Animal Nature

Chapter 14

"Wait. Watch, here he comes," Chester whispered in Mara's ear. His breath tickled the little hairs by her neck, and she smiled.

"Shy! Come here, quick!"

Shy looked up from where she sat on a milk crate, doing her science homework. With frustrating slowness, she approached Mara and Chester.

Mara rolled her eyes at Chester and peered out from behind a metal cabinet. Sure enough, there was David Lupien, inspecting various packages of meat. Mara pulled back out of sight so Shy could see, and walked over to where Chester sat on a stack of boxes marked "Campbell's Soup Company."

"He comes here every day?" Shy asked, coming over.

"Just about," Chester said. "I don't think he knows me very well or something. He's seen me but he's never said hi or anything."

Shy looked at the floor, her glasses sliding down her nose and her brown hair hanging in her face. She looked so dejected that Mara tried to think of something to say that would make her feel better. "He's a lot cuter than I remember him being."

Chester elbowed her. "Hey!"

Mara grinned.

"Are you guys going out?" Shy asked, looking between Mara and Chester.

"Yeah," Mara said, leaning back into the cradle of Chester's bony elbow. They'd only been dating a week but it felt like forever.

Shy chewed on her lip. "I don't understand why he would lie to me about being a vegetarian. It's such a stupid thing to lie about."

"Ah, who cares? If he wants to be a fake vegetarian, let him," Chester said.

"The president of the animal rights club eats meat. That's totally ridiculous. We should vote him out of office. This is a travesty!" Mara looked to the faces of her friends for support.

They stared at her blankly, the same way Shy had stared at her blankly when she'd brought up the "Save the Wolf" campaign at the animal rights club meeting. Not even other animal rights activists understood her.

* * *

The phone rang the second Shy got home from Bryant's Market.

"Hello?"

"It's David."

"Oh, hi."  Shy wasn't sure what to say.

"Look, I know what you're thinking," David said. "I saw you at the grocery store."

"You did? Why didn't you say hi?"

"Why didn't you?"

There was that sharpness again. Shy didn't know what to say. Suddenly she felt very guilty.

"I'm sorry," David said. He exhaled into the phone. "I was just picking up some meat for my mother."

"Chester says you've been going there every day after school and buying meat."

David's was silent.

"I mean, if you're not a vegetarian anymore, it's okay."

"Is it really? That fanatic there, what's her name—Mara—she wouldn't think it was okay."

"I think she'd be more okay with it if you were honest. And so would I."

Another exhale. Shy pushed her glasses up her nose and waited.

"All right. I'm eating meat again."

"Okay."

"Do you really mean that?"

Shy hesitated. "Yes, it's okay."

"You don't sound very sure of yourself."

Sighing, Shy replied, "I guess I'm not. I mean, we became vegetarians together. And now suddenly you're not. Sometimes... sometimes it's like you're a different person that you were before this camping trip."

"I'm sorry. I'm trying."

"Don't worry about it. There are some new things about you I like." She could almost hear David smile on the other end. "I really like kissing you."

"Hey, do you want to go to the Halloween Dance with me?" David asked.

"You mean, like, as a date?"

"Yeah. We can dress up."

"I'm not a very good dancer."

"Who cares? We'll be in costume. No one will recognize us, or care. Come on. Neither of us has gone to a dance at school yet. Please come with me."

Heat crept into Shy's face. "Okay. I'll go with you."

"So, do you want to go look for costumes tomorrow?"

"Okay."

Shy was still smiling long after she hung up with David. Then another of her internet searches for Little Red Riding Hood turned up something about werewolves, and she thought about David being a werewolf again.

"During the fifteenth century, wolf attacks on humans were common in European countries," Shy read. "Both men and women were tried for acts committed as werewolves, and many were executed. The 'Hollywood' version of the werewolf shares very few characteristics with the fifteenth century animal. This werewolf generally had few supernatural powers other than shape-shifting. The Hollywood werewolf can read thoughts, heal itself, and appears more as a hairy, upright-walking beast than a wolf.

"It was believed that humans could turn into a wolf with the use of a belt made of wolfskin or by putting on a wolf's pelt, though later it was also a common assumption that humans bitten by a wolf could become werewolves. Historians generally attribute this belief to the brain diseases of rabies and lycanthropy. Rabies caused the infected person to behave in an animalistic manner, frothing and attacking others. Lycanthropy is more of a psychological disease where the ill person believes himself to be a wolf. Lupus has also been connected to rumors of werewolves. Those infected with lupus are extremely allergic to sunlight and therefore would only venture out at night, spawning the beliefs that a werewolf can shape-shift only when the moon is present or full.

"Werewolves were often executed by fire or beheading, due to the beliefs that only fire or injury to the brain or heart could kill a werewolf. Silver was also believed to injure or kill a wolf. Often towns were such wolf attacks were commonplace hung the herb wolfsbane on the door to repel werewolves. Wolfsbane, which grows in the Alps, contains lycoctonine, which is poisonous to humans as well as wolves. Some legends contend that wolfsbane will cure a werewolf."

Shy sat back. This wasn't going to help for her English paper at all.