Part 32 (2/2)

”Every day?” Pete asks. He doesn't quite believe me, but he wants to. Across the table Lilly and one of her brothers giggle. Pete flushes. He'll have to get used to everyone's ears being as good as his own.

”Every day,” I tell him. ”Four meals. You'll have to work for them, though.”

”I picked apples.”

”Ate most of them, too,” Grandmother says. ”That'll stop.”

Lilly waves at Pete and giggles again. Pete can't decide where to look.

I push my plate at him. I've eaten an egg and half a slice of the murky bread, my hunger muted by heartache. Pete inhales what I've left. ”It's good,” he tells me.

”Micah, clear the plates,” Grandmother says, which means the meal is over. Most of my cousins are gone before Grandmother says plates. Not Pete though.

Lilly waves at him again. ”More apple picking?” she asks.

Pete mumbles no and starts grabbing some of the plates and cutlery ahead of me. I busy myself stacking the cups. Some of wood, some of clay. All made on the farm.

I look across to Grandmother, who nods. ”Slops go in the bucket in the kitchen.”

Pete sticks to my side. I guess he wants to make sure I stay like I promised. Today the Greats let him. It's his first day. They'll get tougher on him soon.

After we sc.r.a.pe the plates into the bucket I wash, Pete dries (slowly), and Grandmother puts away. Great-Aunt sits at the kitchen table peeling and coring apples. Pete nudges me and whispers, ”See? I didn't eat all the apples.”

”You ate enough,” Grandmother says, taking the now-dry plate from his hands.

Pete jumps and I laugh.

”Wolves,” I say, ”have really good ears. You might want to remember that.”

Pete nods. ”Good ears, fast legs, sharp teeth. Like me.”

”Because you're a wolf,” Grandmother says. ”You're strong, too. But you be careful about eating so much. Keep going like you're going and you'll puke it all up.”

”Won't.”

”Can't fit that much food in such a skinny human. When you're a wolf, eat as much as you can. But you're human for the next few weeks. Got to act like one.”

”Why are we wolfs?” Pete asks.

”We come from wolves is all. Most people come from monkeys.”

I try not to groan. Then Great-Aunt launches into the tale of the man and the wolf and the deal they made.

Pete believes every word.

I want to say that none of it's true and launch into my theory of horizontal gene transfer, but they won't understand. I doubt any of them knows what a gene is. Pete can't even read. Besides, I don't have any proof. It's an untested hypothesis.

If I stay here I will never get to test it. I might be able to gather more data but what will I do with it?

I can't stay.

I can't stick around till I run out of pills. Till my body is no longer my own.

It doesn't matter what I promised Pete.

I don't care if I have to hitchhike back, or ride a freight train, or walk. I'm going back to the city.

AFTER.

But I don't have anywhere to go.

No home, no money, no nothing.

My parents don't want me. They cut and ran without looking back. If my own parents don't want me, who in the city does?

Tayshawn?

I have to laugh. His parents are as broke as mine. Tayshawn's on a full scholars.h.i.+p. There's no way his parents could afford anyone else in the house. Especially not someone who eats as much as I do.

Sarah?

Well, she's rich. Or at least her parents are. But no. I embarra.s.s her. What happened between us embarra.s.ses her. Having me in the house, giving up one of her rooms? Not likely. And if she said yes? I wouldn't be comfortable in a place like that. I'd be afraid of breaking something, doing things the wrong way, saying the wrong thing. I'd never belong there.

Besides, what would I tell them? My parents threw me out because . . . because they don't want a wolf in the house anymore. Oh, yeah, that's right, I'm a wolf. You didn't know? Well, it's like this . . .

I don't think so.

How I could prove it to them? The only convincing proof I have no one wants to see.

My DNA test. The one I never opened. What if there's something there?

But that won't mean a whole lot to Sarah or Tayshawn or their parents.

Then I realize who it would mean something to: Yayeko Shoji. My biology teacher.

FAMILY HISTORY.

My parents stopped loving me long before they dumped me at the Greats'.

Their love was already tempered by the fur I was born with, by the way I run, because those were both signs of what I was going to become.

Then, after my first change at the age of twelve, their love was gone completely.

That was the year Jordan died.

My parents still said they loved me, still kissed me good night, still let me live in their home and eat their food, but it was pretend: they were waiting for the right time to get rid of me.

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