December was not a good month to be sitting outside his house selling baked goods, but Josh had no choice. He had no bakery, and he damn sure wasn’t going to sell directly out of his house. That would’ve encouraged more interaction than it was worth, especially if he didn’t end up making a sale.

So, he was outside, sitting in his dead lawn beside a white table covered in pies, cakes, and fresh bread. He had the baking tins sitting in a vast network of heated towels, which he rewarmed periodically as the cold infiltrated. This was a fruitless venture, and he knew it, just as he knew a great many other things in his life were failures. One man couldn’t combat the weather, so the cold leached into the food and stifled the warm scents which would have drawn in half the neighborhood. Instead, he was passed constantly by the same people who would otherwise buy a cupcake to eat on their walk or a loaf of banana bread to take to their business meeting. At first he called to them, but that proved too embarrassing when they just ignored him, so he gave up and sat there.

He felt like a child who, instead of setting up a lemonade stand, decided to pass out cups of mouthwash. He was nonessential; a useless oddity.

Josh looked back at the house behind him feeling an unsettling thrill deep in his chest. He hated that thrill. The big house where he grew up, in one of the nicer neighborhoods of Portsmouth, Virginia, was a fine one indeed. He used to have daydreams about someday buying the house from his parents when they finally retired to the cabin they always wanted to buy, but he never dared imagine ever having it just handed to him. That wasn’t right. That wasn’t the way they raised him. A man worked for what he wanted. He didn’t accept handouts.

But neither did a man just throw something away when it was given to him. That was why he hadn’t sold the house even though he despised the way it seemed so much smaller without his parents filling it up. Two years and he hadn’t done anything after the title was bequeathed to him in their will. It was stagnating. He was stagnating.

It was just like the stupid warm towels. He had gone through this exercise for months, two years in a row now when the cold came, and he still hadn’t bought an extension cord so he could have his actual warmers out here.

Stagnating. No, more than that. Grief rendered him impotent, incapable of doing anything he should have. Two years of grief. How much more could he take before he just called it quits on everything?

A bright flare of red lights in his peripheral vision caught his attention, stark against the gloomy winter background. He looked up, hoping against hope as the car pulling past his house continued to brake and then pulled over onto the curb. He didn’t recognize it, which meant it probably wasn’t a neighbor. Heart hammering in his throat, Josh sat up straight and smiled as best as he could.

Half a minute passed, then another. The driver showed no interest in getting out. Josh’s mind filled in all the potential blanks of the situation. Were they searching for their wallet, perhaps? Or maybe they hadn’t stopped for him at all but were instead looking at directions or answering a phone call. Maybe they were...

The car door opened, and a woman stepped out. She looked to be in her mid-thirties, with blonde hair pulled back into a careless ponytail. Josh supposed she might have been attractive, but he wasn’t into women and couldn’t say for sure. She leaned down and looked back through the driver’s side at whoever her companion was.

“We’re going to be late to your appointment,” she said in the tone of a person who has been repeating the same thing for far too long. While disapproving, she didn’t exactly look unfriendly. Josh was hopeful.

“I don’t care!” came the surprisingly powerful reply, clear as water despite the fact the passenger side, nearest to Josh, wasn’t open yet. “I want pie!”

He bit the inside of his mouth, struggling to keep from laughing. It wasn’t really his place to have an opinion about whatever was going on, and he thought the blonde woman might not like it if she thought he was making fun of her.

The woman shook her head and closed her door, then strode around to the car’s trunk and popped it up. She bent in, swallowed up by the darkness within that cobalt-blue maw, and emerged dragging an odd piece of equipment. With deft, practical motions, she unfolded all the various bars and straps until she had a wheelchair. Some of the puzzle clicked together for Josh as the woman moved the wheelchair to the passenger side and opened the door.

“Fine, Nancy. You can be the one who tells your doctor that we were late because you decided to buy a pie. Why couldn’t we pick one up from the store on the way home?”

A tangle of grey-and-white hair came into view. Josh watched with curiosity, and then astonishment, as a very large woman emerged from the small car. Supported by the younger woman, who was apparently much stronger than she seemed, the elderly woman slid into the seat of the wheelchair. She wheezed, leaning over as a hacking cough shook through her entire mountainous form. The sound was hideous and wet, as if she had pneumonia.

I think I wouldn’t really mind if she decided she didn’t want pie after all. He felt guilty for his thoughts, but germs were germs, and if she coughed on the food, it would be ruined.

Luckily, the coughing fit soon passed, and the old woman named Nancy straightened up once more. She blew her nose and wiped her hands with a disinfecting towelette before finishing off the ritual with a heavy layer of hand sanitizer. The younger woman provided these objects readily, predicting their need without being asked. Watching this, Josh came to understand they were not mother and daughter, but a caretaker and her patient. Only a nurse could foresee what someone needed in that way, with professional accuracy.

At long last, the nurse grabbed the handles of the chair and delicately turned Nancy around to head down the sidewalk to Josh’s driveway. The nurse stopped about halfway up, then raised her foot to put on the brakes.

“Tell me what you would like,” she said.

The older woman’s face fell. Josh’s heart broke a little. He couldn’t keep quiet. “It’s okay if you come on the grass. It’s dead for the year anyway. You won’t hurt it.”

Nancy perked up and turned her head so that her frizzy grey tresses whipped around her face. “See? He said I can be on the grass. I told you, didn’t I, Jennifer? I told you he wouldn’t mind, and the grass is so short and dead.” Her voice was still as powerful as anything, even louder now than before. Josh smiled a little, allowing it to come through this time. Old age apparently hadn’t dulled her enthusiasm any.

Jennifer looked as if she wanted to sigh, but being the professional she was, she held it back. “Okay, Nancy. Just be sure to keep your feet up.”

Josh watched the pair as they made their way across the lawn to him. The grass gave the thick wheels no trouble at all, the brittle blades crushed to nothing beneath the turning. The dry, powdery earth proved to be more challenging, threatening to hitch progress. However, Jennifer the nurse detected these obstacles as smoothly as all the others and adjusted course accordingly. In only a matter of seconds, the pair were right in front of the table, browsing the array of offerings.

He supposed that the laden table would look quite impressive to someone who didn’t know the truth, which was there had been times during that first year when there were two and sometimes three total tables. The house’s kitchen was so expansive he really didn’t need a bakery building at all, though he terribly missed having one. That first year, he’d been in a frenzy. Nothing could stop him. He worked away the entire day, slaving over pies, cakes, muffins, doughnuts, and other ambitious offerings like dumplings and any numbers of breads. If it existed, he’d put it into a bread. A customer was just as likely to pick up a loaf of banana bread as they were to stumble across a tomato-and-parmesan loaf.

But something had been happening to him this second year, and his frenzy faded away into this state of reluctance. He’d put off breathing if he could help it! The second and third tables stayed tucked away in the back of the garage where he didn’t have to look at them. His trips to the grocery store ebbed in frequency. His creativity was nowhere to be found. His delightful and imaginative offerings plummeted to a level reminiscent of grade school bake sales.

But Nancy didn’t know that. She sat there in her wheelchair and looked over the long table with rapt attention but never touching. Now that he was closer to her, Josh realized her bulk probably wasn’t caused by simple overeating like he initially thought. She was very old, with a face that sagged around kind, sparkling blue eyes, and her arms and hands were twisted into unnatural claws by severe arthritis. She simply couldn’t get enough exercise and probably hadn’t been able to for a very long time if the state of her hands was anything to judge by.

“See anything you like?” he asked Nancy, avoiding looking at Jennifer as he did. He had read somewhere it was very hurtful to talk to someone’s caretaker instead of them, as if they had no mind of their own; Nancy was clearly in charge of her faculties.

“Oh, dear! Young man, your parents have left you with quite the burden, haven’t they?”

His mouth fell open. How does she know?

Heat burned at the backs of his eyes, threatening to become moisture. If that happened...Well, he just couldn’t let it happen.

“Leaving you out in the cold like this.” She tutted while picking up a loaf of wheat bread, the top of which was dusted with flour to make it seem artisanal. “Back in my day, when someone started a job, they stuck with it the whole way through to the end! Mark my words, those were better days.”

Through the haze of pained fog in his mind, Josh realized what he’d heard was not what the woman meant. Jennifer watched closely, but she stayed quiet, perhaps waiting to see if her involvement was necessary here. She looked worried, her eyes flickering. She knew it was the wrong thing to say; that he was being rubbed the wrong way.

He pulled in a deep breath, trying to get ahold of himself. “See anything that’s calling your name?”

Avoidance. Avoid it. Just like everything else.

“Oh, all of it! Did you make any of this yourself?”

“Um...most of it.”

Nancy seemed pleased by this. “Well! You’ll make some lucky lady very happy after you graduate.”

“Graduate?”

Now she moved on to a peach pie. Once upon a time, he visited orchards with his parents and a couple family friends to pick fruit by the bushel. Apples, pears, peaches, plums...These would all be prepared by hand, baked, blanched, canned, and frozen before being squirreled away into storage for use throughout the year. Those friends who helped would receive some of the choicest goods every month. The arrangement benefitted everyone, allowing them to have the best produce even when stores were charging an arm and a leg for mealy out-of-season junk.

These days, he just visited the freezer section at the store. It was a disgrace to their memory but he just couldn’t manage to do it on his own.

“Yes,” Nancy was saying. “High school is very important. College, too! Don’t you go running off with the first pretty lady you see, do you hear me? There’s a reason I had three husbands in my day. It becomes a habit to find the most handsome man with a big...”

“Nancy!” Jennifer cut in.

Josh’s eyes widened. Despite his hurt and confusion, he couldn’t help but be amused. This world needed more Nancies in it.

In the end, the old woman bought the peach pie and a loaf of ordinary white sandwich bread. Jennifer handed over her purse without having to be asked, and Nancy very painstakingly counted out $1s with her crooked fingers. She placed these one by one in a pile on the table, then pushed them across to Josh. “I’d make it all nice and neat for you with the heads all going the same way but these fingers of mine are apt to just fall off any second! I’m headed to my doctor for that,” she informed him.

Josh took the pile of bills, not yet straightening them because he knew it might bother her to see him do what she couldn’t. “Well, gosh, I hope he keeps that from happening. You have such pretty nails.”

Nancy blushed, her cheeks going the dusty-red shade of ripening apples. The nails capping her crooked fingers were fake, canted awkwardly from the glue bases that held them on. They were painted as blue as her eyes, but the job hadn’t been done particularly well. There were missing gaps, huge chips, and mounded glops of polish. She had clearly insisted upon doing them herself. “You fooler, you! Like I said, a real lady’s man!”

After exchanging thank-yous back and forth for several confusing seconds, Nancy allowed herself to be pushed back to the car and loaded up. Jennifer turned her head towards Josh as he watched, deftly packing up the wheelchair without even needing to look down at it. “Thank you,” she mouthed, and it was that part which broke him. He could only hope they couldn’t see his tears as they drove away.

Once the car was around the corner and out of sight, he leaned forward and pressed the heels of his hands against his eyes to try and dam the burning river. He had always known he had a young face but he never had anyone assume he hadn’t even graduated high school. It wasn’t that assumption that hurt him, but the connotations that came with it. If he was back in high school, if he could go back to that time again, his parents would still be alive.

Hell, even back in college, they were still alive.

They were bakers for a joint 50 years. Josh hadn’t known his mother to burn anything in her life unless it was on purpose. His father was almost as good. How they managed to set their bakery on fire, Josh would never know. The fire department was unable to determine the cause, stating only the facts everyone already knew. Thomas and Pauline went to their bakery just after 4 a.m. as they always did; they had an employee or two, but they insisted upon doing  the bulk of the preparation themselves each morning. At just before 5 a.m., having not even been there for an hour, the building caught fire, burning fiercely and rapidly. By the time dawn strengthened into morning, there was no bakery any longer. It was only a blackened pile of foundation and walls, studded with ruined hunks of machinery and the counters beneath.

Josh was 25 at the time, the proud owner of a bachelor’s degree in business. He was the manager of a local holding company division, about to be given a promotion which would give him the ability to conduct interviews with applicants. He wouldn’t have the last word on whether they were hired or fired but his word would mean a whole damn lot once he had all the training done and passed a few simulations. His boss, a steely-eyed man who rarely gave out compliments, said he thought Josh would do okay.

He was on a fast track to making six figures a year. All that changed with that one fateful phone call, which came at the same time as his alarm. He thought he’d just been so tired he was sort of hearing double, but that wasn’t to be the case. The phone kept ringing and ringing. Blearily, grunting, he’d grabbed for his cell but it had died in the night because he’d forgotten to charge it.

He remembered wondering as to the source of the sound after that discovery. He was very much a morning person by habit, but he needed time to wake up, otherwise he was a groggy mess. It took him a few seconds of deep pondering for him to remember he also had a cordless phone which he kept in the hallway in the direct middle of his apartment. He was often teased about his cordless phone, mostly by people younger than him, but he kept it around anyway. The number was on his business cards, as well as his work extension, and his cell number. With so many options, including email and fax and pager, it was virtually impossible not to get ahold of him.

As his phone continued to ring, he staggered out of bed and went down the hallway. He had to lean heavily against the wall to do so, as his legs weren’t in working order yet.

He had grabbed for the phone. “Hello?” he growled.

The ringing shrieked in his ear.

Wincing, he pulled back and remembered to accept the call before putting the phone up to his ear again. “Hello?” he said again.

The voice that came through belonged to his pack leader, a rather dashing man in his mid-30s named Ryan. Normally as cool-headed as any person could ever be, Ryan’s voice had shaken to the point where Josh couldn’t understand him.

He didn’t need to.

The meaning was clear. There was only one reason Ryan would be calling him. Something happened to his parents.

It was only later he learned all the details, though he often wished he had never been given that knowledge. Each word, each fractured explanation, only caused more pain to pierce straight through his heart. That first week, he was so full of holes  it was a wonder he didn’t bleed out.

The largest of the holes were more like entire chasms, stretches of absence whose tributaries covered his entire being. His parents once filled those chasms. He called them several times a week and used the bakery to meet with clients. Loyal customers had seen him grow up from a mere pup of a boy to the businessman he was today, and if they came on the weekend they could still catch a glimpse of him in the back, covered in flour and as happy as a clam.

“You really need a second job?” the old timers would joke with him.

Josh would laugh and tell them a company job didn’t pay like it used to. Which was a lie. He spent so much time with his parents because he genuinely enjoyed being with them and always had. He could have been a baker too, if he wanted. Nancy wasn’t wrong on that front; his parents ensured he had the skills to take care of himself and his own family, someday.

All that came to an end with the fire. The flames took not just his parents and their business, but left him a husk. Such a tragedy would have been devastating on its own but it was twice as horrific for Josh because he was a shapeshifter. He was a werewolf, though most of his kind preferred to simply be known as wolves. It was difficult for shapeshifters such as himself to coexist in the modern world alongside humans. The systems of checks and balances humans insisted upon meant that those amongst them who could turn into animals were no longer free to go where they pleased. Packs couldn’t travel. Flocks couldn’t migrate. Gradually, the shapeshifters had to adjust more towards their human halves.

But that didn’t mean everything changed. Wolves had packs, though packs now carved out stationary territories for themselves based upon the majority of their family members. Some wolves were loners, owing loyalty to no one. A pack could be as large as necessary, encompassing an entire city’s worth of wolves, or a pack could be as simple as a pair of mates. Though there were skirmishes, most of these resulted in peace.

Josh was no loner. He was a pack wolf through and through. Portsmouth was a relatively peaceful place for shifters—as far as he knew—and the wolves from other packs were friendly enough when he came across them. He had never known tragedy before, had never been personally touched by it. His life was sheltered and idyllic, with a youth spent roughhousing with the other pups. As an omega wolf, he was weaker physically than the dominant alphas but that hadn’t made much of a difference until they were a little older. Even after that, nothing much changed except the alpha kids took it a little easier on him and the other omegas.

He was part of the pack. It was his identity. He was an omega, sharp-witted and reliable, a counterpoint to the feisty alphas and a direct complement to the level-headed, sometimes overly neutral betas. He was the child of his parents, and his loyalty to them only strengthened as the years went by.

Without them, he didn’t know what to do.

He quit his job and moved into their house. He took up baking with a vengeance, but none of it made a difference.

“I wish I could go back,” he whispered into his hands. He scrubbed at his face and then leaned back in his lawn chair to look up at the grey, overcast sky. The tears on his face were chilled by the biting wind. It felt for a moment as if nature itself was comforting him.

Pulling in a few deep breaths until he had calmed down more, he looked around. The morning was in full swing by now, which meant traffic had died down. It was very likely he wouldn’t see anyone else until the afternoon. He didn’t think he could handle just sitting out here all alone for one more second

He stood up and headed for his Mustang, then paused and looked back at the laden table. Just the thought of taking all the food back inside and unfolding the table made his shoulders sag. His stomach turned into a knot imagining it, though he knew in reality it shouldn’t have been a big deal.

Shopping shouldn’t be a big deal. Talking to nice old ladies shouldn’t be a big deal, especially when they think I’m young and adorable and talented. None of this should be so hard, but it is.

An idea came to him. Though as he walked back inside the house and into the kitchen he had to admit to himself that it wasn’t so much an idea as an excuse. He’d been making a lot of those lately.

It took far too long for him to find a piece of paper and a pen that worked. After the fifth dry one threatened to rip a hole through the paper, he went down into the basement and rummaged around in the boxes until he found a few of his childhood belongings. He had been obsessed with markers and hoped there would still be a few around.

Standing in the basement, Josh opened the flaps of the box he had chosen. The sight of his toys within, relics of a happier time, pained him deeply. He spotted a marker wedged against the corner and grabbed it. Returning to his piece of paper, he scrawled a message across it.

It’s All Free Today

Take Whatever You Want

He took the message outside and taped it onto the table so it would be visible from the street. Then he grabbed up his keys and hopped in the car.

He didn’t have any particular destination in mind until he started driving, letting his wandering thoughts guide him where they would. Portsmouth was aptly named because of its position along the water, which meant most of the businesses had an appropriate theme. Otherwise, it was just a normal city.

A normal city except for the waterfront.

Water.

And just like that, Josh knew where he was going. Water Street. Again.

Despite the unoriginal name, Water Street was a rather pricey area near the docks. Most of the homeowners owned boats, which meant it was only a short drive to the water every single weekend. Josh didn’t know many rich people, but he did know a man who was doing rather well for himself.

He parked out in front of a large and beautiful brick home, which backed up against a long strip of greenery before touching the water. The yard was absolutely immaculate, with well-trimmed hedges and green grass that had somehow avoided the punishment of winter. The hedges fared less well but Josh didn’t doubt that those bushes would have buds before any other plant. Ryan put a hell of a lot of work into his home, staunchly refusing to hire any help. Each summer, droves of teenage boys came knocking on his front door to offer to mow his lawn. At least, that was what Ryan boasted. Josh believed it because he had gotten similar offers for his own yard, though the kids which came to him were of a more grudging sort. He suspected they were trying to earn some volunteer time for some reason or another. While this was a noble goal, he sent them on their way. He didn’t want anyone working on his parents’ house but him.

Ryan had a bit more to work on than Josh did, though. Adding that onto the fact that he was a busy pack leader, and maybe it was no wonder that he was so incredibly built.

He might not even be here, Josh thought. He was looking right at a massive truck with a pristine boat hitched to the back, but the presence of Ryan’s vehicle didn’t mean he was home. Shapeshifters had other ways to get around. He was suddenly nervous, though he didn’t know why. Ryan wasn’t all that much older than he was and hadn’t been leader for very long. Five years or so. The alpha was the most dominant male currently in their pack, incredibly powerful, but he was also laidback and acted more like a friend than a leader.

Shaking his head, he went up the long driveway and around the side to the porch. He climbed the steps, sliding his hand along the railing. It was black wrought iron, smooth as could be and without a speck of rust. The porch had been swept recently. He could still see the tracks in what little dust remained from the broom’s straw head. That gave him hope Ryan was around. The wind was so fierce that it would obliterate the tracks in only a few more minutes.

Raising one hand, he rapped on the door with his knuckles. At least, he tried to knock on the door. It opened just before he made contact. Josh took a step backwards, a little startled.

Ryan stood there, filling the doorway with his bulk. He flashed a pearly-white smile at Josh as the surprise faded from his expression. “Hey!” he said. “Whoa, Josh! How have you been? It’s been awhile since I’ve seen you around. You haven’t been coming to the pack meetings.”

Pack meetings weren’t mandatory. They weren’t even a shifter-wide phenomenon. Ryan had decided on his own that the members of his pack would benefit from monthly group meetings where they could share news and just spend time together. Otherwise, they might never see each other. It was his way of bringing them all together, and so far it had worked wonders for their community.

“I’ve been busy,” Josh said curtly. He looked away from Ryan, a bit flustered. Now that he was here, he didn’t exactly know what he was going to say anymore. He wasn’t really attracted to the alpha and never had been because he preferred a little more intelligence in his men, but it was hard to deny that the one standing before him was a real prize. He was also dressed a bit indecently, standing there in the doorway with his chest bared. At first, he thought Ryan was only wearing boxers but then he realized they were swimming trunks. “Is this a bad time?”

“Nah.” Ryan waved one hand. His fingernails were ragged, his hands callused from constant hard work. “I was just about to head out for a swim. You’re welcome to walk with me. Take a dip if you want.”

Josh looked down at his body, at his frumpy sweatpants and ugly Christmas sweater. “I don’t think I’m dressed for it.”

Ryan flashed another of those white grins. “I won’t tell anyone if you want to run around in your drawers for a bit.”

And now he thought about his wasted body, neglected for two years. No way in hell was he stripping down in front of his pack leader like that, exposing what he’d become. Then again, doing so would give him an excuse not to have to broach the topic himself.

“Come on,” Ryan said, gesturing for Josh to follow him. They worked their way around the porch to the other side of the house, walking along the wall. Ryan was barefoot, seeming not to mind the concrete.

Dimly, something occurred to Josh. “Why did you come out the front instead of just going straight out the back?”

Ryan looked over his wide shoulder, like a man trying to peek around a mountain. “You’ll see,” was all he said.

They had only gone a third of the length of the wall before Ryan paused and turned back again, placing his finger against his lips. Puzzled, Josh nodded. The alpha wolf motioned towards the hedge of rose bushes, dormant now, which lined the house on this side. The mulch beneath the hedges was clear of dead petals and fallen leaves, leaving only a few thorns scattered across to mar the perfection. Ryan knelt down with awesome dexterity, then gently parted the branches of the nearest bush. He looked inside.

Josh saw his alpha’s expression go very soft. His eyes, once as ferocious and green as a Venus flytrap, now were as mellow and tender as new leaves. A soft smile curled on his lips, a direct opposite of his normal grin. It was in that moment he wondered if he might not be becoming attracted to his pack leader, but the thought was only temporary and he pushed it away with ease. Of all the things to worry about, that was not one of them. Ryan was a devout bachelor and very much not gay. Besides, the glow of warmth he felt in his stomach as he watched Ryan peer through the bushes was still not physical. This one moment didn’t mean anything significant.

The alpha gestured for him to come closer. Creeping on his tiptoes, Josh peered through the gap in the bush.

There, tucked back deep in the hedge, was a collection of fur and dried grass and sticks, jumbled up into a rough nest shape. Tucked into this nest, barely visible amongst the clumps of fur, were several baby rabbits.

Josh stared at them, feeling a mix of emotions, all of which were disturbing. The predator in him recognized easy prey and would have enjoyed pouncing on the infant animals. The human part of him recognized that these babies were the result of a family, something he no longer had and probably never would if his dating life was anything to go by.

He could see their fluffy little pale brown pelts, sides rapidly rising and falling as they cuddled together. Their eyes weren’t open now, or maybe hadn’t opened yet at all. Their ears were oval tufts. It was impossible to tell where one ended and the next began, or even how many there were.

Ryan drew back slowly and let the branches slide together once more. He moved away from the nest, motioning for Josh to follow. They walked off down the side of the house again, quiet until they were almost at the backyard.

“I found ‘em about a week ago. They were a lot less cute then, let me tell you.” Ryan laughed softly, still with that gentle edge to his smile. “Almost no hair at all. There’s one who just had a big bush of fur on the front of his snout. Like a moustache. Looked like an angry old man.”

Josh laughed a little, though pain kept him from enjoying this conversation very much. “I didn’t know animals bred in the winter.”

“I didn’t think so either. Maybe it was an accident, or she came across a dashing boy she just couldn’t resist.” They were at the edge of the water now, looking out across the choppy waves which lapped fiercely against the shore. The sky was reflected somehow more perfectly on the surface of the river than it actually was, making it seem as if the world was painted upside down. Far out across the water, a small number of boats meandered as pale smudges against the gloomy background of overcast clouds and city skyscrapers.

“Hey,” Ryan said, turning suddenly to look at Josh. He flinched backwards a step, a little startled by the sudden motion. “What about you? You ever find that dashing male you just can’t resist yet?”

You know I haven’t.

Even when in human form, shapeshifters’ senses were very acute. A wolf could tell what his companion had last eaten, who he was in direct contact with, if he was a virgin, or if he had been claimed or had claimed someone. While Ryan wouldn’t be able to tell Josh had been having a dry spell for over two years now, he knew that he hadn’t seen anyone recently.

“I don’t really do the whole dating scene.”

All the softness was gone from Ryan’s face. He had forgotten the rabbits and was completely focused on the problem in front of him. Josh blinked, a little startled at the realization that people might know he had a problem even if he didn’t volunteer the information out loud. Of course, he was a wolf. But did it show in other ways? Less obvious ones?

“So I hear,” Ryan said. His eyes were fierce and burning again, snaring Josh in their intensity. His voice lowered, as if he feared being overheard. “You don’t date. You don’t come to the meetings. You don’t go shopping. You don’t really leave that house anymore. What do you do these days, Joshua?”

He opened his mouth, then closed it. No excuses. This is the reason I came here. To hear all this. To let someone else fix my problems for me.

“Maybe you need to sell that house. It doesn’t help you any to be there with all those memories.”

His heart started to ache.

“At the very least, go back to your real job. They said they’d rehire you anytime, didn’t they?”

“That was two years ago,” Josh said. His voice cracked down the middle. “A lot of things can change in two years.”

“And a lot of things simply don’t, do they? I know you don’t need to work anymore. The inheritance they left you and the insurance on the bakery sure as hell took care of that. But it’d be good for you, man. Get any job. Any company would love to have someone like you on the team. Or become a greeter at Walmart and spend your days meeting a whole bunch of people.” Ryan stared at him, thinking hard, then gestured around at his enormous waterfront home. “Do you know why I have to be the one working on my home? Hell, I’ve got tons of empty rooms, and I could just hire a cleaning service to dust them every month or so. I could hire a lot of people to do a lot of things, as busy as I am.”

“Then why don’t you?”

Ryan shrugged a little. “I always say it’s because I like to do it myself but that’s just the easy answer. I do it because I need to do it, because it...it enriches me. It gives me something to do other than be a leader. I get to be just a guy cleaning his toilet, getting high off lemon fumes. Or I get to be the guy grossed out by whatever random puddle of gunk is in the bottom drawer of my fridge. I get to have accomplishments. I get to recuperate. I know things have been hard on you since your parents died, but it’s been two years. You need to make an identity for yourself again because right now, you’re just the guy who’s sad all the time.”

“Okay, but how? It’s...hard.” His stomach ached and so did his heart. He lowered his head and turned his face away from the alpha, ashamed of being so transparent, ashamed that he had all this time to fix the problem himself and just hadn’t managed it.

A warm touch on his shoulder made him look up. Ryan squeezed him gently, reassuringly. “You’ll get there. You’re not bad, for an omega.”

Despite the tears lodged in his throat, Josh laughed. “You’re pretty smart, for an alpha.”

Ryan laughed and flashed his customary grin. The water lapped around his toes now as an even stronger gust of wind blew across the river. “I’ll take it. Now, I’ve actually been thinking about you, but I didn’t want to say anything unless you came to me or else you’d just ignore it.”

That was true. The same scenario used to happen a lot before everyone gave up on him.

“I really think you need to focus on something other than yourself. You’re an omega. I wouldn’t say this if I didn’t know you’d talked about it in this way before the fire, but you used to say how you were looking forward to having a family someday. I think you need to get back up there on the horse. Or on the shaft, if you will.” Ryan’s tanned skin darkened slightly with the barest beginnings of a blush. “I think you need to go on a date.”

“Ryan...”

“I know. Seeing someone isn’t going to solve your problem. But just think about it like this. Go out on a date. Get to know someone. Laugh. Get in an argument. Kick their ass out the door after you let them throw you in bed. Feel alive.” Ryan grabbed his other shoulder now, gripping hard enough for it to be painful. “There’s a magic well on an orchard down near Abingdon. It shows you who your mate is supposed to be.”

For a moment, there was nothing but silence between them. Then Josh sputtered, “What the fuck?” and Ryan laughed. “None of what you just said makes any sense at all!”

Ryan shrugged. “I know someone who knows someone who works down there, and he said it exists but hardly anyone dares to look into it, if they even know about it at all. Sometimes knowing the way things are meant to be isn’t always the best thing, you know?”

Josh didn’t understand that, and he didn’t understand any of the rest of this nonsense. “Why Abingdon? Why an orchard? How can anything be magic?”

“You’re asking how something can be magical when you’re able to turn into a wolf?”

“But...that’s science. Gene structure and rearranging and adaptability.” At least, that’s what he’d always thought. It is very difficult to study shapeshifters with human technology that hasn’t yet achieved the required level of complexity. There was also the matter at hand that humans were mostly unaware of shapeshifter existence. Making discoveries, and making these discoveries well-known amongst the general population, was almost impossible. Word of mouth was how most shifters received news relating to them, but that was an unreliable form of communication.

But Ryan just shrugged. “Is there a difference sometimes?”

And Josh didn’t know how to answer that. “Do you really believe in that sort of thing?”

The alpha shook his head. “No way. I think it’s just some fairytale. A wishful thinking sort of thing. But I really feel like you’d benefit from taking a vacation and getting out of that house. I figure you might meet some nice guy on your way down or something, huh?”

Josh hesitated. “I...really don’t know about all this, Ryan. I can’t just leave.”

“If there’s anyone in the world who can afford to just pack up and go right now, it’s you. And if you’re going to, do it soon. Otherwise, it’ll only get harder. Now, I need to take my swim. You’re welcome to stay and watch if you want.”

Josh blushed as the alpha walked away and dove into the water, sending up an enormous splash of crystalline water. He watched the wolf duck under the surface, moving with the startling serpentine grace of a sea lion. Not wanting to be splashed again, he backed up and moved off back around the house to get to his Mustang.

As he sat behind the wheel, gripping it hard enough to turn his fingers white from pressure, he suddenly hated that he had so few places to go when he needed to. No friends, and too afraid to brave the communal wolf gathering area by the park where they all hung out when they were in the area. He had no office to go to. All he could do was head home or out to the store, and both options were terrible. The same sights, the same faces. Or lack thereof.

But I can’t just go out on a trip and leave the house alone, Josh thought. Someone will break in and no one will be around to know about it. I’ll come back to find all my folks’ stuff gone. I can’t.

And he knew he was only making more excuses so he could take the easy way out. And he hated himself more for it.

Fate had a different idea for him, however. As he pulled up into his driveway, he found his next-door-neighbor browsing over the array of cold pies.

“Hey, neighbor!” the man said. “Nice to see that car of yours getting some use. Mustangs gotta run every now and again, know what I’m saying?”

Josh didn’t know what he was saying because a realization just struck him, stabbing him in the back. This was his chance. He could take this step and everything else would fall into place.

“Listen, Mr. Henrich, would you do a favor for me?”