“Mom? It’s Maddy.”
“Maddy?” She was almost immediately awake and sounded worried. “It’s late. What’s wrong? What happened?”
“Easy, Mom. I just have a question.”
“A question at three in the morning?”
“Who’s on the phone?” I heard my dad ask.
“It’s Maddy, dear, I’m talking to her. Maddy, what do you need?”
“Mom.” I took a deep breath. I knew the quickest way to ask was to come right out and see what happened. “Mom, I’ve run out of my medicine. Can you tell me what the brand name is, so I can have my doctor order more?”
There was a long pause, and I could hear my mother’s breathing get heavier. “Your…meds? You’re almost out, or youareout?”
“I’m out. I forgot to tell you. I ran out a few weeks ago and things have been crazy so?—”
“Maddy! Dear God, you have to take your meds right away. Oh my God.”
“Mom, Mom, calm down. I’m not going to die from anemia, right?” I asked the question, but there was a dark pit opening inside me. The way she was acting was almosta dead giveaway.
“No, youhaveto take it. I think I have some here at the house. I’ll drive down tonight.”
“Jesus, Mom. It’s a two-and-a-half-hour drive. Are you being serious? I’m at a doctor’s office right now. Tell me what it is and he’ll call it in.”
“No, no, no. You know I have to call my doctor. I get the discount for it. I?—”
“Enough!” I shouted into the phone. Everything went still. Doc and Nico froze where they were; the look on Nico’s face was resigned regret. Mom went silent, and I could hear Dad murmuring to her, asking questions. “The truth, Mom. Right fucking now.”
“Maddy, baby, you have to understand?—”
“All I have to understand is what the hell is going on. What medicine am I on? Tell me. Right now…or…or I’ll never speak to you again.” In that moment, a part of me meant it. How could I trust my parents if they couldn’t tell me what was happening even when I came right out and asked.
When Mom spoke again, I could hear the tears in her voice. “You don’t have anemia, Maddy. When that strange man called us and said he had a baby we could adopt, your father and I were so happy. He told us you were a shifter, though. Or at least a half-shifter. He said we’d need to give you suppressants onceyour beast, or whatever, started to emerge. He said if anyone found out you were a shifter, your life might be in danger. That’s all he told us. We found a doctor who could get the suppressants into the country.
“We really didn’t think we’d need them, but when you got close to puberty, you started acting out. Almost to the point that we were afraid of you. You lashed out, you were aggressive, and totally out of control. We got scared and started giving you the pills. They keep the shifter transformation from happening. The doctor said it makes the creature go dormant.”
I was sure Nico could hear everything on the phone. He’d taken my free hand in his and his head hung down. I’d never been so angry and sad at the same time. It was like my whole life had been pulled out from under me. The people who were supposed to take care of me and be honest with me had lied to me my entire life. I could hear Mom crying on the phone.
“We only wanted you to have a normal life, Maddy. We wanted you to be safe and normal. You seemed so much happier once the pills took effect.”
My wolf growled, and the sadness was fading. All I felt now was rage. An anger so deep that I wanted to get in the car and drive to their house to scream at them. To shout, to throw things, to show them the wolf they’d tried to suppress for almost twenty years.
“Maddy?” Nico whispered. I ignored him until he hissed in pain. I glanced down and saw that the hand he was holding wasn’t my hand anymore. At least it wasn’t like the hand I’d always known. My fingernails had transformed into claws, digging into his flesh. I gasped and released his hand, dropping the phone. I stumbled backward, clutching my warped hand.
The phone clattered to the floor, and I could hear Mom screaming my name on the speaker. Nico scooped the phone up and started talking, but I tuned it out. I slumped into a seat,already starting to hyperventilate. Doc slid next to me and was trying to talk to me, but all I heard was the dull roar of my blood coursing through my body and the growl of my wolf. I could feel her rage at finding out she’d been suppressed for our entire lives. I could still feel the claws on my hands. I kept them hidden under my armpits, then bent over, staring at the floor.
I tried to tell my wolf that I was sorry, doing my best to make sure she could feel my sorrow. So many years of lies and secrets. I apologized, and almost instantly, my wolf’s anger subsided. It was like she knew how sorry I was, that I’d had nothing to do with the deception. It was the first time Itrulyfelt like a whole new being was inside me. I started to sob, and my wolf seemed to wrap some sort of emotional blanket around me. I could hear her whining, hurt by my own pain. I continued to repeat that I was sorry in my head. Over and over again, I apologized, not stopping until I managed to gain some semblance of control. Finally risking to open my eyes, I saw that my hands had gone back to normal. I released a sobbing sigh and smiled.
Doc helped me stand and walked me toward the bed. “I want you to stay here tonight. I need to keep you under observation. I’ve never known anyone to be on suppressants for so long, so I have no idea what the side effects or withdrawal symptoms might be. I’ll get you a Xanax, so you can sleep.”
“That sounds great. I could really go for being stoned,” I said as I climbed into one of the clinic beds, déjà vu hitting me from the night I was attacked the first time.
Nico walked over to me and took my hand again. I could see the angry red puncture wounds on the back of his hand. I frowned when I saw them. “I’m sorry about your hand.”
He shook his head. “No big deal. Seriously. I’m sorry. Not because I did anything, but for”—he gestured toward the phone on the table—“for all that. For having to go through it all. I can’t imagine how you’re feeling, but we’ll get through it. I promise.”
“Yeah, I know,” I murmured.
