Werewolf's Humanity

Questions Of My Childhood, Part 4

Sammy scrambled up the veranda and crept below the windows, keeping out of sight until he made it to Elizabeth's room. After carefully peeking up to make sure he didn't startle her, he gently rapt on the window until she looked up from her medical textbooks.

She was dressed in just a tank top and a pair of shorts, her massive, bushy hair pulled back and barely bound with a scrunchie. She got up, padded to the window, and stood back as he slid in, landing on all fours.

"You okay?" she asked. "How's the arm?"

"It's okay," he said. Elizabeth had removed the splint earlier that afternoon, and Sammy had gone for a long-overdue romp in the woods. He'd even managed to catch and eat a partridge, chomping down on it twice before swallowing it down whole. Both Night Sky and Elizabeth told him he shouldn't do that, but old habits die hard. He rocked back onto his hind feet, squatting and looking up at her.

"So what are you doing coming to my room at almost midnight?" Elizabeth was like a miniature version of her aunt, though perhaps a little more bossy than the alpha female. No, maybe not more bossy, but... less subtle about it. An alpha female was supposed to co-rule the pack with her husband; Elizabeth just acted like she knew better.

And in Sammy's case, he found that reassuring. She was ten years his senior and looked out for him, and on occasion, saved him from embarrassing himself in front of the rest of the pack by telling him to knock off bad behavior. She was his social safety net.

"Fortune's downstairs. I thought I'd sneak in this way."

She folded her arms and scoffed."She been giving you more crap? I can have a talk with her."

"No, no no," he said, shaking her head. "I'm avoidin' her so she doesn't get the chance."

Elizabeth's not-impressed-glare made him shrug sheepishly before falling back onto all fours and making his way towards the door. "Anyway, thanks for lettin' me in, g'night."

"Hold up," she said, and Sammy froze in his tracks.

"When was the last time you bathed?" she demanded.

"Uh..."

"Yeah, that's what I thought. You're not going out there smelling likerotten melons and partridge-breath. Bathroom, now." She snapped her fingers and pointed through her personal bathroom's open door at her bathtub.

Head hung low, he turned around and began to shift. He'd been in this form since the hunting accident and was eager to get back into his human shape, but he had also been pent up at home for days with the broken arm and needed a run before he got out of this form. Still, once he had resumed a human shape, he stood up and flexed his arms, his legs, even his jaw, like someone putting on a suit they hadn't worn in years.

He followed her pointed finger into the bathroom. It wasn't that he disliked bathing. He just tended to forget that this was a resource now readily available to him. She followed him in and began running the hot water. While it warmed up, she pulled out a towel for him, and then several bottles. "Use this to shampoo your hair, and then this will condition it. This is my favorite body soap, use as much as you want, and don't forget to scrub your pits and wash under your foreskin." She looked into his eyes as she added a washcloth to the pile in his arms. "And don't blush. Nurse, remember? Let's just both consider ourselves lucky I don't have to sponge-bathe you."

That mental image made his face twitch before he nodded in agreement. He accepted the bottles and retreated behind the curtain. Under the blast of warm water, he hesitated until he was sure she wasn't about to jump in with him. But as soon as he heard the door close, he smiled and got to work.