The Choice: Part 5

The Choice
Part 5

Two weeks later, when her parents were out of town again, I arrived at her house. My heart was in my throat, and I felt like I was standing on the edge of a cliff, looking straight down. And the question that kept running through my mind was, did I have the guts to jump?
I knocked on the door, and after a few seconds Caroline answered the door. She let me in, and as soon as she locked the door, she gave me a hug, and we kissed, and she said,
“Are you ready?”
“Are you?” I asked.
She smiled. “I think so.”
It was the day after the full moon, and she looked very tired. We'd waited until then because, according to her, she wanted to give my body and mind enough time to get used to the change before its first shift. Despite my impatience, I had agreed.
We walked into the kitchen where, sitting on a counter there was a burning candle, a bowl, a pack of razorblades, a bottle of alcohol, and a first aid kit. The simplicity of the layout made me nervous.
“So that's it, huh?”
Caroline nodded.
I walked over to the counter and picked up the pack of razors, then looked at Caroline. She shrugged.
I sat down at the kitchen table, and she offered me a drink. I accepted.
“So, uh, I've been meaning to ask you. How have your parents not found out about your, uh... your lycanthropy, I guess.”
She sighed. “Please. Please, do not use that word in reference to what I -to what we are. Lycanthropy is a mental illness. We're not insane.”
“That's debatable,” I said.
She shook her head. “To answer your question, I honestly don't know. I've done my best to keep the secret, and all I can say is that it's worked. I try to sneak out to a forested place where there aren't many people, and I try to keep track of myself. But I have to be honest with you... there have been a lot of times when I should have been caught. Whenever I was sloppy about my location, or I couldn't get out in time, or whatever... people would see me. It hasn't happened often, but every time they have, they've just... looked away. I've never been able to explain it except to say that Luna takes care of her own.”
I nodded.
“But that could be just luck,” she cautioned. “Just because I've gotten lucky doesn't mean you should just go out and be crazy and expect to get off Scott-free, you understand?”
“I know, I know,” I said. “Don't worry, I'm not an idiot.”
“Sometimes I wonder,” she said with a smile.
“Well, you're the one who's dating me,” I said.
We fell into silence after this and continued to draw our gaze back to the counter, where the tools of my transformation waited.
Neither of us seemed ready to go through with it yet.
“So how is this, uh, going to work?” I said.
She looked. “The razors are for cutting, the bowl is for collecting, the alcohol is for disinfection, and the kit's for healing.”
I raised an eyebrow. “And the candle?”
She smiled. “Distraction.”
Confused, I opened my mouth to ask what she meant, but before I could say anything she said, “Do you want to see my room?”
She didn't let me answer so much as grab my hand and take me upstairs. On the door was a sign that said,
Please KNOCK before you come in!!
Caroline said, “Nosy parents,” and opened the door.
Inside, the walls were covered with drawings of wolves and cartoon characters, pictures of the moon and of nature. On the far wall was a bookcase lined with books whose spines were bent and broken.
I said, “Do you read much?” as we stepped inside. She laughed and plopped onto her bed.
“Only when I have nothing better to do,” she said. “So, yeah.”
She patted the spot next to her in the bed, and I sat down. As I made to take off my shoes, she grabbed the back of my shirt and pulled me down, then rolled over on top of me and kissed me.
“What's up?” I said.
A smile spread across her lips.
“Do you want to see me naked?”
I stuttered and blushed. “I, I-”
I sat up, and she put her arms around me, keeping me where I was.
“What's wrong?” she asked.
“I don't know if-”
She leaned around and kissed me on the lips, and held me there, and I put my arms around her. We sank back down onto the bed, and I said, “You're dangerous.”
She smiled. “Why's that?”
“Because, I...” I felt horribly embarrassed for saying this, and it showed, “I'm really attracted to you, and you know it.”
Caroline said, “Don't you want to?”
“Yeah, but isn't this kind of sudden?”
She stopped kissing me, and there was a realization in her eyes. “Oh. Oh god, I'm sorry,” she said, blushing. She got up off the bed and paced around the room. “Shit, I am so sorry.”
“What?” I asked.
“It's the moon,” she said. “You know how you feel after a full moon? I guess it's different for everyone. The shift, it, uh... it gets me riled.”
By then she looked like a tomato, and she shook her head. “I really, really did not mean to put you in that position,” she said.
I got up off the bed and put my hands around her waste, and kissed her neck. She gave a soft moan and I said, “I enjoyed it, trust me.”
We kissed again, and stood there in our embrace for a while before she said,
“We should get this over with.”
I agreed.
We walked back downstairs, holding each other's hands. Each step felt like it was the last, and so many odd things were coming to mind. These were my final moments as a normal human being. In fact, from here on out, the expression of humanity would be something exterior from myself. I would no longer be included in that bubble.
I was about to become something entirely different.
From this moment forward it would just be me and Caroline. Us, together, against the world.
And, strangely, that was okay with me. For the first time since I met her, I had no doubts, no second thoughts.
She set the bowl down on the kitchen floor and brought each of the other items down in turn. We kneeled there, considering the razors, and the bowl, and the finality these objects seemed to represent.
The ending of one life. The beginning of another.
She disinfected her hands with the alcohol, then told me to do the same. She then handed me a razor and told me to carve a wide X on my palm. I stared at my hand and felt a deep fear. My hands trembled, and I looked at her.
She smiled and said, “Give me your hand.”
I did so, and she grabbed the candle.
“What was that for aga- AHHH!”
She turned the candle upside down over the back of my hand, pouring a stream of hot wax on the back. I yanked my hand away from her and said, “What the hell was that for?!”
Caroline held up a bloody razor, and said with a smile, “Distraction.”
Mouth agape, I turned my hand over and saw the two cuts, and the blood that was already seeping from them.
“Holy shit,” I said.
I looked over at her, and she had already cut her own hand.
She held it out to me and said, “Hold my hand.”
I regarded her hand and mine and, trembling put mine against hers. Her fingers clasped, and I followed suit.
Soon, blood was dripping from between our hands into the bowl beneath them.
She looked into my eyes, and I looked into hers, and I felt the terror slowly drain away. Blood ran down our arms and for a while I felt nothing beyond the dull throb in my palm.
Then a shiver ran up my spine, and my vision went white. Next I knew, I was laying in her arms, our hands still clasped above the bowl. Her other hand was running through my air.
She said, “You've been out for almost fifteen minutes.”
“Is that normal?” I asked.
“The only other person I've done this to would say so,” she said. “How do you feel?”
I sat up, groggy. “I didn't see anything, and I don't... I don't feel any different.”
“Good,” she said. “That means it's working.”
I raised an eyebrow, then shook my head. “I'm tired.”
She smiled. “That happens with blood loss.”
Caroline peeled our hands apart. A line of dried blood outlined our hands, and the flesh around the wounds was white. Immediately she opened the first aid kit and started tending the wounds. I expected a sting when she cleaned my hand of with an alcohol pad, but there was only a dull scratch.
“It doesn't hurt,” I said, mystified. “Is that some kind of... superpower, or something?”
Without stopping she said, “Yes, love. It has nothing to do with your hand going numb.”
My head lolled backwards, and I laughed. “I feel funny.”
She rubbed the wounds with neosporin and wrapped my hand in a bandage. “That's fine,” she said. “Just don't go to sleep yet. There's one more thing we need to do.”
She laid me down on the kitchen floor and took the bowl towards the sink.
“Say, I was wondering,” I said. “Why did we need the bowl, anyway? Couldn't we just have done it over the sink?”
The sound of running water. Then she turned and handed me a cup of water. Only, it was tinted red.
“Wait. Wait a minute, what? No, no no no,” I said.
“Trust me,” she said, “It'll help.”
“Well,” I said, apprehensive, “why not just... blood?”
“You can't handle it yet. You'd vomit it back up in minutes.”
I shook my head, “It's not hygienic.”
She held up her still-unbandaged hand. “What about this?” She smiled.
“Caroline...”
“Trust me, okay?” she said with patience.
I held tried to take the water from her, but my hands could barely hold it up. “Man,” I said, “this is weird.”
She held the glass up to my lips and said, “Drink.”
After a few seconds, I opened my mouth and let the water slip down my throat. It tasted vaguely of iron, and set my senses off immediately. I drank it all, and then back. Caroline was barely able to keep me from hitting my head.
“Holy...wow,” I said. “That was...wow.”
Caroline smiled, kneeling next to me, holding my uninjured hand.
Looking at her wound, I said, “Hey, you should really take care of that.”
“I'm fine,” she said. “I'm going to help you get up, and we're going to walk to the living room. Once you're on the couch, I'll get you another glass of water, and then I'll clean everything up.”
“But-”
“I promise.”
I sighed. “I can't argue with such a pretty face.”
She put arm under my shoulder and lifted me up. My vision blurred, and my head rolled from side to side, and I could barely support my own weight. I tried my best to keep myself balanced, but I was dizzy. Caroline held me up, though, and together we made it to the other room.
She set me down on the couch, and once again told me not to fall asleep yet. I sat there for a few moments, staring off into space, my eyelids drifting closed. So many strange, blurry thoughts were floating through my mind. I wondered if this was what it felt like to be high.
Caroline came back with a glass of blood-water, and helped me to drink it down. Afterwards I said, “Can I have some more?”
She replied, “You're not ready for it. Besides, you need sleep.”
I laid back, and before I could try to life my legs up she did it for me. She draped a blanket over me and kissed my cheek. I smiled like a fool, and immediately fell asleep.