“Hey, uh, buddy,” Roscoe said, his ears pulled back. “We good now?”
Darryl said nothing. Instead, he smiled while stroking the soul patch below his thin, black lips.
“I’ll take that as a maybe.”
The larger werewolf placed his rough hand on my shoulder, pulling my attention from the ocean. “You look more stressed out than usual, and that’s saying something.”
“Ever heard of a town called Norwich?”
Darryl shook his head, but Roscoe’s face lit up.
“Norwich? Now that’s a damn pretty place. What about it?”
“Apparently, it’s the only halfway decent town where I can get housing. The problem is, it’s like five hours away.”
“So? What are you so afraid to leave behind? We ain’t got nothin’ here.”
Roscoe actually made a good point. The only reason I’d moved to the city was to start a career, but that was out the window.
“Have you ever been there?”
Roscoe shook his head. “Nah, but I had a few friends that really loved it. That town’s practically made for us. They got a healthy population of werewolves, and the humans are freaks. I’m talkin’ occult type shit.”
“You’re sure as hell not selling me on this place,” I said, typing the town’s name into my phone’s search engine.
“Think about it, Cody. It’s practically Halloween every day! There’s always something spooky goin’ on, and the town’s surrounded by woods people say is haunted. Plus, we ain’t gonna be the only werewolves. The humans’ll love us.”
“Yeah, I bet they do. We’ll be the most popular blood sacrifices to Satan next month. But that’s fine, because it’s cool and spooky.”
“Aw come on. It ain’t like that.” Roscoe let out a loud laugh, but after a couple seconds, his face went straight. “I don’t think it is, anyway.”
“Sounds like a place for witches. I’d take Satan over those any day,” Darryl said.
“Stop fucking with me, guys. I’m not stupid enough to believe this shit.”
Darryl raised an eyebrow. “You think I’m stupid?”
“No. I think you’re fucking with me.”
“You better listen to Darryl. He was big into that shit back in the day.”
I turned back to the larger werewolf, who gave a half grin. “Is he serious?”
“Nah, I just hung around with interesting people. And if I knew anyone that practicedthatkind of magic, Roscoe’s dick would have shriveled up and fallen off years ago.”
“Oh hell naw,” Roscoe shouted, the fur on his neck sticking straight up. “You really had ’em do spells ‘n shit on me?”
“That was years ago, and last night, it looked like it was still all there.”
“That ain’t funny, man! You know about the rule of three, right?”
Darryl shrugged. “It’s not likeIdid the rituals. What happened to all that excitement from earlier, hmm?”
“This is different.” Roscoe looked down at his lap. “Now my dick hurts.”
“Oh please,” I said, shrugging off Roscoe’s abrupt superstitious behavior. “You were fine before Darryl said anything. It’s like voodoo. It only works if you really believe it does.”
“My dick was hurtin’ before.”
