We were in the usual ‘transformation’ clearing near the park, and I swallowed two painkillers.
Astarte was looking at me with impatience.
“Are you sure there is no one near?” I asked her again.
“Yes!”
I sighed, not enjoying what would come next.
“Marie, stay close to King.”
“Why is that?” King interrogated.
“Security reasons.”
“I won’t attack you, if that’s what you’re afraid.” King said back.
“Why would you attack me?” I asked.
“I don’t know?”
“It’s because I know I won’t hunt Marie, and with her next to you, I think you’ll be extra safe.” I explained.
“And me? And me?” Astarte jumped around.
I raised my eyebrow. “You definitely need protecting, sure.”
“Stop talkiiiiiiinnnngg.”
“Yeah, yeah.”
I pictured my wolf self.
The feeling came searing inside my spine. The medicine did not change a thing, and for a few minutes, I refrained shouts of pain and agony.
I didn’t like the sun, high in the sky. The moon was far away, and I felt sleepy.
I looked at my surroundings, Marie was tearful, and King had her mouth wide open.
My instincts forced me to come back to the most dangerous thing around.
Astarte was screeching like a bad pop boy band fan.
“It’s even better than I imagined! You’re like…huge! Look at that fur! Those muscles. Definitely a male wolf but…three times the normal size! Oh my god! Can you howl?”
I looked at her, annoyed. I sneezed. Then, as I had concluded that she was not an immediate threat, I decided to lay on the ground. I yawned and let myself bask in the sun.
“It seems…tame?” King said.
“Yeah, I’ve never seen it so…relaxed before either.” Marie stroke the tears off her eyes.
“Can’t…resist…”
I felt a hand in my fur. Astarte was stroking me on the side of the belly.
I growled.
She smiled wildly but took a step back. “Definitely not tamed.”
“Gray? Are you ok?” Marie got closer, albeit timidly.
“How the hell is this possible.” Said King.
Clic.
Did Astarte just snap a selfie?
“You do selfies?” Marie asked the same thing out loud.
“Why not?” The five thousand and more year old answered.
“It is not safe to do this…” King had a disapproving tone but was carefully choosing her words.
“Pshh, you shouldn’t worry too much, I could even post it on my Instagram and it would not pose any problems.”
“You’ve got an Instagram?” Marie was looking more and more incredulous.
Cute.
“Mh mh. It’s perfect to pass the time.”
“Please don’t post the giant wolf on your Instagram.” King said, a drop of sweat running down her forehead.
“I’ll put the hashtag special effects in the picture.”
“No. Please.”
“Fiiine. I’m taking pictures though. And I’m definitely having it as a poster.”
Clic Clic.
King was close to having a nervous breakdown, and Marie turned around to try to comfort her.
The cute thing had shown me her back.
I reacted by pouncing on it.
Marie shrieked very audibly but was quickly muffled by my fur on top of her.
“Oooh! He’s playing!” Astarte took more pictures.
“Marie!?” King immediately drew her gun.
Was she challenging me?
I growled.
“Wait, I’m fine!” Marie shouted, but only I could hear her.
To King’s credit, her body may have been trembling under my threat, but her hand stayed steady.
I felt Marie bite me.
I jumped back, freeing her.
“You assh…”
I gave her a big lick.
“EEEEEWWW”
“I’m so jealous.” Astarte commented.
The hunter was still aiming at me. It wasn’t a danger, but I really didn’t like this test of domination, she was even looking at me in the eyes.
It took two steps towards her, but Marie got between us.
“King. Gun. Down.”
It took a few seconds for the lieutenant to understand the concept, but she did as was asked.
“Don’t look at it in the eyes.” Astarte had teleported next to her.
“What?”
“Little one, don’t believe one second I’ll come to your help if it decides to eat you.”
Hunter gulped, then broke eye contact.
I yawned, knelt back down, and looked at Marie.
“I’m all sticky.” She looked at me directly, but it didn’t bother me coming from her.
“Fascinating.” Astarte noted.
Clic.
“Transform back so you can apologize.” She ordered.
The human was getting slightly cocky, so I gave her a big lick.
“AAAAAAHHHH FUCK YOU.”
I put my paw on her sternum and pushed.
She fell out of balance, and I pushed her to the ground, careful not to hurt her.
I then proceeded to lick her more.
She tasted nice.
“AAAAAAARRRGHHH STOP. I YIELD. I YIELD.”
Clic, clic.
“Shouldn’t we help?” King asked the age-old being.
“Why? They’re clearly having fun!”
“One of them is…”
“I can’t do a thing to stop it, anyway.” Astarte raised her shoulders.
“What? It’s stronger than you!?” King asked, terrified by the prospect of a new, more terrifying monster in her city.
This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.
“Don’t be silly. It’s a wolf. I don’t hit wolves.”
“Oh. Of course.” King was now done with reality. She took a cigarette, sat on the ground, and lit her tobacco-filled drug.
Marie had stopped resisting, and was now accepting her fate, so I considered the lesson learned.
“You shouldn’t insult the wolf next time.” Astarte told her.
“…It’s because I swore.” She was covered in my saliva.
“…Uh?”
“He did that because I swore.” Marie explained. “Can you transform back, now?”
I yawned. It would have been better to just sleep for a while, but some part of myself reminded me we were next to a park, with joggers and dog-walkers, and them seeing me would be bad.
“Can’t I pet it first?” Astarte asked.
“You mean again? Sure, lose an arm, be my guest.” Marie pointed towards me.
“I’ll tame it somehow.” The fake teenager promised.
“It’s Gray, not an it.”
“The energy signature is slightly different, though.”
“If by that you mean he’s different in wolf form. Yes, he’s feral, but I assure you, it’s still Gray. He’s got that look in his eyes.”
“…interesting.” Astarte took a picture of Marie.
“Hey!” She protested.
“It’s for souvenirs.”
I decided it was time to change back. The pain was horrible, but more tolerable than when transforming into the wolf. It took some time to catch my breath.
Marie brought me back my clothes, hiding me from Astarte or King’s view.
“Here.”
She had used them to wash some of my saliva.
“Fair enough.” I nodded.
“You should wash your teeth as a wolf.”
“I’ll ask the Beast to consider buying a giant toothbrush.”
“You big, empty pumpkin.”
I laughed at the made-up insult.
“Not going to swear?” I put my jeans on, the feeling of wolf saliva on them clearly not comfortable. I was stuck on the butt part.
“You’re Igris right now.” Marie noted.
“Oh.”
“Can’t you even tell anymore?”
I bit my lip. “I don’t know…”
I changed back to Ray’s body and put the jeans on.
Marie looked at me with a funny look.
“What is it?” I asked her.
She was angry now.
“Nothing.”
“Marie, this is a forbidden answer.”
“What is?”
“What’s wrong? Nothing. Are you okay? I’m fine. And the worst of them all: Haha.”
“People are coming.” King had come towards us.
“Yup. Smelled them.” I answered.
Astarte was looking at her phone, a loving look in her eyes.
“We’re going back.” I informed her.
“Oh, I’ve got things to do, as I said before. I’ll be back tonight. Do I need to prepare something for dinner?”
I had a hard time getting to understand the five-thousand five-hundred-year-old propose cooking services, but finally managed to say: “No, It’s my turn tonight.”
“Good. See you soon. Marie, you too!”
“Erm, yeah, sure, see you soon.”
And she vanished in thin air.
“I’m having a hard time understanding what’s happening right now.” King noted.
“You want to go back to the apartment? I can prepare a hot chocolate or something.”
“No. I’ll take the day off. I’ll be fine tomorrow. Or next week. Or some other time in the near future.”
And King left us, walking slowly towards the parking lot. I saw her text someone as she disappeared behind the thick vegetation.
“Look at us, abandoned, full of slime. Everyone is going to look at us funny.” Marie commented.
The sun was high, the grass and vegetation was reclaiming its right. Winter was ending.
“Strange times are ahead of us.”
“That’s for sure.”
“I think I know what I’ll draw next.” I said.
“Nice?”
“It is about you.”
“Oh?”
I looked at her. “Let’s go back to the flat.”
“Sure, but you go first, I’m hiding my face behind your back.”
I smiled, but my mind was already focused on a line, darkish and white. A truth and a lie, the only possible answers, a fake duality that needed to be revealed.
“So? Do you need me for something?”
We were back at the flat, and after a quick shower, I had brought my best friend inside my room.
“Yes. Remove your clothes.”
“Ok?” She did as I ordered, uncharacteristically shy. “If this is a new way to get inside my pants, I assure you, it’s unneeded.”
I didn’t react to the provocation.
“Sit on the chair, in front of the white wall.”
“Are you doing me nude? That’s uh…I don’t know if…”
But I was gone already, entering her room.
“Hey?!”
I came back with her large mirror and positioned it so it could reflect the light of the sun outside and make nice shadows on her body.
“You’re in your artist mode, aren’t you?”
I was searching inside my bag for my crayon, a brush, and the color grey.
When I looked back up. She was gone.
“Marie!” I shouted, confused by the disappearance.
“Don’t fret. I’m there. I’m going to be there a while, and knowing you, you won’t even think about drinking. I brought water.” She gave me a pet bottle, that I immediately put on the ground, and she left another one behind the chair she sat on. She took a pose and began exclaiming: “Draw me like one of your…”
“Shh.”
“Sorry.”
“How am I supposed to sit?”
I changed into Igris and removed most of my clothes.
“Oh. Yeah. Forgot about that quirk of yours.” She gave me a funny look.
That was the one.
I began drawing.
She sighed and stared at me.
As I did now when I was in a trance, I switched bodies multiple times. As some parts needed to be expressed through Ray and others through Igris. Marie had not said anything, trying her best to let me concentrate.
After a few hours, I gave her an annoyed look.
“What?” She asked.
“It’s done.”
“Why the long face, then?”
“Because it’s the truth.”
“Uh uh? Am I that ugly in the truth?”
“Don’t be ridiculous, you’re perfect.”
“Coming from a girl in this killer of a body, I don’t know how to take it.” It was true I had taken Igris’s shape right now.
“I love you.”
That shut her up.
“Come here.” I continued. She stood up and came to see my piece.
Her first reaction was fright.
“Gray, you know it’s not true.”
The painting, as usual with my current style, was of mix of abstract and realism.
Marie was looking at me, in a way similar yet different than the look she had given me those last few hours.
In the mirror on her left, black and white were filled. The black on the top was rugged, hard, and on the bottom, it was soft and curvy. It created an effect on the white in the middle, where the higher you looked, the rougher the nothingness looked, while the lower you looked, the softer the color, or lack thereof, seemed.
The rest of the scene was empty, except Marie. She wasn’t perfectly drawn, and there were some parts of her you could only guess through the shadows the mirror created.
Her eyes though, were a singularity, as they were the only thing filled with something other than black and white.
She saw grey. Her expression was indescribable.
“What do you see?” I asked.
“I’m not…attracted to you as a man.” She lied. “I’m a lesbian.” She said the truth.
“You know I can tell when people lie.”
“I’m not lying!” She lied.
“You are, but not to me.”
“I’m not! You’re wrong!”
“Marie, I love you.”
“I know! I love you too! But I’m a lesbian! Mom sacrificed her relationships with so many people because of me. She chose me! What if…” Tears were falling down her cheeks.
“Marie. I can’t help you. I’m not like you. I can only show the truth, I don’t know how to make people accept it.”
“It’s not the truth…” She went for the door, but I stopped her. “Let me go.”
“No.”
“Gray!”
I kissed her. She punched me in the boob.
“Stop it!” She pulled away.
“Marie. Take a step back. I can’t help you... But you can. What would you say to me if I was in your shoes? How would you help me? You’d help me.”
“I…” She stopped for an instant, her tears ceasing. “I…would tell you to stop being a drama queen.” She winced. “No. That’s what I would say if I was angry at you. I’m saying that because I’m angry at myself.”
“Mh mh?”
“I’d tell you it doesn’t matter. Whatever label you put on yourself, it cannot encapsulate the truth. I’m always arguing about that with Jay. Man, woman, lesbian, straight, black, white. Who cares?”
“Lots of people care.” I answered.
“No. It’s all fake. All false labels. All things we learned and were taught to believe in. But it’s not reality. You’re Gray, that’s the only truth. If you’re a lesbian but you love a man, so what?”
“And you are Marie.”
She sat on my bed. “But my mom…It broke her…seeing my dad like that…all because I was different. What now? ‘Sorry mom, in the end, I’m going out with a guy?’”
“I’m not a guy. I’m Gray.”
She looked at me. “I’m so selfish.”
“You’re selfish because you think about your mother?”
“Because I don’t want to disappoint her!”
I sat next to her.
“She won’t be disappointed. We can’t even tell her anyway.”
“GREAT! So, I’m an asshole AND a liar. I don’t even understand why…transform into Ray.”
“You sure?”
“Yes.”
I did as she asked.
“See. You’re practically naked, and I don’t feel a thing.” She added. “But…” She kissed me.
I realized the feeling of her lips on mine was not so different now that I could concentrate on it.
“But shit.” She broke the kiss.
“Yup. Language though.”
“Oh, come on, give me a break.”
I transformed back into Igris. “Sorry.”
“I’m a lesbian.”
“You’re Marie.”
She looked at the ground in silence for a few seconds.
“Throwing back my words right at me, I see.”
“You taught me that.”
She grinned. “I’ll need to think about it.”
“Mh mh.”
“What are you looking at?” She looked me in the eyes.
“You’re sexy when full of snot and tears.”
“Ew.”
I kissed her again.