I open the bottle of bourbon and my laptop.

I Google what should you do if you were bitten by a werewolf? Then I chug some of the bourbon.

The first link I click on leads to a surprisingly earnest article that recommends I get a cage for my monthly transformations and perhaps also purchase some meat snacks, like whole chickens. It also gives an unhelpful heads-up about the excruciating pain of the transformation.

Great.

I gulp some more bourbon.

I’m starting to suspect that werewolves can’t get drunk, which just might be the most unfortunate part about all of this.

I continue drinking anyway.

I find some random forums to scroll through. None of them are particularly informative, and as the threads go on, the discourse often devolves into arguments. Most of these arguments have something to do with vampires: Who would win in a fight? Can they kill one another, etc.?

At the very least, they can take out drunk men dressed as vampires. I proved that tonight. As for real vampires, I sure hope they don’t exist.

One thing at a time.

I scroll on until the bourbon is gone, until my eyelids are heavy and tired. I hold my head in my hands.

There doesn’t appear to be any legitimate, trustworthy information on the internet about werewolves. I wish that meant I was wrong about this, but I can’t bullshit myself. A creature that looked like a werewolf attacked me during a full moon. And now my blood is silver and I have fur? I just tore off my skin by scratching an itch. I animal-style snarled at Reaper. What I thought was a gentle push to vampire Mike might as well have been a baseball bat to his sternum.

I hear Scarlett’s voice saying, Maybe it’s good she’s coming. Maybe it’ll give you guys the time to talk things out.

She doesn’t understand that there is no talking them out. Maybe they can move on, but I can’t. It’s part of me. I remember Mrs. Meyer telling me that day, The things that happen to us are not who we are, but she was wrong.

I knew it then, too. That I was forever changed. Just like I know it now.

I close my laptop and try to get some sleep.

V

The next morning, when I check under my bandages, four shreds of shriveled pale skin spill out onto the floor.

I gag.

Strangely, that’s the worst of it. The skin has regrown overnight, and now the only evidence of the injury is slight discoloration, a series of faint scars like knots in wood.

I decide to leave the gauze off for today and see how it is. I wear a shirt I don’t particularly care about and a pair of old khakis.

I use a plastic bag as a makeshift glove to pick up the skin pieces and flush them down the toilet.

Out of sight, out of mind.

Scarlett is where I left her, in the kitchen making tea.