Chapter Song: The Wind - Cat Stevens
XX
It shouldn't have been Amy who had to make that call. I don't care how distraught Cam's dad is, but he should have been the one to pick up the phone and tell Cam to come home. He told him to never bother coming back, so he should be the one to eat his words. And after refusing to let Amy and Alina so much as text their big brother, it seems particularly cruel that they would only be allowed to speak with him to let him know his mom was on her deathbed.
But I don't say these things to Cam, because I think he already feels them himself. And there's something about his face right now that frightens me, the way his eyes are shifting about the room as he sits on the edge of our bed, his head in his hands.
"What if he made her lie?" His voice is quiet, barely even Cam's voice. I don't know what to do when Cam isn't himself. I'm not used to being the one to keep him strong. He's always been my rock, not the other way around.
"Why would he do that?"
"Maybe they have something planned to keep me there. An intervention or something, or maybe...maybe it's some kind of trap."
"You really think they'd force you to stay?"
"It's been done before."
"But not for something like this...only when someone posed a threat to the pack."
"What if I'm a threat?"
"Cam...what are you talking about?"
"I don't know. I don't know, Layla. What if we were wrong, and we really are dooming the people around us by choosing each other?"
There isn't anything to say in response. I think of Mira's broken leg, of Cam's dying mother. Maybe I hated her a little when she and his dad chose to cut him off entirely. But before the solstice, before everything went wrong, she had been a mother to me after I'd lost my own. "There's no curse, Cam. And I don't think this is a trap, either. I think we need to go back and say goodbye."
"You'll go with me?"
"Of course." I sit beside him on the bed and slip my fingers through his. "Bad things just happen, sometimes," I whisper. "This isn't your fault—I need you to believe that." There was no talk of curses when my mother died, and still, I think each of us—my dad, Tasha, and me—all found a way to blame ourselves for what had happened. She knew there was something wrong with her long before she went to the doctor, and we had reassured her, tried to take her mind off of it. Maybe it wouldn't have mattered if she had seen someone a month earlier, but it doesn't matter now. And never once would she ever dream of blaming us, or herself, or the gods.
"In the morning, then."
"As soon as we're up."
"Layla," he says softly. "Can I admit something to you?"
"Of course." We lie back on the bed, feet still touching the floor. "What is it?"
"I don't really want to see her."
"You don't?"
"No. I don't...I don't want to see her sick. I'm not ready to comfort anyone." His voice breaks and he clears his throat, eyes staring up at the ceiling without really looking. "I don't want to lose my mom."
I don't say anything for awhile, but absentmindedly roll a button of his shirt through my fingers. His breathing is slow, tired, after a long day, but I can feel the tension in his chest. "It's easy right now, to feel like it isn't real. Or that somehow, by not acknowledging it, you'll be able to make it go away." I kiss his shoulder, and he finally looks at me. He seems so young in this moment, face so easily broken, eyes glistening. "When my mom died...even after she died, sometimes I thought, if I just believed hard enough, I would wake up the next day and she would be there, alive and well, like she'd never been sick." He doesn't say anything, and I don't know how to hold the pressure of that gaze. "But those moments we spent with her when she was dying...those are some of my most precious moments. I think they were for her, too."
Cam lets out a ragged breath, and I wrap my arm around him and hold him close to me. "Thanks for coming with me."
"I'm sorry, Cam. I'm sorry it hurts so much."
He only nods and squeezes his eyes shut, and I wonder for moment if he's going to cry. I've only ever seen him cry once before, when he was much younger, and for some reason it shakes me to see him so near tears now. Letting go of me, Cam rolls over to turn out the light, and then I feel his arms around me again, pulling me almost too tightly to him as the silence of our apartment is gently filled with the patter of heavy raindrops against the windows.
In the morning, it isn't the thunder rattling the dishes in the cupboards that wakes me up, but the steady drip of water in my face. I gently shake Cam awake and we pull the mattress away from where the ceiling has begun to leak above our heads. I place a metal pot below the dropping water, but judging by the torrent outside, it won't take long to fill. Cam is staring out the window with a dark look, and he stumbles back when something solid slams into the glass, leaving blood and cracks behind.
"It's a bird," he murmurs, and I know what he's thinking in this moment, that we have been cursed by the gods, and that curse is killing his mother. Maybe it's even caused this very storm that killed the bird. I watch him staring at the speck of blood on the glass, and I gently take his arm and lead him away from the window before a branch or any other debris sends shards of glass into his face. The wind is howling, and even far away from the window I can see how the water is folding itself down the street, bubbling over street curbs to flood basements and wash out gardens. Our power is out, but my phone is mostly charged, and there's a text from Jeana telling me that the cafe is closed until the storm passes. She reminds me that I have a key if I feel safer downstairs than up here.
Cam pulls on a pair of jeans and tucks a crisp shirt into them, and then he's looping a belt around his hips as I watch, unable to say anything for a long moment.
"Cam..."
He sets a bag on the bed and tucks a change of clothes and some toiletries inside, and then he's reaching for his jacket, never once looking at me.
"Cam, you're not going out there."
"I have to see her, Layla."
"If you try to drive right now you will die."
"If there's no curse, I should be fine."
"Hey," I catch his arm and force him to meet my eyes, but his gaze is still distant, shifting. I don't know how to handle him when he is so far away from himself, and I don't know what to say to bring him back. "This isn't about a curse. It's a bad storm and the streets are flooded. You're going to wash off the highway into Lake Superior if you leave town." He closes his eyes and I gently squeeze his arms, fighting for something to say that will bring him back to me. "I need you with me, Cam. Your mom is going to hang in there so she can see you, okay? If you die on your way there you'll never get to say goodbye."
He looks at me quickly and then nods, running a hand over his face. "I'm sorry, Layla."
"You don't need to apologize. Just...don't do anything rash, okay?"
"I know, I'm sorry."
Some part of me worries that he'll rush for the door when I turn my back, but he seems to be himself again, shedding his jacket and going to the cupboard to fish out some dry cereal. We play cards on the floor to pass the time as the storm continues to thrash against the earth, and we take turns getting up to empty the pot below the leak. By the end of the day, we've added two more dishes in different places around the apartment, and the ping of water hitting metal joins the rush of water against our windows.
By nightfall, the rain is letting up, and we finally have power again, though any meat in our fridge has been at room temperature for too long to keep. The forecast is clear for days now—apparently the storm really was some freak cell. Cam agrees to try to leave in the morning, and his calm is reassuring to me. I've become accustomed to the part of him that always knows what to do next, that always has the answer. I don't know how to give him answers when he doesn't have any.
"The bridge is washed out," Cam says, frowning down at his phone as we sit on the floor and share a cold meal. The microwave didn't recover from the power outage. "Any back roads are going to be impassable after all of that rain."
"I'm sorry, Cam, I really am."
He runs a hand over his face and smiles softly at me, his eyes warm and sad and loving all at once. The smile falls away and he pales when his phone rings, and his eyes are locked on me as he stands motionless.
"Do you want me to answer it?"
"No." But he doesn't move to accept the call. Finally, after several long rings, he brings it slowly to his ear and clears his throat. "Hey, dad."
XX
Listen I'm in on the secret –– most of us read werewolf books for those tall dark and dangerous characters. But like...I really love Cam. He's just a sweetheart. What's your temperature reading on him? Hot? Lukewarm? Cold?