After Martha's distressing text, Shelby left the diner. Only Toni Shalifoe would run away right before a frickin blizzard was about to start. Shelby tried to squash the guilty feeling in her stomach. It wasn't her fault. Not this time, anyway. And she couldn't help that Toni was such a hothead. So really, there was no reason for her to feel guilty. She was just going to make sure the idiot didn't get herself killed. Shelby might not exactly get along with Toni, but that didn't mean she couldn't be worried about her.
Once she was in the cover of the trees behind the diner, she made sure no one was around before undressing, neatly folding her clothes as she hid them beneath a bush.
Shelby closed her eyes and began to shift. She had to concentrate on releasing the ever present, tingling feeling locked in her chest. Heat rippled through her body, starting in her heart, pouring through her veins and ending in her extremities. She felt her bones breaking and reforming, though the heat drowned out most of the pain.
The shift still unsettled her. Shelby hadn't gone through it that often, especially by will. She could count the amount of times she'd shifted on purpose on one hand. The only times the shift happened without her consent was during the full moon.
It still felt very strange, letting that foreign heat loose in her body, allowing it to transform every cell on its path. When her spine changed, she fell on all fours. As the shift came to an end, the heat settled down to a tingling in the background, slowly fading away completely. She opened her eyes and began her search.
It didn't take long for her to find Toni's trail. The storm made it harder for Shelby to catch her scent, but she managed.
Toni was lucky Shelby found her when she did. If she'd been any later Toni would have lost at least few fingers and toes to frostbite, if not her life. It was already a bit of a challenge to get her warmed up, with the blizzard in full force and Toni's clothes at first isolating her from Shelby's body heat.
Toni was curled up on her side with her back against the rock overhang, poorly shielded from the storm. Shelby had curled herself around her, effectively shielding her from the snow and the boisterous wind.
As the storm raged, Toni almost woke up a few times, moaning some unintelligible words, burying her face in Shelby's fur.
By the time Toni woke up, the storm had mostly subsided.
It was too late to leave before being seen. Besides, she wasn't sure Toni could make her way back on her own.
She carefully watched Toni's reaction to her. She didn't really know what to expect. She'd never come across another person as a wolf who didn't already know what she was and that she wasn't going to hurt them. And it was Toni Shalifoe after all. The girl was as unpredictable as they come.
When Toni just stiffly kept looking at her, Shelby got impatient. She was already quite late. Her parents were not going to be happy with her.
She needed to do something to get Toni out of her stupor without scaring her, so she did the last thing she thought she'd ever do to Toni Shalifoe. She (begrudgingly) licked her face.
Well, that got a reaction.
Toni scrunched up her face. "Ew."
Shelby's shoulders shook with laughter, surprising herself. That's another thing she'd never thought she'd do near Toni. They didn't exactly get along.
"Ha ha, very funny."
It really was.
Shelby got up. They both really needed to get home.
After she stood up, Shelby noticed Toni attempting to subtly look at her behind...
What the heck?!
She growled shortly, not wanting to scare her.
Oh Lord. Had Toni truly never heard of fricking manners? She knew that Toni thought she was just a regular wolf, but still.
Shelby really hoped that Toni didn't have some kind of wolf fetish.
She walked a few feet away, then looked back, waiting for Toni to follow. As Toni caught on to her intentions, Shelby led her to where she knew Martha lived. She didn't know where Toni lived, but she'd been to Martha's a few times to work on a group assignment for Geography. They'd quickly become friends. Martha had been kind enough to approach her at the beginning of the school year since she was new here.
Martha's backyard also bordered the forest which meant she could make sure Toni made it inside. So that's where Shelby brought her. She still couldn't quite grasp how Martha, such a kind and caring person, could put up with an arrogant hothead like Toni. Though it was clear how much they cared about each other to anyone who'd ever seen them together.
She watched as Toni made her way up to the house, waiting until she was sure that Toni could get inside.
The moment she heard the door unlock, Shelby turned and took off.
She went to retrieve her clothes where she'd left them, now covered with snow, the bush having done little to shield them from the storm. She took them in her mouth and raced home.
Shelby shifted and quickly put her clothes back on before entering through the backdoor. She quietly made her way to the stairs, hoping her parents had already gone to sleep so their interrogation could wait till morning.
"Where do you think you're going? You've got some explainin' to do."
Crap.
Her parents stood up from the couch in the living room. They'd clearly waited up for her.
"Where in God's name were you?"
Shelby struggled to come up with a plausible excuse.
"I wasn't tired yet after getting somethin' to eat with Andrew, so I went on a run." It wasn't entirely a lie.
Dave and JoBeth spook simultaneously.
"In a frickin' blizzard?"
"Your father and I were worried sick."
"Not as a human." Shelby tried, but it sounded more like a question, so she added "Honestly, I barely noticed the cold." Which was true.
"Christ. You know I don't approve of these... outings." Dave said, still squeamish around the if-we-don't-say-it-out-loud-maybe-it'll-go-away topic.
"Honey, she has to get rid of the extra energy somehow." JoBeth tried to soothe her husband. "I don't see the harm if she's only runnin' around in the woods for a bit."
Dave sighed, resigned. "Fine. I suppose you're right."
"Thank you, daddy." Well, that was easy. Too easy.
"But you can't be seen. If I hear about someone spotting a white wolf with blue eyes, you're done. I don't care how much excess energy you have. We've already had to move once." The 'because of you' was silent, but unmistakably implied.
"Of course." Shelby forced a smile.
"Now hurry up to bed, it's still a school night." Her mom mercifully put an end to the conversation.
Shelby bid her parents goodnight and climbed the stairs. Once she was out of earshot she let out a relieved sigh. They had let it slide much easier than she'd expected.
Once she was in her room, Shelby got ready for bed. She took a shower to get rid of the small amount of dirt stuck to her skin. While standing under the hot water she let her mind process what had happened tonight. She was glad Toni hadn't run away when she'd seen her, that would have tremendously complicated getting her home unscathed. She really hoped Toni wouldn't tell anyone about the encounter. Or at least no one except Martha. Shelby doubted Toni would keep something like that from her, with Martha being the animal lover she was. Though people would most likely brush it off as a hallucination, her dad would somehow most definitely hear of it. The last two years, fate had been having a way of screwing her over.
Shelby got out of the shower, pointedly avoiding her reflection in the bathroom mirror until she'd put on her pajamas.
She quickly went through the rest of her nightly routine, hoping to still get a few hours of sleep. When she finally got into bed and checked her phone, it was 3:52 AM.
She had two unread messages. The first one was from Andrew, which she ignored, he'd be asleep now anyway. The other one was from Martha, telling her that Toni was back and mostly okay (she'd narrowly avoided 1st degree frostbite and had just a mild case of hypothermia). It could have been so much worse, Shelby thought, now sure that it hadn't been a mistake to go look for Toni and put herself at risk for exposure.
She put her phone on her bedside table. She would reply in the morning. There was no need for Martha to question why she was still up so late. Not that Shelby thought that Martha would ever think that she was...well, what she was. But that didn't mean she couldn't be careful.
She closed her eyes and waited for sleep to come.
***
The next morning Shelby wasn't as tired as she would have been a year and a half ago.
She sent a quick reply to Martha, telling her that she was glad Toni got home safe, and made to get ready for school. She had decided to forgo her morning (human) run this once, in exchange for an hour more of sleep which had resulted in her sleeping through her alarm and meant that she was gonna be late to Geography if she didn't leave for school right now.
She made it to class just as the bell sounded. She quickly took her seat next to Martha, who looked at her with a worried expression.
"Good Morning!" Shelby said cheerfully as always, glad that she'd made it in time.
"Hey!" Martha still gave her that look. "Are you alright?"
"Yes, why?" She probably looked a little dishevelled. She'd put on the least amount of makeup and had quickly put her hair up in a messy bun before rushing out the door.
"You're usually always early to class. Did something happen?"
"Yeah, I slept through my alarm."
Martha looked like she wanted to ask more.
"How's Toni?" Shelby tried to change the subject. Martha didn't need to know why she was up so late.
"She's alright. My mom wanted her to see a doctor to make sure, but of course Toni declined."
The teacher silenced the class, drawing everyone's attention so he could start.
At the end of first period, Shelby got another message from Andrew. Only now did she realize that she'd completely forgotten about the other one. In the first one he'd asked why she'd basically stormed out of the diner and if she was okay, which made her roll her eyes. The second one stated that he had an extra football practice so she wouldn't be able to sit with him and his friends, most of whom were also on the football team, at lunch. She didn't particularly like sitting with them, especially without Andrew, but it was better than sitting alone. They were kind of entitled and maybe a little obnoxious, but they were Christian which meant that her father approved of them.
"Everything okay?"
Shelby looked up at Martha and immediately put up her smile.
"Yes! It's just Andrew. He has to skip lunch because he has an extra football practice. They have a big game tonight."
"Oh. You can sit with us if you want." Martha put one of the straps of her bag over her shoulder.
"Really? Are you sure?" Toni was most definitely not going to like this, but Shelby would rather sit with her than alone. It was just one lunch. They could be civil for one lunch.
"Yeah, it's no problem." Martha actually looked delighted that she would be joining them.
Shelby smiled brightly at her. "Thanks! That's real kind of you."
"Great! Then I'll see you at lunch!" Martha waved as they parted to go to their second period.