Valentina jumped in the air stifling a shriek, as lightning flashed blinding her for a moment. When she blinked those golden eyes were a lot closer to her; right in her face as a matter of fact. With that flash, she saw a lot more than she needed to know. This was no person, but there was no way this was an animal either. Its eyes were above her head, and no animal would be this big, or as quick as this one.
Would more of these animals appear if she ran, she thought with panic. Adrenaline flooded her body warming her for the moment and making her tense. She couldn't outrun this thing, but she still looked off to her side to see which way she could run. Her heart pounded when she didn't see a viable escape route.
Moving one foot she yelped when the creature walked closer to her standing less than an inch away from her face. She could make out the flecks of brown in its golden eye and saw something deep within them. From its calmness, and the way it studied her face she would almost think the animal was intelligent. If she moved out her hand she would be able to stroke its dark hair, that's how close it was, and she could even feel its warm breath on her face.
Valentina didn't know what she could do, the creature wasn't letting her move but then again it wasn't making any move to attack her either. It only continued staring at her unblinking. Could she really touch it if she wanted? She had a dog at home, so she wasn't scared of animals, but this was nothing like a pet dog.
'This is a dumb idea' she thought to herself.
Slowly she began reaching her hand towards the animals feeling compelled to touch it. Would it be as soft as it looked? Did it want her to touch it? The rain continued pelting them, but it felt like its eyes were drawing her into another space where nothing else mattered. For a moment she forgot her fear. The sudden desire to be closer to this animal was beginning to overtake her mind especially as her hand neared its head.
The whole time the animal only watched her with those large eyes. She imagined it almost asking for her touch. It didn't cross her mind how she knew he'd be soft or how she even knew the creature was a 'he' to begin with. As her finger just barely grazed the animal multiples things simultaneously happened.
She felt something shock her causing her to pull her hand back, just as thunder and lightning sounded. When the light cleared the animal's eyes were narrowed into slits, and it was growling. It was a deep menacing sound that sent her stumbling backward, heart wildly beating. It bared fangs the size of her hand alone dipping its head.
Had her touch angered the animal into finally attacking her? She kept moving backward in the rain slipping in her converses as the creature continued growling in her direction. It was then she knew she was prepared to run no matter what happened.
"Get out of the way!" a voice yelled behind her making her turn quickly.
Not too far away Valentina could just barely make him out, but it was a figure. And he held something that glinted in the moonlight in his hands.
"Move before I shoot" he warned voice annoyed and Valentina scrambled out of the way of his weapon as he stayed focused on the animal.
He walked forward towards Valentina, but she continued backing up quickly and shook her head. She needed to get out of here but as she backed up she remembered the animal to her back growling and stopped. In the time she stopped the man reached her grabbing her arm forcefully.
"I have business with you girl" he hissed.
Behind them, the growls grew louder but Valentina focused on trying to push the man's arms off her. He was the same man from inside the shop, she could see the silver scar in the moonlight.
"Let me go!" she yelled kicking out her knee to ram it between his legs.
He released her, and she turned to run just as the animal moved in a blur in his direction. Out the corner of her eyes, Valentina saw it lunge for the man and a loud shot go off blending in with another crash of thunder. Covering her mouth to prevent a scream she saw the animal standing above the man claws raking down the front of his shirt shredding his skin underneath. its powerful jaws clamped over the man's shoulder.
The man tried his best to fight the thing off, but the animal wasn't letting go and Valentina ignored his screams as best she could aware the animal was growling behind her again. She bolted for her car pulling out her keys and unlocked the door. While guilt squeezed her chest, she didn't plan on being the animals next prey.
Grabbing her phone from between her seats she immediately thought to call 911 so that they could get animal control and maybe save the man being attacked. She looked back to where they both had been seeing the giant creature had gone, but the man was still lying on the ground in the rain.
"911 what's your emergency?" the operator asked.
With shaking hands Valentina shifted gears backing out of the lot and replied in an equally shaky voice, "Hello? Yeah, I wanted to report an animal attack on 7654 Southwest 9th Ave. Something, like a wolf, attacked a guy just now; please hurry" she said quickly then hung up not wanting further questions.
She didn't want to get questioned but she didn't want to leave the man to bleed out either. During the drive home, she could only hear her own ragged choppy breaths as she drove white-knuckles squeezing the wheel. A huge animal, possibly a wolf just attacked a man, and who's to say she wasn't going to be next? But when she considered its eyes it didn't attack her...could she trust that it meant her no harm?
Valentina snapped out of her trance when she heard a car honk in front of her. The horn caused her to jerk the wheel out of the way to avoid a collision since she had drifted into the wrong lane. Pulling over she gasped in her seat trying to get ahold of herself. She squeezed her eyes shut aware she was having a panic attack but could do nothing to stop it.
"You're okay, you're alive" she chanted to herself in the dark car forcing herself to breath slower and it eventually helped.
"Yeah, you're not dead, that guys already...hopefully not dead. Whatever that was is gone. Everything will be okay" she continued rambling on to herself as she drove back onto the road.
With regained composure, she began driving home again and pulled into her driveway. She ran out of her car into the house to get out the rain and grateful she closed the door behind her. Leaning against the frame and looking into the darkness she hoped everything that happened had been a dream.
Was that man dead now? He had tried to save her, and she left him there. She thought to herself feeling disgusted. She was a coward for leaving him there, she could've done more for him but what? Stay there and get killed too?
Valentina blinked with a start when she heard someone come out the hallway mumbling in Spanish under their breath. Her mom looked at Valentina's arms crossed and annoyed until she saw her daughter dripping wet on the carpet shivering.
"Valentina mi carina, why are you getting home so late? And you're soaking wet? And shivering!" she heard her mother rattle off growing more and more surprised by the moment.
Was she shaking? She hadn't even realized it Valentina thought to herself and her mother felt her checking for injuries.
"M-nothing happened Mamí," she said trying to reassure her mother, but her stutter gave her away.
"Where have you been and what happened?" her mother demanded with narrowed brown eyes, the same eyes Valentina inherited.
"I was at work closing up and..." she began but chocked up at the end as events replayed themselves through her mind.
She wanted to tell her mother what had happened, but the words wouldn't come out. She wanted to know if she did the right thing in that situation, but she didn't even know if her mother would believe her. Who would if you told them a giant wolf-like creature bigger than grown man watched you for minutes then attacked some man about to kill them.
Valentina already had a lot to worry about and something that could've been a combination of the storm and paranoia could've warped things in her mind. Her mom still looked at her worried then pulled her close stroking her daughter's hair. Confused Valentina hadn't realized she'd been crying as she thought.
"You don't have to tell me now, but you will tell your father and me tomorrow," her mother said moving them both into Valentina's room and onto her bed.
For a moment Valentina enjoyed embracing her mother like this. She and her mom weren't distant, but they weren't super close as family goes. She was always locked up in her office with their father having hushed conversations or with men they claimed they worked with.
After a few more minutes her mother pulled away looking Valentina in the eyes stern.
"Now hurry and shower hija before you catch a chill. You're staying home from school tomorrow" she mother said but Valentina shook her head.
"I have 4 classes tomorrow I can't miss, I'm sure I'll be fine," she told her mother who didn't buy it.
Her mother must've been getting ready for bed, by her button up nightshirt and black pajama pants, and her dark curly hair French braided. Her face was bare of any makeup and her mother had taken out her contacts. Valentina couldn't help feeling like she was already burdening her mother, so she continued with what she had wanted to say.
"I don't approve of this, but I can't force you to stay home, I expect an explanation tomorrow," her mother said accent strong in her irritation.
Valentina busied herself getting ready for bed while her mother kissed her cheek leaving. She tried her best to close her eyes and sleep but every time she did that event replayed behind her eyelids. She knew she wasn't going to be getting any sleep tonight and try as she might she was not going to forget what happened.
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