A porch light gave off a harsh white light that cut shadows into the snow still hanging on.Jem knocked.And then he knocked again.Come on.Don’t be out.Don’t be at your stupid lab.He knocked again.
Sticks of red meat piled on the bed.
“Come on,” he said under his breath and hammered on the door.
It opened with a jerk, and Chaquille stood there.He’d gotten rid of the cornrows, and his hair was done in finger twists now.His eyes were glassy, and the smell of weed rolled out around him.After a moment, he pushed the door open a little more.“Where you been?”
Jem shrugged and stepped past him into the duplex.It was about what he’d expected: a low ceiling, fake wood paneling instead of drywall, brown carpet thirty years old.Whoever had done this place had been too cheap to put in lights, so there was a floor lamp in the corner that looked like a paper box, and its soft yellow glow barely broke up the darkness.There was also a lava lamp, and two neon signs had been mounted on the wall—an inverted cross, red, and a marijuana leaf, blue.They made the shadows look pink and purple.The perfect place to get high.
Chaquille didn’t ask any more questions.He settled onto the couch; his laptop was open next to him, and it looked like he’d been working on something for school.He grabbed a vape off the coffee table and tossed it to Jem.Jem turned it on and took a hit.
He coughed once as he exhaled.“Holy shit, that’s strong.”
With a shrug, Chaquille turned back to his laptop.
Jem sank down into a weird chair that made him think of a catcher’s mitt.His jaw still ached, but already he could feel the weed working its way through his system, like someone had turned up the gravity, his body starting to get heavier.He took another hit.The inside of his mouth had a faint oily feel.Normally, he liked a joint.Sometimes, if he knew that wasn’t realistic, gummies.Did all vapes make your mouth feel like this?Was it just his imagination?He took another hit to be sure.
“You been home all night?”he asked.It sounded like someone else was asking, and he checked, just to make sure.Hewasheavier now, so heavy he was sinking into the chair, being sucked into it.
“Far as I know,” Chaquille said.
“Any chance I’ve been here all night with you?”
Chaquille looked up from his laptop.The glow lit his face and made his eyes shine.“Depends on who’s asking.”
“Cops.”
“Then I guess you been here all night too.”
Jem started to laugh.Or maybe it was someone else.It sounded like the words, like someone else was talking, someone else was laughing, someone not him.Like it was all outside of him somehow, and he was still being sucked into the chair as everything got heavier and heavier.He was going to open his eyes to check, make sure nobody else was in the room, but the pink and purple shadows were heavier too.
The blood was in his mouth, and his teeth hurt, and the door thumped as something heavy—
It’s him.It’s him.He’s trying to get in.
—smashed into it.He pressed his back to the door, and the next thump ran through the wood and into his body.It bounced him so that his heels skidded across the tile.
“—going to kill you, you little shit—”
Thump.
And the force of the blow lifted him again.
Thump.
The handle kept trying to turn.
Thump.
In the mirror, his own eyes stared back at him.They were red.Like a wolf’s.
Thump, thump, thump.
It was dark, and he was so heavy that for a moment, he didn’t think he could breathe.Something buzzed—the neon lights hanging on the wall.And then it was Chaquille’s duplex, and his skin felt too thick, and someone was pounding on the door.
Wolves don’t have red eyes, he thought as he pushed himself up.Tried to push himself up.His arms felt like rubber.His legs were too soft to hold him.He took a hit on the vape and tried again.
The knocking on the door got louder.
