The Alpha Girl and Her Rogue Mate

Wagers

Almost before I know it, it’s my birthday. In the few weeks since the meeting, I’ve managed to avoid passing out, although I have had a few near misses. Occasionally I shake, and as time has gone on, I’ve felt warmer and warmer naturally. The warmth is a burning feeling, but not an unpleasant one, sort of like a little fire burning at the center of my body. When I get very happy, or upset, or any particularly strong emotion, it seems to get larger and spread through my veins. 

Apparently, my first shift is close. At least according to my mom, that’s what it means when these feelings start to happen more often. She says when it’s time to shift for the first time, I’ll know. I’ll get what she called a whisper from my wolf. I assume it will be just like when I was at the pack meeting, but I didn’t ask. I never told anyone that that happened, because I was a little worried about it. I just didn’t know what it meant. It is normal to occasionally hear a little voice before your first shift, your wolf talking to you and helping you recognize her. But it wouldn’t usually happen a month before the first shift, it’s usually a week or two. And I haven’t heard her since. 

I’m nervous though, because the full moon is in a few days. And this morning, Rosa told me at my locker that she heard her wolf for the first time, and then she scurried off so she wouldn’t miss her first class. And my parents are convinced I’ll hear mine today or tomorrow. 

Which is why I’m excited for lunch, so I can ask Rosa how she knows. I can’t wait to hear about it. 

I slam my locker door, relieved that it shuts easily for once. It’s only because I returned several books to the library this morning and I haven’t picked up any new books. The librarian, Mr. Lassier, usually puts a few aside for me. He isn’t a wolf, but unlike a lot of the humans he never seems too afraid of the wolves in school. I saw him argue with Principal Schnieder last year, which was very odd. Principal Schnieder is a wolf, and one of our best Warriors. He even scares me, and I technically outrank him-- or at least I will after my first shift.

When I get to the cafeteria, I join the line to buy some lunch. Our lunches are really good compared to what a normal school lunch is apparently like. I’ve never gone to school anywhere else, of course, but werewolves have the internet too, and I’ve seen memes about it. But since we have about 60 wolf pups, cubs, and teens in the school system, and even baby wolves are voracious, the food is high quality here. Our Alpha has always made sure that a wolf is the Superintendent of the town’s schools. 

Since I’m nervous, I just pick up a Greek salad, though I have them add double chicken over it. The employee behind the counter looks a little surprised, because I usually get a burger or pizza. I smile and thank her. Out of the corner of my eye, I see Rosa hurrying into the cafeteria. I turn and make eye contact, waving toward our usual table. She nods, so I turn back to my salad and slide it down the silver counter so I can pay for my salad. 

I wave my student ID over a sensor as the woman running the register rings up my food. She’s one of the few people working in this town that doesn’t live here. Since we are pretty isolated, more of us drive out to other towns for work than drive into the town to work. But my father is even kind to humans. If he finds out someone is in town looking for work, he tries to find something for them. Lindsey, as her faculty ID hanging off her neck called her, has worked the cash register for a year or so. My father told me that she lost her job in a town about 50 minutes away after her husband and their kids were killed in a car crash. They were on their way to visit her at her office. She fell into a depression afterwards and was afraid to go back to that job. When she finally felt ready to look for a new job, no one was willing to give her a chance. That’s how she ended up 50 minutes from her home, talking to my dad about a job, any job. 

I give her a small smile too, and a little wave as I walk off toward our table. When I sit, I see Rosa chatting to one of the employees behind the counter, who covertly slips a plate with a few slices of pepperoni pizza to her over the glass panels that keep the food from getting breathed on by a high school’s worth of kids. I laugh to myself, because Rosa has always been a charmer. Pepperoni isn’t on the menu today, but they make it special for her like once a week. 

A minute later, she drops heavily into the seat and starts immediately devouring the pizza. My fork in one hand, I stare at her. Waiting for her to stop inhaling pizza and tell me about her wolf.

Finally after a slice has been all but swallowed whole, she looks up and catches me staring. 

“What?” She says, the second slice of pizza halfway to her mouth.

“Um, Rosa… your wolf? You felt her? Last night? Remember? The thing you told me this morning but didn’t have time to explain?”

“OH,” she says so loudly that a nearby table of kids looks over. “Sorry, I’m just so hungry.”

“So… what happened?”

“Oh, right.” She sets her pizza down, somewhat unwillingly. I finally shove the first bite of my salad into my mouth, suddenly also very hungry. “Well, it was last night, like I said,” she shoves another bite of pizza into her mouth as she continues, “and I felt that super warm feeling, right? And I was just thinking, eh, I mean I was watching that HBO show about that British king, you know the one?”

Through a mouthful of lettuce I say, “Showtime. The Tudors. Yep.”

“Right, so I figure that’s basically the same as studying for our history exam tomorrow, right? Because we definitely studied that guy.” History is the only class we have together this semester.

“Uh, King George? No.”

“What?”

“We are studying the American Revolution, so that show takes place like… 200 years before what the exam will be about. Also, I don’t think it’s very accurate.”

“Oh… well, whatever. It’s all the same right? Some kings and some wars and some intrigue, you know. All that.” 

I shake my head, but she keeps going, “so anyway, you know, that show is actually kind of sexy right? So I figured, maybe I was getting a little excited, you know, my emotions getting the best of me.”

I sigh, but with a little smile. Rosa is a truly stereotypical wolf. Not dumb, just completely uninterested in human academics. She’s actually brilliant, and she will probably get a C on that exam tomorrow writing about King Henry VIII. I sometimes wonder what she could do if she ever paid attention in class. Most wolves also run hot in every way possible. If I had a dollar for every teenaged wolf I’ve heard of hearing their wolf for the first time while watching porn, I’d be almost as rich as the pack treasury. 

She gulps down some of her soda. “So anyway, I didn’t think anything of it. I was trying to look up that lady, uh, the hot one? With the dark hair? You know, she has that face? Like, ‘I’m kind of a b***h so don’t try me’?”

“The actress or the character?”

“The character.”

“Oh, Anne Boleyn. The second wife.”

“Yes, her, so was she really like that? I mean, was she really so calculated?”

“I don’t know her personally,” I say, and Rosa rolls her eyes, “but she was supposedly brilliant. She was well-educated for a woman in the 1500s. So, yeah, she might have been.”

“Right, well that’s what I wanted to find out. So I was Googling it, right, but then all of a sudden I just heard this noise. You know when wind goes through trees at night and it sounds a little like someone whispering to you? Well, I had my window open, so I got up to close it. And I just heard a little voice, she kind of sounds like me but her voice is deeper. She said “it’s time,” and it freaked me out, I dropped my phone! Which, by the way, it’ll be so cool when we can just mindlink instead of texting. Can’t leave my mindlink at home right? But yeah, it scared me, so I said out loud, ‘who’s there’ but she just laughed at me. I think my wolf might be kind of a sarcastic jerk, but I guess that’s fair--”

“Ah, so just like you.”

She throws her napkin at me, “Anyway,” she drags the word out to the point of ridiculousness, “that’s when I realized it was my wolf. And I said, when? And she said ‘next full moon.’ So I checked my calendar and I realized that’s in three days, so that’s that!” She cheerfully pulls the crust of her second piece of pizza apart and stuffs half into her face with a smile.

After a gulp, she raises her eyes back to meet mine and says, “are you sure you haven’t felt anything?”

I shake my head. “Not like that. Nothing like that.”

She shrugs, “well, there is still time! My mom said she first heard from her wolf like, five hours before the full moon. They had to shoehorn her into the ceremony!”

I laugh. I’ve heard the story. Rosa’s mother always jokes about it. They scribbled her name at the bottom of the notes for the Alpha, and he misread it and called forward her 10 year old sister. Shockingly, Rosa’s then prepubescent aunt did not shift. The Alpha called her forward and gave her the ceremonial robe just before the time for the shift. First shifts always happen at midnight, exactly, and for about two hours beforehand most packs do a ceremony. The ceremony does differ between packs, but it usually involves being given a large ceremonial robe. The purpose is largely to give new wolves an understanding of how large their wolves are, because they can see how loose or tight it is after they’ve shifted as compared to before. Some wolves even burst the seams on the robes. One of our Omegas is dedicated specifically to gathering and repairing the robes after any shift. He also usually customizes them for each wolf before their shift. He sews little patches or symbols onto the robes. It’s very cute.

“Yeah, maybe. You’re older than me though, this is my first full moon since my birthday.”

“Only by like three months! It isn’t even that uncommon to shift on the first moon after a birthday.”

“It’s a little unusual for a wolf to have their first shift in the full moon immediately following their 17th birthday,” I point out.

“A little unusual, sure, but not that much.”

“And, for both of us to shift in the same moon? I don’t know. Don’t get your hopes up, that’s all.”

“My hopes are up!” She’s finished her pizza and has started sneaking chicken off my salad.

“The average age of a first shift is 18! I just don’t think it’s likely we will both shift this week.”

She shrugs, “we will see, I guess. Hey,” she stabs her fork through some lettuce, “do you want all the rest of that salad?”

“No,” I say, “I’m going to go buy a brownie.”

“Oooohh get me one!” She says, pulling my tray with the half eaten salad towards her.

“You’re a garbage disposal.”

She flashes a wolfy, toothy grin at me before bowing her head over the salad she is attacking with gusto.

“Hey,” she says as I’m just about to walk off, “let’s put money on it. $20 you shift this week, you up for it?”

I roll my eyes. “Yeah, why not. I’ll take your money,” I say over my shoulder as I walk toward the cash register.