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I kept my eyes closed even though I was awake. It was a trick I learned from Dante when we were young, so we wouldn't be caught awake past our bedtime.
"I know you're awake," a voice said.
"Yeah but if I keep my eyes closed, none of this is real," I said.
"It's real," she replied.
I opened my eyes.
I wasn't in my dorm room. I was in my bed at home. I wondered how drunk I was to make it all the way back home-
I sat up so suddenly, I should have given myself whiplash.
"Is he okay?" I asked and threw the blankets off my legs and stood. My heart was beating rapidly and I looked around the room for my clothes.
The woman, who was the most breathtaking person I had ever been in the company of, didn't even blink when I stood up, wearing only in my boxers. She regarded me coolly like I was an interesting piece of art that she couldn't decide if she liked or not. "Sit down," she said softly. And even though I didn't want to, I sat. "Do you know who I am?" She asked. "The... Librarian?" I guessed. I felt like there was more to that question but she seemed satisfied with that answer, at least for now. For a moment, I was hypnotized by the way her dark hair fell over her shoulder in one long, elegant sheet. She wasn't wearing makeup, but her eyelashes were long and thick anyway and her eyes were a hypnotizing green. "Do you know what I am?" She asked.
"I-" My mouth shut, which would prove to be the first miracle of the day. "I feel like that could be a question that would lead me into a great deal of trouble."
She grinned. Her teeth were white and sharp and I was probably imagining things, but her canines looked sharper than the average person. "You're smart, Lou. I like that."
"Thank you," I said. "Is Dante okay?"
"He is more than okay. He is a werewolf," she said. I stared at her mouth as the words fell from her full lips.
I was probably still drunk. Maybe I was high. There were drugs at the party, I was able to recall that much. Maybe someone slipped something into my drink and I was dreaming still.
The sunlight from the window illuminated half of her face and I forgot about her words for a moment and stared at her. Her skin was a warm, rich brown and the way the sun fell on her made me know instantly that in this new, fucked up world, she was important. More than that, she was near worshipped.
I shook the thought from my head. I needed to go to the nearest hospital. There was obviously something very wrong with me.
“A wer-” I opened my mouth, closed it, looked away from the woman and out the window. After a moment I nodded and looked down at my bare feet.
"Okay," I finally said.
"That's an interesting reply," she noted. "If we are being honest, which I try to be when I am sitting with a beautiful woman in my childhood bedroom wearing my boxers, it kind of explains a lot, you know? What's your name?" "Celia," she said. "Are you Eli's girlfriend?" I wondered if she heard something underneath that question, from the way she looked at me from head to toe and smirked. "I'm his older sister and his alpha." "...okay." She watched me and I felt uncomfortable under her gaze and moved towards the closet. "Does this have anything to do with my mom's bridge club that she goes to religiously?" I asked. "Possibly. Your mother is a very powerful witch." I felt like I should refute some of her claims like I should defend myself and my mother against what she was saying but everything was making a certain amount of sense. You didn't grow up normal in Glenwood Lock because Glenwood Lock was not normal. For one thing, it was extremely violent for such a small place. For another, there always seemed to be consultants working with the police on certain cases. People died strangely here quite often. "So where is he? When can I see him?" I asked. "Dante?" Celia asked. I nodded. I pulled on a shirt and a pair of sweatpants I saw thrown across the dresser. "After we talk," she said and sat back in her chair. She turned to the doorway. "You can come in now." I sat back down on the bed, realizing that we weren't going anywhere anytime soon. I expected Eli or someone his size, formidable and angry, dark storm clouds in their eyes, lightning on their fingertips. Instead, a scrawny kid came into the room, thin and practically vibrating with energy. His bright green glasses made him appear even younger than he probably was and he was grinning from ear to ear. "Artemio, meet Lou. Lou, meet my youngest brother Artemio," Celia said. I held out my hand for the lack of any other proper greeting. Artemio practically leaped over the bed to shake my hand. "Artemio? Like Artemis?" I asked. "Derived from, yes. A gift from the goddess," Celia said. "I have been waiting days to meet you," Artemio said.
"Days? How long have I been asleep?" I asked, now slightly alarmed.
"Two days. Had to have your magic settle and even it out so that you wouldn't lose your hold on reality," Artemio said.
“Magic?” I asked and my voice broke mid-word. I didn’t know what I expected, but magic was not it. From the pain I felt, I thought that I was also a werewolf.
Artemio studied me and then scooted closer to me on the bed. Gone was the eager young teen and now I could see something older and bigger in his eyes.
This was not a kid to fuck with, I realized.
“Yes. It’s there,” he said and passed a hand over my chest. I felt the answering shift-thump of something in my chest and gasped. I raised my hand to my chest and I expected to see something.
There was nothing. Just my hand, the same as it had always been.
“Don’t be scared. If ever there was a place to discover you harbor magic that hasn’t been seen in living memory, it’s here,” Artemio said.
I looked to Celia, no less alarmed. She shrugged. "I'm a wolf, not a spellcaster. Between Artemio and your mother, a decision was made to make sure that you were not going to be in danger when I woke you up."
"But I’m not a spellcaster," I pointed out.
"I beg to differ," Celia said.
"Wait," I said and held up a hand. They both fell silent. "Dante was the one who was attacked and almost killed."
"He's fine. Great, even," Artemio said.
"I don't know how to explain it. The way your mom told us was that you and Dante are two sides of one coin, that when one of you goes through a big change, it will always impact the other,” Celia said.
I stared at her. She stared back.
“Can we start at the beginning?” I asked.
Celia sighed and turned to her younger brother.
“How far back do you want to go?” He asked.
I felt like my brain was beginning to fill with fog. There were so many questions and it wasn't a matter of not having the correct answers or even answers at all. I couldn’t even think of the questions.
I felt like I should be angry or that I should lash out at these two. But at the same time, they seemed as politely confused as I was. I turned back to Celia who was sitting in the chair in front of my bookcase. It was filled with books that my mother read to me before I could walk. The whole situation was so incongruous that I didn't know where to begin.
“Were you the one that attacked Dante?” I asked.
“No I wasn't,” she replied.
“Do you know who was?”
“No.”
I wished for her confidence, desperately. Nothing about this situation seemed to bother her but I felt like there was something inside of me that was threatening to turn me into a ticking time bomb. What did it mean to harbor magic? What was this going to do to me? Would I be able to go back to school? Would my dream of owning a bookstore be thrown out the window for performing at kids birthday parties?
I sucked in a deep breath. “Where is he?”
“Deep in the forest in a hole that I dug after I tore his chest open.”
The room spun and I closed my eyes.
I sat back and let the information sink in. I still didn't know where to begin and I didn't know how to sort through all this information. Under most normal circumstances, I would have been panicking and searching for Dante like my life depended on it. But here, with these two strangers in my childhood bedroom, I felt the truth in their words that he was fine.
"Can we start that night?" I asked.
Artie nodded. He was remarkably self-composed for being a kid.
"There was a Rogue. That's what we call the wolves who are searching for pack members. I don't know what he was doing here and if I had known that he was here before he attacked you and Dante, then I would have forced him off our lands or killed him. I'm sorry that this happened to you," Celia said.
I was confused. I shook my head. “There was no way for you to know. You couldn't have stopped something that you didn't see coming.”
Celia remained quiet after I said that and I was worried that I said the wrong thing.
“I don't blame you. I'm just really confused and I don't know where to begin,” I said.
Celia nodded but didn’t seem satisfied with my reply.
“That night, in the forest, Dante was the one that was bitten. Dante was the one that should be here and the one you should be explaining to,” I said slowly.
“Believe me, we’ve already had that talk with him,” Celia said drily.
“Theoretically, yes, that's how it's supposed to work. But, when Dante was bitten, the magic that lives in most residents of Glenwood Lock shifted. There are shifts all the time, like earthquakes. Most of the time, unless you have the right equipment, you'll never notice them. But sometimes the earthquakes are so large that you can't help but be affected by them. You and Dante are an earthquake big enough to send California into the ocean,” Artie said.
I felt like there was a truth to his words but also like he was holding something back.
“Does this happen a lot?” I asked.
Artie looked over to Celia.
“No it doesn't,” she said after a moment.
"So what are we talking about here? Is this a once-a-year event? Like when the car dealership puts all the old cars up for sale? Or is this a ten-year event, like a high school reunion?"
There was nothing but silence in my room and I could swear that I could hear the ticking of the clock from my mother's room on the other side of the house.
“It's hard to say, really,” Artie said.
“Give me a rough estimate.”
“It's closer to once in a thousand years,” Celia said. She reached out and patted my hand. There was a lot of comfort in that gesture, a lot more than I expected.
“Why?” I asked. I looked between the two of them, impatient for more than the answers they were giving me. “Why us?”
And there it was. That panic that I knew was going to descend on me like a suffocating blanket in the middle a very hot summer, building in my chest. I reached up and scratched at my throat. Behind Celia, a few books fell off the shelf. Artie gave them a cursory glance but neither sibling seemed surprised.
“I mean, no insult to you guys or anything but this is a lot. I don't know how I ended up here,” I said and swallowed hard.
“Okay. That’s okay. It is a lot. Hey, when I was nine years old, my sister told me that I was destined to be one of the most powerful warlocks our line had ever seen,” Artie said and took my hand in his.
This kid, this child, was comforting me. I wanted to laugh.
Instead, I cried.
“Hey, Cee, how about you scram? I think Lou and I need to have a talk. Magic stuff. Wolves don’t understand,” Artie said. I got the sense that he was trying to save my dignity. Far too late, she had already seen me in my space rocket boxers.
Celia sat back and looked slightly offended.
“Yeah, sucks huh? You and Eli do it to me all the time,” Artie said, with only a trace of bitterness in his voice.
“Fine. I’ll be with Eli and Dante. Call if you need me,” she said and stood up.
She left the room.
“Is it a good idea to piss her off? She seems like she could break both of us in half with one hand,” I said and wiped my face.
"Oh, she could. For sure," Artie said and smiled eagerly. "Get some clothes on. Let's walk."
“Where?”
“To your new school,” he said and patted my arm. Sensing my anxiety or maybe seeing it written all over me, he offered one more reassuring squeeze and left the room.
I still wasn’t sure what I should do but it seemed like it came down to two choices: lay in bed and cry or get up and follow the weird kid to this new school he was talking about.
I got up.
When I went out into the living room, Artie was seated at the dining room table reading a book, a cookie in one hand. There was a glass of milk next to him, half full.
It would have been incredibly sweet and domestic except for the fact that the book in front of him looked impossibly old and there was a pencil spinning in the air next to him, as his fingers directed it absently.
“H-hey,” I said.
Artie looked up and snatched the pencil out of the air. “Ready?”
I nodded.