Dark Side of the Moon
"Wolf! What are you doing?" Virginia was knocked onto her side, dragged forward and gathered up in Wolf's arms. "Oh - what, you're soaking wet!" Her arms went around him, appalled at the state of his shirt, at how cold he was.
"Virginia. I thought. I looked. I couldn't. Dead. Prison. Hungry. The cub. Lost. The moon. You were. I did. Oh. Virginia." He rambled crazily in her ear, shaking, whimpering, kissing her in between words on the eyes, face, neck. She couldn't understand exactly what he was trying to tell her, so she merely shushed him and held him tight until, finally, he ran out of disjointed thoughts and quieted.
They lay there for a little time, Virginia making soothing sounds, Wolf calming down with relief, clutching his mate to him for dear life. Virginia tried to wrap her coat around both of them, but it was too small and the air too cold for it to do much good.
"Wolf," she said at length, "we need to go home."
His teeth chattered. "I know...but, but , Virginia, I don't know where that is. We...no way out --"
"We'll find a way." Virginia hoped she wasn't making false promises. She paused, momentarily unwilling to move. If it weren't so cold, if he weren't in such a high-strung state, it would actually be kind of romantic here, in their own little wolf den inside the tree.
But they couldn't stay. She stirred and he released her. She crawled out of the hollow and turned to help him. He moved stiffly, unwinding himself from the small space. They stepped onto the path and Virginia gasped as light fell on Wolf's bloodstained shirt, but she bit back her shocked reaction. There were questions she wanted to ask, but this was not the time, not while the moon still might be influencing him. And she wasn't sure, down deep, if she really wanted to hear the answers.
She guided them back towards the entrance. Now that she'd found him, the park didn't seem threatening any more, and its shadows were just that - shadows, not inky pools concealing danger. She cast her eyes at the sky, at the moon, then threw a furtive glance at Wolf. He appeared disheveled, damp and somewhat depressed, but not dangerous or delusional.
The front entrance was locked, gates pulled across the turnstiles.
"I told you we can't get out," he whined. "We're trapped --"
"No, Wolf, we are not trapped. Let's be logical here. There is a way out."
"Not for the animals."
Okay, that was logical, if unhelpful. "How did you get in?"
Wolf screwed up his face and chewed his lip. "I don't remember," he said finally.
"Okay, okay, think...did you climb the fence?"
"I told you, I don't remember!" His voice was harsh, suddenly. He closed his eyes and regained control, then scrutinized his palm. "I cut my hand."
"Let me see." The cut wasn't deep, but it had a ragged look that could have come from the wire. "All right, we won't climb. Except -- Wait a minute..."
Virginia had a sudden flash of herself peering over the stone wall of the park from the street. There hadn't been any razor wire on the Fifth Avenue side --
"Wolf, come here!"
"It's no use --"
"Wolf, Come Here!" The command made him blink. But he came.
There was a storage shed that abutted the wall. More chain-link fence enclosed the shed, but it was only six feet high, and though there were spikes, it had no wire looping around the top. "Give me a boost." Wolf lifted her up until she could get leverage on the shed's roof. She climbed up the rest of the way herself, carefully avoiding the spikes, and crawled along the slanted roof to the wall. There was only a gap of a few feet between the shed's roof and the grey stone She found herself overlooking the cross street that traversed the park, and it looked to be about an eight foot drop to the road. She gestured for Wolf to follow, and he climbed the fence easily and came to the edge of the wall.
Fortunately there was little traffic in these early morning hours, or they would have been in danger from cars whizzing across town. Wolf leapt down first, then reached up and helped Virginia. And then they were actually, finally free.
They walked back to 81st Street at a brisk pace. Virginia was sorry she hadn't taken her wallet when she left so suddenly - a cab would have been nice, as she wanted to get Wolf home as quickly as possible. As for Wolf, he was silent on the way uptown, but every now and then he'd sniff, look up at the sky, sigh deeply. He seemed to have sunk into his own thoughts.
Virginia rushed them through the lobby, grateful no one was there to see how awful they looked; between the dirt smears and bloodstains, the two of them made a frightening pair. Once in the apartment, Virginia dropped her coat and ran to turn on the shower, letting the water run until it was quite hot. Wolf had paused at the door to the kitchen, and stood looking at the rubble with blank eyes, as if he hadn't seen it before, and couldn't quite understand what he was seeing. She propelled him towards the bathroom, pulling off his ruined shirt, then pushing him onto the edge of the tub so she could strip off his pants and shoes. He let her push him and pull him any way she chose. His listlessness worried her.
She made him stay under the hot water until his shivering stopped and all the rusty smears of blood had washed down the drain. He yelped as the water hit his torn palm and numerous small scratches, and Virginia was glad to see some sparks of energy returning. But he hadn't said anything since they left the park, and she realized after some futile efforts on her part that he wasn't making eye contact with her either.
Virginia stripped off her own clothes and stepped into the shower, thinking that some physical contact might lure Wolf out of his mood. But just as she joined him, and reached up to touch his face, he moved aside and stepped out of the shower, grabbing a towel and heading into the bedroom.
"Wolf? Can't you wait just a second..." Her voice trailed off. He didn't answer, so she made quick work of her own shower. She briskly toweled off and wrapped herself in her robe.
She found him in the kitchen, picking up bits of china from the rubble. "What are you doing?"
"Have to clean up."
"It can wait." She put a hand on his arm, but he shrugged it aside. "You should go to bed. You had a rough night. Come on." This time she put her hand firmly on his, refusing to let go, and finally he put down the broken china and allowed her to lead him to the couch. There, he sat huddled, knees drawn up, eyes fixed on a point inside himself. So she sat down with him. "Please," she said softly, "please talk to me. Let me help."
He shook his head. "Virginia..." He sounded tired, but more than that, defeated. "It was terrible."
"I know."
"There's no way to stop it -- it keeps happening, over and over again, no matter how hard I fight. I try to be better, I try so hard for you --" He swallowed. "I can't control myself. I behave like a wild animal, a monster --"
"You're not a monster."
"But you don't know me. What I'm like. Not really." His eyes finally met hers, and his voice grew harsher. "I hunted, I killed something tonight. I tore it limb from limb. I ripped its throat out. I ate it. All. Raw. Cripes, I am what I am, Virginia, and no matter how hard I try, I can't change the fact that I am a wolf, an animal!"
"Yes. You are."
He flinched, perhaps expecting she would argue with him, deny what he had said. Maybe hoping she would.
"You are an animal, Wolf, and sometimes a wild one. And you know what else? You are sometimes a very strange person, too. And sometimes you are so wonderful I can't imagine you really exist... And sometimes you're impossible. Should we make a list? Good points: sensitive, loving, funny, sexy; bad points - odd sense of timing, obsessive, intense, eats raw meat - and then what about me? Do I get a list too? Good points - well, you'll have to fill those in -- bad points - scared, sometimes moody, doesn't trust easily, makes far too many lists - we could go on and on, if you'd like, figure out exactly what's wrong with both of us. Frankly, I think it's a waste of time."
She paused, feeling tears well up, and took both of his hands in hers. "Stop trying to change for me. I never asked you to, you know."
"But --"He pulled a hand away and gestured towards the kitchen door. "I almost killed you!"
"No you didn't. You just got a little carried away. So did I. It was an accident. Just a bad choice of location. Everything else was amazing." She squinted at him, thinking of what he'd just said. "So you do remember that!"
He shot her a sideways look under his lashes, and a corner of his mouth went up. "Virginia, some things are hard to forget." She smiled at him, moving closer. Wolf seemed to relax, just a little, but his expression became troubled again. "Something else. When we were, when you - had the accident, I couldn't help you. I tried, but I couldn't seem to do anything. Everything got all -- jumbled up in my head. If you really had been dying, it wouldn't have been any different. I would have done the same thing - run away!"
"You didn't run away, you tried to help. You got confused because of your cycle --." Virginia stopped. Wolf was shaking his head.
"No. A wolf always protects his mate, even during the full moon. Always. It's an instinct. My change -- what happened should have snapped me out of it. But it didn't. I got worse and worse, and for a while I couldn't even hear you or smell you or --" He sagged a bit lower on the couch. "I'm not even a good mate for you."
Virginia considered what he was saying. "A wolf always protects his mate?" Wolf nodded. "Wow. And that feeling of not being able to smell or hear well - does that happen a lot?"
"Never."
"Not Ever?"
"Never. Usually everything gets sharper. It would be like my tail got smaller, instead of fuller, during the full moon. See?" He wagged his extremely bushy tail at her for emphasis.
She leaned against him, mystified. And then, suddenly, she had it, though she didn't know why it came to her. "Wolf, did you ever take anything during your cycle before? I mean anything like medicine?"
"Nope. Well, except that one time a guard felt sorry for me and gave me something that was supposed to make me sleep through it."
"'Supposed to?' What happened?"
He looked a little abashed at the memory. "I, um, huff-Puff, Virginia, it's kind of, well, embarrassing."
"What?" Pause. "Tell me!"
"All right, all right, all right. Instead of falling asleep I ended up on a parapet. Naked. Singing. The other prisoners were all chanting 'Jump! Jump!' and I almost did."
"That's awful!" It was awful, though Virginia couldn't get the picture of Wolf, naked and singing, out of her head, and had to contain a snort. She cleared her throat. "Wolf, I think that pill I gave you affected you the wrong way. Like, like -- well, like you were drunk. No, worse. It made you high, stoned, you know. Like you were on a bad trip or something." He was looking at her with a complete lack of comprehension. "Okay. Never mind. But it was my fault, not yours. I should have known not to give that to you."
"Not your fault. You were trying to help. I know." Wolf put his arms around her and Virginia snuggled up to him. "Thank you for trying." He nuzzled her hair.
"Wolf, I won't ever let you be alone again when you go through this." She lay her head on his chest, comforted by the steady sound of his heart beating. "I was so worried about you, that something terrible would happen to you. And it did. I guess that, until I can think of something better, next time I'd better just tie you up, like you said."
"It's probably for the best, Virginia."
"It's still weird."
"I know."
She sat up and gave him a little kiss. "Come to bed?"
"Okay." They got halfway to the bedroom. "What about the kitchen?"
"Leave it for tomorrow." She tugged at his hand.
"But -- what about the leg of lamb?"
"It's okay. I put it in the fridge before I came after you."
"That's not what I meant. Uh -- aren't you even a little bit hungry?"
She looked up at him. "Ah. That means You are. How can you be hungry, after you ate a whole..." An image of the paddock swam before her eyes. "Um, never mind. Let's not go there. Want a snack?"
"Yes, please. Succulent, juicy, fresh frolicking lamb, please."
"It's cooked, you know."
He shrugged. "I'll make an exception."
Virginia did eat some of the lamb, her spaghetti dinner having been one of the casualties of the kitchen avalanche. Wolf finished it, pronounced it delicious even though it was cooked, and washed it down with a quart of water. He thought a quart of milk would have been better, but wisely did not say so.
Continued in Part 5 - Aftermath.