CHAPTER 6

(updating Sundays generally)

He jumped up in front of her, planting his feet on the ground and holding his body back, spring-loaded. They played for a bit more, and then Cassandra decided to go back to her den while he followed. She was all slick with blood, so she did the once again distinctly unwolf-like thing of turning the shower on with her jaws, wrenching the circular human mechanism until it spit out water, and let it carry all the blood on her coat away down the drain. She snapped at the water as it came down, making a game of it.

Before long, the male “wolf” showed up in the bathroom doorway, sniffing the air, curious. She didn't react and continued washing herself off, so he slowly walked into the room and hopped over the bathtub. It only took another moment or two of her not reacting, and he was snapping at the water too.

She retained enough of her memory of her human self to paw at the drain enough to stop it up, and then she knelt down and let the water rise a bit so she could more easily wash herself completely. She grabbed a bottle of soap nearby and squeezed it with her jaws enough for it to fly open and fire liquid into the air, settling under it. She pushed everything a bit with her paw, as much as she could reach, to get soap going and bubbles.

The boy wolf looked at her in confusion for a moment and sniffed at the scent in the air. Lilacs. He didn't run away but didn't come closer to it either.

Still better than smelling nothing but your scent going down the drain, she thought. She liked the smell and figured she shouldn't just let herself smell like blood and rabbit guts since a human was probably coming soon. Didn't humans not like that kind of thing?

After a while she let the drain go again, after some romping in the water as wolf pups do. She felt human clean now anyway.

The “wolf had hopped out and was rubbing his fur on a towel that fell on the ground before she could even do anything else.

Something tickled at the back of Cassy's wolf brain, and she realized the human side of her was complaining about being in the bathroom with a boy. She nosed him out of the room and closed the door behind her with her jaws.

He looked a bit crestfallen, though he went. He had dark coloring on his fur, with a white patch over one eye. She had never really paid attention to it before.

Unfortunately, he went into one of the corners of the house and laid down, resting his head on his paws.

She shifted back into a human and put her hands on her hips, trying to decide what to do. As she did, she noticed that there was a note on the table in the main room with the fuzzy floor down here.

There was a note. Her parents taught her to read along with the rest of her kin before, what happened, happened. She still was working on it,

But it was enough for this anyway. She began reading. It said-

“Hello, Cassandra,

Welcome! You're home!

Myself and my organization heard about what happened to you. We decided to help until you can find a better situation. We have never met. My name is Vera. I am looking forward to meeting you!

I got you pudding pops and lunch meat. Also bones? Was in a hurry. Will come back with more food soon. Do not leave the house. You are safe here. Do not mind spirit on roof. Will protect you. Don't wander far!

P.S. Nice to meet you.

P.P.S Will be back soon. We will make this into a home, promise!

Cassandra had to think about that for a while. Idly, she went into the cold box that smelled strange and found the bones there. She handed a few to her friend in the corner and this seemed to at least cheer him up a bit as he gnawed on them.

She didn't understand much of what the letter had said, even though she could read it well enough. She knew that someone had brought her here, but hadn't thought much about who it was or the hows or whatever. Mostly, Cassy had tried not to think about what had happened at all.

But now she was getting a bit more about it, it all made sense. Cassy couldn't remember the name of this organization, but her father had called them the “Best Humans.” He'd said that they'd had a connection with their family for a long time.

And with that, she decided she'd been thinking enough for one day, as the memories came flying in again and she had to wipe back tears, so she decided to go back to the wolf, but waited for a second first before doing it since she noticed her wolf-friend, a member of the kin, was still gnawing on the bone. It was like he was trying to crack it open and eat it, but he was also pausing a lot and looking toward her den in the bathroom.

Cassy thought about what to do now. Her new friend looked sad, so she focused on that, and then had an idea, from a memory. She suddenly turned on a dime and loped out of the house. Her friend followed.

She went outside, and she saw what she was looking for right away.

No, I mean, like your name. As one of the kin?

He bit again, snapping at the air.

“I don't know what that means. Can't you transform? Haven't you ever been human before?”

He shook his head. A strange gesture coming from a wolf.

“So, you understand me, but you can't transform?

Head nod.

“So you still don't have a name yet? After all this time?”

“He bit the air again.”

“Wait, are you saying that's your name? Your name is, 'Bite?' Or is it only that action that's your name since you can't speak English?”

Another bite, this time he leapt first and bit the air at the top of his arc.

“OK, I guess you're right. There's barely a difference when you're in your wolf form. OK. Follow my lead.”

Cassy then shifted wolf and grabbed the kiddie pool that she had spotted in the yard before. She grabbed it with her jaws and started trying to pull it toward the house. Her new friend, Bite, immediately bit the side of the pool as well, and together they dragged it inside.

It took some doing since they were both small, and the pool only barely fit through the door after some warping, but they managed it. For some reason, Cassy decided to drag it up to her room where she had slept previously.

She then ran back downstairs with Bite following her. Cassy hunted around the yard a bit for what she had also seen before. Bite got a little excited and was just running around in circles in the yard.

However, finally, she found it.

Turning the wheel thing was hard as a wolf, but after some tugging with her jaws, the green hose leap to life with some water coming out.

Bite immediately went over to drink some of the water, but as she continued to growl at it and turn it in the same direction more and more with her jaws, Bite got the right idea and immediately grabbed the front of it with his jaws as more and more water came out.

He then ran off for the front door with water flying over his head, some of it landing on him in what looked like a wild water snake. Once the hose got stuck, and she had to go pull it out with her jaws, shaking it back and forth like it was a dead rabbit. All at once it came loose and Bite, who had been pulling with all his might, fell backward in an explosion of limbs. The hose fired water everywhere as it fell into the wooden floor of the threshold and the stairs.

Bite, recovering quickly, jumped on the hose again like it was an unruly snake, and ran up the stairs with it, water streaming down the stairs as he did. Now a wolf with a mission, he released the head of the hose over the kiddie pool once he got it into her room.

Gravity, however, had something to say about it and the hose fell off the side of the pool and began pulling the whole thing back down the stairs.

Ever dutiful, Bite chased it back down the stairs, grabbed it again, and just full out leapt with it into the pool. He splashed around the pool with it a bit, as if deciding whether he could drop it or not.

As Cassy arrived back into her room, it appeared he had decided to just keep holding it, becoming his own mobile wolf fountain as the pool quickly began to fill up. Cassy leapt into the pool with him, and they splashed around for a while.