Old Habits

Conor: newfound tempers

Conor

I had promised Susie Lynn to help her look for the missing softball, but now scouring the woods, this felt like a ridiculous task. Tish had declined to come with us, saying that it was my fault I had hit the ball too hard in the first place. So instead of getting back into training, Susie and I were out in this foggy field at dawn.

"Find it?" Susie Lynn questioned.

"We need to make these balls smell like something I can search for," I replied. "I'm not used to looking with my eyes.

"Humans find things with their eyes all the time," she countered.

"Poorly," I grumbled, and moved some brush to look under it. Susie said this is why she had orange balls so we could see them, but we had been out here for ten minutes already.

"I hope we get some more gloves," she said. "My hand still kinda hurts from yesterday. But I'm glad Mom dragged us all out here."

I suspected that Mel wanted a distraction from today's meeting with the hunters. But it had been a lot of fun being split into teams and watching the others taunt each other. I suspected that humans needed more competition than they understood; maybe that's why people played sports. We needed more hobbies that weren't just beating each other up.

"Maybe now that I understand the rules, I'll have more fun," I said. "I wish we would have talked about it before."

"Sorry," Susie grimaced. "I forgot, mostly people know baseball rules because we played in school. You didn't. You did good, considering."

I spotted a glimpse of something orange and hurried to it, only to find that I had stepped into a boggy part of the forest, mud squishing around my shoes.

"Got it," I said, reaching in the mud to retrieve the ball.

"You don't sound happy about it," Susie Lynn noted.

Instead of explaining, I threw the ball to Susie Lynn, who squealed when mud slung everywhere. I raced back to the house, Susie Lynn close on my heels, swearing to tackle me with all the mud I had flung on her. Mel met us at the porch with a smile.

"You find it?" she questioned

"I'm muddy now," Susie complained.

"Well, don't come in the house. Conor Becker, you stop right there with your muddy boots. Take those off."

I came to a halt before I was able to step onto the porch. Susie Lynn rinsed off the softball with the hose, trying to get her hands cleans as well. Sheepishly, I washed my hands in the water and then I unlaced my shoes before stepping onto the porch in just my socks.

"I would have thought you'd want to get back to training," Mel remarked to her daughter.

Susie Lynn shook her head, peeling out of her coat and her shoes so she also didn't track mud into the house. Tish and Ralph were sitting at the kitchen table drinking coffee. It was early yet for the pack to be up, though I was sure some of them would have heard Susie Lynn yelling at me.

"My hands hurt a little from yesterday," Susie told her mom. "And if we didn't find my ball today, I was worried that we wouldn't find it."

I washed my hands again in the sink, getting my mug out to make some tea with the hot water on the stove.

"And I am not quite adjusted enough for early mornings," Tish complained. "I know, I'm up, but that's because the bed without Conor is cold. Did you know he had turned off the vent in our room? All this time, I didn't know."

"It gets too warm," I told her.

Mel made her own mug of coffee, standing next to me as I waited for my tea to steep.

"Tish, I know you'll want to confront Gayle, but I'd rather you take Susie Lynn into town," Mel said. "To Carol's. I called them last night."

"I don't want to leave," Susie Lynn complained.

"If something happens," Mel continued, as if her daughter hadn't said anything. "Tish, you are pregnant. You and Susie are certainly going to be of interest to the hunters. I don't want you on the property."

"Yes ma'am," Tish said. "I'd feel better if Conor came too."

"I would as well, but Gayle will be expecting Conor here. I can't make you all disappear."

I threw away my teabag, but Mel stopped me from closing the lid of the trashcan. She moved over some paper and frowned.

"Whose heart is in our trashcan?" she inquired.

"Oh, that's Helen's," Tish confessed. "I meant to take the trash out and forgot. We buried her and the other vampires out in what I guess is becoming a graveyard."

Ralph and Mel shared a look. "Yeah, you're not wrong," Ralph sighed. "I know this is gross, but I wonder if we shouldn't hold onto the heart, Mel. It may help our case. We got attacked by Helen just the same as they did."

"Dad, that's gross," Susie Lynn complained.

"Less gross than digging her up," Ralph pointed out. "Get a plastic bag, will you, Susie?"

She fetched one, reaching into the trashcan using the bag as a glove. She wrinkled her nose, handing the bagged heart to her mother.

"Good morning," came the voice of Victor, walking in from the guest room. He blinked at the heart in Mel's hand. "Do I want to know?"

"Helen's," Ralph told him.

"That's...oddly satisfying," Victor admitted. "Listen, Mel, Thank you for saving my life but..."

"No," Mel told him. "You're not going back."

"You don't want another pack member you didn't ask for," he pointed out. "And I have work, important work now that Peter's..."

"Dead, along with his work," Ralph reminded him. "No way the hunters let you back into headquarters. No way they let you carry on like usual. And honestly, you aren't going to be able to carry on as usual."

Victor scoffed. "You people keep thinking I'm going to fly off the handle and maul a small town. I'm fine."

"Because you're here," Mel told him. "In this instance, Victor, all the medical degrees in the world are not going to prepare you for the next couple of months."

"I said I'm fine!" he snapped, hitting the wall and leaving a larger hole than I would have expected.

Susie Lynn sighed, setting down her cocoa to get the drywall and patches. Victor stared at the wall like it had personally attacked him and sagged. No one had jumped or been startled. Only Victor was surprised he had done such a thing. Tish tsked and took a sip from her coffee, unmoving from her place at the table.

"You're not going," Mel repeated. "So take the kit from Susie and fix what you've done before the rest of the pack gets here for breakfast. I trust you can follow written instructions better than my verbal ones."

"I'm...I'm sorry," he said, his anger deflating.

"Welcome to the werewolf temper. Don't punch our walls again."

"Yes ma'am."

He nodded and took the tub from Susie Lynn. We had bought it because we kept being attacked in our home, not because we were personally having fights. Still, it was nice to have the means to repair the damage quickly.

Tish took pity on Victor and helped him with the patching as I assisted Mel in the kitchen. She sighed, looking through her recipes as if she was planning a fancy breakfast.

"Waffles?" I suggested.

"Sure, why not," she agreed.