Angelina

I started walking around and calling him in my mind. If he could hear me, he should please respond. I turned to the left and started walking down the road. There were many people, and this was part of L.A., where people often come. You could see men on the street holding cups, coming down from their cars, or holding hands with their lovers.

It was a busy part of the city; there were so many people and so much smell that it was difficult to pick him out. I closed my eyes briefly. My special abilities were on high alert. I could see ten times further and could hear ten times better. I began to run as fast as I could, hoping I would catch him before he would do something stupid.

I came to a junction, which was a lot quiet. The road looked like the part he would take. I could hear howling in the farthest distance, miles, and miles away. Then I slowed down. I could smell him.

I walked for some minutes and came to an alley on my right side, but there was another one on the other side of the road. I could still smell him. He could be down a corner or the other one. So, I stopped running and turned around in circles, thinking of which direction I should follow. I stopped moving and turned to the alley on the left. How could he just leave the car when I had told him what would happen if we were caught? How could he go around in a city like this when he understood what could happen if he should get caught?

As I marched down the alley, I lost his scent. So I stopped walking, turned around, and headed in the other direction. I ran as fast as I could and kept running until I came to a seven-story building. The smell was so strong. He was on one of the floors of the building. I walked to the entrance door and took the stairs, climbing as fast as possible, faster than humans could climb.

Collins was on the last floor, trying to break into the building. He was kicking the door and trying to get a door.

I stopped. “Hey, what are you doing?” I asked.

“A child. He needs help.”

“Are you out of your mind? You left the car and came here.”

“I said the boy needs help.”

“No, we need to get back and stick to what’s important to us.” I looked back at the door I had followed. No one had come out to ask why I was shouting so loudly with no other humans in sight.

“Listen, Angie. Just listen. There is a baby inside. He is dying.”

I took a deep breath and walked to the door as he tried to open it again. I looked inside the keyhole. There were the cushions, rugs, center table, and things you would expect in a living room. There was no baby in sight or anywhere around.

I tried to look around again to see what he was talking about and why he was this serious about getting inside. On the left side of the room, a lady was lying on her back, her hair sprawled all over as if she had been knocked unconscious. I took my eyes off it and stepped back from the door. I ran and hit the door with my shoulder. The door gave in on the third attempt.

“Stay here,” I said and ran inside.

Truly, a baby was lying in the bathtub, probably drunk. I took her out of the water and placed a hand on her chest. She was still breathing, but he was losing it. I put her on the rug, placed my palms over one another and on her chest, and began to pump. I would pump twenty times and lean to her nose and breathe in. She cried out, an amount of water pumping out of her mouth.

She was a toddler, probably three or four. I tried my best to pacify her and walked around. The mother was still lying on the floor and got up some minutes later, looking around the house.

“You tell me,” I said.

“You and your child were close to dying. While you passed out.”

“What? Oh,” she rubbed her head and looked around. Then she started crying at me.

“Hey, You are okay. Both of you are okay?” I said, walking closer to her and hugging her.

“Is there someone I can call to come around? You can’t be alone,” I said.

She took the child from me and kept crying. Then she nodded, “my sister,” she said.

I nodded, asked for her phone, and she pointed at it on the center table. After asking to unlock it, I called her sister and explained what had happened. Then I put the phone down and waited for her sister to arrive.

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“You passed out on the floor,” I said. “Has that ever happened before?”

“No,” she said. “I was just tired.”

“You need to take care of yourself. You know that, right? You have a baby who needs it. She could have died today because you were not there for a minute.”

The mother continued sobbing, and I just stood there watching. The baby had stopped crying, and now he was fascinated with his mother crying. “I am sorry,” she said to her daughter, “I am so sorry.”

The said sister came around, a chubby lady with shades. I explained the situation again and waited for the family reunion to begin before excusing myself.

“I am sorry. I have to leave,” I said.

“Thank you for saving our lives,” the child’s mother said.

“You take care of yourself,” I said, heading out the door.

I took a deep breath when I got outside the door. Collins wasn’t at the door, but he was still around, and I could smell him. I closed my eyes again, eyes morphing to a green hue, and senses ten times alert again. Then I began to climb the stairs down.

Collins was waiting beside the building, and he came out of the building.

“I was here to help,” he said.

I didn’t listen to him. I kept jogging while he followed me behind. I was walking on two legs, and he was following on four, but we both were the same. His eyes would have the green hue as mine. My senses were heightened already due to anger and choice.

“I am sorry for putting you through that. I just can’t help it.”

I didn’t stop walking. “You don’t care, Collins. You don’t care if it’s dangerous. You will do as you please.”

“I am sorry,” he said. “I was only trying to help.”

I stopped running. “How did you know that child needs help? The distance from where we parked to this one was too far. How did you get here?”

He stared into my eyes, and I couldn’t read his mind. The street was quiet, but some cars honked, and soft music played in the distance. Once we got to the main road again, we would see people moving around, and it would be all noisier again. I wanted him to admit that he didn’t just hear the child’s cry. He was walking around and trying to put us in danger.

He looked at the ground and up at me.

“I saw… someone. I think he's a werewolf…”

I frowned a little bit. He saw a werewolf? I stared around the area, trying to ensure a pack had not surrounded us. I couldn’t smell anything dangerous, but Collin’s eyes were determined. He was telling the truth.

There were reasons why seeing werewolves could be dangerous. This was California. My grandparents met here — as wolves. They were sent out of their packs. Their packs were using their ability to kill, steal and commit crimes. They were recruiting people against their will. Many died. Turning someone into a wolf through bite could go three ways. If you are lucky, you will become a wolf. The unlucky ones die instantly or go insane before they die.

“You saw a werewolf?”

“Yes,” he said. “Someone run past me. He was close. I felt something strange when he did. I could smell him. I tried to follow him.” he said, looking at the direction we had followed.

“Did he see you?”

“I tried to catch up, but he ran away.”

“Did he see you?”

“No…”

“Collins, you are a lone wolf. You can’t… We can’t join other wolves. It’s dangerous.”

“Why?”

“He doesn’t look dangerous.”

“You just said he didn’t see you. How did you know he wasn’t going to kill you?”

“Is that how werewolves behave? They kill each other without questions?”

I shook my head and looked down the road into the far distance. There were woods down the end of the alley. It would take a few minutes of walking to get there, but a wolf would get there faster. “We will talk about this at home, alright. Werewolves don’t kill people. But we have good werewolves and bad ones. Just like humans. You and I know not all humans are kind or nice to everyone. Let’s go home. We will talk about it.”

We started walking to the car again. We weren’t running, just moving casually and gracefully. My head was filled with thoughts. I remembered when I first moved here, living alone, a lone wolf in a city like this, and I wanted to belong. I wanted to find a pack so bad that I would call my mother and talk. My mother was visiting every weekend so it would be less lonely. She told me never to join a pack and be caught up in the wrong one.

But what about Collins? Would he ever give up the impulse to belong in a pack? His body and abilities would whenever he had that sense of belonging. He would be drawn towards that. I took a deep breath.

“I guess Clara15 didn’t come up,” he said.

We crossed using the pedestrian crossing. “It was a prank,” I said. “I should have listened to you.”I put my hands in my coat and bowed my head. It would be more difficult to find a witch than I thought.

I was about to raise my head when someone bumped into me. The knock was so painful that I clutched onto my stomach and winced.

“I am so sorry. It’s my fault. I shouldn’t have… I was.. carried away. I am so sorry.”

Her hands were on my arm, trying to help me get back into a standing position. She helped me straighten my hair, too.

I glanced at her face. She was a young lady, probably in her early twenties. She had an attractive face like those young models in high school romance. Her hair was red, naturally red, like the girl in my dream some days ago.

“I am so sorry,” she said again.

“No, it’s okay. I wasn’t looking either. So, yeah.”

“Is that your friend?” she asked.

“Yeah, his name is Col,” I said.

“Oh, he is so huge and cute. So calm. He doesn’t need a leash.”

“No, he is a good boy…. He doesn’t need that.”

She tried to touch her, but Collins took a step back and wouldn’t let her. “Yeah,” he is wary of strangers,” I said.

“Hi,” she said to Collins. Then she looked at me. “He is cute, though.Do you mind? My name is Jennifer… Jenniffer Griffin.”

“Angelina Cole,” I said.

“You share the same surname as him,” she said.

Well, I hadn’t thought about that. “Well, yes,” I said.

“Nice to meet you, Angelina.”

“Nice to meet you, too.”

“Have a nice day.”

“And you, too.”

I watched her walking away, the wind blowing her red hair and her gown so perfect on her body. I wished I had told her how beautiful she was.