Werewolf Boy and Strawberry Girl

Chapter 1: Wolf Boy

            It was one of the darkest nights in the small town of Westport Washington. You could hear the loud, reiterating crashes of the ocean waves every time they connected with the cold, wet sand. The salty air blew past my head, whipping my long brown hair all around my face, invading my line of sight. Not that I could see very well in the first place, it was much too dark. Sometimes it would feel as if the strong gusts of wind could take all my troubles with it, scattering them, never to be seen again.

I felt the mixture of the bubbly foam and freezing salt water rise up the length of my calf and then retreat back, like it was trying to cling to me but kept failing. I didn't focus on the ungodly temperature of the water as my mind drifted elsewhere, like leaves in the wind on a brisk, autumn morning. I loved it out here; the calm aura that the ocean provided was perfectplace for me to relax and not worry about anything.

If you walked just down the road from where I am now, then you would come upon a cute white house with blue shutters on the windows and a wraparound porch. A wooden swing hangs from the beams covering the porch to the right of the front door. The house even has a cute white picket fence that reaches your hips. The grass is always green in the front yard and it is rare if you ever see one of the flower beds housing weeds. Those same beds always hold a wide variety of daisies, petunias, pansies, roses, and tiger lilies that give color to the white walled backsplash of the house.

Nevertheless there is one thing that no one ever notices about the cute little house on the street corner, whether people just don't see it or they try to ignore it. Those nice, clean cut, blue shutters, that seem like they are there to add color to a plain old white house, are always shut. Not once has anyone seen the inside of that house. I overheard some old woman who lives in the pea-green house right across the road claim she heard a girls screams in the middle of the night. No one knows what is in that house; you are lucky to get a glimpse of anyone living in there.

Unless you are me. Yes, that little angel-white house is mine.

Don't ask me what goes on in that place because I wouldn't tell you. I try hard enough to make sure my life is normal and that means ignoring the fact that everyone thinks there is something strange about my family. I don't know where my neighbors get all these crazy ideas of what's inside my house, but to be completely honest, it's really none of their business.

My eyes are still closed when I hear the slightest out-of-the-ordinary sound; click, snap! It would have been hard to hear over the pounding of the ocean if it weren't for me having a heightened alertness. Whipping my head around to face the noise, I instead come face to face with nothing but darkness. I scour the rest of the beach wanting to believe that what I heard was real and that I didn't imagine it. It was a useless search though, it was nearly one o' clock in the morning and nothing was visible to the naked eye. I decided it was time to go back home before I passed out right here in the water.

The water splashed around me as I turned and the sand stuck to the bottoms of my feet in a silent plea to not leave. But it was time to go, I was getting an icy feeling down my back making me feel as if someone was watching me, and I know for a fact that it wasn't the cold water giving me that feeling.

As I slipped on my sandals I took in one more refreshing breath of salty air and then I was on my way, down the narrow dirt road all the way to the white picket fence entry. Though the icy feeling that slithered down my back never ceased, I tried hard to ignore it.

Passing the flowerbeds that were now covered in shadows instead of bright color, I climbed the steps to the wraparound porch but stilled with my hand over the knob of the door. Something in the air did not feel right. I didn't know how I knew but something was unquestionably off. This was not the normal feeling I would get when I was near the house, normally I would feel a sense of tranquility or a burst of excitement. Slowly I took my hand away from the knob and turned around to face the front lawn and the dirt road behind it.