Feral Nights

A STEEL-TIPPED COWBOY BOOT
jabs my shin. The half-naked girl in my arms gasps, and I blink at the double-barreled shotgun pointed at my nose. Sloppy. I’ve been having so much fun that I didn’t hear Grams coming. And I’ve got damn good ears.

“Get up and get out!” my grandmother yells, gripping the stock. “I’ve had enough of you tom-cattin’ around while I’m workin’ day and night to keep your belly fed.”

“Yoshi?” whispers the drowsy girl draped across me in the barn loft. “Who —?”

“Stay calm,” I reply. “No sudden moves. It’ll be okay.”

Wide-eyed, she sits up, grabs her sweater, and holds it over her bra like a shield.

What’s her name again? Zora? Zelda? No, Zoë. That’s it.

Zoë’s visiting town from Topeka over winter break. Last night, we hit it off, standing in line for chili cheese dogs at Dairy Queen. I’m not sure what time it is, but we headed back to the farm at around midnight.

Now Grams is standing with her boots shoulder-width apart between us and the loft’s one-story drop-off. She gestures with her weapon toward the wooden ladder.

Zoë doesn’t have to be told twice. She hurries out from beneath the Mexican blanket and across the straw-littered floor. Then she scrambles down to the ground level and sprints out the open barn door without looking back. Not that we bonded emotionally or anything.

Zoë will be all right. Her cousins’ property is just down the road.

Meanwhile, my grandmother returns her attention to me. “What’d I tell you about picking up strange girls?”

“Well,” I begin, “you don’t like me hooking up with local girls, either, and I only have so much willpower. After all, they’re usually the ones hitting on me and —”

“You know better than to bring anyone home!” Grams fires a warning shot, knocking a hole in the roof that she’ll be cussing later. She isn’t the type to kid. The way I figure it, this effectively terminates her role as my legal guardian.

“What?” I ask. “No good-bye hug?”

As Grams lowers the barrel, I push up into a tight crouch and launch myself over her head. It’s a glorious, ninja-looking move, one I’ve nailed a hundred times. But not with a gun pointed at me or after slamming a six-pack of Bud Light.

Instead of landing neatly behind Grams on the plank floor, I overshoot the edge of the loft and, waving my arms for balance, fall another story down to hit the ground near the hogpen. Contrary to superstition, I don’t always land on my feet.

Off-balance, I turn my ankle and, wincing, dart into the early-morning light.

I didn’t feel the winter chill in the barn. Not half buried in straw with a warm, enthusiastic girl draped over me and alcohol heating my belly.

Outside, the wind bites my skin, and I yank together my unsnapped Western-style shirt. Glancing at Grams’s old farmhouse, I hesitate. I don’t have much in the way of belongings, but a change of clothes would be nice. Besides, it’s the only home I’ve ever known.

Bam.
Grams gets another round off. So much for that idea.

On the upside, she’s a great shot. Grams must have more familial affection for me than she realizes, or I’d be dead by now. Still, it’d be idiotic to push my luck.

What the hell. It’s time I moved on. Because of my grandmother, I’ve got no friends, and I wasn’t getting much out of my senior year of high school anyway.

Within seconds, my semi-restored 1972 Mercury Cougar roars to life. I make a U-turn and hit the accelerator, peeling out on the long gravel drive.

Farewell, Kansas!

I’ve got a few hundred bucks on my cash card. Enough to hightail it to the only family I have left — my big sister, Ruby, in Austin.

Could be the adrenaline, could be my metabolism, but I feel sober enough to drive. I stop for gas and munchies (four bacon cheeseburgers, six packs of beef jerky, and a two-liter bottle of Coke) outside Wichita, and just over an hour later, pull over in Tonkawa, Oklahoma, for a nap. I don’t, strictly speaking, need the sleep, but I relish it.

Continuing on my way, I sing along to country music and the pain in my ankle fades to a dull ache. By the time I hit OK City, it’s gone and the bruise has vanished, too.

Being what I am has its advantages.

I don’t feel that guilty about disappointing Grams. Wind blows. Seasons change. And I hook up with nearly every smokin’ girl who catches my eye. Since puberty, I’ve worked my way through a sizable percentage of the decent
Homo sapiens
females (and a couple of the gloriously indecent ones) near my age residing in Butler County.

So, no regrets, or at least few regrets, even if Zoë did cost me room and board.

I don’t blame Grams, either. She’s got a no-tolerance policy when it comes to friends, babes, or showing so much as a whisker in public — like I’d be stupid enough to tell anyone that we’re werecats. I understand that it’s a dangerous world, that our keys to survival are secrets, lies, and loneliness. My whole life, I’ve never known any different.

Cruising down I-35 South, I’m ready for something new.

SOMETIMES IT FEELS LIKE
I’m the one haunting this little neighborhood park, but no. That’s the literal domain of my best bud, Travis. The big question is why.

Why is he still here? Why isn’t he resting in peace?

I start off with a safer subject, our friend Aimee. “She hasn’t been to the paintball range since . . . you know,” I say. We don’t usually talk about the night he was murdered. “She claims nobody wants to go with her.”

“Why don’t you go?” Travis asks.

Maybe talking about Aimee isn’t so safe after all. She’s attractive enough in a friend sort of way, and her comic-book collection rivals mine. But paintball seems more like a date than just hanging out, and no way can I cross that line.

I’d never do that to Travis, especially now that he’s dead.

Seated by the chain-link fence that’s become a shrine to his memory, I peel a blade of dry brown grass in two. “You know I’m a lousy shot.”

Partly to distract him, I display the most recent cards in a row on the paved walk, and Travis floats down for a closer look. At first, people from all over Austin — including a few ass-wipes from Waterloo High who never spoke to him when he was alive — brought not only cards (“Forever in Our Hearts”) but also homemade signs (“We Love You, Travis!”), flowers, and candles. Now it’s just those of us who knew him.

With the holidays came red bows, candy canes, and a beaded snowflake ornament, not that we get a lot of snow. I spot a new contribution, a four-inch-long Oaxacan wood carving of an armadillo. Like the plush dillos, it obviously was left by someone in the loose network of local shifters who knows that Travis was a werearmadillo.

“Do ghosts make New Year’s resolutions?” I ask, tossing the grass aside.

“Like what?” Travis replies. “You think I should lose weight?”

“Very funny, Mr. Incorporeal.” He appears vaguely translucent, but otherwise looks like he always has — barrel body, bowl haircut, Longhorns jersey, and blue jeans.

Travis is the first friend I’ve lost . . . or sort of lost, given that his spirit is still here. As the wind picks up, blowing empty swings, it’s hard to know how to feel about that.

I’ve been doing my homework, trying to figure out why he became a ghost in the first place. At first, I figured he was too upset to move on — pissed off at having been murdered, wanting his life back, and freaked out by the grieving of the family he left behind. But Travis doesn’t seem stuck or angry. He doesn’t seem lost or afraid or confused. He’s not haunting his own home, where he could watch over his loved ones, and his remains were properly buried with full honors.

“Clyde,” he begins, “what’re you trying to get at?”

“Like . . .” I return the cards to the fence, use the links to raise myself, and maneuver into my wheelchair. “Maybe you should think about, you know, going into the Light.”

Travis’s grin is good-natured. “What would you do without me?”

“I’m just saying,” I reply. “It’s been a while since . . . it happened.” Travis was slaughtered near this very spot — closer to the tennis courts — over three months ago by a skanky werecat named Ruby Kitahara, who hasn’t been seen or heard from since.

When he doesn’t reply, I add, “Do you want to talk about it?”