Carrie Vaughn - Kitty Takes a Holiday

The room smelled strange. It was filled with the scents of sweat and illness, with Ben's own particular smell that included hints of the clothes he wore, his aftershave and toothpaste. And something else. His smell was changing, something wild and musky creeping into the mundane smells of civilization. I'd always thought of it as fur under the skin—the scent of another lycanthrope. Right here in the room with me. My lycanthropic self, my own Wolf, perked up, shifted within my senses, curious. She wanted the measure of him: friend, rival, enemy, alpha, samepack, different pack, who?

Friend. I hoped he was still a friend when he woke up.

I made him drink some water. With Cormac's help I lifted his shoulders, held his head up, and tipped a glass to his mouth. As much spilled out as went in, but his throat moved, and he drank a little. He didn't wake up, but he stirred, squeezing his eyes shut and groaning a little. I shushed him, hoping he stayed asleep. He needed to rest while his body sorted itself out.

Then I made Cormac eat something. He wouldn't tell me when he'd last eaten, when he'd last slept. It might have been days. I made bacon and eggs. I hadn't yet met a meat eater who could resist bacon and eggs. Whatever else he was, Cormac was a meat eater.

After breakfast, he spread his sleeping bag on the sofa and lay down. Broad daylight outside, and he rolled over on his side and fell asleep instantly, his breathing turning deep and regular. I envied that ability to sleep anywhere, anytime.

I sat at my desk, because I didn't have anywhere else to sit, but I didn't turn on the computer. I rubbed my face, hugged my head, and leaned on the table.

I didn't think I could take it anymore. I'd reached my limit. If ever there was a time when turning wolf and run­ning away sounded like a good idea, this was it.

"Norville?"

Startled, I straightened, looked. Cormac wasn't asleep after all. He'd propped himself on one elbow.

"Thank you," he said.

I stared back, meeting his gaze. I saw exhaustion there. Hopelessness. I'd told him Ben would be okay, but I won­dered if he'd believed it.

"You're welcome." What else could I say?

He rolled over, putting his back to me, and went to sleep.

I turned on the computer and wrote. Typing whatever came into my head, I wrote about the random shocks of life, the events that brought friends to your doorstep beg­ging for help, even when you felt that your own life had tumbled irrevocably out of control. You did what you had to do, somehow. You kept racing ahead and hoped for the best. I wrote about being at the end of my rope and made a list of the reasons I had to stay human. Chocolate, as always, was near the top of the list. I was in the kitchen eating chocolate chip cookies when Cormac woke up, after dark.

I was looking out the kitchen window, to where Deputy Ted's patrol car was parked at the end of the road, hidden in the trees. I spotted him when he turned on his dome light to eat a sandwich.

Cormac sat up, rubbed his face, then stretched, twist­ing his back, pulling his arms up. Something cracked. "What're you looking at?"

"Take a look," I said. "You'll like this."

He came to the kitchen area, and I moved aside to give him room to look out the window. The deputy still had his light on, making his car a glowing beacon among the trees.

Cormac made a derisive grunt. "They're not going to catch anyone if that's how they run a stakeout."

With the cop sitting there, nobody would come within a mile of my place to lay any sort of curse. Nobody smart, anyway. "At least I won't have rabbit guts all over my porch in the morning."

"You're a werewolf, I thought you'd like that sort of thing. Fresh meat, delivered right to your door. Maybe it's a secret admirer."

"I like picking out my own dead meat, thanks."

"I'll remember that."

He crossed his arms, leaned on the counter, and looked at me. I blinked back, trying to think of a clever response. Finally, I offered him the bag I was holding. "Cookie?"

He shook his head at it. "How's Ben?"

"Asleep. How are you?"

"Feeling stupid. I keep thinking of everything I should have done different."

"That's not like you. You're a head down, guns blaz­ing, full steam ahead kind of guy. Not one to dwell in the past."

"You don't know anything about me."

I shrugged, conceding the point. "So what's the story? You know all about my dark past. I don't know anything about yours."

"You're fishing," he said and smirked.

"Can't blame a girl for trying."

"Save it for your show."

Ouch. If only I were doing the show. It occurred to me to consider how big a favor I would have to do for Cormac before I could talk him into coining on the show for an interview, if taking in him and Ben in their hour of need didn't do it.

Cormac pulled himself from the counter. "You have a bathroom in this place?"

"In the bedroom."

He stalked off to find it. A minute later, the shower started up. At least he'd be clean.

I found my cell phone, dialed the number I wanted, and went outside. The air was cool, energizing. The inside of the house had become stifling. I sat on the porch and put my back against the wall.

A woman answered, "Hello?"

"Hi, Mom."

"Kitty! What a nice surprise. Is everything all right?"

"Why wouldn't it be?"

"Because you never call unless something's happened."

I sighed. She had a point. "I've had kind of a rough couple of days."

"Oh, I'm sorry. What's wrong?"

Between the extracurricular shape-shifting, animal sac­rifices on my front porch, my lawyer getting attacked by a werewolf, and a werewolf hunter camping out in my living room, I didn't know where to start. I didn't think I should start.

"A lot of stuff. It's complicated."

"I worry about you being out there all by yourself. Are you sure you don't want to come home for a little while? You've had such a busy year, I think it would be good for you to not have to worry about things like rent."

Strangely enough, rent was one of the few things I wasn't worried about. As much as going back to my parents' and having Mom take care of me for a little while sounded like a good idea, it wasn't an option. Not that Mom would have understood that.

"I'm actually not by myself at the moment," I said, trying to sound positive. "I have a couple of friends staying over."

"That should be fun."

If I would just break down and tell Mom the truth, be straight with her, these conversations would be much less surreal. I'd called her because I needed to hear a friendly voice; I didn't want to tell her all the gory details.

"Yeah, sure. So how are you? How are Dad and Cheryl?"

She relayed the doings of the family since her last call—more of the same, but at least somebody's world was normal—and finished by turning the questions back on me, "How is the writing going?"

"It's fine," I said brightly. If I sounded like everything was okay, maybe it would be, eventually. "I think I've got­ten over the writer's block."

"Will you be starting your show again soon? People ask me about it all the time."

I winced. "Maybe. I haven't really thought about it."

"We're so proud of you, Kitty. So many people only ever dream of doing what you've done. It's been so much fun watching your success."

She couldn't have twisted the knife any harder if she'd tried. I was such a success, and here I was flushing it down the toilet. But she really did sound proud, and happy. To think at one point I'd been worried that she'd be scandal­ized by what I was doing.

I took a deep breath and kept my voice steady. Wouldn't Jo any good to break down now. "Thanks, Mom. That means a lot."

"When are you finally coming to visit?"