Page 100 of Such Sharp Teeth

“I like a challenge,” he says.

It’s Dave.

“I like you, kid,” he says.

His breath grazes my ear.

I’m fifteen now, in the front seat of Jay Coker’s car. I know what he wants because I know that look. Only this time I want it, too.

It feels wrong to want it, but it won’t always. Soon, the confusion will fade, and only the want will remain. Soon, I’ll know my want is mine. All mine. It belongs to me. It’s under my control.

“I like you, kid,” he says, even though he’s not much older, even though I know he’s not much more experienced than I am.

I climb across the console to straddle him. He puts the seat back as I unzip his jeans.

“You want to?” he asks me.

“Yes,” I whisper in his ear. I take the lobe between my teeth. He plays baseball and was voted Class Flirt. He’s not that good at flirting, but he is a good kisser.

Senior year, I’ll get voted Class Flirt, but that’s not what they call me in the halls.

I’m at my locker, but I’m not fifteen. I’m the wolf.

The lights are bright, those terrible school fluorescents.

“Hey.”

It’s Ian. High school Ian. Lanky. Wearing a band T-shirt and beat-up Chuck Taylor’s, his hair long.

I need to tell him to run, to get as far away from me as possible, but I can’t speak. I can only growl and snap my jaws.

He’s not scared of me. Why isn’t he scared of me?

He should be scared. He should be running as fast as he can in the opposite direction.

But he’s coming closer, a stack of books tucked under his arm.

“Why?” Scarlett says. She’s behind me, clutching a naked baby to her chest. She sets the baby down on the floor. “Why won’t you let me help you? Why can’t you help me?”

The baby’s crying.

Why would she leave it here for me?

“I think you’re really special,” he says. Dave. We’re standing in the distillery. I’m still the wolf.

“I want to show you something special,” I tell him.

And it’s like the deer. The head comes off easily. Like nothing. Like opening a jar.

—

I wake up late the next morning. I listen for Scarlett before leaving my room. When I hear nothing, I poke my head out into the hall. Her bedroom door is shut, and I assume she’s still locked in there, avoiding me.

Reaper, an early adopter of the anti-Rory stance, turns his back when I step into the kitchen, pushing his food bowl into the laundry room and away from me.

I sit at the counter, gnawing on a pepperoni stick, trying to think about anything besides my last transformation. Trying to ignore the violence that keeps replaying behind my eyelids, a violence that makes my heartbeat something uncomfortable.

My phone chimes. It’s Ian.