I opened my mouth and my lungs, and woke the sky with a long, mournful howl. To my right, Jules tilted his head back and howled too. We howled and howled until we were spent, and the entire valley echoed, alive with the sound of our call.

15. Fifteen

15

When I woke up the next morning, I was buck naked and lying tangled in a bramble bush. I clambered to my feet and saw a hint of the cabin through the trees. We’d almost made our way home. I looked around and spotted Jules a few feet away. He was sitting up, bare ass on the ground, and was rubbing his eyes. One side of his face was caked in dirt, and he had a twig stuck in his hair.

“Jesus fucking Christ, how wild was that?” His voice was so loud, it made me wince. He clapped a hand over his ear and screwed his eyes closed. It must have sounded too loud to him, too. “Holy shit,” he said, lowering his volume considerably. “How unbelievable was that? Dalton was right. He was right about everything. It was the best surprise on the planet. It was everything.”

“I . . . It was . . . I was . . .” I had no words. What we’d experienced was indescribable. It was the best night of my life. The best night by far. It was more fun than the first time Jules and I stole his dad’s minivan and took it for a joyride. It was more beautiful than the time my parents took me to see the Grand Canyon. It was more exciting than the first time I saw a woman naked, and it was more satisfying than anything I’d ever experienced, and that included every single night Jules and I had spent with Storm.

It was better than all those things rolled into one.

“Should we go down to the river?” I asked, lowering my volume and softening my voice until it didn’t sound like the heavy bass in a nightclub.

“Yeah, I need it. I’m a fucking a mess.”

I laughed, but when I looked down, I saw I had dried mud all over one side and I didn’t need to run my hands through my hair to know it was matted.

We fetched our toiletries and towels from the cabin and headed down to the river. I felt disoriented and had to refamiliarize myself with my human form. Everything was loud and my nose was flooded with the scent of every creature in the forest, living or otherwise. It was overwhelming. My eyesight was bothering me too. It felt kind of like when you try on someone else’s glasses. My eyes felt like they were being strained.

“Have you worked out the eye thing yet?” Jules asked as we walked.

“Nah, they feel weird. Everything looks too sharp. It’s making me dizzy.”