Are you there?
In a flash I’m pulled downward. The light disappears and I’m sucked into darkness—free-falling. Then suddenly the light is back, only it’s white and blinding and I’m still falling. With a splash I land in a shallow body of water, then thrash my way to the surface and gasp for air. Once I’ve shaken the water from my eyes, I squint into the light.
I’m standing at the edge of a waterfall, forest on three sides and mist rising from the sheer edge over which the sky, a perfect blue, stretches on for eternity. The sun is a blazing ball of light. Across the water something catches my eye––a dark shape floats on the surface. A body.
Dread seizes my gut like a ravenous wolf and I sprint, lifting my knees and splashing my way across the basin.
I dive for the body, slipping an arm under Jasper’s back and cradling his limp head in the other. His face is blue and puffy, one eye swollen shut, his bare chest covered in angry cuts and livid bruises. His mouth is open ever so slightly and, no matter how much I shake him, he doesn’t move.
Madness flares in my abdomen, rage expands in my chest. I wipe the hair from his face, touch his battered skin. Still, he doesn’t respond. He’s gone.Dead.
With a guttural urgency I open my elongating jaws as fur sprouts all over my body and claws and fangs spear outward. With one mighty breath, I look to the moonless sky and release a bloodcurdling howl.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY
When I wake up it’s dark. I lift my bleary head, my mind still swirling in a fog, and something pointy sticks into my back. Leaves crunch under me as I shift my weight and try to sit up. I’m lying on the ground among the moss and fallen branches. One leg is still draped over the rock where I sit and draw.
I must have passed out after…
The vision I experienced comes back to me in a flash. At the waterfall. Jasper’s limp body in my arms, his broken face, his lifeless eyes. My breaths become short, and I grope around in the brush for my phone.
“Max!” In the distance I hear my name. Someone is calling for me, shouting my name over and over: “Maaaaaaaaax!” It’s Mom.
“Over here,” I mutter as loudly as I can, my chest aching with the effort.
It’s a struggle but I manage to haul myself back up onto the rock. My phone is on the ground a couple of feet away, where I must have dropped it. Looks like it slid a little ways down the riverbank.
“Max?” Mom and Dad explode from the nearby trees, Mom coming straight for me. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah, I’m fine. I think I must have passed out. I was on the phone to Jasper.”
“We know,” Dad says. “He called us. Said you stopped responding. But we didn’t know where you were. What happened?”
I stare at my parents’ faces, concern, worry, confusion etched into their features, and I don’t know how to respond. What did happen? I’ve only ever been able to see memories before: Jasper in the car with his mom the day she…and Clayton when Aisha rejected him. But this—this couldn’t be a memory, because Jasper was—he was—I can’t even think it.
A bewildered shake of the head is all my parents need to know that now’s not the right time to get into it. Mom grabs my phone while Dad helps me up, and together we make our way back to the house.
“So, kiddo,” Mom says, handing me a steaming cup of chamomile tea with organic honey, then moving to sit on the armrest of the chair where Dad is situated. “You want to tell us what’s going on?”
I pull my feet a little farther under me on the sofa, hold my favorite cozy blanket tighter around myself. A plate of chocolate chip cookies is balanced on the armrest.
“Jasper and I have been trying to mind-link,” I say.
They glance at each other, communicating something I can’t comprehend. I wonder if they’ve ever tried it, ever been able to speak without words. Could they be doing it now?
“Mind-linking is a pretty tough thing to accomplish,” Dad says. “Your mother and I have never been able to.”
“Not that we’ve tried all that hard,” Mom says, nudging Dad semiplayfully.
“We know,” I continue. “But we figured since Jasper has all that alpha training and I’m the blood wolf or whatever…”
Another unreadable look is shared between them.
“Max, we don’t know much about your—I can’t believe I’m about to use these words—blood-wolf powers.” She shakes her head like she just said the most fanciful thing imaginable. “Maybe it’s best not to push yourself. Until we know more.”
“But how am I supposed to learn more?” I set my tea down on the side table and edge forward on the sofa. “No one seems to know much of anything about it and I’m so tired from keeping everyone’s brain noise at bay, even if I wanted to experiment, I’m not sure I could figure out how before something like today happens.”
Mom leans forward, her hand inching out from her body like she wants to reach for mine.
