Zleft the bus stop and went into the woods across the street. Something about being in Aysel’s house had felt like an escape—homey and with a mother ready to care for her daughter, who grew food in the yard like witches long ago had. When Z had gotten up from doing homework to go sharpen a pencil in the office, they had glanced into the kitchen and seen Aysel’s mother stirring a rice dish with one hand and holding a cigarette between two fingers of the other. There had been something so profoundly amazing and entrancing about Ms. Tahir in that moment. Z figured it had something to do with grief. They touched the place on their chest where the spell was burned into their skin and wondered how and when Suzanna Chilworth had cast the spell, and what she was thinking when she did it. And why she had never told Z about it—or even that she knew how to do necromancy. Z couldn’t remember the last time they had talked to their mother about anything serious, and now they never would again.
Z didn’t want to take the bus back to Mrs. Dunnigan’s apartment, so as Aysel turned to walk back home, they spun around and walked through a hedge into the nearest backyard. They distantly felt the branches scratch at their face. Z’s feet slid on the wet grass. A few dogs barked at them as they ambled along in the shadows. They walked through people’s backyards until the yards started having fences, and then they moved to the streets. Z looked through the bright windows onto the scenes inside— everything seemed so small from outside the houses. There was a dog sleeping on a couch, a woman at a sink, a man playing video games. They stood staring in one yard for a few minutes, watching two children run around each other in a living room. Above them, the sky was completely black; no stars were visible. They reached the end of Aysel’s suburban neighborhood and tried to figure out where they were. They vaguely recognized the strip mall they were facing from when they had seen it out of the window of a bus. They walked across the street without looking for the crosswalk. Behind them, a car rushed by.
As Z crossed the parking lot next to the grocery store, they saw two people walking toward them. Z squinted at them. Both of the strangers looked messy and were wearing large backpacks. They both had patched jeans stiff with mud and heavy sweatshirts.
“Hey,” one of them called out. Z stopped and turned around. Both of the approaching strangers looked ragged and clumpy and strong. As they got closer, Z realized that they were just teenagers. One of them was a girl, which made Z less nervous. Z wondered what they could want. Not money, hopefully. Z did not have any money.
“What do you want?” Z asked.
“Chill out,” the girl said. She was missing a front tooth. “Do you have a cigarette, kid?”
“I don’t smoke,” Z said.
The boy laughed. “What did you think, Elaine? He’s like eleven.”
Z’s ears pricked up. People usually didn’t think they were a boy.
“What, I mean, could be a small adult.”
“I told you.”
Z grimaced.
“Okay,” the girl said. Her face looked greasy and she had a zit on one side of her chin. She looked tired. “I shouldn’t really be smoking either. It’s so bad for you. Hey, kid, do you know how to get to the Union Gospel Mission from here?”
“I have no idea,” Z said. The wind blew and Z felt it very slightly. The boy shivered and hugged himself. Z felt sorry for him. Living people felt so much.
“It’s this meal thing we heard about. We’re hitchhiking and we haven’t got any money, you know?” He paused. “You know? We’re staying at a friend’s place but they haven’t gone grocery shopping and we need dinner.”
“Yeah,” Z said, realizing that they were actually expected to answer. The boy grinned, encouraged.
“I’m not asking for money,” he said. “You’re a kid, I don’t ask for money from kids. Anyway, we just need to get to this thing. Apparently it’s kind of close to Riverfront Park, on Commercial Street near the bridge.”
“Oh,” Z said. They had to think for a minute. “Well, that’s . . . that way.” They pointed north. The boy and girl both turned and looked in the direction Z had pointed. “I don’t know how far it is or anything,” Z added hastily. “I think it’s like two miles to the bridge. But if you walk north on Liberty Road you should get onto Commercial Street.”
“Oh, okay,” the girl said. “We couldn’t get a bus there or anything, could we?”
“I . . . I am not sure,” Z said. “Maybe the 08? I don’t know how late the bus runs. But it wouldn’t save you much time. It has like a million stops.” Z felt very grown up, giving this advice.
“Thanks,” the boy said. “Means a lot, man.”
“Yeah, thanks,” the girl agreed. The two walked off. Z watched them. They looked smaller the farther away they got. They couldn’t be that old, Z thought. Maybe eighteen or nineteen. The boy had one of those mustaches that meant he couldn’t grow a beard yet.
Something felt odd in their heart.
Z walked on, thinking about how scared they would have been of two strangers in the dark before the crash. They wondered if they had forgotten how to be scared of things.
A few blocks away from the street where Mrs. Dunnigan lived, Z stopped. They looked up at the street sign and across the road—they were close to the cemetery. The bus didn’t come this way. Z stopped for a few minutes and wondered whether to go find their parents’ graves. They decided not to. It would take too long in the dark.
Mrs. Dunnigan did seem glad that Z had gone to Aysel’s house.
“What are her parents like?” she asked. “What did you do?”
“We didn’t do much, just homework. And her mother and father are separated, or maybe she doesn’t have a father. Her mom’s nice.” Z thought of Ms. Tahir’s cigarette and her smile again and of the warm, protected feeling she gave Z. Z felt a little guilty about it.
“It’s good that you’re making new friends,” Mrs. Dunnigan said.
“How was the bookstore event?”
“It went all right for a little while,” Mrs. Dunnigan said. “The man who came to read is a friend of an old friend of mine. Not a werewolf, but he was married to one. But then two or three angry people came in and tried to start an argument about this business with the Archie Pagan murder. I don’t know if you heard, but apparently Pagan gave electroshock to unregistered werewolves. It’s a very controversial thing. There are people who think that’s fine, since it makes werewolves safer to be around, and there are people who want all werewolves to be registered with the state and get treatment through those avenues, and there are people like that Morris fellow who think electro-shock hurts werewolves more than it helps. It does cause things like memory loss and different allergic conditions.”
“Who were the angry people?”
“These people were the people who want all the wolves to get registered and get shock therapy. They said I was a monster activist. Sometimes with those people you can talk them down, but they were looking for a fight, so I had to ask them to leave, and right after that it looked like time to close up shop for the night.”
After her dinner, Mrs. Dunnigan and the cats watched the news and Z sat behind her, looking at the television and sort of absorbing what was happening. A new farmers’ market was opening, and a street downtown that was currently inhabited by homeless people was going to get cleaned up and made safe for businesses. There had been no new werewolf attacks; an initial search of Archie Pagan’s office had not turned up any evidence to show that he had treated werewolves there. All the reporters seemed tense.
Mrs. Dunnigan fed the cats and turned off the television.
Outside, it was dark and cold, though not cold enough to freeze. Mrs. Dunnigan tried to talk to Z about the book she was reading, but it was about something Z found very hard to pay attention to. Some of it had to do with sea monsters.
In the shower that night, Z was washing their hair, humming, when a large clump came out in their hand. They stared at it. Bits of wet skin clung to it, gray and disgusting. They felt their scalp, where the hair had come from. It was bald. There was no blood, but then that might just be because Z was dry of blood.
“I’m losing my hair!” Z shouted, as if there was anything anyone could do about it. The shower was loud and the TV was on and Z couldn’t hear if Mrs. Dunnigan responded.
Z released the clump of hair and watched it float toward the drain. They sat down, clutching at themselves as if their whole body might disappear, just dissolve and diffuse down the drain, so many particles of carbon. Their legs felt thin and bony. The skeleton inside them moved visibly. Z didn’t turn off the water; they were wishing in some part of themselves that if they didn’t act the water might destroy them right there at that moment. That would have at least been an effortless and probably painless end. The water was hot enough that for once they could feel something— the sensation of burning. Their fingernails were torn and scratchy. They sat down in the shower, the hot water sloughing over them in waves, steaming up the mirror and the frosted glass window high up on the wall. Nothing was okay. Nothing was okay. Everything was going to fall apart, Z included. Worms were going to shred their body and make it into mulch and Z was going to remain conscious for all of it. I wish I could just get it over with, Z thought.
Eventually the water went cold. Z wasn’t sure they wanted to self-preserve, but they still turned off the tap and wrapped a towel around their shoulders. Then they curled up and lay with their heart not beating and their lungs not working and their skin the temperature of a cool windowpane on the floor of the shower, as the night grew thicker and colder outside. They weren’t sure where Mrs. Dunnigan was.
The phone rang, and Z got up to get it before Mrs. Dunnigan could leave her room and reach the phone.
“Hello?” they said into the receiver.
“Hello? Z?” It was Mr. Weber’s voice on the other line. “I think I figured out a plan for Saturday. I think I can put an invisibility hex on you and get you inside the room alone to look for the books. I’ll try to create a distraction or just keep watch outside, depending on who is in the area.”
“Aren’t invisibility hexes dangerous to put on people?” Z asked. “I could suffocate . . .” they trailed off. “Oh.”
“I think that’s not a danger in your case,” Mr. Weber said. Z could hear the gum snap between his teeth. “It’s still going to be dangerous, though. I don’t have any idea what the staff schedule is like or if we will run into trouble. I’m going to try to minimize the danger for you as much as possible, but I can’t promise that this is safe. If there were other options, I would say try those first. But there aren’t.”
“Thank you,” Z said. “I do really appreciate it. I didn’t think you’d like . . . end up helping me. Everyone else has been so weird to me.”
“If you can get over to my house Saturday morning, we can drive over to the library together.”
“Oh,” Z said, trying to hide their excitement. “Great. Where’s your house?”
Mr. Weber gave Z his address, and Z wrote it down in green ink on a yellow Post-it.
“I am so worried about everything,” Aysel said to Z as they waited for Spanish to start on Friday. “The test is this Monday and I still haven’t caught up from last week.”
“What were you sick with?” Z asked. They felt ill and their eyes were puffy. They pulled their knit hat lower on their head, to hide the balding spots and the red and purple patches of skin that showed through.
“Nothing really awful,” Aysel said elusively.
“Mrs. Dunnigan’s been sick too,” Z said.
“I think I want to go shopping,” Aysel said. “That sounds so dumb, but it’d be fun I think. We wouldn’t be dumb about it. Will you come with me this afternoon?”
“Where would we go?” Z asked.
“I don’t know, Goodwill. The mall. I want some black clothes.”
They sat out by the dumpster during sixth period. Aysel ate Pop-Tarts and Z sat and threw rocks at crows. Aysel told Z about her crush on Kathleen Hanna, the singer.
“When you say a crush, do you mean a crush crush?” Z asked.
“I don’t know any other kind of crush,” Aysel said.
“Well, like, a gay crush, or a crush that just means you really like the band?”
“I am gay and I like the band,” Aysel said.
Z stewed in surprise for an instant, and then smiled. Aysel didn’t look as terrified of Z’s smile as she once had. “You’re gay?” Z asked.
“I’ve been told it’s very obvious,” Aysel said. “I also have a crush on Şebnem Ferah. She’s like the Turkish Kathleen Hanna, or maybe the Turkish Joan Jett. Or something. She’s more of a real rock star than Kathleen Hanna is. I also have crushes on Olivia Newton John, and Winona Ryder, and Julie Andrews. But they aren’t punk.”
“I sort of have a crush on this singer my mom likes,” Z said. “Joanna Newsom. I like her voice. And I think I had a crush on my swim coach when I was ten.”
The custodian came around the corner with a garbage can, humming. When he saw Aysel and Z, he shouted for them to go back inside. Z’s joints hurt whenever they tried to stand too fast.
The rain that had been so intense the previous week became deep mist.
Z and Aysel went to the department store downtown after the final bell. They both had homework to do, but because it was the start of a weekend they lingered under the fluorescent lighting, counting dimes and figuring out what they couldn’t afford. Aysel’s mother made an okay amount of money, Aysel said, but a lot of it was going back to repay her debts for law school, so things were still tight. Aysel was pretty good at shoplifting, she had told Z before going into the store. Z pretended not to be fazed by this information, even though they had never known a shoplifter before and were worried about what would happen if Aysel got caught. It didn’t end up being that dramatic. Aysel shoved things into her backpack while Z bought black eyeliner and the palest foundation the store had.
When they got outside and went down the street, Aysel started dumping the things she had stolen out onto the sidewalk. Z was sort of horrified by all the junk Aysel thought would be useful.
“Why did you steal pink mascara?” Z asked, picking up the little tube from where it had rolled off the sidewalk into the grass.
“It was the smallest, most expensive thing there,” Aysel said.
Z didn’t know what hours the library at Willamette University was open. When the sun came up slightly over the edge of the horizon, they were sitting at the window of Mrs. Dunnigan’s front room, looking out at the foggy street. Mrs. Dunnigan was up early even on Saturdays, and Z could hear her moving in her room, closing and opening drawers.
“Mr. Weber gave me a spell to disable the security on the Censored Materials room at Willamette,” Z said when the old witch opened her bedroom door and stood for a moment to put on her slippers. “We’re going there today together if I can get to his house.”
Mrs. Dunnigan blinked. She looked for a second at Z uncomprehending, and then her face settled into a smile. “Well, I’m glad that worked out,” she said. “Where does he live?”
Z showed her the address.
“That’s a ways across town from here, but it’s not terribly far from the bookstore if you take the bus,” Mrs. Dunnigan said.
“Do you think you can go there with me?” Z asked. “Or do you have the bookstore to take care of?”
“The bookstore is open today and I’ve sworn to myself that I’ll stay open in spite of the people who want to close it. You can come with me downtown if you want and I can send you on your way from there.” She cleared her throat and folded her bathrobe more tightly around her small body. “I wish it was the seventies so I would have the kind of thing you needed on the top shelf of the back room ready to give you, but they burned all my rare books about that kind of magic years ago and they do the same to anyone nowadays who tries to get at the ones they keep locked up.” She moved past Z into the kitchen and began making tea.
Z didn’t say anything, and stretched their arms above their head, listening to their own bones crack.
The bookstore had not been badly damaged by the rock or by the angry people who had shown up to protest the werewolf rights display, but there was a long, uneven line of splintered glass down the length of the front window that had been patched up unevenly on both sides with layers of clear packing tape. Z had carried the spell Mr. Weber gave them in their pocket.
“Okay,” Z said at the door of the bookstore. “I think I’m going to head on my way.”
Mrs. Dunnigan studied Z. “Do you think you can stay out of danger?”
Z shrugged. “I’ll wear a sweatshirt or something so people can’t see my scars.”
“Wear a hat too. But let’s see. You can wear my friend Sal’s baseball cap and sweater with the Oregon Ducks logo.”
“People hate the Ducks here.”
“If anyone asks you can say you’re from Eugene and you’re visiting your brother at school and showing your allegiance for the Ducks to spite him.”
Z nodded. “Okay.”
As they closed the door of the bookstore behind them, the bell chimed so loudly that it almost covered Mrs. Dunnigan’s goodbye. They caught the bus at the corner.
Mr. Weber’s house was low and small. It was close to the center of town, but in one of the older, more dilapidated neighborhoods of tiny bungalows. His yard was neat and his car sat outside, brown and bricklike. He was sitting on the stoop waiting for Z.
“All right,” he said as Z approached from the road. “Go Ducks.” He looked tired. At school Mr. Weber always dressed neatly, but today he was wearing baggy gray denim pants and a loose vest over a T-shirt.
“Are you sure you want to do this?” Z asked.
“Well, I haven’t missed Shabbat morning service for years,” Mr. Weber said. “But I can today.”
“You’re Jewish?”
“Sure,” Mr. Weber said, standing. “It makes for dangerous living in central Oregon, especially when you’re black at the same time, but I guess I just like to live on the edge like that.” He stretched over and touched his toes, and Z heard his shoulders pop faintly. “Let’s do this, huh?”
Z looked at him to see if he was annoyed with them, but they couldn’t tell. “You really don’t have to. I know I’m here, but if—”
“I felt terrible about leaving you to do this on your own. I never wanted to be that kind of person. I thought about it all yesterday and realized I had to help you. I get scared sometimes, but this is something I need to do.”
The ride in the car on the way to the library was pitted with bumps from Mr. Weber’s car. Though it looked solid on the outside, it seemed to stagger along like an old dog.
“How is Aysel?” Mr. Weber asked.
“She’s okay,” Z said. “She was pretty sick the other week, I think.”
“She may get sick again. She misses school once in a while. Look after her, okay? I’m glad she has a friend. She’s a cool kid. She reminds me of my friend Sam who studies dragons.”
“You have a friend who studies dragons?” Z asked.
“Yeah, at the fossil fields out in Montana and Idaho and stuff. It’s fascinating stuff. You know, lizards are mostly descended from them.”
“Yeah, you told us in class,” Z said. “I meant more that it’s weird to think of teachers having friends.”
Mr. Weber laughed. “I have friends,” he said. “Mostly they got sick of Central Oregon, but there’s a few who are still around here.”
“Where does your family live?” Z asked.
“They’re down in the Bay,” Mr. Weber said. “Three of my brothers work in computers, one is a glassblower, one is figuring himself out and working in a pet store, and one has been directing a reality television show about narcissistic personality disorder for six years running.”
“Why do you live here, then?” Z asked.
“I mean, who knows, really,” Mr. Weber said drily. “I’ve gotten attached to teaching, though. It’s something I like doing.”
The library at Willamette had been built in the later eighties and was still fairly new. It was made of brick and glass and had a clock tower in the front that looked like it had been built more to represent the idea of a tower than to fulfill any real function.
“Originally it was going to be named after a US senator from Oregon, but once the senator was investigated for affiliation with dissident magical groups, the committee in charge decided to call it the Wells Library instead. After the Boeing guy,” he said.
“That’s sad,” Z said flatly.
“I didn’t like the senator much either,” Mr. Weber said.
It was made of brick and glass and had a clock tower in the front that looked like it had been built more to represent the idea of a tower than to fulfill any real function. You could not climb into it, though it was true that if you stood in its shadow it blocked you from the rain. Z passed under the clock on their way to the sliding doors that opened into the building. As Mr. Weber and Z passed the front desk a bored student employee looked up and then back down at the book they were reading.
“We’re going down to the basement,” Mr. Weber said in a low voice to Z.
The only other people in the library early on a Saturday were students who looked harried and sleep-deprived and carried with them large stacks of books or papers. Z’s feet made little noise on the thin blue carpeting as they made their way to the elevators. The elevator doors opened onto a flat, fluorescent expanse of shelving and computer banks, labeled in a way that Z couldn’t make heads or tails of. As the silver doors closed and the chain inside the elevator mechanism lowered Z and Mr. Weber to the basement, he cleared his throat. Z looked over at him, but he seemed to have decided against saying whatever it was he was going to say.
The elevator reached the basement floor and the small chime rang out as the doors slid open. Mr. Weber gestured for Z to stay where they were, pressed into the space on one side of the door.
“Invisibility,” Mr. Weber said.
“Oh,” Z said. “Right.” They squared their shoulders.
Mr. Weber pressed one hand lightly to Z’s forehead and muttered a rapid-fire incantation. Z recognized part of it from basic invisibility lessons the previous year, but it went on far longer. Z felt a sensation along their spine and in their fingers and toes as if someone had just wrapped them in a thin, sticky bedsheet.
“The archives are at the end of the hall to your right,” Mr. Weber said. “It’s all in cabinets and lockers. You’re looking for the last four cabinets on the right side of the hallway. I know from having broken in once before. You can probably unlock them easily once you’re through the outer security spell.”
“How will the invisibility work with me holding things?” Z looked down at the bag they were holding, trying to see if it was invisible.
“Whatever you touch and hold to your chest will be invisible until you get out of the building and probably to the other side of the quad. Duck behind a bush or something for a few minutes. Tap your foot three times when you’re on your way past me to the elevator so I know you’re leaving with books. Tap twice if you didn’t get what you came for.”
Z didn’t know what to say. “Thank you,” they said through the plasticky invisibility hex, their words muddled.
Mr. Weber nodded. “Go as fast as you can,” he said in a low voice. “I’ll talk to the librarian to buy you time. Hopefully there aren’t too many staff.” He turned and walked slowly out toward the open office door a few yards from the elevator. Z followed behind him, unsure if they were really invisible. They looked down at their own hands and body and could see just fine where everything was, though at the same time there was a kind of mauve cloudiness around the edges of their elbows and knees and fingers. They felt as if they were encased in a spiderweb as they started down the hall toward the large black metal door with the inscription Authorized Staff Only, fumbling in their pocket for the spell Mr. Weber had given them earlier in the week. The paper was crumpled and torn on one side. Z tried to remember the incantation for fire. Z glanced behind them and saw Mr. Weber standing near the open door of the librarian’s office, looking at them.
“Incendi,” they muttered at the paper as they neared the black door. They felt at a distance the magic, as if it was entering their head from behind and shooting through their arms. It was a shock like a lightning bolt. The edge of the charmed scrap caught fire and began to send up a ribbon of smoke. When the red ember reached the sigil scratched in the middle of the paper, it sent up bright white fire. Z pressed it to the door, unsure if this was what they were meant to do. All at once, a bolt of brilliant blue emanated from their palm and an acrid chemical smell surrounded Z. They pulled back their hand, and the door swung open.
Inside, the cabinets looked at first just like the ordinary filing cases that filled the rest of the basement. There were no windows, though the room stretched farther than Z had expected. It seemed to be organized in a different way than the rest of the library. Some cabinets were stacked one on top of another, and narrow ladders on rollers hung like long ship’s beams down the length of the walls. Z began to walk down the aisle of metal cabinets, looking for something about death, or necromancy. They remembered Mr. Weber’s directions and walked quickly to the back of the expansive room. The subject listings stood out on their small white placards, written haphazardly in a way that contrasted with the orderly university shelves outside the black room. Cohens, Hattie Mae. Commune, Paris. Druidic Rites. Fey, American.
Then, at the end of the long room, Z heard the sound of someone closing a drawer and the noise of footsteps. They froze in place.
“Augustine?” a voice called out. “Did you reorganize this section?” A woman’s head peered around the corner, wearing a surgical mask and glasses that had a slight tint. She was otherwise dressed with exacting plainness, in a brown sweater and corderoys. “Augustine? Are you here? Is this door open?”
Z edged past the woman as she made her way rapidly toward the open door, looking at the labels on the shelves. They were at the N section now. They opened the nearest cabinet, where the slightly peeling label Necromancy, Practical shone in the fluorescent lighting. It squeaked on rusted hinges, and Z froze before edging it open the rest of the way.
The drawer was empty. Z’s heart plummeted into their stomach.
Outside in the hallway, Z heard a shout and a sudden loud high-pitched screech that continued to drone on in a pulsing monotone. The lights above them in the room of censored materials began to flash red. After a moment of horrified paralysis they realized that it was an alarm. The noise was followed by the noise of running footsteps. Z frantically opened the remaining drawers in the cabinet. They were empty—folders divested of contents, and spaces where the books should have been. They moved in on the next one, which was empty too, and then desperately opened the drawers labeled Naiad, Nazis, Nigerian Exorcism, and Nostradamus. These drawers had volumes and folios inside them, but from what Z could see they all had to do with the designated subjects.
The noise of the footsteps got closer. Z heard a shout and realized that the voice was Mr. Weber’s.
Z had only moments to react. They shut the drawers with a bang and raced back down the corridor to the black door. Two people were standing near it, and Z slowed to look, their legs aching. It was a large security guard in a dark navy uniform, standing pressing something into the back of Mr. Weber’s neck. Z almost cried out, but at the last second remembered to stay silent. About ten feet away, the woman Z had seen in the Censored Materials room stood, mask off, next to another librarian, watching.
“We had a notification that an unauthorized person disabled the security spell on the Censored Materials Division door,” the guard said. “You’re the only non-faculty personnel in the area. Hands above your head, sir.”
“You have the wrong person,” Mr. Weber said. He looked to and fro as if he was seeking out Z, but he could not place where they were. Z tapped their foot twice, as loud as they dared. Mr. Weber jerked his head toward the elevators and nodded in their direction. The guard pressing him into the wall didn’t notice.
“We’re going to have to take you to the campus police station and conduct an inventory of the room, unfortunately,” the guard said. “Willamette staff takes the security of their federally protected censored materials very seriously. I need you to remain still and not perform any magic. Any failure to comply will be interpreted as assault of Willamette faculty.”
“I swear I was just down here to look for a volume I need on lizards,” Mr. Weber said. “I can’t find the oversize books in the public library, and this university has such a fine collection.”
“I’m going to need you to remain silent,” the guard said.
“Well, get a move on, whatever you’re going to do,” Mr. Weber said. He nodded again in Z’s general direction.
Z ran for the elevators, and then at the last moment decided to use the stairs instead. They hauled the door open. Racing up the stairs, they stumbled, and began to feel the sticky spiderweb feeling lifting from their face and limbs. Z grabbed the railing to right themselves and scrambled up to the ground floor. They tried not to run for the exit when they left the stairwell and limped as carefully as possible toward the door.
Out in the foggy morning, Z threw themselves down on a bench across the quad from the library and held onto the wood on both sides of their legs as tightly as they could. Their heart was not pounding and they were not breathing, but the muscles that remained were pulled as tight as a string about to snap. Z didn’t know how long they sat motionless under a drooping bare black tree and the shadow of a square concrete lecture hall. As they sat and tried to think about what to do next, they heard a wail of police sirens approaching. Z did not want to run or move more than they already had, and so hesitated, frozen, watching a black-and-white cruiser pull slowly down the wide footpath to the library. They did not wait to see the people inside get out.
When Z told Mrs. Dunnigan that Mr. Weber had been arrested, and that Z had opened the door to the Censored Materials Division only to find the books on necromancy gone, Mrs. Dunnigan did not say anything at first, and then stepped forward and enveloped Z in a bony embrace.
“At least he turned out to be brave,” she said finally. “He did the right thing. And at least you’re all right.”
“Will he be all right?” Z asked. “I feel like I did the wrong thing, asking too much of him or something. He’s been arrested. He’s so nice.”
“We’ll check up on him,” Mrs. Dunnigan said. “But you didn’t do the wrong thing. You were protecting yourself. And he’s a grown man. He chose to help you.” There was such a tone of conviction in her voice that Z almost believed her for a moment, until they remembered the stance of the security guard and the thing pressed into Mr. Weber’s neck.
Z felt a deep ugly sensation in the pit of their stomach, and pushed Mrs. Dunnigan away.
A story appeared in the Sunday paper. Local Man Apprehended; Materials on Necromancy Found Missing from Willamette, the headline read.
“The books really were missing, then,” Z said. “Not just in a different place. But then someone else must have stolen them. Why didn’t the people notice before we showed up?”
Mrs. Dunnigan, who was in the living room, did not seem to hear Z.
Before school on Monday, Z told Aysel what had happened. They sat outside together with Aysel underneath the awning. It wasn’t raining, but there was mist. They watched people trudge into school, looking weird and eerie under the yellow lamps that were turned on before sunrise. Aysel was already eating her lunch because she had forgotten to eat her breakfast.
“I can’t believe that he went through that and you didn’t even get the books,” Aysel said. “I read the story. I had a sinking feeling.”
“I know,” Z said. “He could have stayed home and then they would have got me instead, which would be fair anyway.”
“They won’t let him go,” Aysel said.
“How do you know?” Z asked.
“My mom is a paralegal,” Aysel said. “She went to law school. I know about this stuff. If someone is suspected of holding censored materials they can be held indefinitely, especially when they have known exceptional magical abilities. And Mr. Weber’s a sorcerer.”
“Not indefinitely,” Z said. “That’s against the rules. And he doesn’t have anything. Even if they search his house.”
“Maybe he’ll get out of it. He’s kind of a genius.”
“Yeah,” Z said. They felt like Aysel was judging them. They wondered what they could do to make her understand that they felt guilty. “Aysel?” Z asked. “This is all my fault, isn’t it?”
“I mean, yeah. He was going there for you. And it’s because of him that you didn’t get caught while he did.”
Z swayed weakly in the morning breeze.
The second bell rang. Aysel turned around and walked off to class.
At lunch, a rumor had started that Mr. Weber was the one suspected of having the stolen books. It spread very fast. Aysel wasn’t anywhere to be found. Z had to walk around alone. They wondered where Aysel was.
Tommy Wodewose was being harassed again because he had worn a long black cloak to school. It had silver clasps and billowed out behind him as he walked. He had worn his hair loose and long today, and it must have hurt when Charley Salt reached out and yanked it as Tommy sat reading and eating alone at a table in the cafeteria.
“Ouch,” Tommy said. His voice was reedy and high.
“What are you doing today, Tommy?” Charley asked.
“Nothing,” Tommy replied.
“What are you reading, Tommy?”
“It’s a book on ancient druids. It’s very interesting.”
“Do you want to be a druid, Tommy?” Everyone laughed again. “Make friends with the feys who change shape into monsters?”
Tommy just got up and wandered vaguely away down the hall. Z wondered if he even knew it had been a real insult. He must know, they thought. He was thrown off the roof.
Charley and his friends just turned around and began making fun of Danny Xu’s glasses. Danny Xu took it in stride and pretended he was in on the joke.
Z went looking for Aysel after school. They looked by the dumpsters, which were deserted, before making a slow circuit of the rest of the school. Finally they found her. Aysel was sitting on the floor of the girls’ bathroom near the entrance to the school, her backpack and coat on the floor next to her. Her face was turned away toward the wall, and she looked like she was crying.
“What’s wrong?” Z asked. “Have you been here all day?”
“You don’t understand,” Aysel said. “You just don’t get it.”
“I get it, Aysel. I’m sorry. But I don’t think they’ll burn Mr. Weber or whatever. They will figure out that he’s innocent and they’ll let him go.”
“You’ve never thought about this. You just think police protect people.”
“Well, not all the time. It was scary to see the guard—”
“Or you don’t care. He was just someone for you to use to stay alive. A black guy the cops would pounce on so they wouldn’t look at the fucking zombie stealing government secrets.”
“No, Aysel.”
“No, Aysel,” Aysel said, imitating Z’s voice. She looked angrily up at Z. “You’re dead, don’t you get it? They hate you. You can get burned in a big furnace now as easy as anyone else, easy as any of the rest of us monsters. You’re not a person anymore in their eyes, just a thing. Mr. Weber protected you and they’re going to hurt him and you don’t even seem to think you’re responsible!”
“I don’t understand what you’re talking about,” Z said. They felt scared and also angry. “Who’s them? Who’s ‘us monsters’? I’m the only monster here.”
Aysel only made a gurgling sound.
Z felt angrier and they felt their voice get meaner. “I don’t understand what you think you’re talking about. I know people hate me. My whole family is dead! My mother is dead! I lost my friends. My uncle hates me and I’d be homeless if it wasn’t for Mrs. Dunnigan.” Z paused. “And you have a mom and a house and you feel like a monster, but really it’s just that people don’t like you. My hair’s falling out. You just have pimples and are sad because people call you a lesbian. Well, you are a lesbian, so what does it matter anyway? You’re going to get out of this stupid town someday and I’m going to be rotting somewhere with my eyes open.”
“Go away,” Aysel cried out. “I don’t have to listen to you.”
Z scowled. “Aysel, I thought you were on my side.”
Sobs shook Aysel and made her face red and blotchy. She looked dangerous, even crying, Z thought. They sat down on the bathroom floor with her. Eventually Aysel’s crying stopped. She began to make little hiccupping noises and then sat up. Z wasn’t sure what they should do.
“Do you want any water?” Z asked.
Aysel shook her head, then nodded. Z went to the sink and emptied out the thermos Mrs. Dunnigan had filled with soup. The bits of beef got stuck in the drain. Z rinsed out the container and filled it with water and gave it to Aysel, who drank deeply.
Z felt like they had run their mouth off, but they didn’t want to say anything else, even if it was to apologize.
They got up together without talking and left the bathroom. Both of them looked really awful, Z realized. They wandered out of the school and went out into the parking lot. There were still cars there, because of various sports practices happening. Aysel dropped her bag on the cement so she could put on her coat.
“I hope we’re not enemies,” Z said.
“No,” Aysel said. “I’m mad at you because you’re dumb, that’s all.”
“I’m sorry.” Z paused. “I know it’s my fault Mr. Weber’s in jail. But that doesn’t mean the police are after you.”
“It gets to me more than most people. All this stuff with the werewolves and then the Pagan thing and now Mr. Weber getting arrested.”
“Why?” Z asked. They walked to the bus stop and waited for the bus. It was a long time before Aysel answered.
“I guess I should trust you,” Aysel said, but then she didn’t say anything else. Z didn’t want her to cry again so they didn’t press her. The bus came.
“I have to go home alone today, I think,” Aysel said.
“Okay,” Z said. They were sure that Aysel was never going to speak to them again.
But then Aysel scribbled something on a piece of paper against the wall of the bus stop and handed it to Z. Then, unexpectedly, she lurched forward and hugged Z hard. Z was sure they felt one of their ribs crack, but they didn’t want to spoil the moment, so they hugged Aysel back.
After Aysel was gone, they looked at the note.
I’m a werewolf, the note said. Sorry and stuff.
Obviously not.
“What day is it?” someone asked the old man across from Aysel. Aysel glanced over. The person talking was an anxious-looking teenager with a huge backpack and greasy hair. The old man ignored him.
“Hey man,” the boy repeated. He had an awkward, greasy mustache. “What’s the date?”
The man looked up. “Please don’t bother me,” he said. But he wasn’t doing anything, like reading or listening to music. He had just been staring uncomfortably at Aysel before the boy spoke to him.
“I just asked the day.” The boy started to move toward a seat near the front of the bus.
“It’s the eighteenth of February,” Aysel said loudly.
“Thanks,” the teenager said. He laughed nervously. “There’s going to be a supermoon on the eleventh of March.” He paused, as if waiting for someone to ask what it was. “It’s when the moon gets closer to Earth than other times. It gets really big in the sky. It’s going to be intense.”
Aysel looked at him with interest. “Oh, you know about it too?”
“Yeah,” the boy said, looking surprised. “I’m really into that stuff. Really into like, the uh, the energy.”
Aysel smirked, feeling very hollow. “Yeah. Me too.”
“Nice eye makeup,” the boy said, smiling. “You look like you’re too cool for this town.” Aysel wasn’t sure if he was being sarcastic.
“I was crying all afternoon because someone I know is dead and someone else might die soon,” she said.
“I know how that is,” the boy said. “I’m sorry.”
When Aysel got home she made herself a cup of tea and watched the pigment diffuse through the hot water and refused to watch the news. She painted her fingernails black instead. She wanted to cut her hair. She touched the split ends and curled them around her fingers. Aysel took a pair of scissors and held them near her hair, hesitated, and put them back. She felt like it wasn’t the right time for some reason.
She lay in her bed and wished she had a cat.
“What’s wrong?” Azra asked when she got home.
“Mr. Weber is suspected of stealing from the Censored Materials Division of the Willamette University library. He didn’t do it. He’s in jail.”
Azra’s hands shook a little but she went to Aysel and tried to comfort her. Aysel felt like clinging to her mother but didn’t because she knew it wouldn’t accomplish anything. She sat up and moved away instead.
“I think it’ll be okay,” Aysel lied.
“I heard about that case today. It sounds like the police take it very seriously. They’ve even put the search of Archie Pagan’s house on hold.”
“I know,” Aysel said. “Mr. Weber’s the only good person at my school. He was going to help me enter the robotics competition.”
“It just shows what a racist mess this place is.”
“I want to leave Salem,” Aysel moaned.
“The place I mean isn’t Salem. It’s the whole country. Maybe Earth.”
At seven, Aysel heard her mother turning on the stove top with a click and a hiss and setting down the heavy pot onto the grange. After a few minutes, the smell of onions frying filled the air.
“Can you go get some kale from the yard?” Azra called from the kitchen. “I’m making Karalahana çorbası.”
“Couldn’t you make the chicken dish?” Aysel yelled back. “We have that chicken in the fridge.”
“I know what I’m doing with the chicken. I’m going to make it this Friday. We have to use the kale.”
Aysel went to put on her shoes. She braced herself against the cold and tripped down into the dark garden with the big colander and a pair of scissors. The porch light came on as she moved down the steps into the mud. She cut the leaves from kale plants until the bowl was full. When she went back inside, Azra had added the tomato paste and peppers to the onions.
“I got the kale,” Aysel said.
“Now chop it up. Remember, fine little strips.”
“I still wish we were having the chicken,” Aysel said, but she pulled the cutting board out from behind the dish drainer and took a knife from the drawer.
Azra shrugged. “I cook for you and I make sure you eat good things. It’s a stew night. Pretend you’re in Trabzon with my family. Pretend you’re going to cook this to impress your anneanne. She would like it if she knew you could cook so well.”
Aysel almost started to cry then, but she managed to stop herself. She felt the tears stinging her eyes.
Azra frowned. “Your eyes are all red.” She brushed her hair out of her eye and reached out with a smooth soft dry hand and did the same with Aysel’s hair. Aysel swallowed hard to keep from sobbing.
“I’m fine, Mom.”
They ate dinner on the couch, Aysel trying not to drip onto the red fabric upholstery. They rarely used the table, except on weekends. They usually watched TV, but Azra didn’t want to, so they just looked at each other. Aysel ate slowly.
“How is school going?” Azra asked Aysel. “Besides Mr. Weber.”
“I got an A on the Spanish test.”
“That’s good. I still wish you had taken French. It would be so much more useful if we ever visited my parents.”
“Well, I’m taking Spanish and I’m getting A’s. I don’t know what you have to complain about.”
“So school is good? You’re doing well in everything?”
“I’m doing well, but everyone hates me,” Aysel said.
Azra looked upset. “Does your friend Zee hate you? She seemed nice.”
Aysel began to cry into her dinner.
Azra looked distressed. “Oh no, Aysel. Aysel,” she said, “I didn’t mean to upset you. Oh dear.” Her hands fluttered. “Be strong, Aysel. Stop crying.”
Aysel sniffed loudly and blinked hard. “Mom, I did something really stupid. I—I’m really sorry, Mom. I’m really, really sorry, but I did something really stupid.”
Azra settled back like a cat into the pillows on her end of the couch. She set her bowl on the table behind her. “What is it?” She looked tense and nervous suddenly.
“I told Z.” Aysel made an odd snuffly noise in her throat.
“Told her what?” But Azra had already guessed, Aysel could see.
Aysel sobbed loudly, for a long time. Her wail crested up toward the ceiling.
“Aysel, what did you tell her?”
“I told Z I’m a werewolf.”
Azra’s eyes went wide. She sat frozen on the couch.
“I told—I’m sorry, Mom. I just thought I should. They’re my friend. They needed to know why I was upset today, and I was upset because Z didn’t understand how I felt like a monster.”
“What?” Azra’s voice was almost a yell, which was odd because Aysel had spoken softly. Azra’s face was drawn and pale. “What?”
Aysel started to cry again.
Azra took a few deep breaths. “Aysel, you told her—Zee? You told Zee?”
Aysel choked on her own spit and coughed. “I’m sorry, Mom. I had been really mean to them because I was worried Mr. Weber would be hurt, especially if they got it out of him that he’d been protecting me. And Z thought I was mad at them, so I had to explain . . .” Aysel felt herself swallow a sob and her eyes clouded with tears.
“What happened when you told her?” Azra asked intently.
Aysel paused. “Nothing.”
“Nothing? What did your friend say?”
“I ran away after I told them. I didn’t want to see.”
Azra put her hand to her face. “Of course you ran away,” she said.
“What? I was scared!”
“With all this nonsense with the police happening, it’s not a good time for anyone to find out about you. I’m not mad at you,” she added, again touching Aysel’s shoulder, “but think.”
“I mean,” Aysel said, “I don’t want to get all paranoid.” She was trying to talk herself down.
“People think werewolves are dangerous, Aysel. You are dangerous in their mind.”
“I know.”
“The police who take you won’t give you back to me. I could go to jail for hiding you from them. You’ll go into a treatment facility until you are eighteen and be under probation for the rest of your life. With all this happening right now, it couldn’t be a worse time. The police think there is some kind of werewolf radical cult that killed Archie Pagan. They’re looking for unregistered wolves to blame. I never wanted that for you. I wanted you to be safe. I wanted to protect you. We’ve worked so hard to do this.”
“I know! I said I’m sorry! You’ve told me a million times already. I don’t need to be any more scared than I am!”
Azra looked away and made no reply. Aysel felt embarrassed of her anger. She got up and made tea and brought it back without speaking. They turned on the television and watched a competitive housecleaning show. The television distracted from the fear both of them felt. Gradually, the atmosphere calmed.
“I’m sorry,” Azra said, over the noise of a power saw on the television. “You’re right. You didn’t need that outburst from me. I’m being stupid, darling. I should be tougher than this.”
“It’s too late for that,” Aysel said.
Aysel got up and walked past her mother. She carried her plate to the sink. Then she went into her room and turned on her music as loud as it would go. She didn’t come out to brush her teeth until after she was sure Azra was asleep.
In the morning Aysel did not want to go to school. She covered her head with the pillows and sat and felt the comforter curled around her. Her room was dark and she could hear the wind outside rattling the trees against one another. Her alarm went off twice and so she arose, scowling.
Azra had already left for work and Aysel dressed in a hurry.
The gym teacher hadn’t arrived and Tommy was getting shoved into the big trash bin by the art room when Aysel finally reached class, ten minutes late. Nobody was helping him; the other students were gathered near the doors to the gym, talking among themselves like nothing was happening.
“What are you doing?” Aysel demanded, running over. Tommy’s feet stuck out of the bin. The rest of him was submerged in wood scraps and old charcoal drawings.
“We’re showing him what kind of treatment he’s going to get when Fey Regulation comes for him,” Charley Salt said, turning around. “They take fey and put them in these big silver boxes so they can’t get out and destroy society.”
“Why is it always you?” Aysel asked. “Can’t you stop picking on someone for maybe two seconds?”
“He’s a fairy,” Charley said. “In more than one way,” he snickered. “I heard his granddad was born in this Celtic circle and changed into five animals a day.”
“Oh, okay, yeah,” Aysel said loudly. A few students who were waiting by the gym looked over. “Harassing him because of his relatives and because you think he’s gay. That’s really cute, Charley.” She wasn’t scared of Charley today. She was too tired and too angry.
“I think it’s realistic. He needs to know what the world has in store for him. I’m only helping.”
“Maybe you want to tell the nurse how realistic you thought it was after I break your nose. It’s only fair that I get a shot at yours, since you did mine.” Aysel rolled up her sleeves and felt the hair on her arms and head rise with crackling electric current.
“Chill out, Tay-her.”
“You chill out, you toad!” Aysel said. She stepped forward solidly and swung at him. Her fist made contact with his temple, and his head swung around sideways. She kicked him in the gut and he doubled over. His friends rushed over to him and tried to haul him to his feet.
She went over to the bin where Tommy was. “Are you okay, Tommy?”
“I’m fine.”
Aysel was too short to lift Tommy out, so she tipped the bin over as gently as she could. It clanged against the ground.
“Jesus,” she heard Bill Oswald say behind her, as she and Tommy turned to head back to the gymnasium. “If Tom-my’s a fairy, she’s a troll.”
“Is she a dyke?” Neil Trotter said. He laughed nervously.
Aysel wheeled around to face Bill and Neil. Her hair flew out behind her, a black frizzy wave of sparking static. She stormed forward, her fists ready to hit something again. Punching Charley had been the most fun thing she had done all month.
“Oh shit, here she comes,” said Neil.
“Yeah, here I come. What did you just say about me?”
“I said you were a dyke. You don’t even look like a girl. You look like a whale with eyebrows.”
Aysel grinned. “Well, Neil, joke’s on you. I am a dyke and I think it rules.”
They all stared at her, then laughed dumbly.
“Are you serious?” Bill asked. “You’re a lesbian?”
“I am serious,” Aysel said. “I am a big mean whale dyke!” She shouted this last phrase loud enough for the people by the gym to hear it. “I’m hairy and fat and have huge fists and I will break your jaw if you mess with people I care about!” She shook her head to get her hair out of her eyes and her mouth. She felt like she might start shooting fire out of her eyes.
“You care about Tommy Wodewose?” Bill asked incredulously.
Neil laughed. “Do you lick each other’s”—he held up his fingers in a V and stuck his tongue out of his mouth.
She launched herself at Neil and punched him in the teeth.
That, of course, was the moment the substitute gym teacher chose to appear from inside the school with his coffee and keys, and of course the only thing he saw was Aysel trying to pin Neil on the ground and punching him in the face.
“This is the earliest in the day I’ve ever seen anyone be sent to the principal’s office,” Mr. Bentwood said thirty minutes later.
Aysel stared at him and did not speak. She had a bruise near her eye and a split lip, but was otherwise whole.
“This is the first time you’ve been in here for disciplinary issues, Aysel,” Mr. Bentwood said, sighing a little as if he regretted that Aysel had gotten into a fight. Aysel knew he didn’t care.
“Sorry, sir,” she said as politely as possible.
“What possessed you to get into such a fight, Aysel? You’re not a stupid girl.”
“Charley and his friends were harassing Tommy Wodewose, sir. I stepped in because they shoved him in a trash can.”
“Let’s not talk nonsense,” Mr. Bentwood said quickly. “I’m sure they did nothing like that. Don’t spread rumors, Aysel.”
“I’m telling the truth.” Aysel sucked on her split lip, tasting the blood.
Mr. Bentwood looked seriously down at Aysel, his skinny face hollow and dour. “Charles Salt and his friends are good boys,” he said. “I’m sure they and Tommy were only having fun, like boys do.”
Aysel scowled up at him and stayed quiet. She knew better than to contradict Mr. Bentwood directly. He had a grisly expression and tiny crumbs of something in the grasslike red fur on his chin.
“Perhaps you misunderstood the situation, Aysel,” Mr. Bentwood said slimily. “After all, maybe it looked as if Tommy and Charles were fighting. No adults were there, after all. It must have been very upsetting.”
“Maybe,” Aysel said, sensing an out.
“In that case, I won’t suspend you. This is the first time a disciplinary situation with you has involved violence, and I admit that it is partially the fault of our faculty for not being present to supervise.”
“Thank you,” Aysel said, looking at her shoes. The early morning light shone through the window. The streetlights outside still hadn’t gone out. The day had barely begun.
“I still have to call your mother,” Mr. Bentwood said. He smiled primly and shuffled the papers on his desk.
“She’s at work, so she won’t be able to come talk to you,” Aysel said.
“Well, it’s school policy.” Mr. Bentwood shrugged at Aysel apologetically, but he was smiling. He reached over and dialed the phone. Aysel made her face as blank as possible, because she didn’t want to look scared. What would her mother think?
Azra was indeed busy, and did not pick up her phone. A crackling voicemail message sounded distantly on the other end, and then there was a beep.
“Hello?” Mr. Bentwood said. “Mrs. Tahir, I am calling about your daughter, Aysel. She got into a fight today with some boys before first period. I’m calling to let you know that this has happened so you can speak with Aysel, as it was her first offense and I am choosing not to suspend her. I have to inform you that if this continues to happen, she will be suspended and you may be obliged to attend a hearing before the Court for Magical Juvenile Affairs. That’s all. Have a nice day. Goodbye.”
Aysel knew the message would horrify Azra.
“Are you all right, Aysel?” Mr. Bentwood asked, his yellow teeth showing.
“I can’t really go to court, can I?” Aysel asked.
“Not for this, Aysel. But be careful how you deal with conflict in the future.”
“I can’t help getting into fights that other people start,” Aysel said, trying not to make this statement sound too contrary. There was something tricky about using polite tones of voice and Aysel wasn’t sure she had gotten the hang of it yet.
“Careful, Aysel. Charley doesn’t see it that way.”
Aysel looked blankly at the principal and then turned and looked blankly out the window.
“Aysel, is there anything going on at home?” Mr. Bentwood tried to make his voice soft and sympathetic.
“What?” Aysel asked. The question had come from nowhere and it surprised her.
“Well, is everything okay at home?” Mr. Bentwood asked. “Sometimes when children have trouble dealing with their anger, it means that their home situations may not be the best. I want to let you know I won’t tell anyone what you say to me here. You can trust me.”
“My mom is a great mom,” Aysel said angrily. “There’s nothing wrong with her or with my home.”
“I’m sure she is,” Mr. Bentwood said. He looked taken aback by Aysel’s immediate and intense defense of her mother. He drummed his fingers on the desk. “Still, uh, Aysel. If you want to talk about anything, I’m here, and uh, the school counselor Mr. Peach is also here if you want to talk to him. I can make you an appointment with him, if you like. He’s here Wednesdays and Fridays from eleven thirty until one, and you can talk to him about anything. Your feelings, your family . . .”
“Are you going to make me have an appointment with a therapist?” Aysel asked.
“No, of course not,” Mr. Bentwood said carefully.
“I won’t then,” Aysel said.
“Okay,” Mr. Bentwood said, trying to sound accommodating. It did not work. He tapped both hands firmly on the desk. “Well,” he said, “if you’re sure you don’t need to talk, Aysel, you can go back to class.”
“Gym class is almost over,” Aysel said. “I can just wait in the hall,” she added as a worried expression passed over the principal’s face.
“Yes, all right,” Mr. Bentwood said. “You can do that.”
Aysel got up and left. She let the door shut loudly behind her.
It was then she remembered the other reason she had been grumpy this morning: she had told Z her secret.
Aysel looked for Z after second period. She couldn’t find Z in the bathrooms or the library, though, and the bell rang before she could check back by the dumpsters, so she went to third period.
Aysel didn’t think that Z would outright reject her. Or—maybe she did. She wasn’t sure what she thought. Everything was so convoluted. Aysel knew how people thought about werewolves. They thought werewolves were sick. Z was a monster too, and so should understand that not all the prejudice against werewolves was based on fact, but they wouldn’t understand everything, and they might say something awful. Aysel didn’t know how she could stand it if Z did that.
Aysel’s pen shook in her hand and she could barely write during class.
By lunch, Aysel didn’t feel like looking for Z anymore. She also didn’t feel hungry.
At the end of fifth period, after forgetting to draw the sigils from the board in her notebook, Aysel tried to get up but was shaking too much. She sat down hard on the lowest step of the staircase and stared at the frosted glass window and the wall. It took her a few minutes to pull herself up enough to go to Spanish class. She walked down the halls, pulling hair out of her face and lint off her sweater.
Z was in class, staring straight ahead. Aysel froze in the doorway and almost turned around again, but made herself take the few steps to her desk. She sat down and stared resolutely at Z.
“Hi,” she said grimly.
Z turned and half smiled. Aysel had a hard time figuring out if there was anything odd about the smile or if she was just being paranoid.
“How are you?” Aysel heard herself ask from far away.
“I’m glad you’re in school today,” Z said.
In Spanish class that day, they all had to walk around the room with little cards that had Spanish present progressive verbs on them and define them for each other. Z couldn’t really stand up and walk around easily, and so would lean on one desk or another and wait for someone to approach them. Nobody did except for Aysel and Mrs. Cortez, the teacher. Z didn’t seem to mind too much.
After class Z and Aysel went into the hall with everyone else. People bobbed around them, hurrying to their next class, not paying attention to the way Z leaned against the wall or Aysel’s black eye. Z turned to Aysel and hugged her abruptly. Is this weird? Aysel wondered. She realized she had hugged Z yesterday, so maybe it made sense that Z would hug her back.
“Wow, okay,” she said aloud.
“I just—I’m glad you’re here. I’m glad you’re my friend,” Z said.
“Why?” she asked.
“Because you’re great,” Z said, rocking back onto their heels. Their yellowing eyes shone and they smiled with teeth that were too long because their gums were receding. “I hope I am friends with you for a long time.”
Aysel felt tears coming to her eyes. “You too, buddy,” she said, trying to make it sound sarcastic so it wouldn’t sound too soppy.
They went to Mrs. Dunnigan’s place after school that day.
“Is it all right if I tell her?” Z asked as they and Aysel walked toward the house. Aysel and Z had decided not to take the bus so they could talk privately.
“That I’ve got problems with the moon, you mean?”
“Yeah.”
Aysel considered. Azra had made Aysel promise that she would never tell anyone about her lycanthropy. This secret was the backbone of her life. She remembered how many times they had moved because her mother had thought someone knew about her. “No,” she said. “I told you because I trust you. I’m sure Mrs. Dunnigan is great, but even great people don’t act so swell around werewolves. I don’t trust her yet. She might not be okay with it.”
“I guess so. I mean, she had a rock thrown through her bookstore window because she has a werewolf section that has books by werewolves, and she had a werewolf author come speak once,” Z said.
“Oh,” Aysel said. “Well, cool. I’m still not going to tell her.”
“Do you ever think that you could change someone’s mind about werewolves by telling them?”
Aysel laughed.
“Why are you laughing?” Z asked.
“Well, I mean, it doesn’t work like that,” Aysel said.
“Like how?”
“One time when we were living in California after my parents broke up, there was this guy who started dating my mom. He was from Texas. My mom liked him. But I remember one time he was at our house, and I heard him tell my mom that she wasn’t like most Muslim women. He told her she was smarter than them. Like that was a compliment.”
“Oh,” Z said.
“So it’s kind of like that with werewolves, too. Even if you prove that you’re human,” Aysel said to Z, “they just think you’re the exception, and it just allows them to contrast you with everyone else. Someone might say, 'Oh, sure, you’re a good werewolf, you aren’t like the other ones.'”
The trees were icy and their branches were silver spears against the sky, except for the pine and conifer trees, which were black and prickly. Aysel tracked pine needles into the apartment. Z turned around and gestured for her to remove them. Aysel felt smaller without the rubber soles giving her an extra half-inch in height. The apartment smelled like cats.
Mrs. Dunnigan was sitting and crocheting something which looked like a very large potholder in black yarn.
“Are you dears all right to study quietly for a while?” Mrs. Dunnigan asked them as they came in. “I have a terrible headache. I don’t think I could possibly watch the news or listen to music.”
“That’s all right, Mrs. Dunnigan,” Z said. “We’ll just be in my room. Thanks.”
They sat on the floor and stared at the ceiling in Z’s room. There were mysterious flecks of blue on the ceiling, and Z had never asked Mrs. Dunnigan where they were from or what they were made of.
They lay in reverent silence, a tribute to the blue spots. They did not do any homework.
Aysel volunteered to cook when she saw that Mrs. Dunnigan was sitting on the couch with a compress on her head. Rice and corn and salt and tomatoes and carrots fried in butter. It was all right.
“So, Aysel,” Mrs. Dunnigan said at dinner, “Z tells me you’re gay?”
Aysel made a small coughing noise. She looked up at Mrs. Dunnigan cautiously. “Yeah,” she said. She looked at Z. When had that come up?
Mrs. Dunnigan smiled. “That’s so nice that you folks today can come out so young.” She looked very friendly, Aysel thought, very motherly.
“Mmm,” said Aysel. She looked at Z sternly, and Z looked away with an expression of embarrassment. Aysel’s mother still didn’t know Aysel was gay, and Mrs. Dunnigan knowing made her feel like it was only a matter of time before that uncomfortable conversation with Azra had to happen. Word would surely get around.
“When I was a girl it was hard. Lesbians weren’t supposed to have happy lives. It’s so nice that they can now.”
“I’m not so sure my life will be that happy,” Aysel said.
“New legislation is being passed all the time. That anti-gay bill last year failed. In ten years you may be able to get married.”
“Aren’t—I mean, weren’t you . . .” Aysel trailed off. “I mean, your name’s Mrs. Dunnigan, right?”
“Hmm? Yes, it is, dear. My first name’s Alondra, though, and you can call me that.”
“She wants to know why your name is Mrs. if you’re a lesbian,” Z said. Aysel glared at them.
Mrs. Dunnigan laughed. “Oh!” she said. “Well, that’s because I married a shapeshifter in Ireland.” She paused to laugh some more. “That was back in the fifties, and Ireland was getting sorted out, you know.”
Aysel didn’t know. “Right,” she said.
“What a story it is, when I think about it!” Mrs. Dunnigan grinned. “I had just moved to Ireland, and I met Cassie and fell in love. She was very attractive. Since she was a shapeshifter she couldn’t get very many jobs when Ireland was under British control, but the new government was very eager to hire people they thought represented Gaelic magic, and she helped scientists with some of the deep-sea diving work by becoming things like seals. All the people in the ecology department knew how useful she was so they paid her lots of money.”
“I never knew that,” Z said. They looked at Mrs. Dunnigan as if they were reevaluating her.
“I don’t talk about it much. Americans are a lot like British in how they look at fey,” Mrs. Dunnigan said. “Irish are better.”
“I didn’t realize they hired fey anywhere, especially back then.”
“Because of how new the Irish government was, and how much druidic magic was valued there as part of the Republic’s nationalism, they were passing some very progressive laws. People like selkies were getting citizen rights, you know.”
“Selkies?” Aysel asked. “What are those? I’ve never heard of them.”
“Like werewolves, in a way. Related to fey but not as powerful as shapeshifters. In reverse, though,” Mrs. Dunnigan said. “They live as seals most of their lives but come ashore and take on human forms and take off their sealskin. Usually only long enough to mate or to bask in the sun—once or twice a month or even less. If a human hides the sealskin from them, they can stay human the rest of their lives. If they get the skin back, they have to return to the water. It does of course make for a very complicated bureaucratic situation. Some selkies like to come ashore, and some avoid people and don’t want to be included in legislation. Selkies can live a very long time and come ashore for only a little while. Anyway, the Irish government tried to make it easier for them to live as humans if they wanted to.”
“Wow,” Aysel said.
“So you see it was very different than here. One of those things that sort of got thrown in with a lot of other things like that was that shapeshifters could marry either male or female people. Cassie and I just screamed when that one got through.”
“People approved that?”
“Well, yes. Shapeshifters can be male or female, you know, biologically, whatever that means to you, so even though Cassie spent most of the time living as a woman, the law said, oh, well, she could be a husband if she felt like it, so they let me marry her.”
“That’s so cool,” Aysel said.
“They don’t even have that in America, do they?” Z asked.
“Definitely not after Reagan,” Mrs. Dunnigan said. She had finished with her dinner, and stood up. “No, definitely not. They don’t even let shapeshifters walk around in the sun.”
“What happened to Cassie?” Aysel asked, looking over at Mrs. Dunnigan as she cleared her plate.
“Oh, well, we moved here to study the water dragons in the Pacific. We hid her past so she wouldn’t be incarcerated as a fey, even though things weren’t as bad then as they are now. She lived to be quite old. And then she passed. When we lived here we weren’t officially married, legally, but I still had her name because my passport from Ireland had it on there and we called ourselves Mrs. and Mrs.”
Mrs. Dunnigan stood at the sink looking sad for a few seconds, and sighed. Aysel thought she was just preparing to say something, but then the silence dragged on a moment too long, and Aysel realized there was nothing more to be said on the topic. There was something that couldn’t be talked about. Mrs. Dunnigan eventually turned the faucet on and began washing dishes.
Aysel helped to clear the table.
“Did the situation with Mr. Weber get sorted out, dear?” Mrs. Dunnigan asked Z as she pumped rosemary-scented dish soap onto the sponge.
Aysel turned away so that nobody would see her facial expression. She was worried she wouldn’t be able to control her face. She looked out the window instead, at the dark cold yard where several cats still circled, waiting until the last possible second to show humility and ask to be let in.
Z frowned. “He’s still not in school,” they said.
“He could be dead,” Aysel added in a monotone.
“Or he might have skipped town,” Mrs. Dunnigan said brightly.
After they cleared the plates, Aysel and Z finally started their homework. Aysel had gotten out her notebook and was looking at a page about Magical Summons of minor objects. She had to copy out the pentacle and practice summoning pencils from across a room. Magic homework was always just about the dullest thing in the world. Sometimes it seemed like school didn’t teach students magic so much as slow them down and mire them in busywork so they would never move on to the good stuff. Aysel tried to draw the pentacle. Her pen jittered and left splotches on the paper. She set it down, frustrated. Z was also having trouble.
“I can’t hold the pencil hard enough,” they said. “My handwriting’s barely legible.”
Aysel looked over. Z’s handwriting was indeed very faint on the page. “Maybe use a darker pen? A fountain pen?”
“I’d just spill ink everywhere.”
Aysel drew the pentacle again and tried to practice the spell they were learning in class. She summoned pencils and hair clips and bottles of clove oil from the bathroom. They made small buzzing noises when they appeared in the middle of the inky circle. A cat nestled on Aysel’s lap, and she smelled the clove oil. For a moment she was calm.
“They say they found evidence that Archie Pagan treated werewolves after all,” Mrs. Dunnigan commented noncha-lantly. She was reading the paper.
Aysel spluttered, “I didn’t know they were still investigating that.” She wondered if Mrs. Dunnigan knew about her. How would she have found out?
“It was covert, I suppose,” Mrs. Dunnigan said. She squinted at the newsprint. “Something too about a werewolf terrorist ring they’re pretending exists. Some kind of house of anarchist werewolves. Which is nonsense.”
“Wow,” Aysel said. She felt herself begin to sweat.
“It’s really going to put everyone on edge,” Mrs. Dunnigan said. “There haven’t been any new werewolves in the state for years because of the controls on that kind of thing. Nobody knows how to deal with it. They just shoot them all.”