Damaged Mate

14

I almost couldn’t believe it had just been a week since school started. Time felt like it flew past me whenever I flipped open my phone’s photo album, fully engrossing myself in the journal images. Every page just led to more questions, depicting images of women wearing antlers, of men with pointed fangs, and wolves. So many, many wolves. Their faces at various angles, their canid proportions carefully sketched and measured, and dozens of hasty scribbles of them in the forms I’d seen in my dream. In my memory?

I kept flipping between the two possibilities, knowing that, eventually, I’d need to decide.

“Aria, heads up!” Noah’s hand suddenly flew across my face, catching a basketball spinning toward me. I nearly fell off the bleachers as the ball bounced innocently across the gym floor. Hastily, I stuck my phone back in my pocket, not wanting anyone to see what I was looking at.

“S-sorry!” I apologized with a grimace. “Just got lost in a text chain with my dad.”

Noah shot me a bemused grin, turning back to the court and blowing his whistle sharply. “Alright, guys! Be back in ten for a matchup; I want us sharp for our end-of-month skirmish.”

All the guys let out a breathless cheer, happy for the chance to breathe and rehydrate. As they jogged toward the water fountain, I managed to upright myself, catching Aiden’s eye as he passed by. He gave me a smile and a wave, but before I could reciprocate, Clyde shouldered into him with a far more sarcastic smirk and salute. My hand recoiled immediately, a disgusted scowl crossing my face.

“Those two really have it in for you, huh?” Noah asked.

I sighed, pushing up from the stands to stretch out my back. “Aren’t I lucky?” I glanced Noah’s way, catching him with his phone out this time. He seemed fixated on the screen, lip caught between his teeth as his thumb scrolled through. “You doing okay over there?”

Noah blinked, looking up with a sheepish grin. “Oh, yeah, no worries. Just some family stuff is all.”

“Anything I can help with?” I asked.

He rolled the proposal in his mind for a moment, eventually setting his clipboard against the bleachers before taking a seat himself. “It’s just my brother. Ma’s been all over him about wandering off lately, and she keeps asking if I can walk him home from school.”

“Ooh, I get ya,” I teased. “She thinks you don’t have a social life.”

“Exactly.” Noah groaned. “And he’s, like, ten now! Kid’s old enough to get home on his own, but ever since the harvest festival mishap…” He shook his head, running a hand through his hair. “Anyway, Ma’s been on my case all week about it. I’ve been getting away with having him stay at school, but now he’s on my case. Like he doesn’t have a phone to keep him occupied for an hour.”

I give Noah a reassuring pat on the back. “Gosh, it must be so swell having siblings. I wish I could relate.”

He responded with a playful push. “Yeah, well, he should take the medicine he dishes out. It’s what he gets for running off into the forest at night.”

A shudder ran down my spine, hand quickly pulling back to my side. “He… went to the forest? During the harvest festival?”

“Yeah. Mom was madder than I’d ever seen her.” Noah scoffed. “And now I’m in trouble because of it.”

The image of the boy filled my mind, quickly followed by his gruesome shift into a wolf. “Um… random question, but is your family native to this area?”

Before Noah could answer, his phone started vibrating in his hands. “For God’s sake.” He gave me an apologetic smile and started toward the gym entrance, his good-natured tone quickly sinking to an irritated one. “Ma I’m not walking him home! He can wait for an hour until I’m done! I—Ma—Ma, it’s not just a game!”

I couldn’t help but smile as he vanished behind the double doors, though a hint of unease stuck with me. Sliding my phone back out, I started sifting through the journal pages once more, trying to find something, anything, about Ayersville itself. Maybe the town was magic? Noah hadn’t mentioned anything about he and Clyde being related in any way, so how could his brother become a wolf?

“If his brother is a wolf,” I muttered under my breath.

“Whose brother is a wolf?”

I let out a startled gasp, spinning around and nearly clocking Clyde straight across the face with my phone. He managed to catch my arm, spinning me into a dip and holding me there for what felt like forever.

God, but his face was so close to mine.

“I—u-uh.” I quickly shoved away, regretting it instantly as my back hit the ground. “Ouch.”

Clyde hung over me with a smirk set on his face. “Nice landing, Safety Patrol.”

Much to my surprise, he then offered me a hand. I just stared at it from the ground, arms crossed tightly over my chest.

“Oh, don’t be like that,” he groaned. “I’m trying to be nice, here.”

I responded with a scowl.

“What? You want me to say I’m sorry?” Clyde rolled his eyes, letting out another dramatic sigh. “Okay, fine. I’m sorry.”

I squinted my eyes, scowl darkening further. “Are you actually sorry, or did Trevor make you say you’re sorry?”

Clyde threw his hands up in the air, a frustrated snarl escaping his lips. I’d totally hit the nail on the head. “Okay, fine! I’ll just keep being a jerk, then. And you can keep laying on the ground like an absolute idiot.”

“Maybe I wouldn’t be laying on the ground if you didn’t start this!” I scrambled to my feet, staring straight at him with an angry huff. “Seriously, what did I do to earn your wrath? Do you really hate my dad that much?”

Clyde looked somewhat taken aback. “I—he’s everything I stand against. You can’t expect me to not to be constantly on edge around him. Aiden might’ve brainwashed others, but not me and Vanessa. Your dad’s a menace, end of story.”

I shook my head, unable to hold back a lifeless chuckle. “You are amazing. Truly, the epitome of backwoods paranoia.”

“It’s how we’ve survived this long,” Clyde growled, his shoulders straightening. “And if you wanna stay here, you’d better get used to it.”

“I don’t have to get used to anything,” I snapped back. “I didn’t do anything, and neither did my dad. If anything, he’s probably helped keep this stupid town afloat!”

That intense look flashed across Clyde’s eyes once more. He looked ready to snap my neck, hands clenching tightly at his sides. “God, I should’ve let Vanessa tear you to shreds back there.”

A heavy silence hung between us, his expression falling at my blank reaction. Then, something registers on Clyde’s face as he lifts his trembling hands. In our impromptu dip, he’d gotten his hands on my phone. His eyes flicked to it, then lingered, finally catching what I’d been looking at for nearly a week now.

“I…” my voice croaked out, brain completely shutting down as the world crashed around me.

Clyde looked just as broken, still holding the phone and occasionally casting a look my way. We must have looked like a pair of dumbfounded idiots, like someone had just told us Santa Claus was real.

Even with the caterwauling of the other guys coming back for practice, we remained frozen in place.

“Clyde, quit bugging Aria.” Aiden’s hand pressed against my shoulders, but I barely felt it. “I’d actually like to get through a practice this time.”

Amazingly, Clyde was speechless.

Aiden’s brow rose slightly, a slight smirk crossing his face. “Wow. You gotta teach me that trick, Aria. I’ve never seen him so stunned.”

To be fair, I was equally so. It was like the floodgates had burst; I had a million questions and literally no time to ask them. But then, my saving grace came in the form of a disgruntled Noah, skulking back through the gym entrance with his phone in hand.

“Noah, Clyde and I can walk your brother home!” I suddenly called out.

Some semblance of focus came back to Clyde’s eyes as he blinked. “Wait, what?”

“Yeah, what are you talking about?” Noah asked. “Did I seriously miss that much while I was gone?”

Crap. I’d opened my mouth without thinking this through.

Then, much to my amazement, Clyde swooped in with a save. “I—yeah, I gotta stop by the elementary school, anyway. Mom wants me to drop off some stupid thank-you present to Miss Emmery for a cake recipe; she’ll kill me if she finds out I procrastinated this long.”

Noah stared at the two of us, long and hard.

“I don’t trust him to not run off,” I added hastily. “So I told him he’s stuck with me, just to make sure he does it.”

“Which is stupid,” he put in with a scoff. “I’m the absolute foundation for this team; you guys would be lost without me.”

Whatever tension hung between us was immediately lifted as Aiden let out a snort. “And yet, somehow, you’re not team captain. Strange how that works.”

Clyde flashed him a scowl, immediately shifting Noah’s confused look back to general concern.

“Okay, okay, please don’t, you two.” He glanced at his phone, then back up at me. “I mean, it’s a bit of a weird ask… I’d protest at doing it right now, but I’d really like the extra drill time with the guys. No offense,” he added sheepishly, “but you’re not entirely up-to-date with our play guide.”

“I certainly am not,” I agreed eagerly. “So let us handle this.”

“Yeah, Coach.” Clyde grinned. “You can trust us with your little bro.”

Noah made a slight face. “I trust you as far as I can throw you, Clyde. But I do trust Aria. So… yeah, okay. Kinda weird, but I won’t turn it down.”

“Great! We’ll be back in a flash; don’t you kids have too much fun while we’re gone!” Without even waiting for me to speak, Clyde grabbed my hand and yanked me toward the door, my legs flapping like wet noodles in an attempt to keep up. All the while, Aiden fixed me with a strange look, as if unsure I hadn’t been forced into this.

“I’ll call you later,” I mouthed, motioning the universal sign for a telephone before barreling through the gym’s double doors.