Blake gave it another three days to allow them both some time to cool down from their confrontation, and then he went back to Josh’s neighborhood. This time, it was the middle of the day, and there were plenty of people out and about. He was stared at the entire way, whispered about, but he ignored it. Those things, he was used to. They didn’t bother him any.

He was fully prepared to arrive at the house and find that the omega was gone, taking his Mustang with him, but that wasn’t the case. The car sat so perfectly in the same spot that it was clear it hadn’t moved at all since the last time he was here.

God, I hope he isn’t dead, Blake thought, surprising himself with his worry. He walked up the driveway to the front door but, even on that path, he couldn’t smell any recent presences.

A man standing in the yard of the next house over was watching him like a hawk. He swore inwardly. He couldn’t exactly try the door and then climb in the windows with someone watching. Besides, it was a very real possibility Joshua noticed his one screen window had been tampered with and proceeded to lock all of them for the future. Maybe the only thing preventing him from getting a big whiff of death was the air-tight seal created by the closed windows.

Maybe it didn’t matter as much as he was making it out to. After all, he was here as a...gentleman caller.

Blake glanced at the man in the neighboring yard, letting him know that he knew he was being watched, Then he went right up to the front door and knocked.

Nothing happened for a long minute, so he rang the doorbell. He looked around, acted idle like a human would, feigning impatience when in reality he was surprisingly nervous.

The door opened only a few seconds later. Josh stood there, rubbing his ears with both hands. He looked neither surprised or disappointed to see Blake standing there, but he also didn’t look particularly pleased about it. “I was looking through the peephole. You just about blew my eardrums out.”

“Sorry,” Blake said. “I just wanted to make sure you weren’t dead.”

Josh looked at him blankly. “I’m pretty sure that’s a lie. I don’t matter to you one way or another.”

“Not true,” Blake replied, a little hesitantly. “Look, can you maybe invite me inside so your neighbor doesn’t get it in his mind to call the cops on me? I’ve had enough of the police in my life already.”

A flicker of something intangible passed over Josh’s face, though it was impossible to tell what emotion it really was. “Mr. Henrich watches out for me ever since I asked him to keep an eye on my house while I was down in Abingdon looking for the wishing well. He’s a good guy. Unfortunately, you aren’t. What’s stopping me from screaming right now?”

Blake looked around and then leaned in conspiratorially. Josh also leaned in, though a little reluctantly. “You still think I’m your mate. I still think it’s crazy. But I can’t forget about you. And maybe we noticed each other for a reason, before you even went out to that well. Maybe we should...try to have some fun while it lasts. Until we get bored.”

“Are you asking me out on a date?”

“Yeah. Yeah, I am.” Blake turned his head away a little and rubbed the back of his neck. “Look, you can say no. Doesn’t mean anything to me one way or another.”

“Yes,” came the breathless reply. “Yes. Let’s go right now. Oh, wait. Let’s not. Um.”

Now that the big moment was behind them, Blake relaxed. It felt like it was the first time he’d relaxed in years, tension easing from his very essence. He leaned in further to the doorway, pretending to look past Josh. “What, you busy? You got someone else in there?”

“No!” Josh said, stammering. He blushed a little. “It’s just that I...look like this?”

He hadn’t even really taken a good look at Josh until right this moment. He still had a mental image of how damn good Josh looked when the omega came to find him and the differences between then and now were jarring. His hair and face were greasy, and his beard was spreading tendrils of untamed hair all over the place. The bruises under his eyes had become even darker and larger than before. He was almost skeletal now too, clearly not eating or taking care of himself in any way at all.

Whatever his feelings about the omega, this was beyond awful. No one should ever have to be so despondent as this.

Blake reached in and held the door. He supposed it was a pretty heavy door but Josh’s arm trembled just from the effort of pushing it open. “So let me in. I’ll make us some lunch. You shower, get dressed. We eat. We go somewhere.”

“Where?”

“Wherever it is that will make you stop asking questions.”

Josh smiled. It was small and sad, but still a smile. “Okay. Come in.”

And he stepped inside to the same classic living room which still showed no signs of habitation. There was more scent than there had been, but otherwise, nothing else had changed at all. No pillows had been shuffled around. There were no cups or plates left sitting out, no books, nothing. Not even the TV remote had been touched, since the buttons were covered in a layer of dust.

“Have you even been leaving your room?”

Josh shrugged. “Here and there. Have to pee sometimes and stuff.”

But nothing else, apparently. Blake gestured off down the hallway. “Go. Shower. Take your time. “

Josh wandered off obediently, moving with the careful shuffle of a man who doesn’t exactly know how much more he can take. Blake watched him and shook his head.

He made sure Josh didn’t just flop right back into his bedroom, and then he turned around and wandered into the kitchen where a number of outdated appliances awaited him. The toaster was a dinosaur, for fuck’s sakes. The last toaster in the world that only cooked two slices at a time was right here on this granite countertop.

Everything else was much the same, showing its age but in a classy way so it gave the house an antique vibe rather than a crummy one. Though, he soon discovered, it was a little bit crummy after all. Even the most pristine of artifacts here were covered in at least some dust. Carelessness? Or was Josh just like every other man who never saw a need to dust? Blake sure as hell didn’t. Anyone who would walk around your house and comment on the dust on top of your ceiling fan was a person you didn’t want inside the house at all.

But he faced the hardest task he ever faced now. He didn’t know how to cook. Sure, simple things like scrambled eggs, pancakes, and grilled cheese were usually within his grasp, and he would eat it even if it did turn into an outright disaster, but this was an occasion where “something simple” just wasn’t going to cut it. The man needed to eat. A lot.

But, as he explored the fridge and cabinets and the cellar—the honest-to-god cellar—he quickly got the idea there wasn’t a lot here to eat. The shelves and fruit baskets in the cellar were all but empty, and he didn’t think jars of plum jam counted as substantial food. The fridge contained milk and other bare essentials, but the milk and yogurt were out of date, the vegetables were clearly inedible, and everything else that remained couldn’t be combined in any fashion to make a meal. The freezer held a few packages of frozen meats and a few crusts of bread in mostly-empty Tupperware containers.

Blake puzzled over this for a moment. Now he couldn’t even fall back on scrambled eggs or pancakes, because there were no eggs at all.

Shrugging a little, he made a pot of coffee and settled in the living room to await Josh’s arrival.

The omega came wandering around 20 minutes later, dressed in a t-shirt and jeans that might once have been his size but which now draped over his frame. With his mussed, wet hair and fresh-shaven face, he looked like a child rather than a man.

Blake touched his chin and frowned. “Can’t decide whether you like a beard or not?”

“Too much work to maintain it,” Josh said, sounding as hollow as he looked. “No mustache, either. No time for that shit.”

Blake privately agreed. He neither stayed clean-shaven, nor attempted a beard. He preferred the scraggly, shadowy look.

But for Josh? Blake thought he rather liked the clean shave. It let the soft point of his chin shine through, making his face seem all the sweeter in shape. If he wasn’t so thin, he might have been adorable.

“So, coffee?” Josh headed for the kitchen.

Standing up, Blake intercepted him and let out a low warning growl. “Back up there, omega. You sit down. I’ll bring it to you.”

Josh obeyed, perching on the very edge of the sectional couch and staring down at his knees which he kept tightly drawn together. Blake frowned and went over to him, planted a hand on his chest, and then pushed him backwards slowly until he was at least resting against the back cushion. The expression on Josh’s face didn’t change. He seemed to not even realize he was being touched.

Blake waited until he was back in the kitchen to shake out his hand, which was tingling like crazy from the contact. He grabbed a cup and poured coffee for Josh. About the only thing there was plenty of in the kitchen was sugar and flour, so he added three heaping tablespoons of sugar and stirred vigorously until it all dissolved. He might not have any food available yet but he knew the brain lived on simple carbs. Some sugar and caffeine would help keep him going just a bit longer.

Josh accepted the cup readily, but then simply held it in his hands like the main purpose of a cup of coffee was to get warm.

“Drink it,” Blake growled.

Josh looked at him with one eyebrow raised. “I like it black.”

“It is black.”

“I smelled the sugar when you got it out. And don’t you think I know what it sounds like when your ham-hands open a sugar container?” Josh shook his head. His voice was flat, but Blake felt somehow that he might be teasing. “There’s sugar in this. You drink it.”

“I don’t think so.”

“Okay, then I can only assume you put poison in it, too.” And there it was, a small flicker of a smile beneath the stubbornness.

Blake grabbed the mug and took a swig. Overwhelming sweetness made his tongue cramp up so hard he thought it would shrivel and fall off. “There. Are you satisfied? It’s not poison. Yeah, there’s a fuckton of sugar in it but you’re going to drink it anyway because right now you’re running on fumes. Might be empty calories but it’ll keep you from dying on me while I drive you to a restaurant.”

“Drive me? Restaurant?”

“No questions until you drink.”

Josh glared at him but couldn’t maintain it. He brought the rim of the mug to his lips and took a long sip from right where Blake had. “Okay. I did.”

“More.”

“I’ll burn my tongue.”

Blake rolled his eyes. “Holy shit. I’m starting to regret coming here. You are one fucking annoying omega.”

Josh giggled, surprising them both. He took another small sip of the dark liquid, grimacing as the sugar bit him. “Okay, so what’s this about driving me somewhere? You don’t have a car. Or do you? You don’t strike me as the type.”

Many shapeshifters choose to forego modern vehicles most of the time, since they are expensive but also because shapeshifters are part animal and don’t view walking everywhere as odd as humans do. “I don’t have a car. I’ll be taking yours.”

“And why would I let you do that? It’s an expensive car. Do you even have a license?”

“I do.”

Which was a lie. He didn’t. Not anymore. As it turned out, you had to renew those things, and he hadn’t been in a DMV since he passed his test. If he went now, he’d probably have to take another. No, best not to bother.

“Show me.”

“You’re hurting my feelings,” Blake said.

Josh giggled again. “Why do you need to drive my car?”

“Because I’m taking you to a restaurant.”

“I thought you were going to make me lunch?”

“I was until I realized you don’t have shit. So, I’m going to take you somewhere nice and inexpensive and I’m going to feed you, and then we’re going to have our fucking date. Okay? Is that enough detail for you or do you want to know the exact route I’m going to take to get us there?”

Josh nodded as sagely as a man could while struggling to swallow a mouthful of sugar. “That one. Yes. I’ll get a map.”

“Okay. That’s it. I’m leaving you here.” Blake turned around and walked away, veering at the last second to enter the kitchen. He slid the coffee pot out of the machine and made a good deal of clatter while pouring it. “I’m putting this in a travel mug,” he called to the living room, from which came a series of hurried slurps. “I’m going to have a fun time without you.”

A few seconds later, Josh appeared with his empty cup, scowling. “You’re a liar.”

Blake shrugged and leaned back against the counter, leisurely drinking from his own mug. “Man, I don’t even know where your keys are. You can’t really have thought I was going to leave without you. There wouldn’t be any point to me coming here.”

Josh wandered over to the sink and set his mug inside after rinsing it out with water. “Some people do really pointless things sometimes. And sometimes it’s nice to play pretend. It’s better than the real world when you can trick yourself into thinking things are contrary.”

I don’t know what contrary means but that sounds like something an old man would say. Not a little omega.

“Hey, how old are you?”

“27. Why?”

“Huh, you are an old man, then.” He didn’t bother explaining what he meant even though Josh looked at him quizzically.

“Anyway,” Josh said after a pause. “You would have found my keys eventually. They’re on a hook right by the front door.”

“Good,” Blake growled. “Get your shoes, and let’s go.”

Blake had driven a few sports cars before, and he was a passable driver when it came to a stick shift, but he hadn’t ever been in a Mustang before. The engine snarled like a terrified stallion, making him shudder from the sheer exhilaration of it all. It was quick to start, quick to stop, and just as terrifying as it was amazing.

In the passenger seat, Josh gripped the door with one hand the entire time as if he was preparing to leap out at any moment. His eyes were wild and the grin of terror on his face could have been taken for one of complete amusement.

Somehow, they arrived at a Denny’s still in one piece. To be honest, halfway through the drive, Blake had forgotten what their goal even was and had to have it pointed out to him by Josh that they were soaring right past an awful lot of restaurants. He chose the least-expensive one. From the look on Josh’s face, he was aware of this.

“You like this place?” he asked.

Blake shrugged. Something came over him, and he motioned for Josh to stay put, then stepped outside the car and went around the other side to open his door for him. Neither of them commented on this phenomenon. It had just struck him as the right thing to do. A charade, of sorts. Playing pretend.

“It’s okay,” he replied, shutting the door behind Josh and locking it. “I have $15 on me and that’s all I got, so don’t order the lobster.”

This joke fell flat. He badly wanted a cigarette.

They stepped inside and were seated quickly, mainly because Denny’s wasn’t a place which had a lot of traffic during the day. Despite its original purpose as a breakfast place, most of its sales tended to come from people eating a late dinner, or from drunks who suddenly felt the need to eat more than anyone ever should in a single day.

Blake ordered more coffee for both of them, and Josh looked relieved when he said they wouldn’t be needing any sugar or cream.

The bored waitress returned quickly with a chipped mug for each of them. “Are you ready to order?” she monotoned.

Josh opened his mouth, but Blake reached out and swatted at him with the sticky menu he held. “I’ll order for both of us,” he said, a touch of warning in his voice. He could just tell from the look on the omega’s face that he was going to order a bowl of oatmeal or a few pieces of toast, shit that would have been fine under any other circumstances—fine, but still sad—but which wouldn’t do when you were basically starving.

“We need an order of the chocolate chip pancakes, an order of maple French toast, three sides of sausage...” Basically, if it was on the menu, Blake mentioned it at some point. He knew it was unwise, considering he probably didn’t have enough to cover it, but he’d get it paid for. Somehow. Favors were fair currency these days.

The waitress hadn’t been prepared to write any of this down, expecting a normal order which could be easily memorized, and had to fumble out her notepad and jot the order down. She didn’t look pleased about having to put in extra effort at her minimum wage job. And she looked just as displeased to have to tote out the laden tray when their food was ready a few minutes later.

Josh just shook his head at all of it as if he was uncertain where to start, or had possibly forgotten how to eat. Given how skinny he was, either option seemed likely. “I hope this is all for you. I’ll just...”

“No.”

“No? You don’t even know what I was going to say!”

“Doesn’t matter,” Blake replied. “I’m saying no to all of it. You need to eat.”

“I’m fine, thanks.”

“No, you aren’t.” Blake grabbed several of the plates and started rearranging the contents so he could put it in front of Josh. “You’re actually being a little pathetic. When was the last time you overate?”

“What?”

“It’s healthy. We’re meant to do it. We’re wolves. We gorge when we can. So, you’re going to gorge with me and then we’re going to go find a nice park to take a nap in like true animals.” Other customers passed by while he spoke but he didn’t bother lowering his voice. “Dig in.”

And they ate. Blake’s own stomach was hollow and nagging at him since he’d been neglecting it, but Josh didn’t seem to have much in the way of an appetite. That was evident but sometimes the body shut itself off a little bit to survive. A lack of food led to hunger, of course, but a continued hunger signaled to the brain that no food would be coming soon; metabolism functions slowed and the sensation of hunger dimmed, or ceased altogether. A couple bites of food would send these functions into overdrive to make up for lost time.

That didn’t happen for Josh. He’d neglected himself for so long that his stomach had shrunk and his body was wary of food, having learned by now that it wouldn’t be fed on a regular basis. He just picked and nibbled at his food, choosing bites carefully and then chewing it into mush because it took that long to work up the desire to swallow.

Blake watched him the whole time, noticing the way his lips were moistened after a sip of coffee, captivated by the motion of his mouth and the gradual bob of his throat. He had been inside that mouth; had hit that back of the throat.

Eventually, what they couldn’t eat started to grow cold. Their bored waitress reappeared as if she had been watching for this moment her entire life, bearing to-go boxes and their bill.

“Don’t feel rushed to pay,” she said, though her tone said the opposite. She wanted them gone so she would have less to do and more time to goof off in the back with her cell phone.

Blake reached for the bill, only to have it snatched away from just beneath his fingers. He lifted his head and glared at Josh. “I don’t think so,” he growled, and reached for it again.

Josh held the scrap of paper close to his body and stuck out his tongue. “What are you going to do about it?” he teased.

He opened his mouth to growl again, then reconsidered it. He wouldn’t have enough money anyway. He’d get a free meal with leftovers to boot. “Fine,” he said, knowing he was giving up too easily. After all, he was the alpha here. It was his job to provide for an omega, not the other way around.

Josh pulled out his wallet and set a credit card down on the edge of their table with the bill beneath it. “It’s the least I can do for you after you dragged me out here in the first place. You can get it next time.”

I hope I’ll have more money by the next time. If there is one.

The waitress came back, not even pausing as she swiped the credit card from the table.

“Or, you can get the tip.”

That, he could do. Though he didn’t really feel the woman deserved one at all. He laid a couple bills in the middle of the table. “Now that we’ve gotten that out of the way, where do you want to go for the remainder of our...date?”

Josh shrugged, reaching for his credit card as it made a reappearance. Blake made a point of not looking at the number. “I’ve never really been on a real date.”

Blake stared at him. He didn’t say anything. They walked out of the restaurant in silence and got back into the Mustang. Moving carefully, Blake piloted the car out of the parking lot and back onto the street. Only then did he speak. “What do you mean you’ve never been on a date?”

“I didn’t say that,” Josh replied. “I said a real date. I mean, everyone’s gone to the movies when they’re younger and made out in the back of the theater and then couldn’t answer a single question about it when they get home, but that’s not really the same thing as an actual date. That’s just a reason to get away from your parents.”

“You’ve been in relationships before, though, because you sure as hell aren’t a virgin.”

Josh went quiet and looked off into the distance a little ways. “No,” he murmured. “I’m not. But that doesn’t mean I’ve dated. I’ve had relationships, but dated? No.”

Blake didn’t understand the difference, not really, but he suspected this was somehow important. “So, what would you consider a real date? What do you have to do?”

Josh shook his head a little, a small smile playing on the corners of his mouth. “I’m not sure I could explain it right if I tried. And I’m not sure you’d go for it even if I could.”

“You might be surprised.”

Although I privately agree with you.

“Can you just let me think a little bit? Maybe drive around for awhile?”

“Sure, sure,” Blake replied easily. He felt tense for some reason, though he hadn’t been tense this entire time. Why was this what got him nervous? Was it the fact that this had heart-to-heart potential and might involve emotions, or was it just something he just wouldn’t want to hear? After all, he was here to fuck, not get emotionally involved with someone who clearly wasn’t available.

He let Josh sit in silence and tried to orient himself with where exactly he was in Portsmouth. He couldn’t see any water from here, couldn’t see any of the usual waterfront businesses, so he decided to see if he could find some. Screw the fact that he had been avoiding places like that after The Explosion. If ever there was a time to bend the rules, this was it.

So he drove around, looking idly at signs, weaving aimlessly back and forth through meandering turns that covered a great distance but didn’t have much in the way of forward movement. Beside him, Josh mused on in silence. Occasionally, he drummed his fingers on the door, or playing with his seatbelt. These busy little tics were amusing in their own right because Blake could see that they always preceded a huge thought. Josh would scrunch his face up ever-so-slightly. His head would tilt or angle towards the window, and his eyes would unfocus. Then he started the fiddling around until whatever thought he chased came to him abruptly, and then he’d relax again. Sometimes he even hummed when chancing upon the thought.

Finally, just as Blake managed to find a waterside park, Josh lifted his head. “Still interested?”

“Even more than before,” Blake said truthfully. He wouldn’t admit it to anyone but he sometimes envied those people who could just sit down and think things through. He couldn’t do that. He thought best in actions, when actively doing something else, so the thoughts could sneak up on him in their own time. Like timid deer.

“Can we sit outside? There’s a park right in front of us.” He seemed to consider this. “I guess maybe you already knew that.”

He couldn’t help it. He laughed. Josh smiled at him, and something strange happened. A spark danced, kindled between both of them, tingling somehow without any physical contact. Blake knew what it was, though he’d never had that happen before and that’s why it was strange. Just then, their thoughts had touched. Their wolf spirits had brushed fur, exchanged a polite sniff of interest.

Wolves in the wild needed very little courtship. An alpha found their mate, the two decided they could tolerate each other, and then they spent the rest of their lives together as the other’s only mate. If he was smart at all, he would stop the car, get out, start walking, and just keep on going until he was somewhere Josh could never reach him. Any further time in each other’s presence was only going to cement this odd situation they found themselves in, until it was too late and their spirits considered each other mated.

But Blake didn’t budge. Maybe it was already too late for him, though he hoped it wasn’t, or maybe he was just interested in knowing what all that thinking had been about.

“So, can we sit outside?” Josh repeated.

Blake nodded. “Open your own fucking door this time.”

He got out and quickly shut his door so he wouldn’t hear the omega’s soft laugh, but that didn’t prevent him from seeing it through the window. He waited for Josh to join him as he went around to the front of the car.

Though the sky was still overcast, the grip of winter had abated somewhat today, enough to allow patches of deep blue sky to show through the covering of cloud. The occasional ray of sunlight fell through the open patches, sparkling silver on the gray water. The river was narrower here, allowing a better view of the land across the water, but the lack of room and the pervasive chill had done nothing to dissuade avid sailors. Some boats drifted softly, belonging to the people who actually appreciated what their wealth had been able to buy them. Others slashed between those drifters, sending up sprays of white foam. Water birds lazed in the shallows or drifted on warm currents over the open water.

A damn good view, Blake thought, but not one which he would have wanted to see every morning. He wasn’t much of a swimmer. Or a fisherman. Or a sunbather. Some people said muscle looked better tan but he was always one of those people who burned and then had it peel off to leave him just as white as before. Of course, the fact that he spent a lot of his time skulking around in alleyways and doing things at night really didn’t help him much.

Josh joined him and stood very close at his side. The heat between them was very obvious. Neither one of them said a thing about it. They didn’t touch, but they might as well have been holding hands anyway, as close as they were.

The grass crunched softly beneath their feet as they went over to a bench positioned in the shade of a tree covered in dead buds. It must have mistaken one of the unusually warm days recently as the true start of spring, only to have its burgeoning new life snuffed out by a frosty night.

Blake sat down and turned sideways slightly to watch Josh descend. “So,” he said, “Spit it out. Tell me why you don’t think you’ve ever had a date.”

The omega hesitated, then turned away and looked at the boats on the water. “You’ll make fun of me.”

“Yeah,” Blake agreed. “But oh well, right? Who else are you gonna tell?”

“True.” Josh clasped his thin hands together and kept looking away. “Like I said before, I don’t think a date is just going somewhere with another person and calling it a date. That kind of defeats the whole purpose of what it’s supposed to be. It’s supposed to mean something.”

“Going somewhere and having fun with someone you like isn’t meaningful enough for you?”

Josh blushed a little. He bent down and picked up a stick from beneath the bench and started to peel off the bark in long strips. “I mean, for most people...”

“But you think you’re different for some reason.”

“Who doesn’t think they’re different?” Josh replied softly. He kept stripping the bark, exposing the soft, shiny wood beneath the protective outer layer. “I mean, that’s what we’re raised to believe, isn’t it? That we’re all special and unique? But that’s beside the point, huh? I guess if a good time is all those people want, then that’s as perfect of a date as you can get. But if people both want different things...then it’s not a date. Not really. Not truly.

“And you can have dates without a relationship.

“And a relationship without dates. I’ve had a lot of those.”

Blake considered this information for a moment. “Tell me more about the whole date thing.”

“I don’t know...I thought about it real hard but in the end, all the words in the world don’t make it make sense when I can’t say them in the right way.” Josh suddenly gripped the stick and snapped it in half. The jagged point along one end reminded Blake of the broken baseball bat, and for some reason he felt sick. He was only too relieved when Josh dropped the broken stick back to the ground. “It’s about the meaning behind it. That’s all I can say. People have always told me I take things way too seriously, but sometimes I think they don’t take things seriously enough.”

Blake growled contemplatively in the back of his throat. “You do strike me as that kind of guy. Knowing what I do about you now, I feel like you’ve never just had fun before.”

Josh straightened up. His pale eyes suddenly glittered, warming as if a fire had been started inside him. “Oh, that’s not true! I had a lot of fun with my parents and helping out in the bakery! But...with people I liked or who were in a relationship with me...I’ve always wanted a family, you know?”

Blake understood. He couldn’t reconcile the desire with his own personal feelings, but other wolves were like that. From a young age, they knew they were expected to find mates and contribute to the general population of shapeshifters. He had grown up being told the same thing but it never stuck for him like it did for others. Apparently, Josh’s potential mates in the past had felt similarly.

“And they didn’t want one?”

“They just wanted to screw around. Which I don’t care about when it’s not me, but I want to find someone I can be with forever. Maybe the wolf part of me is stronger than the human part. I still don’t know. I just think it’s wrong when one person manipulates another into doing what they want or leads them on.” Josh fiddled with the material of his jeans, plucking and plucking at a loose strand. He seemed at a loss for words now, too wrapped up inside his own thoughts to voice them again out loud.

Suddenly, Blake couldn’t stand to just sit there and watch the omega dig himself a metaphorical hole. He reached out and swatted Josh’s hand away from his jeans. “Don’t do that,” he warned harshly.

Josh looked at him, mouth open with surprise. He seemed confused.

Blake gestured to the thread on Josh’s jeans, which had multiplied. “You’ll undo the whole damn pair of pants. I’m not walking around this city with you naked from the waist down.”

“Walk around the...”

Blake stood up and took a few steps away, then glanced nonchalantly back over his shoulder. “I’m going for a walk down by the water. You coming or not?”

Josh didn’t move. His mouth opened and closed silently for a few seconds as he struggled to make sense of this sudden development. Shrugging, Blake headed off down to the shore and walked along the thin patch where grass became sand. After a moment, scampering footsteps came from behind him, and then he felt a soft touch on his wrist.

“Hold on,” Josh puffed. “We aren’t all as in-shape as you are, you know.”

He hid a smile, and subtly slowed his pace.

They walked along the edge of the water side-by-side for a time, not speaking. The park fell away behind them, and they soon found themselves on a concrete walkway beside a pier. This area teemed with couples and families, most of which were looking out at the water as if they’d never seen wetness before.

There were a few waterfront restaurants nearby, but Blake didn’t feel much like eating again just yet. He hesitated, considering whether or not to start heading back. Over the course of less than half a mile, the world had gone from beautiful to depressingly gray again.

Suddenly, he felt another touch on his hand and turned to see Josh pulling back. “Sorry,” he muttered.

“It’s okay,” he replied, surprised at the fact that it was true. “Did you see something? Hungry?”

“No. Not hungry. I just....was here not all that long ago but I didn’t really get to just linger. Can we go in some of the stores?”

“You were here?” Blake repeated.

“Well, not here. I was on the other side.” Josh pointed out across the water. His arm trembled as if it was almost too heavy for him to lift. “I think. My pack leader has a home right on the water. He can walk down his backyard and just swim away.”

“And does he?” Blake spoke absentmindedly, more focused on looking around. They stood on the top of an incline above the walkway, looking out over the heads of the people down below. An enormous parking lot cluttered with vehicles spread out in a wide circle around them, edged with restaurants with quaint themed names. There were no gift shops, but he thought he could see one across the street. Surely there would at least be a shopping district nearby.

“Yes. All the time. Do wolves swim in the wild?”

“I think they catch fish sometimes.” Blake turned and looked at Josh, wanting to get his attention and slightly surprised to find he already had it. It should have been natural for him to assume that someone who wanted him as a mate would be focused on him much of the time, but he still couldn’t quite wrap his head around it and didn’t know if he’d ever be able. “You up for a little more walking, then? If you really want to go in some stores, that is.”

Josh nodded, and they walked off through the parking lot with the soft sounds of crunching gravel between them. Sunlight bounced in beams back and forth between the parked vehicles, creating a web of warmth. Had he been a cat, Blake would have purred.

They came to the end of the parking lot, where the street was. Blake started to cross, only to find his hand tingling with sudden fire. He glanced back, a little surprised again, to find Josh had grabbed his hand and was holding onto it tightly.

“We’ll use the crosswalk since you seem to have a habit of almost getting hit by cars.”

Blake growled at him to hide his laugh, then shrugged. “Whatever.”

The nearest crosswalk was about 30 feet away, to their right. Blake started walking again, fully expecting Josh to let go. It didn’t happen and suddenly they weren’t just walking with each other, they were walking together. Holding hands on their date, like a real couple would. He tightened his fingers, flexing them, his fingers tingling as if they were cold and about to go numb, though the opposite was true, and he was on the verge of catching fire again. Josh’s hand in his was small and cool and a little too bony, and he wanted to let go of it but he couldn’t. Their hands belonged to neither of them now, having become their own entity when they joined.

I guess it doesn’t matter much.

By the time they crossed the street, holding hands seemed to have become right. Blake relaxed. For a moment, they were as wolves should be; as mates would be, walking through a forest of metal with their flanks occasionally brushing and their bodies moving as one without having to stop to communicate. They communicated with scent, with touch, with a brush of their thoughts against the other’s; thoughts were fractured, images and scraps of words which the human mind readily translated in a way it could understand.

The stores passed by as they meandered over the sidewalk, their true purpose here forgotten for a minute or two.

Then Josh pulled to an abrupt stop and the enchantment of the moment was gone. Blake looked at him and raised his eyebrow.

“Let’s go in here.”

It was an ordinary gift shop, lacking anything special to set it apart from all the others. Clearly, it was geared towards tourists from the variety of oversized, cheap t-shirts, snow globes, and other useless baubles which might serve as an object of conversation for a month or so before people simply stopped asking, and the buyer stopped advertising. After all, in the grand scheme of things, a trip to Virginia wasn’t likely to be one full of fantastic anecdotes. However, the moment he stepped inside the shop, Blake realized exactly why Josh chose this one. A scent hung in the air, vaguely wolfish but extremely muted and soft around the edges. Josh dropped down to his knees in the middle of the shop floor, reaching to let an old black lab sniff him. The dog’s tail wagged slightly and then it rolled over onto its back, a puzzled look on its elderly face, because it didn’t know whether it wanted to submit to the wolf inside the human, or if it simply wanted its belly scratched.

Blake shook his head, his heart warming slightly at the sight. He didn’t really like animals one way or another, thought they were a waste of time in many cases. In the case of a shapeshifter, keeping a pet felt like a transgression almost as taboo as cannibalism. Animals didn’t keep other animals captive in their homes. They ate one another or ignored one another. But right here before him, wolf and dog were joined in laughing play as the lab licked Josh’s fingers all over and swatted at him with its enormous paws.

The clerk leaned out slightly over her counter and smiled down at the two canines. “I was gonna tell Sandy not to bother you, but I can see I’d be wasting my breath.”

“Is Sandy a boy or a girl?”

Blake left them to it and wandered deeper into the little store, poking around on the shelves to see if there was anything actually worth his time. Coffee mugs, flasks, silverware, more clothes...Yes, because the average businessman wanted to see a flask he bought a decade ago to remind him of the fact that he hadn’t had a chance to take a vacation since.

Snorting, he moved on. In the background, he heard Josh’s soft voice alternately cooing to the dog and replying to the clerk.

Says he wants to go shopping and ends up not going a foot from the entrance. I don’t understand omegas.

He was on the verge of returning to Josh to urge him out the door when he noticed a display he’d somehow missed. On a shelf above a display of key charms and rubber bracelets were ten small figurines, each one only about two inches tall. He thought they might be wolves, though a closer inspection had him believing instead that it was just a generic dog. The figurines were plastic, depicting a dog wearing a striped sailor shirt and a captain’s hat; protruding from the mouth like a disturbing tongue was a pipe.

It was one of the most absurd things he had ever seen, a conglomeration of ideas which should never have gone past the first couple design meetings. No part of the figurines made sense but they were the only things here he could see that were unique in any way at all.

He picked one up carefully, trying not to snap off that fragile protrusion of pipe, and looked underneath for a price tag.

That bitch wants $25 for this thing? 25-fucking-bucks? No goddamn way.

Even if he wanted to cough up that much money, he couldn’t. He didn’t have the necessary amount.

Gritting his teeth a little, Blake looked over at Josh to tell him they had best get going when he realized he couldn’t see the clerk. He leaned past the shelf and saw her now: both she and Josh were on the floor, crouched over the old dog as he soaked up all the attention. His tail thumped against the side of the counter, wagging a mile a minute. If he jumped, he might simply flutter off into the sky like a helicopter, never to be seen again.

Blake looked at them, hearing the low, indistinct murmur of their voices, and he acted before his conscience could get the better of him. He slipped the figurine into his inner jacket pocket, where it rested uncomfortably just beneath his armpit.

“Josh,” he said, heading back over.

Josh looked up, grinning. His smile faded as he looked up at Blake, and he looked bashful. “Sorry,” he said. “I got distracted.”

If this whole date thing is about intentions to you, what am I supposed to feel when you ignore me for a dog? He didn’t say the words out loud, didn’t even really care one way or another, but he knew Josh would pick up on them and feel properly teased.

Josh stuck his tongue out at him. “You’re impossible. I guess I’ll look around now, though.” The clerk nodded as if he’d spoken to her, then seemed to understand that he hadn’t; she faded back behind her counter, forgotten now somehow and looking a little dazed for it. She must have thought she’d found an easy target, or at least someone worth going for, but now the notion that she never had a chance in the first place just slapped her upside the head.

“I already looked,” Blake growled. He made a silent plea that the clerk not notice there were now only nine dashing little sailor-dogs on top of the shelf right by her station. “Nothing here you’d like.”

Josh raised an eyebrow. “Not sure how you can say you think you’d know what I like.”

And Blake frowned, confused. “We can talk about that outside.”

They walked out together after bidding the clerk and the dog a farewell. The omega turned to face him, hands on his slim hips, a frown on his face and a question already escaping his lips, but Blake reached out and placed one hand on his back to turn him around again. “Not here,” he said. “Here.”

Clearly not a man familiar with alleyways, Josh grimaced and assumed the posture of a disgusted man who wants to touch neither the walls nor the floor, like he would be floating if it was within his power to do so. “Why are we here?”

“I had something to give you,” Blake grunted, “until you were rude to me.”

“Give me?” Josh’s amber eyes opened up wide with astonishment. “Like a present? You bought me something? I didn’t see anyone else in the store.”

“I didn’t say that.”

“You stole me something, is what you’re saying.”

Blake shrugged but he couldn’t keep from grinning, pleased with himself. “Yeah, I did.”

“Blake!”

“Hey,” he said, “you should be happy I cared enough to do that. And you can’t turn back the clock, so what’s done is done.”

Josh growled at him, fire sparking in his gaze. “You aren’t being fair, but fine. Whatever. Give it to me.”

“No.” Blake wrapped his arms around his chest, which pressed the figurine sharply against the soft skin beneath his arm. “You have to answer my question first. What did you mean, when you said that in there? That I couldn’t know what you like.”

“Well, how could you?”

“I’ve been in your house a few times by now,” he said, raising one eyebrow. “I’ve seen your stuff. What? What is it?” The omega started shaking his head almost as soon as Blake started speaking. He hated being interrupted and growled loudly, resisting the urge to bare his fangs.

“You didn’t see my stuff. It wasn’t my house, was it?”

“What...oh. Oh.”

Things clicked into place for him, offering a much larger expanse of the picture than he’d been able to see before. The old furniture. The furniture that looked as if no one had touched any of it in a very long time. And that was because no one had. He knew Josh had set up residence in his parents’ house, but he hadn’t realized what that might mean until now. The omega had kept the furniture exactly as it was, adding nothing of his own. The house was a museum of memories, a reliquary of forgotten dreams; even the room Josh slept in was exactly the same. The previous life he’d lived, climbing the corporate ladder, was a life he’d entirely left behind to wallow in what he could no longer have.

No wonder he looked so sad. He wasn’t a brat. He wasn’t ornery or psychotic. He was depressed and desperate, which also explained why he latched on so readily to that shit about the well. He’d needed something to keep going. That something just so happened to turn out to be Blake.

Like it or not, this was no longer casual and never had been. Blake was responsible for Josh, the main thing—the only thing—upon which all his current dreams and desires were hitched. The enormity of the realization was staggering, almost sending him to his knees with the weight of it all. He’d thought...

No, he hadn’t thought. He’d pretended. He’d known this all along.

Josh looked at him and then at the ground, his shoulders slumping. “I guess it looks pretty sad, huh. Real pitiful. No shit of my own. But...I loved them. Maybe you can’t understand.”

“I think I understand that you really need this.” Reaching into his pocket, Blake said, “Hold out your hands, and close your eyes.”

Josh did as was asked of him, and Blake deposited the plastic dog figurine in his cupped palms. “Alright. There you go.”

Josh looked at the figurine and then laughed. Amusement glittered in his eyes, though both of them knew the laughter was overlaying a glisten of tears. “Is this supposed to be you?”

“Pipes are disgusting.”

“You have very cheap tastes. Thank you for buy...giving me this. But what am I supposed to do with it?”

Blake turned back towards the riverfront, back the way they’d come. The water was barely visible from here as a glistening turquoise expanse. There wouldn’t be any further point to lingering here, not when he’d accomplished something; besides, it wouldn’t do to still be in the area when the clerk or the manager finally noticed something was missing.

“I’ll tell you what you do with it,” he said. “You put it on a shelf. Not like, Mom’s Favorite Shelf. But, a shelf. Somewhere you can see it but where you won’t really notice it all the time. Start there.”

Josh said nothing in response, so he considered the conversation to be over with, and walked off towards the water. After a moment, he felt Josh grab his hand again and they were walking together once more. It was easier, much more natural this time. Blake felt himself relaxing, as if he had always done this with Josh, as if they had always been side-by-side. Their thoughts touched together much more often, familiarity growing between them like some sort of flowering bamboo, fast and beautiful.

They reached the park, and that was when everything changed. Blake felt it coming before he even knew what he was meant to be afraid of, felt the hot rush of foul breath approaching from behind, and the vibrations in the earth. He whirled, shoving Josh out of the way, and met the graying alpha wolf in mid-air. Their bodies collided like nuclear bombs, exploding with fur instead of radiation. They hit the ground and sprang apart, snarling into each other’s faces while circling, biting, clawing, watching for a weak point.

“What the fuck do you want?” Blake snapped, forcing the words up from his lupine throat. They emerged hardly intelligible but the meaning was clear all the same. He was so fucking tired of dealing with this asshole attacking him at random places and times, for no reason whatsoever. Animals were not meant for such senseless violence. In a way, feral shapeshifters stuck in animal form were much more dangerous than regular animals. Animals went rogue as a result of human intervention, mistreatment, or neglect, some sort of outside force, but shapeshifters receded inside themselves. Though they might lose touch with their humanity in the process of going feral, the human cunning and brutality remained.

And the old wolf was in much worse shape than he had been, his mind deteriorating at a rapid rate. His eyes held almost no sentience in them whatsoever, and his already-thin body had crossed into the territory of emaciation. Great patches of bare skin mottled his pelt, exposing the pale flesh.

Those wasted muscles reminded him of Josh, who had been going through his own sort of deterioration. For just a moment, he was furious with both of them, would have attacked them both indiscriminately. Then the moment passed, and he focused back on the wild alpha just as it lunged for his shoulder. Pushing hard against the ground, he dodged to the side and then whipped around the other to bite his tail high up near the base of his spine.

The old alpha screamed.

Blake staggered back, alarmed, blood drooling pink from the corners of his snout. The screaming went on and on, not human, not wolf, but some dreadful realm between where both halves of the old man had united to give expression to their feelings. Feeling sick, he realized he must have bitten harder than he meant to. The alpha’s tail dangled from his haunches now by only a scrap of flesh.

Fuck.

He waited for the other wolf to round on him to get revenge for his severed limb, but that didn’t happen. Staggering, leaving a crimson trail which soaked the earth, the older alpha turned to the place where Josh crouched down, making himself small. The alpha leaped.

Blake snarled, “No!” and leaped, too. He kicked off the ground with every ounce of strength he possessed. His front paws hit the other alpha high on the shoulder. Something cracked beneath the both of them as they went sprawling.

Rising again, Blake rounded on the old alpha to continue his onslaught but he no longer had an opponent. Somehow seeming much smaller now, prone on the ground with blood gathering beneath his rear, the alpha twitched and jumped in the middle of what seemed to be a seizure.

“What’s wrong with him?” Joshua cried out, clamping his hands to his mouth with horror.

Blood drizzled from beneath the alpha’s open jaws. His body bucked, straining, muscles snapping, broken bones cracking; his mouth opened again and again, heaving for a breath that would never come, or trying to cough up an obstacle that wasn’t there. Blake didn’t know. Shaking hard, he turned back into a human and went over to Josh.

You don’t need to see this, he thought. He didn’t know if Josh would be able to pick up on the message, nor did he really care. His actions spoke loud enough as he grabbed the omega and pressed his head to his shoulder so that he couldn’t see. Blake covered Josh’s ears with his hand. He buried his face in the mass of dark curls and listened to the other wolf die.

The horrendous cracking as he struck him had been like snapping brittle tree branches. The force of bones breaking reverberated still through his limbs, and he didn’t think he would ever be able to forget it. He must have done more than simply break bones. Maybe he had stopped the old alpha’s heart, or sent broken ribs piercing into once-protected organs. Maybe he’d snapped the old man’s neck. Maybe all of those, maybe none.

He heard it all and pictured it in his mind as vividly as if he was seeing it, shielding Josh from the horrible gagging, the sound of grass ripping as desperate claws grabbed for the earth. The old wolf’s paws skittered and clawed, his body heaving, side thumping the ground over and over. The motions continued on and on, gradually weakening, until the mind was dead and the body still struggled on for a few minutes more before finally giving up as well.

Clutching Josh tighter, Blake moved one hand to whisper into his ear. “I think it’s over.”

“You...killed him?”

“I had to protect you,” Blake muttered, confused at the intensity of his own emotions. They surged up as he spoke, too jumbled and confused for him to recognize any of them separately. All at once, he was exhausted.

I killed for you. I’ve never killed anyone before. I’ve never even thought about...never even considered actually doing it.

Wriggling against him, Josh caught his attention for another second more. “Is he human now? We can’t just leave him there if...if he isn’t.”

Blake grimaced but looked over his shoulder and immediately wished he hadn’t. The carnage was...monstrous.

One thing a cub learned very quickly was that their wolf form and human forms were connected. That was why a wolf could speak, and why a human could grow fangs. Their forms weren’t separate, but mingled. Shapeshifting was more or less a literal rearrangement of what was already present, with a few other embellishments. As a result, injuries tended to stay in the same area from one form to the next. A twisted paw meant a twisted ankle, and a torn ear would always be a torn ear. Blake had severed the alpha’s tail but humans didn’t have tails, really. In the case of an animal, the tail tended to be an extension of the spine.

The spine which had been severed.

The grizzled alpha with the Z-shaped scar across his face had been almost eviscerated by the trauma his body wrought upon itself when trying to figure out where his tail injury would be in relation to the rest of his body. The ground around him was muddy with blood, which still continued to pour from the missing gap of flesh in his abdomen. Vital organs spilled out of that gash, tumbling wetly around shards of white bone.

Blake turned away, though the image would stay with him forever. “Um...Yeah, he’s human. Josh....you know I...didn’t mean to?”

Killed him. I killed him. Fuck, I killed him.

Josh looked up at him and nodded. “I know.”

Blake looked down at the smaller man, staring right into his golden eyes. He opened his mouth and then closed it again, searching for anything he could possibly say. In the end, there was nothing to say. “I’m sorry,” he choked out. His wolf senses picked up on people heading in their direction, and he pushed Josh away, towards his car. “Get the fuck out of here,” he commanded.

Josh tried to grab onto him. “Wait! What about you?”

Staring at him, Blake tried once more to think of something to say but time had already run out. He just shook his head again, turned on his heel, and ran away as fast as he could. Josh didn’t cry out for him, didn’t try to summon him back, and that was best because he wouldn’t have been able to respond for anything.

He ran, and ran hard, head down, cold wind tearing at his cheeks and biting his nose. Before long, he gasped for air, legs burning, and he wanted to become a wolf and run even faster and further, to leave behind his dreadful thoughts, but the area was much too populated and he could do nothing of the kind.

And as he ran, he thought. He wasn’t aware of these thoughts because they occurred very deep in the back of his mind, in the dirty factory which all people possess, where life-changing decisions are formulated and decided upon.

He was a punk, the leader of an almost-gang, a ruffian who carried out small crimes, who made little old ladies wet their diapers. He was the wolf in sheep’s clothing, the monster among men.

And he had never touched a gun, much less fired one.

He smoked because it looked cool, because his choice of shitty cigarettes got him attention.

He got in fights and he threatened and lied to get his way, but he had never seriously considered killing another person.

He carried a knife, but the most he stabbed were tires.

He had no job. No family. No close friends who would stand by his side, and he had no one he would do the same for. He was no gangster. He was just a fool, playing pretend all these years, fucking himself over.

He wasn’t bad-ass. He was nothing.

A damn shame it took an accidental murder for him to realize it.