles sore from shivering.

Her hands trembled violently as she sat there, breathing steadily and deeply, sweat running down the sides of her feverish face and streaming into her blurry eyes. It soaked her hair, dampened her pajamas, and even the tangled mess of bedsheets and comforter underneath her weak fingertips felt wet, too. She must’ve just bundled too heavily for tonight.

It felt like an eternity before her vision stopped swimming enough for her to fumble the covers back, her hand shaking so bad it took her several bumbling attempts until, finally, she was able to grasp the fabric and push it aside. Then she swung her legs over the side and froze, screwing her eyes shut, at the wave of dizziness that washed over her, her stomach flipping over, stomach acid crawling. She breathed through her nose in long, steady pulls until it passed and her churning stomach contents settled, then she gingerly climbed to her feet, ignoring the weakness in her knees that threatened to topple her.

Gingerly, she made her way to her dresser and struggled to open her drawer, her palm slippery with sweat, fingers weak. Finally, she grasped it and it slid out silently, the weak light aiding Chloe’s unfocused eyes in finding a clean tank, shorts, and underwear.

Her bundle cradled underneath her arm, she eased open the bedroom door and inhaled fresh, cool air, goosebumps pebbling up and down her sensitive skin as she shut the door behind her and beelined for the bathroom.

Around her, the house was still and quiet, shadows long and stretching across the floorboards that creaked slightly under her weight. Moonlight spilled in from the big window in the foyer, lighting the way, transforming everything it touched silver-white.

When she reached the bathroom, she locked the door behind her, set her bundle on the closed toilet lid, and examined her reflection. Her hair, dark with damp, clung to her sallow face, her eyes red-rimmed and glassy, a waxy sheen covering her skin. The blue of her veins seemed much more pronounced. She looked sickly, a shocking contrast from just a few days ago, but she’d felt fine until right now.

And then she coughed, lightheadedness had her swaying unsteadily, and then—

Her knees buckled, sending her toppling to the floor, but she caught herself on the counter, fingers scrabbling, knuckles white in attempt to stay upright. As she pulled herself upright, a spasm rippled down her arm then the muscles contracted like the world’s most painful Charlie Horse, punching the breath from her. She couldn’t even scream, let alone suck enough air to make any noise, as she clawed her way to her feet.

Then she saw that it wasn’t just her arm spasming; it was everywhere she looked, skin undulating and shifting, pain white-hot and relentless.

Chloe was a lot of things but stupid wasn’t one of them, and it only took her a few minutes to piece it together. She was experiencing the onslaught of the Change, her body prepping for the inevitable transformation into a wolf, and here she was, fighting to stay quiet, wrapping her arms around herself in some approximation of a hug to calm down. What she wouldn’t give for Lauren’s overbearingness, or even her dad’s cluelessness.

Tears brimmed and burned her eyes as she stripped off her sopping clothing, letting them fall to the floor with a soft wet thump, and fought with the faucet handles, fumbling to turn the water on. It sputtered, pipes rattling, but the water came gushing out, spilling into the basin of the tub, pounding the tile.

She focused on breathing steadily until her heartbeat quit pounding in her ears and she could think a little more clearly, then she adjusted the temperature to semi-hot. Stepped in and some of the tension in her shoulders eased at the sensation of water at her ankles, the heat soothing her aching feet. With the state she was in, it didn’t seem safe to plunge into an ice-cold shower.

The longer she stood, the weaker her knees felt so she just sat on her butt and washed herself thoroughly with a washcloth, her hand twitching and shaking the entire time. Each pass felt like heaven to her muscles and sticky skin, and she leaned into the spray of water, letting it soak her hair and sluice down her face.

By the time she climbed out, she felt fifty percent herself, but she still sat on the toilet, wrapped in an oversized towel, fighting to not doze off. Her head dipped, chin touching her chest, a few times as she moisturized slowly, taking time to massage and rub her sore arms and legs, everywhere that hurt where she could reach.

It was as she was pulling on her plain bikini panties and sliding her tank top over her head that someone knocked tentatively on the door, as if unsure.

Her eyes fell shut as she wet her dry lips and swallowed hard. “Yeah?” she managed when she remember words and that she could, in fact, speak, pulling the tank the rest of the way down.

“Sorry,” came the unmistakable rumble of a voice, and her stomach dipped painfully. Her heart skipped a few beats, and she felt woozy for a split second, though she wasn’t sure whether it was the lingering humidity, whatever sickness came with the Change, or just plain Derek himself. “I have to—wait. Chloe?”

“Uh-huh,” she mumbled as she pulled her thin shorts up her legs and squeezed water from the ends of her hair with her towel. A glance at her reflection in the mirror told her she still looked sick but not terminally ill anymore. If anyone saw her, they’d immediately know something was wrong, and that was the last thing she needed.

“You’re sick.” His voice was a soft whisper she strained to hear, concern dripping from the words. It’d be sweet if she didn’t know what he really thought of her. Her stomach nosedived at the recollection, and she clenched her jaw. “It’s four in the morning and you’re in the shower.”

“Maybe I started my period.”

A pause, as if he was considering the possibility. Then, “Well, did you?”

She choked on air, not expecting him to actually ask. “No!” she hissed venomously and yanked open the door without thinking. “I didn’t. I’m just saying I could have.”

“And I’m saying I have to go and you’re in the—Jesus. You look…” he trailed as his gaze slid down the length of her slowly, but not lasciviously. She doubted Derek would ever, ever look at her as anything short of monstrous anyway.

“I look what?” she pressed when he didn’t finish his errant remark, his brow furrowed, jaw tightening. Shadow darkened his eyes. “I look what, Derek? Go on. You weren’t shy before about speaking your mind” —he had the good grace, at least, to look away when she said this— “so why now?”

But he didn’t, not that she expected him to, but it stung regardless. What? Was she not good enough to hear the rest? Or did he just not want to tell her out of spite? She glared at him for a moment before she sighed.

“I really don’t—”

He interrupted her by pushing past her into the bathroom and crouching in front of the under-sink cabinets. Without a word, he opened them and reached inside, rooting around.

“Hey!” she whisper-shrieked in indignation, but he simply ignored her and continued to look for whatever it was that was oh-so-important.

Whatever. She turned, ready to march back to her room, but something clasping her wrist stopped her. The grip was loose enough she could break free had she wanted, but she wanted to see what was so important that he shoved past her into the bathroom and didn’t say anything. So she stayed, watching as he unfolded himself to his full height and handed her a small rectangular packet full of powder.

It took her entirely way too long to recognize the packet as Emergen-C.

“I don’t…” Now it was her turn to trail off, confused on why he was giving her it.

“Simon showed it to me the other day,” Derek said by way of answer, but that still didn’t give her any information on why he was giving it to her. “He used to catch colds a lot, so he ended up keeping a lot of that on hand.”

Okay. That made sense. She frowned. But that didn’t explain—

He scowled down at her. “You’re sick,” he said slowly, dragging each word out. “It’s for the sick.” He made a circular vertical motion with his hand as if to say, keep going.

She looked between him and the packet, him and the packet, until somewhere in her foggy mind it clicked, pieces fitting together. “Oh!” He wanted her to drink it. Duh.

Those hard-learned manners reared their ugly heads, and she swallowed. Started to thank him. “Well, um—”

“Now get out.”

Before she could gape at him or yell at the rudeness, he closed the door in her face and she was left standing in the hallway, packet clutched in her fingers, still gawking. She heard the toilet lid clink and then a steady stream of liquid and wrinkled her nose, turned tail, and padded downstairs.

She fixed herself a glass of tepid tap water in the kitchen and poured the powder into it, stirring with her finger. Then she drank it in a few gulps, wiped her mouth clean with the bottom of her tank, and rinsed the glass out before she headed back upstairs.

The taste of orange lingered in the cracks of her lips as she slipped back into the room and crawled underneath the blankets.

And as sleep overtook her, she heard the toilet flush down the hall.

Chapter Text

Chloe slitted her eyes open at the bright light spilling in through the gap of her curtains and gingerly took inventory of how she felt. No aches, no blood in her teeth, just a mild soreness that permeated her entire body and a lingering exhaustion that hung over her like a cloud of smoke.

Better, she thought as she gingerly sat up and pushed aside her covers, though not one hundred percent. Her muscles ached faintly as she stretched her legs out and climbed to her feet, bracing for the wave of vertigo that never washed over her. Her stomach still flipped over as she walked to her dresser, though it settled fairly quick.

Once she’d dressed in a pair of comfortable leggings and an oversized hoodie that smelled strongly of the lavender-scented detergent the company that hired the staff supplied, she pulled her hair into a limp ponytail and shuffled down the girls’ corridor to the stairs. Class started early, around nine, so she made her way into the kitchen to make some toast and nibbled on it as she walked to the largely empty rooms used as a makeshift classroom.

Thankfully—due to isolation and maybe the pissed off look on her face—her classes were quiet and uneventful, leaving her to do her work diligently and speedily. The faster she finished, the quicker she could stretch out on the rec room sofa and steal a nap in. The nurses didn’t really appreciate when the kids dozed off, but since she had heightened hearing, they never caught her.

When she finally curled up beneath the crocheted afghan, she wasn’t surprised at the dream. When she was ill, it was always the same, and today wasn’t any different. Only it wasn’t exactly a dream but a memory, one of the strongest of her mom.

It was mid-summer, the sun burning across Chloe’s bare shoulders and the nape of her neck, cool, crumbling dirt wedged underneath her fingernails all gritty and a little gross, a sea of grass poking and itching her kneecaps and the front of her legs. The points of the blades poked at her thighs. Tulips. They were planting tulips. She remembered now.

Jennifer’s shoulder pressed solid against Chloe’s, her sun hat pulled low over her face, her cheeks and chin already turning pink despite continuous reapplications of sunscreen. A summer-warmed breeze that hardly cooled them blew her hair across her face, a glimmer of red-blonde in the bright sunshine.

She beamed at Chloe from beneath the shadow of her hat’s brim.

The back door clacked open noisily as Steve joined them, carrying sweating cans of cherry-vanilla Coke fresh out the fridge. Finished with the last of his lawyer’s workload, he’d decided to join them, even though he might scream about bugs.

She didn’t hear what her dad said as he knelt down beside them, but it made Jennifer blush and tip her head back, a loud laugh echoing in the air.

Chloe loved this memory, didn’t mind if it always ended the same way—her stomach sinking as realization crept in, cold and unwelcome. This was the last memory she had of Jennifer, a few months before she died.

Before Chloe’d—

A hand shaking her shoulder bolted her awake, throwing the afghan off in a wild panic, heart racing and pulse thudding in her ears so loud she barely heard Simon calling her name, trying to calm her. She gulped down lungfuls of air, sweat streaming down her face in thin, hot rivulets, as her throat burned as if she’d swallowed a spoonful of fire. Pain splintered on every inhale, as she poured all her energy into steadying her breathing.

One, two, inhale. Long exhale. One, two, inhale. Long exhale, she told herself as she sat there, pulse echoing in her eardrums. It felt like millenniums before her breathing steadied and her heart slowed to a regular pace, the whoosh of blood in her ears fading into silence. Her hands trembled, her fingers ice-cold where they curled around the spaces of the afghan’s pattern.

“Chloe…?”

She blinked away the stream of sweat from her eyes and, when her vision cleared, she realized Simon was in front of her, face pinched with concern, gaze dark and cautious with it.

Stomach acid flirted at the back of her throat, gorge rising, but she swallowed, shuddered, and wet her salty lips. The taste of it burned on her tongue as she sat there, breathing through the minute little tremors that jerked and shook her body, a physical aftershock from the painful truth.

It took years to catch her feel grounded enough to speak, and even then, it was a small, dry rasp that cut like a blade.

“What?” she snapped.

After such a shocking awakening, she was in no mood for him and whatever nonsense he'd brought. No mood at all. And she knew she was being rude, being unfair, but she was too off kilter to care in the slightest.

“I…” he trailed, biting the rest of the words off, his face tight with uncertainty, and she rolled her eyes. Threw back the afghan and pushed to her feet, ignoring her gelatinous knees that threatened to give out from beneath her.

“I don’t have time for this,” she muttered as she pushed passed, ignoring when he called after her. Worried he’d follow her, she picked up her pace to a moderate jog and made her way up the girls’ stairs two at a time.

Then she heard, “Chloe.”

But it wasn’t Simon.

Every muscle in her body went gridlock, tension burning through her arms and thighs, her scalp prickling as she recognized the rumbling voice instantaneously. It’s him! It’s Derek, something inside of her sang happily, but she squashed the rising flutter in her belly and clenched her jaw as she wheeled around to face him.

His unreadable green eyes founds hers, his mouth raw and downturned heavily in his tension pinched face. Spots of red patched along his neck and into his cheeks, no doubt whatever high-strung emotion that whitened his knuckles where his hand gripped the railing and furrowed his heavy, slanting eyebrows.

Despite the sour look, she heard his racing heartbeat that matched her own.

“What?” she spit.

He didn’t reply for a moment or two, his expression veering into mulish, and red-hot anger poured lava in her veins, steamed her cheeks, and pounded her pulse.

What was he doing, approaching her? She’d found herself in enough hot water thanks to him and his nasty remarks, thank you very much, and she didn’t need him to heap more on her shoulders. After all, she was just a monster, and he needed someone to shield him from her fire breath, ever the prince in the tower.

“What, Derek?” Her voice, choked with a host of rampaging emotions, echoed around them, bounced off the wooden walls and the big stained pane of window glass in the wall above the door high up. “What, Derek? What do you need?”

Blistering heat stung her sinuses and she bit the inside of her cheek until that pain overrode the impending slew of tears. The last thing she needed was to cry in front of him and give him the chance to strike her raw, tender insides.

“You’re still sick,” was all he said, more to himself than to her.

What did it matter? He’d made his opinion of her clear that day in the laundry room, even after she’d tried to help him. This was her thanks for sticking her neck out when she hadn’t needed. For trying to be nice. Especially to a sour-dispositioned ass-hat like Derek Souza. Anger-laced derision twisted her racing heart. How could she have been so stupid?

Pressure pinwheeled behind her eyes, sharp little points flaring in pulses in her eye sockets, and she couldn’t stop herself from scrunching her face up at the impending, pounding headache.

“Stay away from me,” she said after a minute of trying to locate her voice, trying to remember how to string a coherent sentence together, remember the shape of letters.

His mouth thinned as his jaw clenched.

And then he started up the stairs, and she just watched him close the distance with easy, heavy strides that vibrated the wood in her fist and under her feet.

It would be smart to move, to disengage the obvious confrontation Derek wanted, but she was still reeling from her dream, frozen to her spot. She could move if she wanted, if she really tried.

“Stay,” she hissed through tight teeth, “away.”

As soon as she’d spoken, he froze on the step he’d almost crossed, about ten stairs between them now, wobbling a little at the unexpected stop. Through the heavy hang of his lank bangs, he stared back at her.

“Chloe, I—”

“What part of ‘stay the hell away from me, Derek?’ do you not understand?” She folded her arms over her chest, squeezing her fingertips into her biceps, grounding herself. “I don’t want to see your or hear you. I don’t want to be in the room next to you or even down the hall from you. I want nothing to do with you. I’m doing what I’m supposed to.”

“And what’s that?” he demanded hotly, voice sharp and pulling the words straight from her.

“Staying the hell away from you.” She met his gaze. “And you should do the same.”

He search her eyes then her face—for what, she didn’t know and didn’t care—and then wheeled, missing a step and almost losing his balance. But he caught himself and stalked the rest of the way down, and she couldn’t drag her eyes away from him the entire time, even as his broad back and hulking figure grew smaller and smaller, shrinking, til he vanished around a corner.

She stood there for a very long time, just staring, before she turned too and walked slowly up the stairs. Blood whooshed in her ears as she reached the landing and started to turn back. Just one little glance, because she couldn’t help herself. Then she stopped herself.

The room was blessed quiet and her sheets cool against her skin as she slid beneath them, but her teeth clicked and clattered against each other as tremors shook her arms and legs. Aftershocks, she thought, puffing exhales through her nose until it steamed up her cheeks and chin, a crash down after all the adrenaline.

She turned her head into her pillow and squeezed her eyes shut.

Chapter Text

After that day on the stairs, Derek might as well have turned invisible or turned out to be a figment of her imagination for all she saw him. She barely even saw Simon anymore, too, and she should’ve been happy.

Finally, she’d successfully driven Derek away, and it’s should’ve been a relief to not see his face, but it wasn’t. There was only a tangled mess of knots in her flip-flopping belly and the thick, heavy cling of guilt that gave her stomachaches. 

And to make matters worse this week she had her once thrice-a-month visit with Steve.

Chloe avoided looking herself in the eye in her mirrored reflection as she tied back her pin-straight hair in a ponytail and fluffed her bangs, picking the pieces that framed her jaw.

Last night’s crying jag had done such a number on her eyes that Tori had taken one glance at her and pulled her aside. Before she could protest or even think of making a break for it, Tori had yanked Chloe into the girls’ bathroom and promptly started dotting her face with concealer and foundation. Then she disappeared so fast out the door once she was done, Chloe’d thought she’d imagined the entire thing until she’d turned to the mirror and saw Tori’s immaculate, professional handiwork. Much, much better than Chloe’s own attempts to cover her freckles.

At least now she looked good enough to pass for normal because even oh-so-oblivious Steve would’ve been able to see something was wrong.

“Chloe?” A sharp rap knocked against her door, and then Van Dop poked her head in. She pushed open the door all the way and stood in its frame, her eyes critical and sharp as always.

She used to be in the military, at least according to Rae, and ran a tight ship with an iron hand and a stainless steel will.

Suffice to say, her tightened expression narrowed further at Chloe’s outfit, a cropped black tank and oversized blue jeans with a cable-knit cardigan over it. Nothing scandalous but nothing shapeless either, balancing just right with her ponytail.

“Your father’s here,” Van Dop informed her in a hard, no-nonsense kind of voice that screamed, ‘try me if you dare.’

Chloe didn’t have the energy to decipher whether the reproach was the outfit or if word had spread of the laundry room incident. She wanted to think it was the clothes but something deep in her stomach knew it was a little bit of both.

Shoving on a pair of scuffed white sneakers, she cast one last glance in the mirror before she trailed silently after Van Dop, closing her bedroom door behind her on the way out.

She looked down at Steve in the foyer as she descended the staircase, taking in the new growth of a beard fuzzying the edge of his dimpled chin, the same one she had. And in his NYU sweater and slightly rumpled jeans, worn from age and wear, he looked shockingly out of place amongst the forced calming colors and the wood framework and doors.

He looked…old. She couldn’t remember if the creases in his face had been there before or if his hair had been shot through with gray quite so much last visit, but drew up blank.

When she reached the ground floor, she hesitated a heartbeat on going in for a hug, unsure if he’d welcome her touch. It wasn’t that he hated her, or at she that’s what she thought, but more of a Jennifer-shaped hole neither of them could bridge. After her mom’s death, Steve had withdrawn, and all Chloe had were memories of better times.

God, how pathetic did she sound, moaning and bitching over the past? But, even as she chided herself for such melodramatic thoughts, she couldn’t stop the twinge of sharp-edged discomfort that knifed through her belly when he lifted his eyes.

Her inhale stuck in her throat as she met his stare, heart skipping a beat in her ribcage.

“Hi, sweetheart,” he said, attention sliding to her new hair color. “Oh, you did your hair.” He tilted his head a little, brow furrowed as he examined it. “I like it. Reminds me so much of your mom.”

She managed a semblance of a smile that must’ve been convincing enough because he turned his focus to Van Dop, who’d stepped off to the side.

“You ready to go?” he asked her once Van Dop left.

Realizing she was being spoken to, she nodded, mute, feeling awkward and lame as she followed Steve out the door. She turned to pull the door shut behind them and cast a glance at the boys’ side of the stairs.

Found that cutting gaze staring back at her from the top of staircase.

⸻ • • • ⸻  

The diner was buzzing pleasantly with restaurants noises that clashed with the music pouring from the speakers overhead, some song she couldn’t recall the name of but knew a few lyrics, drumming along with its melody as she drummed her finger on the table.

Across from her, Steve cut into his omelet with the side of his fork, some monstrosity that took up almost the entire plate, still piping-hot on the inside.

While a lot of things changed after Jennifer, this remained the same—going to the little diner. The food was good, even if her stomach was knots and her throat was tight and she couldn’t even bring herself to taste a bite, scared it might come back up. It’d probably sit in her stomach like lead anyway, and she wasn’t in the mood for that.

They ate in silence—well, she sat and picked at her plate, fussing with it while Steve ate at a moderate pace, his expression a mix of concern and confusion at the way she pushed her food around. Finally, he lowered his fork about halfway through his burrito and took a long pull of his drink, his eyes never leaving her face over the rim of the glass.

Examining her critically, cataloguing details, putting the lawyer’s brain to work.

She racked her brain for topics as she broke off a piece of her country-fried steak and blew until it cooled then pushed the bite into her mouth. Chewed a few times then swallowed, sucking down a sip until her throat was clear enough to ask, “How’s Aunt Lauren?”

Steve set his glass down, ice rattling against the plastic.

“She’s alive,” he remarked dryly, “far as I could tell. Hospital’s been strapped for staff—doctors ’specially—so it’s no shock. It’s kept her busy, so have all the court cases that land on my desk. I’ve been invited to do some pro bono for a firm here, which I’ve accepted, so I’ll be here for a few months.”

He searched her face, and she wasn’t sure what reaction she was supposed to give. They were essentially strangers now, three long years of awkward silence that neither of them ever breached and being shut out, and in those three years, she’d given up hope of being close with her dad again. She’d been a scared, hurt, confused twelve-year-old little girl—his little girl—and he’d locked himself away, left her alone in her cocktail of emotion. Left her so long she’d grown accustomed to it.

“And uh…” he hesitated, seemingly battling himself on what he was about to say, deliberating, weighing and testing it. He always was a worrier, unsure of decisions outside the court room, and now was no different.

She dragged her drink close and took several long sips.

As if it were easier than looking her in the eyes when said it, he turned his focus to the tabletop, dragging his finger through the puddle of water his drink left behind. A little tell that he was nervous, apprehensive, and Chloe’s heartbeat throbbed in her temples and drummed in her ribcage, throwing itself against bone.

“…uh…”

She stared at him now that his head was bowed, urging him silently, say it. Just go ahead and spit it out. Get it over with. Her balled-up hands prickled with anticipation and apprehension as she scrunched her feet in her sneakers, her short nails cutting into her palms.

“I-I…started seeing, well, uh…someone,” he explained. “Not—not romantically, but, um, professionally, I guess?” A wince at how his own words tilted into a question, then, he continued. “And it’s been helping. Making me think, you know, a lot. About a lot of things. About…us, about your aunt, and…” There was a rapid flutter of his eyelids, and she saw a slight sheen in his eyes. “…About your mother, most of all.”

She tracked the bob of his throat as he swallowed and stared at the burgeoning beard there, already growing back despite how anal he was about shaving each morning. He liked it clean-cut, edge defined, and she remembered it was soft. Had smelled of citrus moisturizing oil and whatever cream or balm or wax he used in it.

“And I’ve—well, I’ve realized a lot of things. Like how I’ve been hurting you. Don’t even try to deny it; you hesitated in hugging me. Me, your dad. I don’t—I don’t want you to ever doubt just how much I love you, Chloe. You’re my entire world, and I’m sorry. Fuck, I’m so, so…sorry.”

His voice thickened as he blinked hard and turned his face away, his chin wobbling. A couple of deep inhales lifted and dropped his shoulders as he fought to control himself, overcome with a flood of emotion, no doubt similar to the overwhelming urge to cry and the mix of rage, confusion, hurt, and joy volleying itself inside of her.

“I’m so, so fucking sorry, sweetheart.”

It was everything she’d wanted to hear and more, acknowledgment and an apology wrapped in one, but she hated it even had to be said to begin with. That things had come to this, that he was even saying this because that meant he could’ve changed before because he could’ve noticed the stilted conversations or the lack of texts on his phone or the way none of her Facebook pictures featured him and her together on actual film, solid proof.

And this, on top of yesterday’s confrontation and on top of the laundry room incident, was so overwhelming she could barely breathe, her vision blurring with angry tears. She gulped down a couple of mouthfuls of air until her pulse didn’t whoosh in her wrists anymore.

“Chloe, honey? Look at me. Look at me, baby. Breathe with me. You’re okay. Just look at me, there we go, there we go, honey. Breathe like me, okay?”

It took a millennium for her to register Steve’s soft, low voice and his firm and kind command, and she obeyed, breathing the way he did. Steady, even inhales and exhales that stretched her lungs to capacity and shrank them to raisins, over and over until her vision cleared and her heart stopped galloping.

All around her, the restaurant buzzed, oblivious to the turmoil they were going through. Waitstaff maunevered the narrow aisles of tables, balancing large trays of entrees and drinks while multitudes of conversations happened all at once. Alive, buzzing with life.

“Sweetheart, can you hear me?”

She nodded, though it felt like moving through molasses.

“Good, good. May I—may I touch you? It helps, sometimes, with anxiety. Deep pressure massaging, I mean.”

Again, she nodded and felt a little more grounded, more solid and less jelly, as soon as Steve’s warm palm slid over hers, his fingers curling around hers. She copied his breathing pattern until her heart relaxed.

As she returned to normal, she zeroed in on the sensation of his thumb dragging across her knuckle, back and forth, back and forth over the same strip of skin.

They ate in contemplative silence after that, the only acknowledgement between them a shared glance every once in a while that said everything they couldn’t in the moment.

And on the car ride back to Lyle, her quiet and drained, zapped, and him rambling about therapy, he still held her hand. Squeezed it a few times when he took his eyes off the road to look at her, obviously concerned, but she didn’t have the energy to speak, let alone explain.

Her burning eyelids flagged as Steve parked in the driveway and helped her gingerly out of her seat, her body weighing three tons, limbs reinforced with concrete. Every step was laborious, a fight to lift her foot and inch forward, but it was easier with him supporting most of her weight.

Even Van Dop’s reproachful side eye didn’t seem to deter Steve as he helped Chloe up the stairs one at a time, progress moving at a snail’s pace. When she looked at his face, she saw nothing but patience there, and he gave a small, wobbling smile.

She had just enough energy to kick off her sneakers before she fell face-first into the bed, bouncing on the firm mattress a few times before she managed to fumble the blankets enough to climb underneath. The mattress dipped when Steve sat on the edge, his back to the door, as he stroked her messy hair out of her sticky, fevered face.

“I love you,” he said, “and I’m going to be better. I know it won’t make up, you know, for all the years I wasn’t, but it’s a start.”

If she had the strength or energy to lift her head and speak, she’d have reluctantly agreed.

For now, it was enough. Just like he’d said, it was a start, and that was better than nothing.

Chapter Text

The next morning, Chloe woke up wet with sweat, her skin icy as she shuddered and panted for breath. Her head spun as her eyes burned. Talbot had taken one look at Chloe, at Steve’s insistence, and put her on bed rest and fluids. Thank God the onset of the Change mirrored a common cold exactly, not rousing any suspicions over a mystery illness by the humans around her.

But Steve…the look on his face told her he was worried, and she’d felt his gaze on her face, mapping out her features like it might be the last time they saw one another. It felt nice to be fussed over like this when, for the past three years, she’d been invisible to him.

Did he know? Could he tell it really wasn’t just a common cold? But even if he did, there was nothing he could do to help. This was a werewolf problem and a werewolf problem only. There was only so much he could do, anyway.

So she slept a lot, her dreams restless and fitful, snippets of memory and fantastical imagination colliding. Drank the ginger ale and soup left by Van Dop while she’d dozed. The nausea and skewed equilibrium faded by Thursday, which left her cleared to go back to class.

Quiet and monotonous, she counted down the minutes till class dismissed so she could sleep some more. The nurses couldn’t argue against rest since she was sick, so that was nice.

When she had her final lesson of the day, she decided on a shower, a nice, long, piping-hot one. Maybe the steam and heat would help, or at least relax her aches and pains. Even if it did neither, she’d still feel a little better after sweating her ass off this week, feel a little cleaner to scrub all the dead skin and residual perspiration off her skin.

Her bedraggled reflection in the mirror was a showcase of how awful she felt, her eyes dazed and red-rimmed, her skin sallow.

Make it until tonight. You’ve just gotta.

She hoped she held out until then.

⸻ • • • ⸻  

The overwhelming sound of knuckles on wood pulled Chloe out of her nap, blearily blinking awake. Each bang reverberated through the floorboards and shuddered her closed door. She stared.

“Chloe.”

It’s him, some little part of her whispered excitedly, ever the puppy when it came to Derek. Even against her better judgement. Even though he thought she was a monster.

Something tightly-wound in her stomach loosened an inch as she kicked her ankles free of the tangle of blanket and sheets and pushed herself into a sitting position. Grit and sleep blurred her vision until she blinked and scrubbed at her eyes.

“Chloe.”

Annoyance leaked into Derek’s low voice, straining it, and he huffed indignantly. Maybe he thought she was ignoring him; she wouldn’t exactly put it past herself. Sometimes it felt good to be petty.

But she pushed to her feet and slowly shuffled to the door, pulling it open after a moment of just staring at the whorls and swirls in the wood. She hesitated. Would he just leave if she stayed quiet? She wasn’t in the mood—nor did she have the energy needed—to deal with him, but she was a glutton for punishment. Maybe she was a masochist for the Derek-specific kind of torment, because she pulled open the door far too quickly to be nonchalant.

Embarrassed heat rose into her already fevered cheeks, but she ignored it in favor of examining Derek. He backed up a step then crossed his arms over his chest, straining the waffle-knit long-sleeve around his shoulders and raising the sleeves from his wrists.

“What do you want?” She squinted at him.

There wasn’t an immediate response, his gaze dragging down the length of her bare legs for a moment, as if he’d never seen a girl in shorts before, then they snapped back to her face. She almost rolled her eyes at the flush that crept along his neck and his acne-marked face.

“Are you okay?”

That was what was so pressing? He wanted to know if she was okay? While her stomach swooped and her heart skipped a beat and part of her preened because his concern, a bigger part sagged beneath the weight of disappointment. And annoyance had her eye twitching madly.

“I’m fine,” she insisted, ready to turn and close the door in his face, her bed calling her name once again. She wet her dry lips and watched his eyes track the movement, then his gaze ticked back up to hers.

Turning away, about to dismiss him and go back to bed because she was so, so tired and she didn’t have the bandwidth for this game right now, he stopped her.

“I brought Tylenol and some water.”

When she faced him again, she saw he had four little gel capsules cradled in one hand and a glass of water clutched in the other. She didn’t say anything as she accepted the pain reliever, popping all four into her mouth and washing them down with several mouthfuls of lukewarm tap water.

“You’re supposed to take two every—oh.”

With her werewolf metabolism, the four pills did the same work as two. Just like antibiotics and anything else she’d been prescribed, her body took a double dose the way mortals took one. Perks—or downsides—of being a werewolf. The bottomless stomach was certainly a downside, at least.

“Thanks,” she muttered and drained the rest of the glass, wiping the leakage with her forearm.

He just watched her for a moment.

Too exhausted to stand there, she turned away. Stopped as something occurred to her.

“Hey, Derek?”

When she looked at him, he was still just standing there, holding the glass, staring at her.

“No one needs to know I’m sick.”

His jaw tightened, eyes flashing.

“But—” he started to argue, but she wasn’t in the mood for it. Not from anyone but especially from him.

“No one.”

And even though he looked ready to argue his case, his brow furrowed and expression tight with hard-headed determination and annoying stubbornness that she didn’t have the energy to deal with right now, he relented reluctantly, mouth thinning, when Liz called for him somewhere down the hall. He backed up a step, eyes searching hers—for what, she didn’t know and didn’t care—before he turned and disappeared from view.

She watched him leave before she closed the door softly and sprawled out across her bed, every minute detail replaying on loop as she closed her eyes.

⸻ • • • ⸻  

Chloe shivered violently in the icy chill of the late October wind as it battered against her fevered skin, every exposed inch tightening into little goosebumps. Wet, brittle leaves clung to her pajama bottoms as her gorge rose, wave after wave of contractions forcing her to pant open-mouthed like a dog to not be sick. The acidic smell of her failed attempts watered her eyes, blurring her vision.

The concrete pad they’d sat the shed on scraped her fingertips raw as she swayed back and forth, head hanging low.

Don’t be scared, she told herself. Your body’s made for this.

And yet, just like the changes for childbirth, she was terrified and panicking, wondering how her body would survive.

If it would, even, because how many women died for something their bodies transformed for? And that was without supernatural elements grinding their bones to dust and stretching their joints until all they registered was pure agony.

Hot tears tracked down her cheeks, burning her eyes, as she sniffled and fought to stay quiet. Another convulsion forced her onto her tiptoes and fingertips, muscles in her spine elongating, bones cracking and creaking and popping out of place to rearrange themselves into something new.

Another wave hit before she could brace herself, and she could only squeeze her eyes shut at the force of stomach acid rising, too exhausted and weak to stop it. Her lungs burned after the spray, the horrid taste of vomit clinging to her tongue and teeth and flecking her front, as she gasped and coughed for air.

She couldn’t tell what burned her eyes more—the tears or the sweat—as she leaned against the shed, shivering. Her heartbeat raced in her ears as she prayed to every god imaginable, to her Uncle Ben and Jennifer, to anyone and anything that might listen.

Please let me not die behind this shed. Please let this end. I want it to be over. Please, please, oh, God.

Another breeze buffeted against her face, and the stench of bile had her screwing her eyes shut and counting backwards to avoid another bout of violent vomiting.

As she counted, she heard the back door clack over the howl of wind. Someone approached slowly, damp grass and dead leaves squishing with every step.

She froze, heartbeat frantic in her ribs, pulse rushing in her ears. The very last thing she needed was discovery, crouched behind the shed, suffering the worst pain she’d ever experienced, incoherent with it. Vulnerable. That’s what she was. And anyone—

“Chloe.”

Against her will, all at once, the tension in her body vanished, and she sagged against the shed, breath coming in sharp, short little pants that heaved her chest and rocked her uneasy belly. Safe, something whispered. He wouldn’t hurt her, at least not right now.

“Chloe, are you out here?”

It took all of her strength to lift her head as his footfalls came closer, rustling through the debris of the backyard, and all she could think was, please, please, go away. Don’t look at me. Not like this. Please, just…just leave.

But this was Derek, who was nothing if not the most stubborn person she’d ever met, and he came around the corner, his shadow falling over her. He blocked out the moonlight.

“…Chloe?” The scrape of his sneakers came closer and closer still, until he was right in front of her, and she could see the toes of his shoes. “It’s Derek.” His voice was a whisper.

As if she’d mistake him for anyone else.

She started to push away from the shed, to shrink back, because she didn’t want him—or anyone—to see her like this, weak and small and vulnerable, but another convulsion hit her. Rocked her, splitting her skin and breaking her bones, and she scrabbled at the concrete, only realizing her fingertips were scraped bloody when she saw the five streaks where her hands had been.

She lowered her head and whimpered without meaning to.

“What’s going on?”

Even if she’d wanted to, she couldn’t speak. The pain had stolen her voice away.

As he dropped his backpack and fell to his knees beside her, her body jolted, skin splitting and rippling to make way for a fur coat, fibers forcing their way through the gaps. Her body twisted and turned, and an acid bath would’ve been pleasurable compared to this pain. She could barely suck in enough air to not lose consciousness.

The pain ebbed enough she could speak, though it was guttural and probably smelled horrible. She was too raw to care about offending delicate senses.

“Go…away,” she croaked, though she wasn’t sure he understood with her transformation vocal cords.

“Not happening. What can I do?” he asked instead and inched closer, blocking out most of the chill.

Tears blurred his concerned face as she turned her own away. There was no way of knowing how disturbing she looked, how monstrous she’d become, and it’d just solidify his opinion of her. Proof of the painful truth she couldn’t outrun—that she was a monster.

She sobbed, too striped raw to care anymore. She cried because it hurt and because she didn’t have anyone to explain what was or wasn’t normal and because she was all alone. She cried because her blood felt like shards of glass in her veins and because her stomach turned and she didn’t want to be sick again. She cried and cried and cried, until she heard him.

“Chloe.”

He was still beside her, kneeling there, watching her with a steady level-headedness that calmed the torrent of tears.

“Don’t,” she whispered before she could stop herself.

“I’m not leaving you alone,” he told her matter of factly.

She sucked a choked inhale and hesitated before she reached out, her grimy, bloody hand with its new nails that looked more like claws curling around his ankles. The wolf inside her purred at the contact, and maybe the girl did too.

“Don’t—don’t…” She swallowed. “Don’t leave.”

His hand closed around hers, not even a hint of tremor.

“I won’t, Chloe. I’m right here.”

Chapter Text

When the last of the convulsions passed, all she could do was lay there, her head resting on his jean-clad knee, fighting for both composure and breath. Her chest heaved on each vomit-tasting inhale, and she spat out what remained, thick, mucus-y, foaming phlegm that tasted foul and smelled even worse.

Tremors wracked up and down her exhausted body, twitching her arms and legs vehemently, but even those passed the longer she lay there, just breathing, her heart slowing to a steadier pace. The breezes that blew across the yard chilled the sweat on her body and clothes, leaving her shivering and huddling close to Derek for warmth. If she weren’t so exhausted, she’d have been embarrassed at their proximity but she just didn’t care right now.

His hand, pressed against the back of her neck over the heavy, damp ponytail there, was comforting, grounding, even though he wasn’t actively touching her. Just the heat of his leg under her cheek, the smell of denim and his scent, was enough to soothe her.

Finally, she felt better enough to attempt sitting up, and when her stomach didn’t slosh uncomfortably, she stretched her arms and legs out one at a time, testing her joints, cataloguing the aches and pains. Her fingertips throbbed, shredded raw, but they’d heal.

As she tested and straightened each elbow and finger, curled her toes and rotated her ankles, Derek spoke.

“Are you okay?”

Not what was that? Not what are you? Not what just happened?

Just simple, unfettered concern.

And damn if her heart didn’t lurch in her ribcage, painful. Damn if, despite her exhaustion, something didn’t warm at the show of compassion and the lack of freak out.

“I…think so,” she whispered, and the words scraped her already raw throat. A waft of her own breath hit her in the face, and she ducked her head, staring down at her shaking, misshapen fingers. She could only assume they’d return to normal soon, wouldn’t stay misaligned and bent out of shape. Her cracked, bloody nails would heal, too. All of her wounds would.

She wet her dry, cracked lips and winced at the stinging. It was now or never to clear the air, right before their escape. “Derek, I—”

The bang of the back door opening made both of them jump, her body screaming at the sudden movements. Before she could warn him to stay quiet or, better yet, hidden, he was peering around the corner of the shed. Swore at whoever he saw as he backed up a step.

“Derek?” Dr. Gil called. “Derek, I know you’re out here.” A heartbeat of silence. “And I know Chloe’s out of her bed, too.”

Against her better judgement, Chloe poked her head out and spotted Dr. Gil standing in the backyard, waving a flashlight back and forth, scouring the grounds for the two of them. Then she saw something on the ground—small and white—and it took Chloe a second to recognize her own shoe. Dr. Gil stared for a few minutes before she pressed on, voice still calm and carrying, words firm.

“And if you come out now, I won’t have to inform Dr. Fellows or Andrew about catching you two out of bed behind the shed.”

Mortified heat fried her cheeks and when she peeked behind her at Derek, she saw the same color darken his face.

“I was young once, too, and I did a lot of stupid things. But do you two really think fooling around in the backyard is…” —Dr. Gil searched for the right word— “…romantic?” A derisive snort as she shook her head to herself, rubbing her chin with one hand while she scanned with the flashlight in the other. “Come back inside right now and no one has to know about this.”

Chloe glanced back and met Derek’s eyes. An understanding felt like it passed between them without a word. Then she turned back to Dr. Gil, who was yammering about hormones and the dangers of teen pregnancy and STDs.

Since her clothes and hair were messy enough to pass, she waited until Derek had rumpled his clothes appropriately enough to appear, ahem, interrupted mid-make out then she climbed to her feet.

Please let this work.

And when she stepped around the corner, a beam of light blinded her already sore eyes. It didn’t blind her enough to miss Dr. Gil’s smug smile.

⸻ • • • ⸻  

The glow of the full moon illuminated the darkness of the backyard as Dr. Gil planted herself in front of Chloe and Derek, arms crossed over her chest.

Chloe fumbled for the words, chest pinched tight, as she tugged at her hair and fidgeted, avoiding Dr. Gil’s knowing gaze. “So,” she managed, “I knew the password. Since I’ve been here a lot longer, you know. And, well, he—we wanted, um, some private time.”

“Private time?” Dr. Gil echoed, tone cutting like the edge of a glass shard.

Chloe swallowed hard and refused to glance over at Derek, heat rising into her cheeks that had nothing to do with the linger kegs of fever and everything to do with the insinuation she’d made. But it was a necessary evil. She couldn’t very well tell the truth.

“Y-yeah,” she muttered breathlessly. “So I asked him to meet me down here, so we could—well, you know.” Her voice dipped to a hush, hoarse whisper that was more raw throat than embarrassment. That wasn’t hard.

Dr. Gil just stared Chloe down for a moment before she shook her head and ran a thin hand over her sleek ponytail. Her gaze bounced between them then she snorted and pulled a carton of cigarettes out of her pocket.

Before Chloe could comment, she’d lit up one, blowing out a cloud of sour-smelling smoke into their faces. She didn’t say anything, just let out a small, thin laugh that had Chloe’s already sore muscles tightening, dread ballooning in her belly. Her heart started to race.

“Now,” Dr. Gil said, “this was all very…good.” She drew an inhale, the cherry glow red in the darkness, reflecting in her eyes. Then, on the exhale that blew a cloud in Chloe’s face, snorted. Chloe’s blood went cold. “It’s so good, in fact, I almost believe you.”

Chloe’s heart stopped and restarted in an instant, and a chill swept over her, goosebumps tightening across sensitized skin. Her lungs shrank to marbles as her throat tightened to the diameter of a thumbtack needle. But she fought to keep all of her rising panic and alarm off her face, because maybe she was just bluffing.

“You think I don’t know the going ons in this house? That I wouldn’t notice?”

It was Derek that interrupted this time, still as stone beside Chloe, and it was the first time she’d heard his voice since her Change’s trial runs.

“Wouldn’t notice what?”

Dr. Gil’s gaze slid from Chloe to Derek, all that lasered focus directed at him, but he barely blinked under the intense scrutiny. She flashed a small smile that waned the more she spoke, waving her cigarette through the air with a careless hand. “I’ll admit, you had me going there for a second. You aren’t the first teens to sneak back there for some, ahem, ‘alone time,’ as you so eloquently put it, Chloe, and you certainly won’t be the last, but…” She paused, then continued. “…it didn’t fool me. Not for long, at least.”

Derek licked his lips. “Fool you?” he echoed with an eyebrow cocked. “Why would we need to fool you, Dr. Gil?”

She deliberated for such a long time, Chloe thought maybe she wasn’t going to answer. Wouldn’t deign to reply, because they were just two kids and people tended to underestimate them for that very reason.

“You’re smart,” she admitted begrudgingly. “If I wasn’t a doctor in a group home, I’d be probably believe your little lie. It was a good distraction from your troublemaking siblings escaping. But really” —her smile was back, wicked and cruel— “what boy like Derek ever give you the time of day, let alone agree to sneak out of the group home together, risking punishment, for a sad little romp in the dirt? I mean, really, with a girl like you, Chloe?”

Then she bent forward and grabbed Chloe’s arm. Her fingers gouged into tender muscle, and she was helpless to fight against her, struggling to stay upright once Dr. Gil had pulled her to her feet, knees gelatinous, legs trembling. But just because she was tired didn’t mean she didn’t know how to use her brain.

So she went limp, only for a second, but it was enough for Dr. Gil to drop her guard. It was only the blink of an eye, but Chloe threw herself in the opposite direction, towards the bench, and Dr. Gil’s hand popped off her bicep. She fumbled for Chloe, but she’d pulled too hard in her slow-as-molasses state and went down hard, knocking her teeth and banging her chin into the wet ground. Mud squished the front of her T-shirt and pajama bottoms, but she didn’t care.

As Dr. Gil lunged for Chloe and she scrabbled away, muscles protesting, fingers numb and shaking too hard to properly grip the ground, something dark landed between them. Her lungs burned with sharp intakes of icy air as she twisted and watched Derek rise from his crouch.

Obviously not expecting him, Dr. Gil yelped and tried to backtrack. Whether it was the hem of her pants or the state of the yard, Chloe wasn’t sure, but either way Dr. Gil tipped and lost her balance, fighting to get something out of her pocket.

What was she grabbing?

Chloe pushed to her knees and intercepted Dr. Gil as she went down, wrenching the two-way radio out of her hand and sending it sailing into the wooded area by the fence. And when Dr. Gil hit the ground, she choked out a noise before she went limp, and Chloe stared for a few minutes, panting for breath, head pounding. Stomach acid flirted at the back of her sore throat as she trembled, stomach knotting.

Not again.

Not again.

Tears blurred her vision as Derek knelt beside Dr. Gil and checked her pulse, his face impassive. Her lungs burned with held breath, every inch of her frozen, as she waited for the reality. Had she killed someone…again?

A little whine started to rise, but she bit it back. Now wasn’t the time to fall apart. They’d—they’d have to do something with the body, right? And her clothes. They’d attract attention, surely, a pair of pajamas on an obviously underage girl in the middle of the night. And—

Finally, his hand fell away from Dr. Gil’s neck and, without looking over, he muttered, “She’s just unconscious.”

Relief washed over Chloe so intense, she slumped to the ground and could only focus on the throb of her heart’s beating and each shuddering inhale she drew in, the damp grass and leaves underneath her palms, the stickiness of her skin. Alive. She hadn’t killed Dr. Gil.

Derek left her alone for a few minutes, enough that she calmed and gathered herself the best she could, then said, “We should get going.” He looped back to the shed and picked up his backpack, threw a look over his shoulder at her, his gaze lingering on her messy clothes. “I’ve, uh, got a jacket that shoulder cover…all that.”

He unzipped his bag, fished out the jacket, and shoved it at her, his face drawn and pale in the moonlight. Well, paler.

The shock of tonight would hit them eventually, she knew, but right now they needed to start moving before any of the nurses saw and called the authorities.

So she steeled herself, clenched her jaw until her teeth creaked, and crammed on the too big jacket that hung to her knees. Even as she trailed after him, she couldn’t stop herself from glancing behind them every few minutes, again and again, until the lights of Lyle House weren’t visible anymore.

Chapter Text

The air was freezing, and it wasn’t long before Chloe’s teeth started chattering vehemently. Her cheeks burned from wind chill and her nose turned to an ice chip, but she kept walking, putting one foot in front of the other.

Just one more step, just one more, she told herself, tightening her jaw against the pain that sliced through tender muscle. Every step was agony, thighs screaming, but she simply ignored it and squared her shoulders, breathing through it. Even as her head swam and vision blurred, no doubt shock setting in from tonight’s events—at the idea that she’d killed someone, again—she forced herself to keep going, keep walking.

Air stung her lungs and nose, making every breath agony, but she pushed it aside. She stumbled often, nearly lost her balance, loose rocks and gnarled tree roots half-hidden beneath debris threatening to trip her up.

Beneath the crinkling cheap fabric of Derek’s windbreaker, she broke out in a chilled sweat, the damp seams of her T-shirt abrading her underarms, rubbing her sensitized-skin raw. The dried patch of mud broke off in chunks, crumbling down her front, clinging in the fur of her pajama pants.

Finally, she had to stop, barely able to stand straight thanks to the pantomime knife stabbing between her ribs every time she moved, black stars spinning in her tear-blurred vision. She hung her head and braced on her knees, staring blankly at the ground, the scuffs on her shoes, the mud spatter on the hem of her sweats.

“I need a minute,” she managed, and focused on steadily breathing, blood rushing in her eardrums, heart racing and galloping like a wild horse in her ribcage, banging against bone.

Her pulse slowed to a steady crawl, and her lungs stopped burning, ballooning from the size of raisins to their full capacity. Unfortunately, the pain that threaded along every fiber of muscle and twitched them violent enough that her legs almost buckled beneath her weight barely ebbed and stayed the same excruciating, wicked-intense level as before. And worse yet was the exhaustion that dragged at her sore limbs with serrated razor blades, lacerating her every second she stood there, her eyelids bobbing as she fought to stay awake.

“You aren’t gonna puke again, are you?”

At the sound of Derek’s voice, she straightened up and managed to slant a weak glare in his direction through the sweat-stiff, matted hair that’d full and well escaped her ponytail by now in the scrabble.

“I’m fine,” she muttered, grinding her molars as he looked her up and down slowly, giving her an incredulous eyebrow tilt that screamed, I don’t believe you.

So what if he saw right through her? It didn’t matter in the long run. She’d protect him while he made his way to his siblings and then she’d disappear once they reunited. What happened after that, after she left him in their hands, wasn’t on her.

Anywhere would be better than here, since she had no doubt that Lyle would call the cops and then her aunt and, finally, her dad, and they’d be on the hunt for her, because—as far as the cops were concerned—she was a normal, trouble human girl who’d snuck out of her group home. But her throat tightened at the thought of Steve and Lauren, who knew the truth and had seen her for who she really was: a monster that would attack anyone.

“Let’s go.”

Again, Derek’s voice dragged her from her racing, jumbled thoughts and she fixed her gaze on him, taking in the anxious way he peered into the darkness, face pinched tight with strain. His eyes swung back to hers, unflinching, resolute. Like he’d made his mind up about something and there was no one on God’s green earth that’d change it, set in stone.

“Let’s go,” he said again. “They’ll be looking for us—”

“Me.” She closed the distance by a few scant feet and stopped when a gust of wind slapped her. “They’ll be looking for me. You, of all people, should know how this’ll look to everyone.”

Her barb landed just right, and she saw the slightest flare of his nose, drawing harder, sharper breath. A muscle in his jaw feathered. But before he could continue, she went on. ““Violent, unstable fifteen-year-old injures nurse, escapes group home, and takes three patients hostage,’” she stated, visualizing the imagined newspaper headline, the news report that would follow, and swallowed hard against the way her heart knocked in her chest, the uncomfortable, near-painful lurch in her belly.

His expression shifted, a scowl deepening every second the words hung between them unchallenged, with no rebuttal. He opened his mouth, started to protest, “Chl—” but she interrupted. Anything he said after the laundry room incident, after the staircase, was moot, a lie she didn’t want to let herself believe, because it was so damned obvious that he was just saying it.

And he knew she didn’t believe him, either, the way his scowl went so dark her heart and stomach did a weird flip at the same time.

“So I’ll help you find Simon and Tori, then I’ll—”

“You’ll what?” he snapped, folding his bulging arms over his chest. “Admit it—you don’t have a plan. You’re pretty hard to miss, especially with those streaks in your hair. Where’re you gonna do? Do you even have anywhere to go? Do you even have any money set aside, for transit or dying your hair or” —a quick, derisive glance that had her skin prickling unpleasantly— “to get some actual clothes?”

She didn’t reply immediately.

“None of that is your business,” she muttered tightly, tensed stiff as he reamed her a new one, pelting her with logical and reasonable questions, ones she hadn’t even thought of and didn’t have answers to.

So what if she didn’t have anywhere to go? So what if she hadn’t thought of all the minute, minute-by-minute details, focusing only on the loosest thread of any idea? Why did he care? He’d called her a bitch and monster and made it clear that hated her guts, couldn’t stand her even enough to pretend to be polite. So why did he care? What was it to him?

He laughed incredulously and raked a hand through his hair. “I mean, Christ, Chloe, do you really think—”

“Yes, I do! And what does it matter to you? You don’t like me! You’ve been nothing but nasty and spiteful to me, so why do you care if I have a plan or not?”

And while she expected a lot of things like him to just continue lobbing question after question at her or to escalate things into an all out screaming match, the last thing she expected was for the fight to whoosh out of him, stop in his tracks, and stare at her with a completely unreadable expression, a mask she couldn’t find the seams to.

He was just standing there, staring, not saying anything, like she’d shocked him still or broken his brain. Then he turned and started walking in the direction they’d been going in previously without a word.

For a minute, Chloe was rooted to the spot, stupefied at his lack of response—the rudeness of it, when he’d been flinging question upon question at her on the heels of almost killing a woman and, before that, the trial runs of the Change—and then anger flooded her. Heat filled her cheeks and chased away any nighttime chill that’d set in, warming her from the inside out.

Of all the people she had to be stuck with, he was the worst.

And yet, she still found herself walking after him at a distance, ignoring the discomfort that squirmed her insides, his relentless questions pinging around in her brain. And damn him for asking such simple questions when she barely had the fortitude right now.